August 2023 - Dogear Diary

Oriental Gate Quilt

made by Bits and Pieces ~ artist Haruyo Morita ~ 1,000 pieces

This beautiful puzzle was so difficult. Good quality, and a lovely funny triangular piece cut (like the Little Helpers one) but the pieces are a tad on the small side. And the detailed patterns so intricate, it really intimidated me at first. Took three or four days just to get the border of the frames done. It got easier near the end, but I swear there were some sittings I only put ten pieces in! If I ever rework this one, I think I’ll do the figures first. Odd to me that they all have the same face, but looking at the artist’s other work, every single beautiful woman in her pictures, has the same facial features. I have one other puzzle by this artist, made by a different company.

a thrift store find

Tags: puzzles

Robinson Crusoe

retold from the Daniel Defoe original

by Deanna McFadden

Okay, so I knew what I was getting into with this one, and I read it anyway. I was in my husband’s office and saw this on his shelf. Remembered that I had tried reading the original years ago, and didn’t get far. The beginning with all the details on the main character’s family background, his father’s occupation and who knows what else, really bogged me down. I had put it aside as another classic that stylistically I just cannot read. Now I thought: what the heck, it seems like a story I ought to know the basics of, so this version will give me that. It’s a very much abridged and rewritten version, aimed at elementary school kids. Personally, I found it rather dull (hence two stars) as the writing was so straightforward, but I guess that’s what you get.

Warning for SPOILERS here, as I’m going to summarize for myself all the major plot points. Lots of which took me by surprise: I thought the story was all about this young man who gets shipwrecked on an island and lives there alone for years before finally encountering a companion and getting rescued (the scene where he finds a footprint in the sand is in my head from ages ago, no idea where I first came across that). But there’s so much more before all that.

It starts with young Robinson fretting at home, because his parents want him to study and become a lawyer and he just longs for adventure- to go to sea! He finally breaks their hearts by leaving against all their warnings, and on his first voyage is immediately met with storms. That’s frightening, but it doesn’t shake his desire to travel and see the world. The next ship he embarks on goes to Africa where most of the crew succumbs to illness and fever. On a later ship, they get accosted by pirates, he’s taken prisoner, and forced to work as a slave in a foreign land until with two other slaves, he escapes when they’re supposed to be out fishing for their master (they just keep going). They get picked up by an English ship which takes them to Brazil, where Robinson (from selling the fishing boat and earning some wages) buys his own plantation and runs it for two years, with good success. But the old urge for adventure creeps up again and he can’t help finally going on board another ship. This is eight years after his initial voyage.

A good third into the book, Crusoe encounters the storm in the Carribean that strands him on the famous (to us) island. All his shipmates drown. Luckily the ship itself survives in part, driven on the reef, and after the initial shock of finding himself the only survivor, he spends a good two weeks going daily out to the wreckage and bringing back ashore all the supplies he can manage. Then works making himself a tent, and later a better shelter against a cave- though I don’t know why he had to fortify it so well, as he never mentions dangerous animals on the island? and never at this point saw another human being. He’s got just enough food from the broken ship to last him until he figures out how to grow a few crops, and locates fruit to eat, goats to hunt, etc. Teaches himself to make baskets, catches a parrot to keep as a pet, even has a dog that also survived the shipwreck.

About ten years after being alone on the island, he’s stunned to find a human footprint. Terrified, because he assumes it’s from someone who would harm him- “natives” or maybe pirates? He hides, but then doesn’t see another sign of humans for another two years. Finally now we get to the point where Crusoe meets the man he names Friday, when a group of men land on the island with two prisoners along. Crusoe startles them and frees the prisoners, and one becomes his companion- he apparently doesn’t want to leave. The time it takes for the other man to learn to speak English- at first they just communicate with gestures- is really glossed over. The two men work together, eventually building a seaworthy craft and are ready to leave the island for good. Then they encounter another ship coming to shore- this one the crew had mutinied. When Crusoe realizes what happened, he helps the captain take control again, talks most of the crew back to sense, and they sail off together. They leave behind on the island, those two men who had started the mutiny- all set up well for survival what with the shelters, supplies, tamed goats and growing crops that Crusoe had in place. I suppose they deserved the punishment, but after all Crusoe had suffered on the island (he ate well, the worst thing was solitude) it seems cruel he left others to that fate. It was twenty-eight years he had spent on the island.

From what I briefly looked up, the story of Robinson Crusoe was based roughly on the account of a man Alexander Selkirk, who was marooned on an island for four years. I have to wonder how much of the original Defoe story this rewritten one left out, there are parts in particular that I really wanted more explanation of, and lots of details are sorely lacking. But I think all the other details in the original would swamp me, based on the few pages I did get through in my previous reading attempts, and other reviews I’ve seen online. So I’m glad I read this to have a solid picture of the narrative in my head- if I ever do approach Defoe’s novel again, maybe it will be easier going.

Borrowed from a family member.

Rating: 2/5

151 pages, 2006

Tags: Classics, Current Reads, Juvenile Fic

Total Cat Mojo

the Ultimate Guide to Life With Your Cat

by Jackson Galaxy

co-authored by Mikel Delgado, phD

By the guy who does the My Cat From Hell show. Which I’ve only seen a few episodes of. It’s all about his theories on what makes cats satisfied, confident and happy, which leads to good behavior. It boils down to three basic concepts: cats retain the same instincts to stalk, hunt and eat prey as their wild ancestors, they need high places to feel safe from predators, and they are very territorial. So lack of hunting opportunities (play, for indoor cats) leads to boredom and frustration, lack of elevated perches leads to all kinds of insecurity issues, and feeling their space is threatened – whether by other cats in the household, cats seen outside through windows, new baby, new dog, new cat introduced etc- leads to other problems.

He starts with a basic and quick history on domestic cats, which clues you in to their innate wild nature. Then talks about how cats communicate, three broad cat “personality” types (shy, confident and friendly, or defensive and aggressive), the influence of food, the need for cats to feel secure, how to make you household layout more friendly to cats (this includes things like litterbox placement, and making “cat highways” out of shelves and things) how to teach your cat what behaviors are acceptable (not by using punishment) and finally, there’s several detailed chapters about solving certain problems. First, very specific steps laid out for introducing a new cat to the household. Then how to modify those steps if it’s a dog or a new baby joining the family. Why outbursts of aggression or wild energy occur (cats ambushing ankles, attacking your hand and so on) and how to dissipate them. How to draw out the shy cat so it isn’t living under the bed all the time, encourage your cat to use appropriate scratching surfaces, what to do if your cat is just being a pest (mine likes to knock things off the counter, or meow repeatedly and loudly late and night / early in the morning) and the biggie: cats that eliminate outside of the litterbox. In all things he sounds pretty sensible. Seems like many issues arise from misunderstanding the nature of cats, or expecting unrealistic behaviors from them. Some things in the book don’t really relate to me, or at least not anymore. For example, we have a one-cat household. In the past we tried to introduce a second cat, kind of using the guidelines Galaxy lays out, but not precisely. I wonder now if I’d done it his way -had never heard of the guy back then- would it have worked. Other things I’m not sure I’m on board with: I can see adding a few perches, shelves and cat tunnels to my house- but I don’t really want to fully “catify” it as he urges, with walkways all around the rooms up by the ceiling.

And there was one point that sorely disappointed me. He mentioned that you can use training to get your cat to do unpleasant things. He describes steps to getting your cat used to his carrier so every trip to the vet isn’t a battle of wills. And then states you can get your cat trained to take his pills so that you’re able to just casually walk by, “bend down as if you’re petting her to say ‘hi’ and give her a pill“. I admit my interest ticked up when page 144 mentioned using clicker training for your cat to take medication without struggling. Because mine does. I have to wrap him in a towel and gently force his mouth open. I was ready to take notes on a better method! But he never says how. Just tells you to do your own research and find a step-by-step method that works. (We’ve gotten better. My cat doesn’t run away and hide after getting his pill anymore- he now knows that I give him special treats right after, so after escaping the towel, he’ll pause and wait for that. But his pills have a very bitter taste, so I have a hard time imagining he’d ever just open his mouth and swallow them willingly).

There’s lots more to this book I will leave for the reader to discover. On the whole I found it informative. There were a few parts that lacked clear explanation- especially the section about “catifying” the house to help your pets feel more secure and at ease. The author makes up a bunch of words to refer to his ideas like catify, and he constantly calls the cat’s sense of security and confidence his “mojo” but takes this even further with phrases like “mojo-fy”, “mojo-fication” and “mojo-rific”. Sometimes the phrases he uses sound a bit New-Agey too, which started to get old.Parts of the book are a bit repetitive, probably because the author thinks people will just turn to the section they want immediate help with. But overall- a solidly helpful book.

Borrowed from a family member.

Rating: 3/5

365 pages, 2017

Tags: 3/5- Good Read, Animals Nonfiction, Current Reads

The Inner Life of Cats

the Science and Secrets of Our Mysterious Feline Companions

by Thomas McNamee

I thought at first this book was going to be nothing special- personal stories about the author’s cat, alongside historical stuff about how they came to live alongside humans, how revered they were in Egypt, how they’ve retained their wildness in form and behavior, etc. But then just when I thought this was like any other books about cats, it started to get really interesting. There’s a section about scientific studies done on how early kittens should be socialized to human contact. Another about how specifically cats aim their vocal communication at humans- not each other. There’s a description of a group in Rome that feeds and provides for feral cats- including adopting them out- and all the controversy about supporting feral colonies this way: is it really helpful? also more on the debate if cats are responsible for reducing songbird numbers. More on why cat problem behaviors arise, with strong nods to the guy who does the My Cat From Hell show, and lots about how the comfort of a cat in his environment is so important to his mental health, and state of calmness. There’s much about what makes indoor life for a cat enjoyable and satisfying (high places, play that involves the whole hunting prey sequence, not getting scared or stressed by loud noises, punishments, etc) and then a very personal in-depth consideration of dealing with an older cat’s final illness and passing on. There’s grieving, and then the joy of a new kitten in the household again. So yes this book does have a lot of what my cat did stuff- and it’s delightful to read, but there’s also so much about recent or fairly unknown studies on cats, and what we can learn from them, and how that can make the lives of cats among humans better. He’s got an interesting opinion that most cats are standoffish and seem uncaring, because they lived with people who didn’t show them much affection! Also his idea that: if most indoor pet cats are sterilized, because that’s what good pet owners do nowadays, but the shelters and rescues keep getting filled by kittens born to the feral and semi-feral cats still roaming around- which are then fixed and hopefully find new homes- are we inadvertently selecting for cats that are less people-friendly? Because unless you’re on an island, there’s always wild fertile cats out there that will wander in and fill the gaps in feral colonies. I had never quite looked at it from that viewpoint before.

Borrowed from the public library.

Rating: 4/5

278 pages, 2017

Tags: 4/5- Great Book, Animals Nonfiction, Current Reads

Trooper

the Bobcat Who Came In From the Wild

by Forrest Bryant Johnson

About a pet bobcat. The author found it injured and seemingly orphaned, on the edge of the Mojave desert where he lived. He took it to a vet and was warned that the animal probably could not be tamed, most people did not have success keeping bobcats as pets. But this one, while he wouldn’t let anyone touch him at first, was fairly calm in the presence of people, and grew to be affectionate and companionable. The vet chalked it up to individual variation and personality, the author assumed it was because he found the bobcat so young. He and his wife let the bobcat roam pretty much at will, not restricting it to being inside the house (or a cage, though he was once accused of that by a neighbor!) When the area they lived in started to get more built-up with increased housing, they decided to move further from town, to a large ranch property. There Trooper (as they named him) could roam widely in his natural habitat. The story of this bobcat living as much of the wild life as he chose to, while freely associating with people, is really absorbing. Especially reading about all the desert wildlife they viewed or had close encounters with. Jackrabbits, snakes, a large owl that once got in the house, a neighbor’s mustang horse, kit foxes, and some more exotic birds (one neighbor kept guinea hens, and a peacock wandered in from who-knows-where) among them. Everyone seemed to hate the coyotes, and there’s a vivid description of Trooper and a younger housecat who had joined them by that point, viciously fighting a coyote in the front yard! There’s plenty of close scrapes, times when the bobcat went missing, causing a lot of worry to his household, they were so fond of him by then. Interesting when other regular-sized cats showed up and wanted to join the household, how they interacted with the bobcat. And the comments of people who saw Trooper for the first time- if they seemed to not recognize his species, the author never let on it was an actual wild bobcat (with comments like “oh, he was just a stray” and “yeah, he’s pretty big!”) Of course the ending is sad because Trooper grows old and meets his end, but it’s very lovely how the author expresses the closeness he felt with the wild cat. He had many remarkable interactions with it that made him feel sure the bobcat understood human speech, and even tried to communicate specific things to them.

I think one of my favorite parts of the book, is where the author meets a gruff neighbor who complains blackly about his kids’ pet cat. Very adroitly the author praised cats, pointing out how unique and special this cat in particular must be (throwing in glowing words for the children too, that they had picked out such an amazing cat) and by the end of their conversation, the unpleasant neighbor was self-convinced that he had a very high quality out-of-the-ordinary cat he should treasure. Author marched away very pleased that he had likely turned that cat’s fate around.

Borrowed from the public library.

Rating: 3/5

231 pages, 2018

Tags: Animals Nonfiction, Current Reads

Birthday Pageant

made by Mattel ~ artist James Gurney ~ 500 pieces

A Dinotopia puzzle. I’m not an actual Dinotopia fan, but there was a large beautiful book from the series in my stepson’s room. I much admired the pictures- the artist is really good at doing children’s faces, the soft features and expressions so natural.

I did try to read the book once, the idea is fun but it was one I just couldn’t get into. Something about the writing style put me off or was just boring. This puzzle was nice to do, though! I mean, in terms of having an interesting picture and being just enough of a challenge (I didn’t look at the box much). Odd, through most of the assembly I thought this was a very simple cut, all two knobs/two holes pieces. It wasn’t until the very end that I suddenly noticed I had a piece with wings in the middle of the others.

I looked closer through the mostly-finished puzzle and yes, there were a few more pieces of other standard shapes in there. But the vast majority are just two knobs/two holes. Rather flimsy and thin, too. I liked it well enough, though. Missing three pieces, which is particularly disappointing only because one is across child’s face.

a thrift store find

Tags: puzzles

The Lost Dogs

Michael Vick's Dogs and Their Tale of Rescue and Redemption

by Jim Gorant

About the Michael Vick case: football player who was an influential part of a dogfighting operation, owning and training pit bull type dogs. When he got busted, unlike in previous similar cases, the dogs were not immediately euthanized. Usually they’re deemed too dangerous and vicious to ever live in a home setting again. This case proved it all wrong. Rescue facilities, animal sanctuaries, dog trainers and foster groups stepped to evaluate and work with these dogs, giving them a chance at a better life. Some needed serious medical treatment. Most were terrified of loud noises, the proximity of people, anything unknown. They had lived such limited lives as fighting dogs, many did not know how to walk on a leash, navigate stairs, or even play with toys.

The book begins by telling how the dogfighting operation was discovered, the state the dogs lived in, the methods that were probably used on them (brutal and uncaring to say the least), how all the pieces of the case were put together, where the dogs stayed while it was all getting figured out (some in better places than others), where they all went afterwards (varied depending on their condition and needs) and how their rehabilitation worked out. Some dogs’ stories are covered in a lot of detail, others just get a blip at the end, where there’s a section that tells what happened to each and every one of them. Fifty-one dogs were seized from the property, forty-seven of those deemed worth attempting to save. Only three ended up not making it. One had serious medical problems and was euthanized. Another died in an unfortunate accident. And only one was considered so violent and aggressive it couldn’t be handled at all. All the rest lived through their ordeal and improved with a lot of effort and patience on the part of many people. Their responses varied- ranging from timid and skittish to suspicious and guarded to outright threatening. Many were fostered out and eventually adopted into family homes. Others had to live their whole lives in a sanctuary, due to behavior issues or an inability to be safe around other dogs. But they all did far better than anyone really expected, and it set a precedent for saving other dogs from similar situations, instead of just automatically euthanizing them.

Some parts of this, of course, are hard to read due to the mistreatment and suffering of the animals. The first hundred pages in particular are rather dry and I almost didn’t continue- it starts out just all about the case, more the people involved than the dogs. I didn’t really care about what kind of coffee or beer the investigators had while conniving with each other, or who did what to further his career- but I get it, this author is more used to sports writing and the book is based on a sensational case. I suppose for readers who like reading true crime it’s compelling, but for me it was just something to get through in order to read the part I was more interested about: the dogs. Even then there were some awkward parts, some missing words in a sentence here and there (is it just me, or is this getting more common nowadays? don’t people use human proofreaders anymore?)

There is, as I expected, some overlap in here with content from Dogtown, as a good number of the dogs from this case went to that sanctuary. I recognized two of them from the descriptions of their behavior and how they were rehabilitated. But there’s enough different information that it was still interesting to read about those individuals all over again. I’m pleased to see the author wrote another book after this one, The Found Dogs, detailing where many of these same dogs are ten years later. I’ll be interested to read that one if I can find a copy.

Rating: 3/5

287 pages, 2010

Tags: 3/5- Good Read, Animals Nonfiction, Current Reads

Good Vibes again

made by Buffalo Games ~ artist Aimee Stewart ~ 1,000 pieces

So my kid was doing this puzzle. And didn’t finish. Somebody else wanted to trade me for it, so I had to finish the job to verify all the pieces still there. This is the last point he left it. I put all those assembled pieces in their rightful place (had enough recall for that) and then finished it up. Not looking at the box this time. Very glad I took the trouble- yes some pieces had gone astray during the weeks it was on his floor. I went back upstairs and found a piece on the floor in the hallway, another on the carpet in his room, several on the bed, one under the desk, and two under a flap in an empty cardboard box (lucky I heard them slide when I picked that up). It’s fun to see the different process, flipping through the assembly photos from previous time I worked it compared to now. But I’ve definitely had my fill of this one, and am ready to swap it for something different!

from online swap - Puzzle Exchange Group

Tags: puzzles

Quite Fetching

made by E & L Corporation ~ unknown ~ 500 pieces

This was bound to happen to me someday, acquiring used puzzles as I do. Even for its age (made almost twenty years ago) this one was decent in quality. The pieces have average shape variety, they’re a bit on the small side and a tad too shiny, but that’s okay. Problem is who donated this to the thrift store: it’s missing a ton of pieces. I noticed right away when I was sorting out edges, that I was hardly finding any. A five-hundred piece puzzle, and this was all the edges I got:

That couldn’t be right. I put all the dark ones on a lighter board, to visualize easier. Nope, no more edges.

Spread out the lighter pieces carefully: no more there, either.

At this point I realized it was probably very incomplete. Why did I put it all together anyway? I suppose I was curious to know if just the edges were missing, and how bad it was. In fact the curiosity and aggravation drove me so much, I ended staying up way too late last night working on this one (which is why some of the photos in the middle of the assembly shots have different lighting). Pretty bad, turns out. I counted at the end. Ninety-five pieces missing. Wow. This one is going to turn into crafts, or maybe just get tossed in the recycling bin. Shame.

a thrift store find

Tags: puzzles

Honeymoon in Arles

made by Ceaco ~ artist Barbara Edidin ~ 550 pieces

This is an older puzzle- from 2007. Style of the logo on the box is different. Puzzles by the same company are very popular I see them all over the place nowadays, but just know- they won’t last. I don’t know how many hands this one went through before mine, but it had plenty of layers peeling up off the pieces (I only glued a few of them back down, then gave up) and quite a few bent knobs. Someone before me had taped the picture layer back on one piece- little bits hung over the edge but it still fit in place just fine. Remarkably, no missing pieces!

What’s funny is, the whole time I was working this I thought it was a photograph. I thought it was a photo with a faded, soft look from being printed over a decade ago. It was only when I was making this post and looked up more info from the box that I found out it’s colored pencil artwork, in stunning realism. Now I’m super impressed instead of being bored and slightly frustrated at putting together a photo picture. And once again, I proved to myself that I can just zone out and enjoy the process of fitting together abstract shapes and colors, even if I don’t particularly admire the picture (at first).

This one is from a series called Floral Fantasy- but in the cataloging system I use, it had been mislabeled with that as the title. I made a comment to my husband: why isn’t it roses for a honeymoon, that’s more romantic and he said oh, but in the south of France, it’s all about sunflowers. Sunflowers and old lace. I thought I would start with the bright yellows, but that was too hard. So picked a smaller color group and went with the subtle greens first. Ended up doing the yellow flowers last! Assembly: