Jonathan Livingston Seagull

Posted on October 19, 2015 by Chronicles of a Blogaholic

“Most gulls don’t bother to learn more than the simplest facts of flight
– how to get from shore to food and back again.
For most gulls, it is not flying that matters, but eating.”
Jonathan Livingston Seagull

Feeding the seagulls on the Esplanade.

Study in Black and White

Posted on October 18, 2015 by Chronicles of a Blogaholic

“I guess I’m old-fashioned, but I love black and white films.
They bring me back to a simpler time in my life.”
J R

Study in Black and White

Shine On

Ruff Competition

Posted on October 17, 2015 by Chronicles of a Blogaholic

“I’ve always said money may buy you a fine dog,
but only love can make it wag its tail.”
Kinky Friedman

Ruff Competition

Every year hundreds of canines and their human companions travel to Indianapolis, Indiana to compete in the North American Flyball Championship.

What is flyball you ask? It’s the canine equivalent to the horse steeplechase event. The North American Flyball Association, Inc. (NAFA) was established in 1984, when 12 flyball clubs in Michigan and Ontario banded together to guide the development of flyball in North America.

Flyball got its start in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when a group of dog trainers in Southern California created scent discrimination hurdle racing, then put a guy at the end to throw tennis balls to the dogs when they finished the jump line. It didn’t take long for the group to decide to build some sort of tennis ball-launching apparatus, and the first flyball box was born.

Herbert Wagner is credited with developing the first flyball box, and apparently he did a flyball demo on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson that got a lot of people’s attention. Subsequently, the new dog sport for dog enthusiasts was introduced in the Toronto-Detroit area by several dog training clubs. After a few small tournaments were held in conjunction with dog shows, the first ever flyball tournament was held in 1983.

Today, there are over 400 active clubs and 6,500 competing dogs, NAFA, a nonprofit organization is recognized as the world’s leading authority on flyball and the sport’s top sanctioning organization.

If you want to see the dogs in action, here’s a short documentary about the sport and the ruff competition.

Shine On

Oscar Wilde

Posted on October 16, 2015 by Chronicles of a Blogaholic

“Education is an admirable thing,
but it is well to remember
from time to time that nothing
that is worth knowing can be taught.”
Oscar Wilde

Oscar Wilde

He was an Irish playwright, poet, and novelist who is best known for The Importance of Being Earnest and The Picture of Dorian Gray. Famous for his biting wit, and flamboyant dress, Oscar Wilde became one of the best-known personalities of his time.

Born on October 16, 1854 in Dublin, Ireland, he studied at Trinity College, and at Magdalen College, in Oxford. Shortly after graduating from Magdalen he published his collected poems in 1881, when he was just twenty-seven years old, and was awarded the Newdigate prize for his poem, Ravenna.

While Oscar was touring London in 1881, he was introduced to Constance Lloyd the daughter of Horace Lloyd, a wealthy Queen’s Counsel. Constance was four years younger than Oscar, and was well-read, spoke several European languages and had an outspoken, independent mind. He proposed to her, and they married on 29 May 1884. They had two sons in quick succession, Cyril in 1885 and Vyvyan in 1886. With a family to support, Oscar accepted a job revitalizing the Woman’s World magazine, where he worked from 1887-1889.

The next six years were the most creative period of his life. He published two collections of children’s stories, The Happy Prince and Other Tales, and The House of Pomegranates as well as his first and only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray. The novels implied homoerotic theme was considered very immoral by the Victorians and played a considerable part in his later legal trials.

In the summer of 1891, Oscar met Lord Alfred ‘Bosie’ Douglas, who was well acquainted with Oscar’s Dorian Gray novel. They soon became lovers and were inseparable until Wilde’s arrest four years later.

In April 1895, Oscar sued Bosie’s father for libel as the Marquis had accused him of homosexuality. Oscar withdrew his case but was himself arrested and convicted of gross indecency and sentenced to two years hard labor. Constance took the children to Switzerland and reverted to an old family name, Holland.

The year he was released from prison, Oscar wrote The Ballad of Reading Gaol, a response to the agony he experienced in prison. It was published shortly before Constance’s death in 1898. He and Bosie reunited briefly, but Oscar mostly spent the last three years of his life wandering Europe, staying with friends and living in cheap hotels.

Sadly, he was unable to rekindle his creative fires. When a recurrent ear infection became serious several years later, meningitis set in, and Oscar Wilde died on November 30, 1900.

His short stories, plays and poems continue to inspire millions around the world as well as famous quotes written by Oscar Wilde.

Shine On