Having kittens about having kittens
Until a couple of days ago I was having kittens about having kittens. Now I'm just having kittens. Two weeks ago I went to the Mayhew Animal Rescue Centre at Kensal Green and fell in love with two 12 week old kitty-siblings. I'd kind of primed myself to do so. It's not difficult.

I met three pairs of kittens, and the two I've adopted were called Hector and Lilly. I mean really? What kind of names are those for kittens? So I've renamed them. To Reconstitution and Deathstar. Haha. Not really. Had you going there for a moment. Or not. After some thought, and waiting for their names to settle (well, 48 hours), I've settled on Mag and Merc, short for Magellan and Mercator. Mag will become Meg. Merc will become Murk. Collectively they are to be known as sausages.

They seemed to have settled in fine. I'm keeping them indoors until end January/February time. At the moment they're playing a gave which I think is called Chase and then bite each other in the neck. It's not one I remember from school, although we did play a version of tag called "Bastard-ball" which involved tagging each other through the mechanism of hurling a cricket ball at each other. Sometimes I wonder why I'm still alive.








V+A
I spent this afternoon in the V+A for two reasons. Firstly, I wanted to do a bit of drawing of people who can stay very, very still given that they've been immortalised in marble 200 years ago. Secondly, I want to go and see an exhibition called Shadow Catchers - Camera-less Photography. It was very interesting, my favourite one being the photograph of the underside of a stream. By photograph I mean this:

Take a very large sheet of photographic paper. In the dead of night put it in the bottom of a stream. Flash-gun it, and then fix the image in the lab. Pretty.

Sofa so good
I've been building a built-in sofa for the barge. I've got the seats finished. The frame is built from re-claimed wood from pallets although the seats are from hardboard (obviously). Photos of progress and of the barge in general: