See what they're capable of?

This is why I don't let Mau out alone.



He wouldn't just head down to a fish and chips shop, either. He'd go to NASA or the Pentagon. And then for fish and chips. He likes fries.

(Thanks to MK for the link.)

Is it wrong to out your cat?

I mentioned earlier that my cat sleeps on a pile of purses in my closet. This might lead you to suspect what I've known all along, that my Mau is gay. (All together now folks, "Not that there's anything wrong with that.")

But rather than discuss his fondness for baby carrots and tufu, or he complete lack of sexual interest in Dulce, his beard wife, I'll just post actual photographic evidence.


It's ok, Mau. We all know, and we all accept you.

Well, HELLO and GOOD MORNING to you too.

"What the hell?" said Nick.

Something large and furry stepped on my face, danced around on my hair on the pillow, finally coming to a rest with a wiggling, full body cuddle between Nick and I.

Two facts registered through the sleep fog.
It was three AM, and this was NOT Luca.



I opened my eyes and thought fast.


My bed? Check.

My house? Check.

My dog? No.


Somehow the neighbor's dog Kylie (yeah, that Kylie) had gotten in. Perhaps we left the door open, but Kylie is one hell of a smart dog and it wouldn't surprise me if she figured out how to open our kitchen door.
As Nick escorted her out, and Luca hovered nervously, no doubt worried that his friend's bad behavior might reflect on him, I searched for the Dulce and Mau. (Kylie's a sweetheart, and I would have let her stay, but she has a hard time resisting the urge to chase the cats.)

I found Mau in his new favorite perch, sleeping on a stack of purses in the closet. He only bothered to open one eye to view all the chaos. I expected to find Dulce clinging to the ceiling, but luckily she was only mildly ruffled by the tornado of dog that had blown through.



As we all dropped back into bed, Nick said, "sorry," assuming he'd left the door ajar earlier. But as he and Luca and I all melted into a sleepy pile with Dulce on top like a cherry, all I could do was smile.

In 50 words or less.....

DayDreamer's husband, The Scientist, says that he read that if you say more than 50 words an hour to your cat, you're crazy.

I say that if you stick to the same 50, and just repeat them, you're ok. If you limit your vocab to 50, then you're obviously not seeking the answer to life's mysteries, you're just chatty.

Right?


I counted, and I can say pretty much everything I need to say to my cats in a mere 17 words. No really. I counted. (And alphabetized.)

1. a
2. aren’t
3. come
4. Dulce/Mau
5. here
6. hungry
7. in
8. kittykins
9. lap
10. little
11. mama’s
12. my
13. pretty/handsome
14. scratchy-scratch
15. tuna
16. want
17. you

Anybody want a Dulce?

No, I haven't mastered cloning her (yet) but last night I combed enough hair off of her to make an extra cat.
Very economical, Jonny says.
Any takers?

Normally they don't shed much. I've been pretty lucky in that respect. For one thing, they're both only long hair crosses, so while they have the length of a long haired cat, it's nowhere near as thick as you'd think. Also, since our temperature here doesn't fluctuate much, they don't tend to grow big winter coats, and so what shedding they do is just normal hair loss.

But they do bulk up slightly for winter, and with our little heat wave this week, I was noticing that they were leaving a layer of hair where ever they slept.

Both cats loved to be brushed, but Dulce is much easier. She curls up in your lap, occasionally rolling over for you to get another spot. But Mau objects to staying put, as a matter of principle. You have to follow him around while you brush him.

I'm a bit slow on the uptake.

We had a bit of heat wave lately. Not that heat is unusual here, or that it's even really that hot, but it was a bit hotter than it generally is in March. It's been about 95, 96 degrees the past couple days.

On Sunday, I figured it really was time for all the boxes to be unpacked. I mean, we've lived there two and a half months now. And I was only sick for one of those months, so really, I'm out of excuses. So I busted my (cute) little (well, maybe not little but certainly endearing and love able) tush and emptied out the last of the boxes. A large percentage I emptied straight into the trash or donation bins because, lets face it, I can't have missed it that much in the past two months or I would have dug it out.

I actually have a usable closet now, instead of a cat fort of boxes overflowing out into the bedroom. Wooo-hoooo! Woooo-hooooo for me! Not so much woooooo-hoooooooo for Mau, who misses the cardboard cat fort. I found a box of blankets that he had somehow burrowed into, like Saddam, or Bin Ladin.

Anyway, as I was doing all this, I got really hot and sweaty. I tried to figure out why. Had I accidentally turned the heat on? That happened once in my old Postage Stamp apartment, the heat was so rarely used that it had been painted over and I only discovered it in the middle of the night when I woke up in what felt like a sauna, because I had accidentally bumped it on earlier while using it to hang a Christmas decoration.
Was the oven on? Were all the appliances heating the place up? The heat lamp in the bathroom?

Nope.

I didn't get it until I walked outside.

"OooooooooOOOOooooh. It's hot inside because it's a HOT DAY."

Time for me to bore you with more pictures of my pets.

Poor Mau couldn't figure out how to finish this puzzle of Mount Rushmore.

It didn't even look right from this angle.

And he knows I'm gonna blog this.

Christmas 2006

All is calm, all is bright....







Sleep in heavenly peace.

Rudolf the Twitchy-Nosed Bunny .....

........ likes to nibble on my clothes.
And if you ever saw him,
You would even have to admit that-my-boyfriend-is-totally-better-than-yours, sorry-to-have-to-say-it-but-it's-true.
All of the other pets,
Are threatened/attracted by his irresistible cuteness,
They all want to sniff him,
Turning the living room into a big reindeer game.


Ok, I suck at song parodies.

On my birthday, we went down to the El Cajon Animal Shelter, and in our (my) anxiousness to get a bunny, we got there quite early. While we drank coffee and (I) paced back and forth, a man pulled up with a kitten he'd found, to drop it off. I asked to hold him. He was so cuddly and friendly (and flea-bitten) that I had a very narrow escape from getting a kitten as well.
But a woman pulled up early, and she'd been looking for an orange tabby kitten all over, so she took him home for a fleabath.

At ten, they let us in and showed us the two bunnies they had. Oreo was a little white bunny with black spots, very cute (might still be there, only a five dollar adoption fee, folks), but it was Rudolf that stole my heart. They weren't kidding when they described him as the bunny you always wanted. He's got personality for miles and miles.

When we got home with him, I swear Mau rolled his eyes at us, but he doesn't quite know what to make of Rudolf. He keeps looking at me like, "What the heck IS it?"

It's your new friend, Mau. Keep him close, he might have world domination plans of his own.

Every Morning....

...... while Nick is in the shower, I steal a few moments.
I crawl back into bed and Luca and Dulce join me, and sometimes Mau (he's more of a goodnight snuggler).

And Luca is like a little boy with is first crush. He licks Dulce's face, then panics when she headbutts him back, and buries his face in my neck for courage.

Oh yes. It's all as cute as it sounds.

You Know Why Kids Like Me?

Kids like me because I have this obsessive compulsive NEED to buy things out of those quarter machines, and yet generally have no need for the stuff that comes out.
With the exception of watermelon gumballs (yum) and bouncy balls (Mau likes 'em).

I wonder if that counts as a gambling addiction, being addicted to the quarter machines.