what is the meaning of all this?

"Ao neko" means "blue cat" in Japanese. I lived in Japan for two years what seems like a lifetime ago... but more about that later.

For now, thanks to Andy Warhol for unknowingly lending me this blue cat, part of a drawing of his from the 1950s, with the “purr purr purr” in the background inked by his mother, Julia Warhola. I love her elegant old-world script. Warhol grew up in Pittsburgh, where I met my husband and where we still live. In the early days of being together, we saw an inspirational show of drawings at the Andy Warhol Museum which included this blue cat. It became an emblem for our relationship and, soon after, our wedding, copied onto magnets we sent out to announce the event. Six years later, our life now includes a house, a child, a digital camera, and the urge to broadcast some of our purrs – and maybe the occasional mew, hiss, and yowl – to friends and family over the internet. Excuse me if I can’t bring myself to use the word “blogosphere.” Excuse the frankly forced feline metaphor. Hello!