So Many Things, So Little Time...

There is a LOT going on in Columbia in the next few days...I will probably be adding to this list later in the week, but here goes:

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February 23rd (today): At a City Hall Press Conference scheduled for 4 pm today, Mayor Bob Coble and animal advocates will proclaim Spay Day! National Spay Day is an initiative that promotes the importance of spaying and neutering pets, which significantly decreases the high population of stray animals. The Humane SPCA, Animal Mission, and other local animal shelters are all in support of this initiative. (More on Spay Day events later in the week...see below).

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Tonight- go see A Single Man at The Nickelodeon. This Golden-Globe nominated film starring Colin Firth and Julianne Moore (swoon) will only be playing through Thursday.


Friday, February 26th: Go to the Spay Day Benefit Concert at Elbow Room in 5 Points. Show starts at 8 pm and tickets are $5 in advance from Sid & Nancy, or $7 at the door. Artists include: Kenley Young & the Open Fires, Mean Weiner, Todd Mathis, The Thirsties, and Josh Roberts & Leslie Branham. All proceeds benefit the local Humane Society.

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SC Book Festival poster art by Columbia's own Claire Farrell

Saturday, February 27th: The SC Book Festival is this weekend--February 27th-28th at the Columbia Metropolitan Convention Center and admission is FREE! I plan to go Saturday to check out some of the presentations by authors of cookbooks. There will be all kinds of authors on hand to speak about their books, sell you their books, and sign them too--children's books, arts books, history books, you name it! [For those of you who are big fans- Dorothea Benton Frank will be at the Festival discussing Return to Sullivans Island at 12:45 on Sunday]. Click here for the full Saturday and Sunday schedules.

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Also on Saturday- ride your bike, skate, walk or ride the bus to the State House at 2 pm to attend the Transportation Transformation event, DJ Chris Wenner will be spinning. This event has been organized by Aaron Johnson and Grant Robertson, who are running for Columbia Mayor and City Council, respectively. According to the Facebook invitation, "the purpose of this rally is to draw together disparate groups in order to improve Columbia's transportation system." I for one love public transportation--in other cities. It sucks in Columbia. And I work with a population that has no choice but to depend on our broken and embarrassingly under-funded system...we should all care about this issue. "The problems with our transportation affect our safety, our environment, our health, our economy, and our quality of life."

So, what's on your agenda this week and weekend?

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Fat Albert on a Sofa

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Please check out my cat, Fat Albert, featured in Desire to Inspire's weekly blog post: "Monday's Pets on Furniture."

Fat Albert is a rescue kitty from the Animal Mission here in Columbia. His back-story is that he was owned by an older woman, and when she passed away her family gave him up to the pound. He was approximately 10 years old when we got him, so he is about 16 now.

He has used up numerous lives, besides being on "death row" before we plucked him from the pound, he also had a limp from his former life--a broken back leg that had never been set and healed wrong. It causes him no pain now, I am assured, but he still has a pretty mean limp that my husband and I affectionately call his "pimp walk." Three years ago he was diagnosed with cancer; ;luckily the tumor was all encapsulated in one kidney, so they simply removed the kidney and he's been fine ever since. He also escaped from our house a year or so ago; (Fatty is a strictly inside kitty, as his lack of front claws, the aforementioned limp, and his sizable girth would make it hard for him to escape predators of any kind). He was gone for over a month and I was heartbroken. He finally showed back up in our next door neighbor's back yard...he had evidently been living under their shed for most of that time. He was skinny and scared, but really no worse for the wear. And don't worry he has ballooned back to his "Fat Albert" weight, and then some.

Thanks to the Desire to Inspire folks for including Fat Albert's picture in their weekly post, and if you're thinking of adopting an animal, please consider getting one from your local pound or rescue organization.
Happy Friday everyone!

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