The above photo was taken nearly two months before Raisen died. It is the last photo I took of her. I have a video of her taken October 2nd, two weeks before she died, but I'll have to transfer that to AVI or something, so you can view it, sometime.

This page will documents some of the thoughts and rememberances that I have of Raisen. I'm sure I will be adding to this regularly as the thoughts go through my head as days go by.

RAISEN: The Unofficial Spotter Mascot

I am the Coordinator of a local group called Alachua County SKYWARN. This group basically scans the skies during times of severe weather and keeps an eye out for signs of danger, and notifies the National Weather Service when things like tornadoes or damaging winds are spotted.

Often, I'd jokingly refer to Raisen as the Unofficial Spotter Mascot.

I had a vision, that I had seriously intended to make a reality one day, of a public service commercial advertising Alachua County SKYWARN. It went something like this, as I quickly think of it:

  A reporter, unseen in the background, is holding
a mic to a spotter and interviewing him about what
spotting is like.
  The spotter begins to brag about his trained
spotter kitty, `Raisen.'
  Meanwhile, Raisen is sitting atop the roof of the
car in the background, with her back to the camera,
wagging her tail occasionally, nervously, spotting
the churning, dark clouds approaching on the horizon.
She is wearing a "SKYWARN" cap, and a "Official
SKYWARN Spotter" T-shirt.
  The spotter mentions that he always brings water
with him when he and Raisen go out spotting, so that
Raisen always has something to drink in this
high-energy volunteer work.
  He places a bowl of water on the ground.  Raisen
hops down, walks over to the bowl, looks at it, looks
up at the spotter with disgruntlement, looks back
down at the bowl, sniffs it, then scratches at it as
if its something in the litter pan, and up-ends it.
She then walks back to the car, opens the door,
hops in, and closes the door.
  The spotter notices this reaction from his cat,
but continues on with the interview.
  Meanwhile, noone notices that thw winds are just
barely beginning to pick up in the background.
  Suddenly, the car windows automatically rolls up
seemingly by itself.
  Close up of door lock.  A lone paw appears above
the lock button, and presses it down.
  Now the spotter notices this odd behavior, and
his curiosity is raised.  He stops the interview and
begins walking over to the car.  "Raisen?  What
are you doing?"  The winds begin to pick up
noticeably, now, and leaves and other small debris
are starting to whip around.
  Now the spotter realizes what is happening, and he
begins to tug on the door latch more frantically.
"Raisen!  C'mon, man!  Open the door!"  (Winds
starting to get furious, now)  "RAISEN!  OPEN THE
DOOR! ...RAISEN?!!!  HELP!  OPEN THE DOOR!"
  View from the side, as the spotter is now using
all of his energy to try to open the door, panicking.
The winds are now a roar, in the reflection of the
door window, debris can be seen moving by swiftly in
the background, behind the spotter's terrified face.
"RAIIIISENNNN!!!..."
  Fade to black a black screen, while sounds of
destruction and mayhem continue in the background,
and the spotter is screaming, his voice fading in
and out as if being carried farther away, and then
closer again.
  Fade to:  "Got Milk?"
  Fade to black.
  Fade to "Alachua County SKYWARN."
  Commercial ends.

© Copyright 2000 by Todd L. Sherman. All Rights Reserved.