A New Year

Pam’s Pictorama Post: This year the New Year brought a lousy head cold which I am only just recovering from. It was fairly well timed for a day or so of laying around and reading which arguably is what I should have been doing under any circumstances. The novels are largely not worth mentioning – a rom com about a woman who finds she is dating an android (I thought it had more possibilities than it delivered) and Buckeye which seems to be everyone’s novel of the moment – deservedly. It is very good and fair to say it is sort of an instant classic. (Sadly I am still looking for my next Rosa Mulholland fix. Prior posts about those books can be found here and here. I have read a few since then and owe you all an update.)

Cold notwithstanding this has been a nice holiday visit to NJ. Cookie has made progress and now comes down the stairs to look at first floor activity. She sits in a chair in Kim’s studio like a little queen, much better adjusted to her NJ surroundings than she used to be.

Peaches, we have an ongoing dialogue these days about trying to be a better kitty.

Peaches, our very asocial girl – aka the meanest cat in the world – is make surprising progress in her relation to humans and other cats. I have tried having long conversations with her about this and she listens carefully. She now is willing to sit on a towel near my chair even if I cannot actually pet her. (She’s also showed us how, when atop another chair, she chases her tail in a frenzy – and she has tried, less successfully, to steal food from her very large sibling, Beau. I have written Peaches story here if you want to read it.)

*Kim’s page – hot off the press, or perhaps still on it!*

Shown above, Kim is working on a spectacular pencil for his next story. It speaks for itself! (Check out that polar bear! And the snow!) He is making good use of his time here.

We’ve paid a visit to the comic book store and, obviously given yesterday’s post, to the Red Bank Antique Annex. I also purchased this very nice camel (in photo at the top and which is part of a Christmas set – I will likely keep him in my cabinet year round however) and a nice Santa shown here too. Red Bank was pleasantly decked out in small town holiday mode with lights – although you also get to see Macy’s just before the holiday, snapped on my way to the train on one of the days I commuted into the city.

*Macy’s during my commute in right before Christmas.*

Kim and I had a cozy lunch that day at a favorite place I have written about before, Dublin House. This is an old Victorian house which has been converted to a restaurant and bar. Originally built in neighboring Middletown, it was moved across the river to Red Bank back in 1840. It was first rehabilitated back in 1971 as a ice cream parlour and restaurant. The current owners purchased it in 2004 and turned it into a rather authentic Irish enclave. (Kim and I can vouch for the “Irish nachos” which are cheesy greatness on homemade chips – yum!) There is a fireplace in the small dining room which makes it perfect for a frosty day. In the summer, door-sized windows open to outside dining on a porch and outside area. Some original details remain such as the windows shown here.

*Interior of Dublin House earlier last week.*

As I write there is a huge cat dust up in Kim’s studio – Blackie skulking up the stairs to give his sister Cookie a hard time. Kim is being referee but maybe some extra food might make Blackie less adventurous.

*View from the car driving to the train one morning in darkness with Red Bank’s twinkle lights.*

We had enough snow during this visit that I shoveled the walk and driveway twice, but was sick and skipped the most recent dusting. Luckily snow melt from a prior shoveling was still doing its job. It is a snowy winter compared to last year when we didn’t have any to memory.

*Christmas display at the Antique Annex.*

Kim and I had a little project of hanging some things up. You might remember these from prior posts – they have made their way here for permanent relocation. I also have the great Louis Wain sheet that I purchased and framed a few months ago. Heavy as it is, I am waiting for help to put that up. However, in addition to yesterday’s pig painting, we hung an interesting black cat piece from England and several photos that I purchased here for the house. The house is slowly acquiring a more distinctive Pictorama appearance.

So, well enough to make a grocery run today, I am going to leave off and go get dressed. We leave in the middle of the week so it will be an NYC post the next time you hear from me!

Snow Person

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama.com Photo Post: Today we woke to several inches of snow and more falling so this card seemed like the logical item for today. Purchased a few weeks ago on eBay, I brought it to New Jersey figuring I might have a big opportunity to post it – and right I was.

*No judging my nascent shoveling as shown from upstairs.*

First thing this morning had me out for a rare morning of snow shoveling. Ouch! I am perhaps a bit long in the tooth to adopt this as an occupation – today’s snow, shoveled early, was pretty light but already forming and icy layer under it so it was best to get it done early, or at least the first go at it. I don’t have much skill at this shoveling thing although my mom always did it until she grew too old and then she hired someone. I have someone who comes when I am not here or it is too hard, although he is nursing a bad respiratory infection so another reason to give Fitzroy a break.

Clearly, we are here in New Jersey, having our holiday break. The New York cats adapted fairly quickly to their surroundings and even Cookie is wandering down the stairs with some curiosity about the house at large. Peaches, the meanest of the Jersey Five, is still hissing at us but allowing me to get every closer before she starts. (Not Kim, he still gets the big hiss early on!) Blackie has made his way upstairs to see his sister, eat her food and give her a hard time. (We separate them here for that reason – we’d never get any rest otherwise. The fighting will continue back in NYC for a bit before it subsides.)

Yesterday, we wandered into Red Bank despite the plummeting temperatures ahead of the snow. I made some interesting acquisitions but more about that to come in future posts.

*Kim in his temporary studio earlier today. Snow out the window.*

Anyway, this is an odd card. It was sent from Berlin to Monte Video on September 9, 1908. It is too hard to read the full foreign address but it was sent to Herr Christianson with no note on the back and one I am unable to translate on the front. (If someone else can, please share a translation!)

What got me was this strange snowman, slightly strange looking girl (with a bit of a wicked expression on her face) who looks like she is whispering in his ear. She sports a pointed, witch-like hat with a bow. The snowman is complete artifice, is he painted? Perhaps painted on wood and cut out so she can be solidly behind him in her fur trimmed attire. He wears a sort of smushed (top?) hat, has a sort of long pipe and this cheery little broom. I especially like the snow, which I am guessing was a post production addition.

The top of the card, the best I can read it, has Gluckuches and Neujahr printed at the top. The latter seems to bring up German New Year’s cards which is what I think this is. Below is another (very delightful) card that came up when I search Neujahr. Sorry I missed this one on eBay!

*Unfortunately not in Pams-Pictorama.com collection and produced by the same company. Champagne! Money falling! Not clear to me what the other woman is dropping – bills? cards?*

So on a snowy Saturday in New Jersey less than a week before the New Year, I consider the upcoming one, more than a hundred years since this card was sent. I wonder what secrets of the New Year she whispered into the ear of the snowman and what tales of the year she’d have for the year to come for us today.

Deitch Studio: Christmas 2025

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Post: Arguably the most popular day on the Pictorama calendar – the holiday card reveal – and here we are again! For the third year now, with Kim’s blessing, I have attempted all seven cats – the Jersey Five and the New York cats combined as the illustration. As has become our pattern, I draw it and he then redraws, traces and inks it. The cats have stayed true to my drawing as has the design. Us in the sleigh is more him and the moon has become a good old Deitchian moon. I think it is a fair melding hybrid of our styles.

Kim noted that the cats look a bit like balloons here – of the Thanksgiving parade kind. Some more than others – Stormy hovering over Christmas is the most balloon like. (She is a pretty dreamy kitty. One of the last of the strays mom acquired.) Evidently a slow moving sleigh now that I reflect on it.

For the record and the curious, the top row from left to right are Blackie, Milty, Gus, Cookie and bottom row, Beau, Peaches and Stormy. Milty is the oldest and Peaches and Stormy roughly tie for youngest and last into the house. Cookie and Blackie are the only ones from the same litter (our New York kits) and Blackie and Beau share their all black cat-ness.

As I do the card reveal this year I need to apologize a bit – it seems I have lost my address book which I have had since college. Although many addresses have migrated to my electronic book, many of the oldest ones have not and among those I don’t necessarily have emails or numbers to text either. Someone pointed out that the universe was trying to tell me something.

I didn’t see it at first but someone pointed out that Kim has candy cane horns – I must ask him if it was on purpose or if he was having subliminal Grampus urges. Now I don’t know how I missed it.

If you are new to the card reveal, this joint card project goes back to the first year Kim and I started dating (predating Pictorama by decades) and has developed over time. Some earlier examples can be found here, here and here.

As you read this on Sunday morning we will (hopefully) be packed up and on our way to New Jersey with Cookie and Blackie in tow. We spent today (Saturday) organizing and filling boxes and suitcases so the cats are suspicious – sleeping on the bed with one eye slightly open I’d say.

When we get to the house I am anxious to see if my holiday swags of evergreens have lasted on the front railings. I will take out my few holiday decorations – oversized colored lights will go in the fireplace, an elderly Santa made of lead skiing and a few other choice bits that will live on the mantle – one of the few cat free spaces in the house. (That of course is always subject to change if a cat is enterprising enough!)

*Hard to read beyond Mr. and Mrs. Will Claff. How on earth did this get delivered I wonder.*

I thought I would bookend this post with another card I bought this fall. Sent on December 23, 1914. It was sent from Brockport, NY but the address is hard to read as is the message. Of course it was the idea of the nifty cat pull toy on the front that did it for me, bow and all. I like the little poem too which says, I send this kissy kat because I cannot go like Santa Claus, to give my Christmas love to you, or kiss you – as I’d like to do. So a Merry Christmas to you all – a few New Year’s cards tucked away next.

On Christmas Day Have Mirth and Laughter

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Post: We have a cat Christmas card entry of a jolly sort today, something to get us tuned up for Thursday.

Here in Manhattan, after about four inches of snow last week, we were awash in rain yesterday. (We’re talking street flooding – a lot of rain!) Although there is precipitation in the forecast for later this week, I’d gamble a guess that it will be a green Christmas in New Jersey. A few degrees either way though and we’ll see. Pretty as the snow is (see below for some photos of the house last week) I guess I am old enough to see the disadvantages of shoveling (or paying someone to!) and the slippery sidewalks and roads. We do like to take some long walks when we are out there. However, I wouldn’t mind a sprinkling for Christmas though to see if it could put me in the holiday mood a bit which I could use.

*Snowy front yard in NJ last week!* *From a friend’s phone video.*

The end of the calendar year is always a very busy time for fundraisers. I believe I have opined on this in the past and since the earliest days of my chosen career, the last weeks of the year have been fraught with either being too busy (at the Met) or not busy enough (my first years at Jazz).

My current gig combines its Top Dog Gala and its fiscal year end at the already very busy calendar year end. It’s pretty boffo. However, now in my second year end there I understand it a bit better and I am hoping for some down time, even while keeping an eye on things at the office. I am also old enough to know that we have a plan we’re executing and what will be will be. It isn’t really the sort of place, like the Met, where someone is going to decide they want to donate a valuable mortgaged piece of property in the last ten days of the year.

*Decorating and setting up for Top Dog earlier this month.*

Therefore in my adult life there has never really been a holiday season that has been free of work concerns. There was the year I left Jazz right before the end of the year, but that was a year of other losses and the holidays were a bit sad and full of the anxiety of a new job. Sometimes you just do the best you can do over the holidays.

The card at the top of the post sums it up well, Whatever fortune my come after, on Christmas Day have mirth and laughter. Mom and Dad cat (perched on an ottoman) are in an interesting composition of paws and tails. (The adult cats form a really great sort of central square with a paw and a tail leading us in and out!)

Their progeny, in kitten form, giggle and poke each other next to mom on the couch. There’s something about the furniture that makes me think that it is so specific it refers to real furniture somewhere in the artist’s life. It’s a very suburban and somewhat prosperous scene. Whatever their world weary worries are Mom and Dad cat chuckle together.

The artist knew cats. Dad cat is a proper orange marmalade and mom a darker orange and brown mix – producing an orange kit and as well as a black and white tabby. This combination certainly within the possibility of likelihood.

The copyright on the card is actually 1890 by a company called L. Prang and Company of Boston, USA. Below I share (in its entirety) an entry on Louis Prang via the Boston Public Library:

Louis Prang (1824-1909), a German immigrant, ran a highly successful printing firm in Boston during the late nineteenth century. His company produced high quality reproductions of major art work and greeting cards using the complex technique of chromolithography. Prang is often referred to as the ‘Father of the American Christmas Card’ because holiday cards were rarely exchanged in America until his factory began producing them in the 1870s.

A quick look at his other wares in terms of Christmas cards does not show many of this type. He generally seemed to go in more for arty reproductions of flowers and holly. There is a tiny signature for the artwork, EBW. I cannot find tracks on him, perhaps his foray into cat cards was brief – or he eventually expanded his signature.

This card was never sent but in faded pencil on the back, in script, it says, John Peckham.

*78th Street on our way to Orwasher’s last Sunday.*

So today’s card is a shot over the bow for those of us who are having trouble getting the the holiday spirit. I will spend my day packing us up for our 2-3 week sojourn in New Jersey. And cleaning the apartment – I like to come home to start the New Year in a reasonably clean apartment.

Tomorrow is the 2025 Deitch Studio card reveal. For ongoing readers, you knew it was coming! For now however, try to insert a bit of ho, ho, ho into your proceedings and if not, at least for the day later this week!

And Loving ‘Lite

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Post: Today is a companion piece to yesterday’s post about my love for all things opal in jewelry. However, the other side of that coin is opalite. Opalite is an opalescent manmade substance which is either glass or plastic. Like an opal it has the property of changing color based on light and the colors around it. Alternately called argenon, sea opal, opal moonstone or living under a bunch of similar names, it delivers much of the bang without the buck so to speak.

*Shown up close here it is about a one inch long stone.*

While I have likely run into it before (as a shiny object, opal and moonstone loving person) it wasn’t until it crossed our paths in the form of delightful square lumps on a trip to Red Bank on summer day in New Jersey that it rose into prominence for us.

Kim and I had walked into town to peruse the comic book store and do a few other minor errands. We decided to have lunch at a pleasant outdoor cafe but were told we needed to wait about ten minutes for a table. We were in no rush so we gave them my cell number and decided to kill time in a store next door called Earth Spirit (online here if you are curious).

*I like the way the whole store is just open to the street, alluring.*

Unlike many establishments in Red Bank these days, this one has managed to hang on for quite a stint. It sells crystals and incense and well, stones. It wouldn’t be the one I would pick for longevity but somehow it has stuck around. They seem to specialize in different kinds of tarot card decks and part of a wall was devoted to those.

We had never been in and I was especially enamored of a sign advertising aura photographs and while I was investigating that Kim was picking through the glorious selection of “stones”. I wandered over to see what he was up to and I’m not sure which of us discovered the bowl of opalite first, but we immediately each grabbed one to purchase.

Our lunch reservation came up just as we were purchasing our stones. I never did get my aura photo taken but this was a good trade off.

*Aura photos on display. $25 to take one and $40 if you want a reading.*

It promised us enhanced creativity and AI tells us it also used to support people through life transitions, foster inner peace…and deepen spiritual connection, especially during meditation. I am not going to be the detractor to question these qualities from a manmade substance so while I wonder I will not, um, throw stones. I took mine to work and Kim has his prominently displayed on his desk, shown above. He has lovingly embraced it and its properties, real or imagined.

Variations on opalite above.

Opalite evidently has no single inventor but it appears to have come on the market in the 1980’s. There is a fair amount of variety to the “stones”.

Evidently Taylor Swift has a new song with opalite in the lyrics which will perhaps boost it into greater prominence. It interests me a bit why you’d have an opalite sky rather than an opal one but in another way it makes sense. Opalite in all its forms appears to be a more coherent glow, as opposed to the sparking bits of fire in the different kinds of opal gemstones. Meanwhile, there is plenty of room in our heart for both.

Everything’s Swell!

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Post: It’s impossible for me to see this card without hearing a certain sort of cartoon cat voice from my childhood – vaguely sarcastic, probably based on a motion picture idea of what a citified gangster sounded like. His friend and sidekick would reply, Yeah, right boss!

This is among the last of the cards I bought at the big postcard show over the summer. (Never fear, there’s another show coming in early October.) This card looks like it could have been drawn by one of those cartoon animators as a side gig. It has a pro feeling to it. The cat on the fence with the big orange sun setting – a glowing sunset behind the fence we realize when we really look. We get a peek at a yellow field and a house behind. It is as if the world is very beautiful glowing yellow and civilized just on the other side of the fence from where these three cats gather.

The two males on the fence seem to be tuning up for a night of caterwauling, while the girl cat belongs to someone who has place a bow around her neck. I guess she matriculates through both worlds. There is a garbage can which has overflowed – I guess that can be investigated and raided later if the boys need a snack.

*Blackie and Cookie on the bed recently. They have only just reconciled with each other upon our return to the NYC apartment.*

Not surprisingly it has me in mind of what we called alley cats when I was a kid and which occurs to me right now to be a term you don’t really hear any longer. (Do we no longer have alleys? Or are cats no longer their denizens?) Instead we talk about strays and feral cats – terms people seem to use interchangeably which arguably are not. Domestic cats that have been abandoned are now strays but they are not feral.

I have written about our first stray found when I was a small child, Zipper. (I wrote about him and other tabbies I have known in a post here. Zipper’s interest in our tropical fish can be found here.) He was a classic alley cat, a tabby with a broken tail where the tip was always at an angle. Mom rescued him outside the laundry one day (this was before we had our own washer and dryer – yes, we’re talking quite a long time ago) where some boys were abusing him.

Zipper was super scrappy though and grew into a beautiful cat. I suspect in retrospect that our rather prim but gentle domestic cat Snoopy was probably utterly shocked by him. He kept his streetwise wits about him and became a ringleader of the neighborhood cats of the time. (Our cats were of the indoor/outdoor variety at the time.) Zips would round up his buddies and make raids on an eel box kept for bait up the street. What pussycat parties those appeared to be! Puking for days after and a need to hose down the garage. These two on the card would have happily attended and then gotten into a few fights.

*Mr. Miltie, our old, old timer.* *A long ago rescue from Newark.*

Spending time outside our cats would get into scraps and occasionally come home with a gaping wound which would eventually abscess and require a trip to the vet. Once I remember my mother couldn’t find a cat carrier and stuffed Zipper into a picnic basket which he promptly chewed right through – head sticking out and therefore somewhat stuck, on our the way there.

All of this was brought back to me by a snippet on Instagram this morning about a British woman and her son finding a cat in the backyard and enticing him inside over a period of a couple of years. Reminds me of our Hobo in New Jersey who we never were able to get inside and who disappeared last year. They call him Boysie, another tabby, and it was a bad wound that finally made them urge him inside and to the vet.

*Gus, on the bed. He came to the backdoor in NJ one winter. He can’t decide if he wants to be petted all the time or is afraid to at all.*

Now we have dedicated people doing TNR (trap, neuter and release) of cat colonies which have mercifully cut down their numbers. Strays with docked ears show this has been done and our Stormy bears that evidence. Here in Manhattan strays are much less common than they once were even in my lifetime. Still, Stormy and Gus both came to the backyard at Mom’s and the other three were otherwise rescued, Beau and Miltie from Newark and Peaches from a basement in Long Branch. We know that shelters are full to overflowing and I am told that in the spring a never ending parade of kittens were dropped at our doors at work despite our not even being a shelter.

Recently an older friend lost her sister unexpectedly and the sister had just adopted a stray. I was very tempted to invite her to join the tribe although eight might truly be the tipping of that scale.

Peaches. I actually touched her for the first time recently. She was asleep on a chair and did not appreciate it. Peaches will generally only let me get within a foot or two of her. Still, she seems very happy. Stretches and rolls around. Just a no-touch kinda girl.

I think of our cat companions and how very special they are. Cookie is asleep atop a Chewy box surveying her kingdom as I write and Blackie is wondering if he looks longingly enough I will give him a Churu treat. (I am the soft touch for these and secretly am always trying to put a bit more weight on Blackie. He is a willing participant.) It makes me sad to think of those kitties that could have happy lives in homes but don’t get the chance. Here’s to finding them all their very best homes.

More Autumn in New York: Catching Up

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Post: Yesterday I devoted my post to writing about work and specifically about the dog event fiesta that September has become. My job, which is on a fiscal year ending on December 31 (I do not recommend this), will increase in volume, stress and energy required, continuously increasing through our gala in early December and on through the last week of the calendar year until I fall over on New Year’s Day. However, returning from our summer weeks in New Jersey is more than adjusting to increasing work, it is the adjustment back into our lives here at the official location of Deitch Studio – a physically much smaller epicenter of our operation.

Cookie and Blackie are generally very relieved that we have once again returned them to their private abode here. While there is novelty with the twice yearly trips to the shore house, their discovery that other cats exist in the universe aside from them (not a welcome thought), they prefer the one room here where they rule unimpeded.

*Blackie and Cookie in an uneasy bed truce yesterday.*

For those readers who remember that Blackie was limping before we left (resulting in an emergency trip to work on Saturday) his limp has improved but not gone away. The trickiest jumps are a bit beyond him (the pedestal sink in the bathroom to his chagrin – he needs us to lift him in for a drink), but his jumping gradually improved in New Jersey. He and Cookie are 14 this year and perhaps this is a bit of age showing. If he didn’t hate the vet so I would take him to my friends in rehab and let them have a look or perhaps do some acupuncture on it.

Meanwhile, when we return they spend the first weeks hating each other like they never saw the other before. Blackie wasn’t allowing Cookie on the bed which annoyed her but she was so happy to return to her perch on the top of the couch by the windows she ignored it until it blew over in the last day or so.

I probably bought it because it is pretty but looking forward to reading it soon too.

Books! Despite leaving a pile in New Jersey, many seem to have found their way back here too. As much as I have embraced reading electronically where I can (all new novels and what I can find on my list for 19th and early 20th century writers) I must say somehow a stack of books has built up next to the bed. They are mostly one off old novels and volumes of short stories from the 1910’s. If I find any new leads into interesting writers I will let you know. The most recent Rosa Mulholland book acquisitions reside there, while several earlier volumes remained in New Jersey. (Earlier posts on her novels can be found here, here and here.)

I am enjoying a book of short stories, Nancy’s Country Christmas, 1904, by someone named Eleanor Holt which I purchased on one of our trips to the Antiques Annex. Unfortunately this volume seems to be her only published effort aside from a magazine serialization or two and the internet has yielded little. I would read more of her if there was more to read.

*Very few of the books I buy still have their covers!*

In the pile are: Natalie’s Chum by Anna Chapin Ray, 1905; Our Bessie by Rosa Nouchette Cary (nicely illustrated) with no publication date but a note on the flyleaf of 1896; and a later addition of Janet Hardy in Hollywood by Ruth Wheeler, a series book from 1935. To his credit I think Kim is reading his way through things largely purchased and left to pick back up in New York. His nose has been buried in The Education of Henry Adams for a while now since we got back – in an interesting horizontal paperback form designed to distribute to GI’s. He read reprints of the Superman saga during some of his vacation in New Jersey but luckily for our limited space, was able to leave them at the house there.

I am a rather voracious reader when I get going and I have read a number of contemporary novels recently as well. I generally review them very briefly on Goodreads if you ever wonder what I am reading when I get into the 21st century. I am partial to books about time travel and for example highly recommend The Ministry of Time (here) and, slightly different, The Life Impossible (and here). I am a fast reader and the books pile up so I am glad they are largely electronic. Some are so splendid though I do miss having physical copies. I also miss the ability to hand my copy of an excellent book over to a friend.

*Stack of books among those next to the bed right now.*

Aside from digesting stuff and somehow sorting it into the apartment, there is so much to do as there is for all of us in this back-to-school time of year. I am struggling through the last of the paperwork for my mother’s estate (having saved the worst for last I am afraid; the transfer of retirement accounts is ferocious), the apartment here needs attention (plumber anyone? I can’t seem to get a call back and our toilet needs to be replaced), and soon the weather will inform me it is time to turn the closets over and a long delayed need to weed through them. I have made two fall clothing purchases and both are brown which is different for me – we’ll see how that works out. I will say we have very limited closet space and it is that moment when summer and fall clothes are cheek to jowl. My list for what needs doing is long!

Adjusting to our somewhat miniscule kitchen and away from my garden means a different kind of cooking – more just assembling than cooking really. It took a week or two but I seem to have reacquired the skill set. Kim and I have remembered the sort of dance required for both of us to be in there – let alone when the cats want to be with us! However, soup time is upon us and I am mentally gearing up to schedule in my weekly soup making. (Recipes for soups can be found in prior posts here and here.)

THE PORDENONE SILENT FILM FESTIVAL 2025 – 44TH EDITION: SPECIAL EVENTS AND RETROSPECTIVES

The super charged energy of fall will help – street festivals, dates to see friends, new exhibitions. Even for us early film fans there are options – a favorite, the Perdenone Silent Film Festival, is the first week in October and broadcast online with a subscription. (Information about the festival can be found here.) Next weekend I travel back to New Jersey for some appointments there. Mum season will have begun (I like a good couple of mums on the front steps – can’t compete with Park Avenue shown above though) and I will start to turn my thoughts to getting the garden ready for winter and the eventual holiday season there.

This ended up being longer than planned so thank you if you stayed with me to the end! Also a shout out to all of you as Pictorama crossed the 500 member line last week. Thank you!

Dahlia Days and Jersey Delights

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Post: These are not only the dog days of summer but International Dog Day as I sit down to start this. No dogs here in the House of Seven Cats and I think the Jersey Five find the addition of the two New Yorkers two too many more let alone pups.

Blackie has wiled most of his days away in our bedroom when not hunting up Cookie (who resides in Kim’s studio upstairs) and eating her food. He’s also gotten into numerous tussles with Beau, the head of cats here and fluffed himself up into a righteously puffy Halloween-esque fellow. I am trying to resolve the problem with an extra can of food in the late afternoon. It might be working.

*The view from the back deck one glorious afternoon.*

I am on the back deck as I write, where I have spent many happy hours this vacation. Stormy, the gray tabby who seems to be perpetually surprised and terrified by the world, is at the back door looking out – hoping against hope that a fat fly will land on the screen door for her to chase.

Labor Day comes early this year but having said that the light in the afternoon already has a fall look and I have seen large v’s of birds starting to make their trek south. The evenings are chilly enough to warrant a jacket and I am starting to eye the little used fire pit. However, the earlier part of the day in full sun can be roiling hot so we are not there yet.

With heavy spring rain and subsequent dry spells the dahlias are slow to bloom this year but their show now that it has started is worthy. A few new entries are small in bloom stature but bursting with bright colors, red and white and an orange red and yellow. My beloved hummingbirds come to feast on them and they go from one to another and back to a favorite – like a bird buffet. ( Does anyone know what I mean when I say hummingbirds, hanging in the air, look like they are somehow stopping time?)

I can almost always find bees tucked in the centers of the dahlias, drowsily, drunkenly and dizzily covered in pollen. The strawberry plants are also enjoyed by the hummingbirds and are overflowing with flowers right now. I think I’ve mentioned before that they oddly produce only the tiniest, almost doll sized fruit – delicious but bizarrely small.

The tomato plants promise produce, hanging green on the vine but ripening SO slowly. Another producing tiny tasty yellow cherry tomatoes is doing a great business – unusually small but tasty bits being the order of the day here I guess. We pop small handfuls in our mouth, still warm from the sun. The jalapeno peppers are bountiful (and perversely huge) and of course are the hardest to use up quickly without killing my diners with devilishly spicy treats.

This year has felt like a real vacation. Kim and I have taken long daily walks to the neighboring towns, shopped in the antique stores and scored some items. We brought piles of books from New York (and admittedly added to them) and we have worked our way through almost all of them. Kim has been catching up on some of my Rosa Mulholland recommendations including one I brought with me that arrived shortly before our departure. In addition he has made occasional trips to the comic book store in Red Bank (Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash of Kevin Smith fame) where he has amassed books reproducing the Superman saga.

*From my favorite perch at the comic book store, reading work email while Kim looks.*

Kim and I both worked for the first two weeks here after arriving in early August and we’ll put in a few days from here after Labor Day. Last week I wrote about our pending visit with Bill which kicked off our vacation and below are some photos memorializing his visit. (Bill, if you’re reading this, we found both the Reed Crandall book AND the Pinocchio book after you left! They were on an overlooked shelf together.)

Tonight is our first visit this year to the local Fireman’s Fair. (I wrote about it last summer in a post here.) Although I have reserved the right to go again when another friend visits from Manhattan this weekend.

I recently told Kim if he wants to sound like a native New Jersey-er he weigh in on the state of the summer’s corn and tomatoes – peaches for the bonus round. We take these things very seriously and the quality of Garden State produce is of great local importance. This year corn is small but good corn can be found with some work – it is perhaps just late as it has improved as the month has gone on. The tomatoes are somewhat underwhelming unless you hit one of the El Dorados of good ones (or can convince the ones on your deck to ripen) and eat them quickly before they go from ripe to bad. All but one purchase of peaches failed the test – however last night had some that had been purchased at the peach of ripeness before going bad, ate them with ice cream and felt like we really hit it at last.

In this spirit I began to make tomato pie. After looking at numerous recipes I settled on a simple one which I share below. The tomatoes need to be bled of water briefly before starting and I used a pre-made crust. (For all my apparent cooking talents there’s something about pie crust which I have never gotten into the rhythm of properly.)

Fifteen minutes to throw together and this is in the oven cooking away for 45 minutes or more and it is without question best if consumed immediately – it is inferior when reheated. My only other word of advice is that you should pack it as full of tomato layers as possible because they shrink in the cooking and my first effort looked a bit woebegone as a result. Dan and Cathy Theodore were the first to try my pie and liked it enough to ask for the recipe, but more about their visit and the gift they brought in another post.

Recipe:

1 pie crust
1/2 red onion, sliced thinly into rounds
1/4 cup mayonnaise
6 ounces shredded mozzarella cheese
3-4 ripe tomatoes, sliced about 1/4-1/2 inch thin
4 tablespoons fresh basil, sliced into ribbons (chiffonade)
salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 400F.
Line a 9″ tart pan with prepared pie dough. Poke a few holes in the dough with a fork, then cover with parchment paper and pie weights or dried beans. Bake for 15 minutes, until crust is starting to turn golden.
While the crust bakes, slice the tomatoes on several sheets of paper towels and sprinkle with salt. Flip and salt the other side as well. Let the tomatoes sit for 10 minutes, then blot off moisture with dry towels.
Mix together the mayonnaise and the shredded cheese, and spread the mixture in the parbaked pie crust. Sprinkle 2-3 tablespoons of the basil on top.
Top with one layer of the sliced tomatoes, the onions, followed by a second layer of tomatoes. Add a third layer if space permits. Sprinkle liberally with salt and pepper. (If like me you are worried that the tomatoes are salty from the bleeding the wiping them down wipes off most of the salt.)
Bake for 30 minutes, until crust is golden and some juices along the edge of the pie crust are bubbling. Remove from the oven and set aside for 20 minutes to cool before slicing. Tip with the remaining basil and serve warm or room temperature.

Note: Tomato pie is best served on the day it is made, but leftovers can be store in the refrigerator and reheated in the oven at 350 degrees for 12-20 minutes.

PS – At top, Beauregard, top cat of the Jersey Five, in a pout before we left today!

Pussy Cat Portrait

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Post: This is a bit of a hold the presses Pictorama post. This arrived from Great Britain yesterday as I write and I ADORE it. Now I understand that some of you think I may have really gone dotty at long last. I admit that paintings have been a bit out of my purchasing purview (and buying them online seems really dubious), but I saw this one in an auction preview and was indeed interested. I ended up coming late to the auction and I was sure it had been snatched up however miraculously it had not and it was reasonably price. Mine, mine, mine!

It has taken a few long weeks to arrive at our shores and was dropped off on our doorstep here in NJ while we ate dinner last night. I was showing a friend out and there it was. Oh bliss!

The painting came to me from a new friend who sold me the cat match striker and the lovely green cat face dish. (For those posts with items from @oldstockantiques have a look here and here.) Eventually tariffs on antiques from abroad are going to come for me but I have been purchasing unbidden meanwhile. Or I’ll just go broke!

Anyway, it isn’t too large, about 8″x 8” (unframed) and surprisingly the cat is white rather than my generally preferred black. He (or she) is a little fluffball of a kitty, perhaps just out of kittenhood. There is just something pleasantly insane and maniacal in the cat’s eyes. Between that and the somewhat electrified look of the fur there is, for me, a slightly Louis Wain-ish look of influence about it. It appears to be an oil painting

There are a few bits of damage to the surface (rather charmingly under the circumstances, there is a cat hair or two stuck to it) and it is painted on an inexpensive bit of prepared board with a small hook at the top for hanging. I didn’t see it at first but it says Angela 1977. Whoever Angela was she did a splendid job and I wouldn’t mind finding the thrift store where more of her work is for sale. (That is fantasy worthy.)

I need to go wandering around the house to see where it is going to live, some place where I will get to see it frequently when I am here however!

Picking

Posted by Pam's Pictorama

Pam’s Pictorama Post: I recently bought this photo in one of my jaunts to the Red Bank Antiques recently. It is the kind of quiet photo that catches my eye sometimes and seems fitting for the house here in New Jersey.

This pair has been picking something although hard to say what, my first thought was apples. I don’t know if this a local photo – there’s nothing on the back for date or location. Those wooden buckets could have held peaches or even cherries just as easily. There is a nice rock fence behind them.

The woman’s dress puts this at the 1910’s or there abouts. She looks cool despite her layers of cotton. The man looks a bit warmer in his rolled up shirtsleeves and suspenders. I love the way the sun filters through the leaves. I think it will find its way to our guest room in anticipation of a friend coming at the end of the week.

I wrote a post about picking cherries at my grandmother’s house as a kid. (It can be found here.) Those cherries were cooked down into preserves that we would eat all winter.

A friend suggested peach picking this summer, but we have not attempted it. The peaches seem a bit off this year and as a result I have taken to cooking them down in an easy recipe shared by a friend.

I take all my overripe fruit and cut it up – today will be peaches, nectarines and blueberries. I sprinkle just a bit of sugar, spoonful (I am using regular but you might want to use brown), lemon juice and most importantly lemon zest. Pop it in a baking dish at 375 for about 45 minutes until bubbly. Yummy hot, but great in yogurt or over ice cream once you have refrigerated.