Things that don’t work well together, part 379: Cowboy hats (or any wide-brimmed hat, really) and crossbody bags (unless you intend to never remove your bag for the entire time you have your hat on). Ask me how I know this, right now.

I work at the convention and visitors bureau for Cleveland.

Since the election, about once every 1-3 weeks I answer a phone call from a woman who says, “Bernie Moreno sucks, and I will never visit Cleveland as long as he’s in office.”🧵

Current reading. Only 7 pages in, I can tell this is going to be an absolute wonder and delight. The world works in bizarre ways. It’s a special kind of poetic justice that Christian Cooper has this platform and the career of his dreams. He should have had them without the Central Park incident.

This is my mustachioed kitty, Frida.

This is Victoria, who was so tuckered out by the good time she was having on Kelley’s Island, that she couldn’t be bothered to stand up to eat her breakfast.

He deserves the Joe Buck treatment everywhere he goes, except that it’s a shameful waste of pizza.

No one. Absolutely no one:

The United States of America: You are here ➡️

Things I have in common with my dog:

1. Big, brown eyes.

2. Adorkable.

3. Easily bribed with cheese.

Randomly decided to re-attempt to learn hand embroidery tonight. Maybe because stabbing things in a crafty way is better than stabbing people? This is unfinished, and I was using the wrong needle, but nonetheless, I will persist. I’m going to make the swallow’s little banner read “F*ck Off.” 🪡

Still going strong and ruling our home with velvet (dagger-laden) paws.

12 years ago, this trio of fuzzballs showed up on the next-door neighbor’s garage roof while I was at work. My husband texted me this picture. I got another neighbor to adopt the center black & white girl. I let left b/w (Pepper) and right gray/w (Frida) into our house, and that was that.

1. Your dog digs a hole in the middle of a brand-new quilt.
2. You cut the intact parts of the quilt into five pieces.
3. You sew up the raw edges with random bias binding from
the dead lady’s notion stash that came with your machine.
4. You donate the blankets to the dog shelter.

Everyone wins!

I’m a nerd trying to get my steps in, so I’m using an app called Fantasy Hike. It syncs with my Apple Fitness app and matches my step count with a journey that closely resembles Frodo’s trek from Bag End to Mount Doom.

Me, literally every time I open up my phone to look at the news.

Made what I’m calling Med-Mix tomato-lentil soup for dinner. Inspiration was equal parts Moroccan, Israeli and Sardinian - result was 💯delicious:

- mirepoix
- 🧄
- red bell 🫑
- crushed 🍅
- brown lentils
- fregola sarda
- homemade veg stock
- cumin, coriander, cayenne, paprika, turmeric, cinnamon

Cleveland will plunge into the deep freeze soon, but today was sunny and temps scraped the upper 30’s, so Brian and I hiked Cleveland Lakefront Nature Preserve. Iced-up Lake Erie and a deer herd casually browsing (sorry for the grainy photo - can you see what the gal in the middle is doing? 😂).

With apologies to Wet Leg:

On the cat tree,
On the cat tree,
On the cat tree,
You’ll find me on the cat tree.
On the cat tree,
On the cat tree,
On the cat tree,
All day long on the cat tree.

(I have complete lyrics, BTW, but need to make a video for full impact.)

Unexpected bonus of the new Sherwin-Williams HQ tower? It blocks the ugly-ass Justice Center from view at the Tremont Cleveland script sign.

Weekend sights around #cleveland. I failed to get shots, today, of the tug and barge that plied its way up the Cuyahoga, with a vortex of gulls frenzy-feeding behind as Brian and I walked the Scranton Flats trail, nor of the uncharacteristically calm and flat water on Lake Erie, though.