School starts Monday

My cat does this. I always thought it was just him, but apparently not, lol

My new cat Murray is coming along swimmingly. This summer since I've been home, he as taken to seeking me out for company. He will sit or lay at my feet, request grooming and actually purr, or bump noses with me as a hello. This is wonderful progress since for the last year since I brought him inside as a stray, he has pretty much fled whenever I even looked in his direction.

I found another television show that I really like. As I've mentioned many times, it's hard to find one that is interesting, clean, well-written, etc. And more often than not when I do find one, there was only one season of it. See Terriers (2010), Firefly (2002), Enlisted (2014), sadly, so many others.

The show I found on Netflix is "The Finder." It got one season in 2012. The premise is "An Iraq war vet suffers a brain injury that triggers the ability to see connections between seemingly unrelated events, objects or people." The setting is Key West so it would seem we can call this one a "blue skies" show. I have seen two episodes and there is an undercurrent of Christianity running through, something that others have noticed as well. Probably why it got only one season.

Ha ha now that I am looking at the cast and crew for both Enlisted (2014) and The Finder (2012) I see that the lead male character in both shows is Jeff Stults. Coincidence? I think not.

I still miss Terriers and I love Donal Logue. What a great show Terriers was.

As for Firefly, well all that's been hashed over so much. We've been mourning it for 15 years now. I notice that when Firefly was canceled its lead Nathan Fillion was depressed for a long time, heartbroken he said. When Terriers was canceled Logue became a truck driver he was so heartbroken and disgusted with how shows are made and kept and canceled. Coincidence? I think not.

I found Castle online. Yes I know it has beenon for 7 years. It really does take me a long time to wake up to things. Its lead is the aforementioned Firefly lead, Nathan Fillion.  I've been watching this summer. I like all the Firefly references in Castle. They're great insider jokes.

I like TV shows, when they're good. (Sea Patrol). I like bingeing on them when they're really good. (Sea Patrol). But all that is coming to an end. Monday I go back to work. This year they have bumped back the starting bell for parapro's day to 7:10, so I will have to leave home at 6:55 latest. Early.

We have a three-and-a-half hour convocation starting at 8:00 Monday, and then after break for lunch I'll be in my shared  classroom setting my section of it up. I'm anxious to see the schedule, how my day will go and into which classrooms I'll be sent to support the teacher. And which groups of kids I'll be taking out for small group or tutoring work. I know already that in addition to Kindergarten I'll be used in first grade and second grade. It's a busy day for sure, but good days, because they involve kids!

I will miss my afternoon naps though, my studies, and my kitties. All good things come to an end, while other good things come in to take their place. In my case, fulfilling and enjoyable employment.

Terra cotta

I have real terracotta pots on my deck that hold my plants. My landlord lent them to me, she was not using them. I love terracotta. Ever since I went to Italy the first time and stayed in a real castle! I fell in love with this type of material for roofing. This Old House guys says of ceramic roofing:

"Ceramic tile roofs are found throughout the Mediterranean and Levant — and of course in the Mediterranean-Revival-influenced architecture of Florida and California. Barrel tiles, the most common type of ceramic tile, resemble half cylinders about 16 inches long. In the old days they were individually made by hand, their tapered shape achieved by forming the clay over the top of the thigh."

"Tile roofs are quite heavy, so the roof framing must be stout enough to support the load. Waterproofing is achieved via a waterproof membrane laid directly on the roof sheathing. Then the clay tiles are laid one by one in a pad of mortar. Tiles turned upside down form a trough, which is then covered by tiles laid right side up. The whole process is quite labor intensive, which makes an authentic tile roof quite expensive -- about $1,000 per 10x10-foot square, or about three times the cost of a standard three-tab shingle job."

"In addition to barrel tiles there are a number of variations of clay roof tiles. Some are shaped like thick shingles, some like slates. A high-quality tile will be hard-fired and will not absorb moisture that could fracture the tile when frozen. Thus such tiles are suitable for northern climates. All high-quality tile roofs are expensive, both in terms of the material and the installation, and so clay tile roofs are fairly rare."

"Yet in the long run the most expensive might be the most cost effective, since you can expect to get 60 to 80 years or even more out of a well installed tile roof."

Below, Spannochia, the castle I stayed in while on an Earthwatch archaeological dig. I had never seen terracotta tiles before.





Though my wide-ranging travels are over, I still think about Italy a lot. Looking at these terracotta pots on my deck remind me just a little of the gentle Tuscan hills dotted with farmhouses and castles built in another time.