Animal Creative Consultants
I cannot tell the story online of how I got George. You will have to buy me many drinks to hear that one. (And maybe poutine.) But I can tell you that he got liberated from a bad situation.
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George actually got up and posed for this photo. I was trying to get a shot of something else. I know he posed on purpose: when I went to the other side of the room for a different angle, he got back up and posed again. George is a poser.
I suppose I would be a poser, too, if I looked like a panther.
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Carmella is an SPCA cat who got her forever home when George needed a sister.
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She is as rough and tough as her eyes say she is in this photo. She is more of a cougar than a panther. She can take me in a fight. She drools.
Carmella actually came from the SPCA with the name Caramel. That’s a stupid name for a cat, don’t you think? She doesn’t even have caramel colouring. I wanted to call her Spike, but I’d just given that name to one of my acoustic guitars. And it didn’t seem fair to give her an entirely new name change anyway. Her full name now is Carmella Fitzgerald, after the great lady.
Bit hard to tell in the photo above, but my plan to keep my feline overlords from scratching the slipcovers I made is working so far. Both the feline overlords and I are satisfied with the new arrangements.
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I don’t know if I could create without an animal in the house. I suppose there are those who can, and of course, nothing could stop me from creating. But I think every artist has to be a kind of mystic to create. And every mystic needs an animal “familiar.”
One must always take a moment to consult the animals of the household, I think, when creating something new.
After all, George was right. That photo would have been boring without a panther in it.
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And now, Carmella’s namesake:
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Happy creating!
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Dodie Goldney
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related posts by Dodie Goldney:
The Secret is to Know When to Stop
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The Treehouse by Dodie Goldney 
I saw your “Toe Mail” and wanted to say hello…come visit Dylan and Bagheera 🙂 . (I learned about Kamloops many years ago via a favorite film, “The Grey Fox”…)