can you have a kitten for a spirit animal?

we have to take our sunshine however we can get it these days. what you can't really tell in this photo is that the sun was shining brightly simultaneously with it pissing down rain. i'm not sure why the rain didn't show in the photo. maybe because of all of that dazzling green. or maybe it's demonic rain that doesn't show on camera. whatever it is, i swear it was raining.

the weather has sucked for weeks now and it's affecting my mood. the dismal danish election results didn't help. we knew we'd landed in the middle of the danish countryside equivalent of orange county, but learning that 41% of the population in our area voted for dansk folkeparti, the most xenophobic, conservative, right-wing party in denmark, was disheartening to say the least, especially with their attitude towards foreigners, what with being one and all. i'm still not over it. and neither is husband. he's now joined two political parties, to try them both out and see which one is for him.

at least we have kittens. they do help improve my mood. i was feeling a bit down and decidedly headachy at one point today, having one of those (thankfully seldom) moments of reading facebook and feeling like the whole world has a way better life than me, and the kittens scrambled up to me and proceeded to bombard me with their cuteness until i felt better. cats are the best therapy.

i also spent some time weeding in the garden and watering in the greenhouse. that helps too. there's something just so honest about weeding. you can't get around it and it just takes the time and effort that it takes. and it's so strangely satisfying. so much of what we do today is ephemeral, just a series of 0s and 1s when it comes down to it, but weeding, you can literally feel between your fingers and you can actually see the results of what you've done. it's so wonderfully analog. and there are days when that's precisely what one needs. but a kitten or two doesn't hurt.

i wonder if a kitten is my spirit animal?

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there is a real (im)migration crisis going on in europe

and this article (in slightly strange norwegian english) brings it home.

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a bit of inspiration from

seven decades of soviet photography.

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and for a laugh?

buzzfeed showed pictures of danish stuff to non-danes.

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if you're listening to season 2 of the start-up podcast,

you should read this piece on their feature company.