Kooky & Nutty: 2 Icons Share A Birthday

Shirley MacLaine: 6 Oscar nominations with a win for Terms of Endearment, 20 Golden Globe nominations with 7 wins including Best Newcomer in 1955 & the Cecil B DeMille Look Alike Award. 14 books, all best sellers. Her brother is Warren Beatty. They have never worked together, but that is something I would pay to see, especially if they would play senior citizen lovers. She talks to her dog- Terry & her dog talks back. My favorite MacLaine role – Doris (a thinly disguised Debbie Reynolds) in Post Cards From The Edge.

Barbra Streisand: 5 Oscar nominations with 2 wins, including one as a composer, 16 Golden Globe nominations with 8 wins including the Cecil B DeMille Look Alike Award. 8 Grammy Awards, & one of only a handful of performers to have an Oscar, Emmy, Tony & Grammy on their mantle, & the only artist to have a #1 Album in 5 different decades. Her son-in-law is Josh Brolin. Last year she wrote a frightening coffee table book about her questionable interior designing taste. She gave her very cute son-Jason Gould a role in the underrated Prince Of Tides.  She talks to her dog- Sammy. My favorite Streisand role- Doris in The Owl & The Pussycat.

They share a birthday today- April 24th. MacLaine turns 77 & Streisand, 69. Traditionally, they spend their birthdays together. I would like to be a fly on the wall at that party.

He Is Risen!

We Love Jesus At Post Apocalyptic Bohemia!

19th Century carved ivory Cruxifix from India, found in an Indian import store In SoHo, NYC in the late 1990s.

"Our Lord- As Is" is how the tag was marked at a junk store in the Phinney Ridge of Seattle, circa late 1980s.

In a canine memorial niche in the small hallway, Jesus looks over & protects our dead dogs in their urns: Baby (1985-1999), Sister (1990- 2006), & Butch (1994- 2007). They are joined by a mason jar of the ashes of Pearl, a close canine companion without a place to be, as her Mommy travels around the world seeking answers.

Jesus chose to be born in a stable among donkeys & cows. He chose to ride into his last week of life on a donkey. He said the foxes have their lairs & the birds their nests. He said the Father watches over the birds of the air.. the sparrows. Jesus became angry in the temple when animals were butchered.

"The lion also shall dwell with the lamb, & the leopard shall lie down with the kid; & the calf & the young lion & the fatling together; & a little child shall lead them."

Isaiah 11:6-9 (King James Version)

Close Encounters Of The Canine Kind

I woke with a start in the middle of night, feeling compelled to go to the back garden. I wasn’t completely awake or fully conscious when I found myself naked, standing among the hydrangea with little Junior by my side. I had a surprising feeling of calm & introspection. As my consciousness shifted, several lights appeared, accompanied by a strange mist. I watched as Junior levitated, seemingly passing through solid objects like the fences & trees, rising through a tunnel & into the light.

I awoke in my bed. It was still dark. I went to the back window just in time to witness & photograph Junior being returned to the back garden. He seemed very sedate for a terrier, but none the worse for the experience. 3 hours had passed, although it seemed like minutes. Like all the inhabitants of Post Apocalyptic Bohemia, Junior seemed to have enjoyed his occasion with an alien anal probe. It is difficult to ascertain if there is any damage to his little doggie brain, Junior is just a bit nutty anyway. If it was an alien abduction, I am left to wonder, when I am the highest evolved life form in residence, why they would take Junior? Is it because he can lick his own private doggie parts? Will the mystery ever be revealed?

Do You Hate It When Bloggers Post Photos Of Their Pets?

Photo by the Husband

Good News!

While reading the NY Times on line this morning, it was so nice to read some good news for a change: A strong majority of Americans now view married same-sex partners as families. Better still, most consider an unwed gay or lesbian couple with children to be a family, too. There's also an increasing willingness to see homosexuality as a natural, innate trait, & most people know or have family member who is gay, quotes the report in the NY Times. This good news is from a survey included in the new book out next week- Counted Out: Same-Sex Relations & Americans' Definitions of Family.

I was so excited for this bit of good news instead of gloom news. Until I read the details & found this little tid-bit: "There's a solid core resisting this trend who are more willing to include pets in their definition than same-sex partners." It's a solid core of 30 percent. In an interview lead researcher Brian Powell was understated in his assessment of this stat, "The sheer idea that gay couples are given less status than pets should give us pause". I will have to inform my terriers.

What makes a family?

Born On This Day- September 10th... Rin Tin Tin

Born on a battlefield in World War I, Rin Tin Tin went on to be an American movie star & icon. Rin Tin Tin is credited with saving Warner Brothers from bankruptcy in the 1920s. He received 2,000 fan letters a week, that’s 286 a week in dog years. He remained a huge star until the talkies did him in.

Born on a battlefield in World War I, Rin Tin Tin went on to be an American movie star & icon. 2 months before the war would end, an American soldier- Corporal Lee Duncan discovered a bombed out German war dog station while on a scouting mission. Inside he found a shell shocked mother German Shepherd & her 5 puppies.


Not wanting to leave them helpless, Duncan brought them back to his base where he took care of them. When he returned home to California, Duncan brought Rin Tin Tin with him. Rin Tin Tin was named after small dolls French soldiers carried for good luck.


Duncan settled into his home in L.A. & he became interested in the new movie industry. Knowing his dog was special, he made the rounds of the studios, but they showed little interest in a canine movie star.


Finally he got his big break when he came upon a crew shooting a scene with a wolf. Rin Tin Tin was able to perform a feat in 1 take that had frustrated the crew trying to work the scene with a real wolf.

In 1922, Rin Tin Tin ( his friends called him "Rinty") , made his debut in a low budget western called The Man from Hell's River. He did all his own on screen stunts.

Rinty’s charisma, good looks, fearless ability & acting talent attracted the attention of the struggling Warner Brothers studio. Together they made 24 films that helped establish the new studio & made Rin Tin Tin a household name, & a magazine cover boy.

At the height of his celebrity, Rinty earned a salary of $1000 a week, had his own production unit, a chauffeur driven limousine, a personal chef & a diamond studded collar. Not much is known about his personal life, but Rinty was spotted at several underground gay spots around Hollywood. Although he was quite a stud, siring 48 pups, including a favorite named Junior, Rin Tin Tin was known to hump male stunt dogs & was very probably bisexual.

In 1930 in an ungrateful gesture, Warner Brothers released Rinty. He was forced to work low budget serials. He admitted to a Milk- Bone addiction & went into rehab. After 40 movies, he retired in 1931.






Following Rin Tin Tin's death in 1932 in L.A. (in the arms of actress Jean Harlow, according to Hollywood legend), Duncan arranged to have the dog returned to his country of birth for burial in the Cimetière des Chiens, the famous pet cemetery in the Parisian suburb of Asnières-sur-Seine.


His son, Junior went on to appear in movies following the death of his father. Rin Tin Tin is one of 3 dogs to have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame along with Strongheart & Lassie.


As a child, I was devoted to The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin, an ABC television series that ran from 1954 to1959. It featured Rin Tin Tin IV as the star.

Golden Slumbers... Nap Time At Post Apocalyptic Bohemia

Once there was a way, to get back homeward.

Once there was a way, to get back home.

Sleep pretty darling, do not cry.

& I will sing a lullaby.

Golden Slumbers fill your eyes.

Smiles await you when you rise.

Sleep pretty darling, do not cry.

& I will sing a lullaby.

Once there was a way, to get back homeward.

Once there was a way, to get back home.

Sleep pretty darling, do not cry.

& I will sing a lullaby.

Lennon/McCartney
1969