Wordless Wednesday ... or Hushed Halloween

Play bows,
Zim

PS:  Stay safe tonight, friends!  It can be a scary night for us pups and kit-cats, too!

Hunter's Moon

Ha roo, pups and cool cats!  It's me - Zim.  Up here.

Up on the catwalk.  Can you see me?

"Ha roo!"

How about now?  Is that better?

Up here on the catwalk, I can get a great view of all kinds of stuff!  I can see the living room, the front door, even out the front windows!  And do you know what I could see out that set of windows last night?  The full moon!  It was gorgeous - so I sent Mom outside to shoot it!

Here is moonrise!

Moon and sticks

That's our neighbors' tree.  Mom thinks it adds ambiance.  Me?  I love it.  It reminds me of my buddy Goose and his love of a wonderful stick.

Here's the full Hunter's Moon, high above us!

"Ha rooOOOoooOOOOooooo!!!!"

Oh.  Sorry.  I couldn't help myself.

We also had a lovely view of the moon as it was setting this morning!

Moonset over Manhattan

What a gorgeous way to start the day!  Hope it's a great one for all of you!

Play bows,

Zim

Maybe on Monday

Woo, everypup and everycat!  It's me, Dave, here with the best kid brother a guy could ask for - Zim.  So, there we were, minding our own business, being the perfectly well-behaved Siber-boys that we are, when for some bizarre reason Mom called us over and asked us if we were up to something.  We used the best defense God blessed us with - the ability to look cute and innocent in a split second:

"Aw, Mom!  How could you even ASK such a question?!?"
"Yeah, really, Mom.  Look at how cute we are!"

Now ... between us friends here in BlogLand ... were Zim and I up to something?  

...

Maybe.  Ha woo.

Luv,

Dave

Serene Scenery Sunday

Ha roo, pups and cool cats!  I have a real mishmash for you this week for Serene Scenery Sunday, but I sure hope the pix help you find a little bit of that lovely inner peace.  Ready to enter the Zen of Zim Zone?

Let's start with a little snoofing of our burgundy-colored Mums!

Aren't they gorgeous?  And the mulch that Mom put in there is pretty tasty, too.  ... in case anyone might wonder.  Not that I'd try to snarf any.  ...  Moving right along -

I hit the Kansas Ocean a couple times during the week!

Me at the KSO

I love the rich colors and warm sun.  (And the cold temperatures!)

As you can see, the tide is incredibly low!  Maybe if we have a gazillion feet of snow this Winter, it'll help out the sea level!  Wouldn't that be great?!?

Speaking of great, Dave and I had a lot of wonderful walks together this week -

"Isn't this great, Zim?"
"It's the best, Davy!"

I love it when we can all go on walks together!  We all do!  

Also - guess who dropped by to enjoy a stroll around our garden?

"Ha roo, Fluffy Black Cat!"

It's my friend, Fluffy Black!  Can you see her down there?!?  Here's another look:

"Be safe, FBC!"

I think she was going to go try out the neighbors' trampoline.  I hope she didn't try any crazy back flips or anything.  Oh!  And can you see Dave's reflection in the window?  (Look right above where Fluffy Black is!)  While I found serenity in looking at Fluffy Black, Dave found serenity in looking at Mom!  Yep.  Something for everyone here on Serene Scenery Sunday!

Are you feeling mighty mellow?  I sure am!  I hope you've enjoyed your trip into the Zen of Zim Zone.    Have a great Sunday!

Play bows,
Zim

Week In Review

...or at least part of it!

Ha roo, pups and cool cats!  It's me, Zim.  I thought I'd show you a few miscellaneous glimpses into our activities from the past week.  Ready to take a look?

In the afternoons, after lunch and a walk, Dave likes to do this:

"I'm just gonna catch 40 winks, OK?"

Me?  I'm fired up and like to go on an adventure.  Here I am, getting buckled in the other afternoon:

"Yep.  Tighten it in a bit and I'm ready to roll, Mom!"

Mom and I usually don't have a predetermined destination - we just go where the road leads us!

"COWS!"

For whatever reason, I did not get to go meet those cows.  

Dave did a lot of this during our evenings:

"What's on TV, Mom?"

He loves that!

Also this week, our temperature "highs" for the day dropped by 40 degrees (ha roo!) so Dave and I made sure to celebrate by doing this:

"C'mon!  Let's go!"
"Yeah, Mom, step it up!"

It's ... almost like Mom's not as happy with this great change in the temps as we are.  Strange.  She did take us on extra walks, though.  What a trooper.  I thought a reward was due, so I chose our route for the afternoon adventure with Mom in mind:

"Great idea!  Thanks, Zimmie!"
"Sure, M--oooh, look!  People!"

She got a nice hot beverage and I got to people-watch!  Something for everybody!

I hope all of you had a wonderful week!  Enjoy the weekend!

Play bows,
Zim

Photo Finish Friday: I See A Trend Here...

Ha roo, pups and cool cats!  It's me, Zim!  Hey, remember last week when I took some treats over to the KSU vet school for our Vet Tech's pups?  I forgot to show you what was going on out front!  Check out the scene:

"Wowzers!"

That wasn't the kind of "cat" I was expecting to see there!

There were orange cats all over the place, making a real mess-a-roo out of things!

"Ooh!  A big candy corn thing!"

It was cool that there was a giant candy corn in the parking lot, but I noticed something very disturbing right there by the building ...

"Wait a minute!  Those branches!  This could only mean one thing!"

Can you see all those branches over there?  There's only one place they could have come from!

"GASP!"

The Great Tree of Messages?!?  They're taking out the Great Tree of Messages?!!?  Where are we going to do our ... oh.  The Porta-Potty.  Maybe that's the answer.  Hmm.  Interesting.

Meanwhile, a bit closer to home ... in fact just next door ...

"Wowzers!"

Does anyone else see a trend here?  And NO, I had nothing to do with the  destruction  construction at either location!  Honest!

Play bows,
Zim

Creative Solutions

Woo, everypup and everycat.  It's me - Dave.  As you might have heard by now, our dad was out of town for a while - I'm here to let you know that my kid brother Zim and I took really, really good care of Mom while he was on his trip.  I thought I'd share how we worked together to keep things on an even, happy keel.  Ready to take a look?

Saturday night, we settled in to watch our Kansas State Wildcat football team take on West Virginia!  I helped Mom turn the TV on and we settled in to watch what would be quite the decisive victory!

"Woo!  Go 'Cats!  And ... how 'bout a tummy rub?"

I got up to get a beverage and when I got back ...

"Hey, Dave.  The 'Cats scored again!"

Wait a minute!

"That's my mom ... and my quilt ... and my kid brother?!?"

Haven't we already been down this road?  

Then I realized Zim was just making sure Mom wasn't lonely, since Dad wasn't there and I was out getting my liquid refreshment ... for all of 2 minutes.  But now ... what to do?

"Wait a minute!  I have an idea!"

Being the creative guy that I am, I came up with an idea that worked out great:

Me (Davy), my mom, and Zim

I think we were all happy with that one!

Luv,
Dave

Wordless Wednesday

Luv,
Dave

Dad's Home!

Ha roo, pups and kit-cats!  It's me - Zim!  Our dad's been out of town but guess what?!?  He came home last night!  This can only mean one thing:

"DAD!!!  Ha roo, Dad!"
"ZIMMIE!!!"

Time to play!!!

Play bows,
Zim

Soup-er!

Ha roo, pups and cool cats!  It's me, Zim!  As some long-time readers of the Ao4 Digest may know, I'm a huge fan of kitchen appliances.  As a Drill Sergeant, it is my duty to inspect new equipment and help test it out.  Imagine my delight when the FedEx man dropped this baby off on our doorstep last week:

"A slow cooker that also roasts, browns/sautés, and steams?!?  WOWZERS!"

Wowzers!  How exciting is that?!?   There was only one thing to do -

"Let's fire this baby up, Mom!"

We had to test drive it - right?!!?

I suggested we make some steamed Stinky Goodness, but Mom opted for Onion Soup instead.  Hmm.  Does anyone know what "Not a snowball's chance at the Equator" means?  Hmm.  She must have wanted to try out the sauté feature.  Fair enough!  Mom shared a couple pix on FaceBook and her friends wanted the recipe.  It's Mom's old standby recipe that is in her head, not written down, so I thought I'd take a shot at writing it up for everyone.  PLEASE NOTE:  Absolutely NO onion soup for us pups and kit-cats!!!  Sorry.  Bipeds only.

Ready to start cooking?  Here's what you'll need:

10 large sweet onions (use Vidalia if you can, yellow otherwise)
3 Tablespoons of butter (or for our friends in the south, buttah)
1 teaspoon Kosher salt
+/- 2 cups white wine  (Mom used a lovely Riesling; the better the wine, the better the soup)
2 cups chicken broth (or half chicken, half beef)
10 oz. apple juice or cider
basil, thyme, etc. to taste (I have no idea what that means - add green dried herbs that smell good together)
Shredded Parmesan Cheese

Now for the action!  Peel and trim the ends off the onions.  Slice into half-moons.  Set the new appliance to Sauté/300℉.  (If you're doing this on the stove, heat a Dutch oven on medium/low.)  Melt butter ...

... then start layering in the onions -- some onions, then Kosher salt, more onions, more salt, etc.  Do NOT stir until the onions have sweated down - 15 minutes or so.  (Mom has a hard time with that one - but really, it's best.  Leave it alone.)

"Leave it!" as they say.

After the onions have cooked down, stir occasionally until they're a wonderful, rich caramel color like this:

Mom wanted to eat them right then and there.  Just to let you know.

That could take anywhere from 30-60 minutes, depending on how your heat source is doing.  Be patient!

Now add enough wine to cover the onions.  Increase the heat, stir often, and reduce the wine to a syrupy consistency.  (If you're on the stove top, crank up the heat to high!)  Add the broth, apple juice and herbs.  Reduce heat, switch over to crock pot mode, cover, and leave for a couple hours.  (On the stove, turn to low, cover, and simmer until you're hungry.)

In the meantime, do this:

"Eyes... RIGHT!"

Dave and I like to work on our military drills while out on patrol.

Where were we?  Oh, right.  The soup.  By the time you get home, this is what your soup should look like:

Soup's on!

All that's left to do now is to enjoy!  Sometimes, Mom ladles it into bowls, tops with a slice of crusty bread and shredded Parmesan, then sticks it under the broiler to brown the cheese.  This weekend, she skipped that stage - she made some flatbread to have on the side and just tossed some Parm on top of the soup like so:

Looks like a soup-er Fall meal to me!  (Oh, please - you had to see that one coming, didn't you?  Ha roo roo roo!)

I'll add this recipe to our sidebar, in case anyone wants to refer back to it.  If you try it out, please let us know what you think -- and remember, no onions for us quadrupeds!  (But treats and walks are great ideas!)

Play bows,
Zim

Serene Scenery Sunday

Ha roo, pups and cool cats!  It's me - Zim - here with Serene Scenery Sunday.  I have a collection of a bunch of different things that made us feel that inner calmness; I hope I can spread some of that tranquility around through our photos.  Ready?

Let's start with a dynamic sunset:

Those colors are so warm and wonderful, aren't they?

Here's last night's sunset:

Mom took that down the street when Dave and I were taking her on an after-dinner walk.  Here's what the sky looked like toward the south(ish):

There was an explosion of color all over the place!  That's the moon up there in the upper third of the picture.  It was a little bit cloudy.

The skies cleared up later on and the stars were just stunning!  Dave and I had read about the Orionid meteor shower and that there would be great viewing overnight.  We set our internal clocks and got Mom up at 0200 this morning to go out and enjoy it.  We took a walk to the end of the street and saw a couple shooting stars!  It was really cool!  We don't have any photos of that, but here we are from a walk later this morning:

Me and Dave on Morning Patrol

Pretend it's dark, starry, and that we're on the sidewalk instead of the street, and you're there!

Speaking of being places ...

I don't really care where Mom and I go on our afternoon adventures, but I do insist that Mom puts the Jay Sekulow Show on the radio.  I don't "settle" into my serenity zone until she does.

Flower-wise ... our Mums are pretty much the only things still blooming.  Here's a look at the Burgundy ones by our mailbox:

They've really filled in nicely this year.  Let's stick our snooters in for a close-up:

What a great burst of color!

We've had a couple light frosts, so our sunflowers are gone.  We did take this picture before they got zapped out and wanted to share it with you:

We Kansans can't get enough of our sunflowers!  Mom even likes them when they're starting to fizzle out for the year.  It's a sign of the changing of the seasons ... and ... given that it's Serene Scenery Sunday, I'll share another reason with you, with one of the special pix Mom likes to do.

What a great reminder!

Have a wonderful Sunday!

Play bows,
Zim

Saturday Decisions

Woo, everypup and everycat.  It's me - Dave.  It's Saturday - a day to kick back, relax, and have some fun!  I can't decide what to do today.  Zim and I have already taken Mom on a couple walks, but now...

Do I want to go outside ...

... and play some football?

"Are you ready for some football?"

Or should I stay in and hang out with Purple Panda for a while?  That sounds like fun!

Here we are, having a staring contest ...

"Hey, Dave ... what's that over there?!?"
"Where?!?!"

Ha.  Purple Panda won that round with the old "Made You Look" move.  

"He's a tricky Panda!"

Don't worry.  I'll get him next time around.

"Let's settle in for a nap, Purple!"

And now ... I think it's time for a late morning snooze!

Have a wonderful Saturday, everyone!

Luv,
Dave