Weather, politics, animals

The weather just goes on being strange. Today our low temperature is what would normally be our high temperature in early March, and the high yesterday afternoon would have been appropriate for a nice day in May. The weekend will be nice and spring-like, with a change in the weather coming on Monday, when the usual cold March rains will get started.

The French presidential campaign is in high gear now. Incumbent president Nicolas Sarkozy is campaigning full-time, and he's omnipresent on television and radio interview programs as well as on news broadcasts. Socialist candidate François Hollande has been campaigning hard for a month or more now. Extreme-right candidate Marine Le Pen says she now has a good chance of gathering all the 500 endorsements she will need to get her name on the April ballot in late May.

Sarkozy, as usual, appears to be bogged down in details that don't seem very presidential. Right now, he's offering teachers, for example, a plan under which they would accept an increase in the number of hours (+44%) when they are on duty in the schools in exchange for a higher salary (+25%). Interviewers keep pointing out to him that his administration has eliminated thousands of teaching jobs over the past five years. Why not hire some of those teachers back if there are now not enough teachers to take care of all the students? Oh well...

Our neighbor the mayor asked me and Walt for some photos that she might use on the village web site. We supplied some earlier this week. She especially requested photos of local sunsets, and we have plenty of those. I'll be interested to see if she really decides to use any of them.

If you look closely at the top of the cat's head, you can see
the reflection of Callie's scratched nose in the glass. Bert
seems to be examining the scratch with great concern.

With Bertie and Callie, it's status quo. Bertie got used to coming into the house when the weather was so cold a few weeks ago. We were able to close off the living room/kitchen area — there are doors — and also put up a barrier that kept Callie upstairs. The dog couldn't see the cat so she didn't get excited, and the cat felt secure and would settle down and sleep either in front of the fireplace or next to a radiator.

Bert looking past his canine friend to see
if the humans are paying any attention...

We'd rather that Bertie remain a basically outdoor cat, so we don't overly encourage his visits. He sleeps on top of a tall piece of furniture in the garage, where it's relatively safe and fairly warm, despite the fact that we leave a garage window open all the time for his comings and goings. We've made him a comfortable bed up there with a thick blanket and a towel or two. We actually bought him a little bed last week, but he hasn't shown any inclination to start sleeping in it so far. Maybe if the weather were colder he'd use it, but he doesn't need it now.

Bert's new bed should keep a cat pretty warm —
if he ever decides to sleep in it.

Yesterday Bert came up to the French doors that separate the living room from the terrace and meowed some, letting us know he wanted to come in. Callie heard the meowing and of course got excited. The two animals gazed at each other through the glass for a few minutes, sitting quietly. Finally Bert gave up hope and went back downstairs to eat some kibble. I went down and played with him for a few minutes, without Callie.