yonmei

11:44 am: I love pure black cats

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PS But Bob left the house at the same time as me today and sat on the top step looking up at me with enchanting wide eyes and I petted her and wished I could sit on the top step with her drinking tea. Me, not her. Bob does not drink tea.

Tags: bob, wolf

05:13 pm: Am HOME!
Priority Actions:
1. Hug Bob, because she's acting awfully unloved.
2. Open windows! 'cause the place smells awfully stuffy
3. Feed cats.
4. Pet Wolf's nose, because it's the longest I've ever been away in his LIFE and he had his 2nd birthday while I was gone and he's acting like he's not sure who I am any more
5. Change litter in litter trays, light incense and oilburner in bathroom
6. ...check e-mail! E-mail solo to tell her I'd love to go bungee jumping with her and another slash fan in a couple of weeks.
7. Also, need to e-mail catsitter to tell her I'm home and catsitter's employer to ask her to bill me.
8. While hoping it will stop raining before I walk over to Tattie Shaw's, get involved with the retweet game on #welovetheNHS.
9. Realise it is Scotland, after all, and the rain is not going to stop, so go out anyway to buy fresh fruit and milk

Tags: bob, everybody lies, evil american politics, evil americans advertising against nhs, health, lists, weather, wolf

11:15 am: Took Wolf to the vet this morning
He's in awesomely good health and good condition, and he weighs 4.7 kilos - about 1.5 kilos more than Bob. He's almost too big for the cat cage - but he's just about two years old and I kind of hope he has actually stopped growing. (He hates the cage, poor baby, but when we got to the vet he stayed inside it until literally dragged out, and spent most of the time on the vet's table with his nose pushed into my fleece looking up at me with big gold worried eyes.)

(I will have had Wolf for two years on the 7th of August this year, and he was just six weeks old when I got him, so... yes, he had his 2nd birthday at the end of June.)

Tags: wolf

12:42 pm: Bob is too thin.
She's 3.1 kilos. The thinnest she's been before, last September, was 3.2 kilos. She went up to 3.4 kilos last time she saw the vet.

She had an appointment to be seen by the vet this morning, and the vet went over her thoroughly - no lump in her thyroid, no sign of tumours elsewhere. No reason she should have lost weight, except she has and is: she's eating but not enough. She's lively as usual, and affectionate at me and growly at Wolf. But too thin.

She feels far too light when I pick her up.

I couldn't even make this post last night, I was too worried. I feel better that the vet's checked her over - I was thinking (among other horrid prospects) that how Cally went was a tumour in her stomach that stopped her from eating.

Wolf is ginormous. I'm going to have to buy a bigger cage to take him to the vet next month for his booster shots: he'll never fit into the one I use for Bob.

Tags: bob, cats, wolf

09:18 am: Wolf and weather
We've had really lovely weather the past few days - beautifully warm and sunny. Even at night it never really got cold. Wolf's been going out (and staying out) all hours.

Last night it started to rain. It's grey and mizzly today.

Wolf ran to the front door. I opened it for him. He stood looking out. Then he turned round and ran back inside.

(A few minutes later, he got me to open the front door again, but the weather hadn't changed. Too bad, Wolfcat!)




Tags: weather, wolf

04:17 pm: Of strawberries, carpets, cats, and kittens
I am in my bedroom, and Bob is sitting beside me, looking very wary and disconcerted. A bloke called Alan, who looks far too young to have a regular job (yes, yes, I am getting old) is cleaning my hall and stair carpet, for £45. The company what is doing it is H2O. He is using some kind of powdery green chemical which - I was checking out the label on the giant carton - is remarkably short on specifics: it's Heavy Duty Detergent, made by Prochem, 30% phosphates, do not get on bare skin, keep away from small children. Contains ionic and anionic cleaners, FWIW.

Anyway. The point of paying someone else to clean the hall carpet is to find out if this improves my nose. My allergy, rather, but we'll call it my nose. Properly, my guess is, I would need to have someone else clean every carpet in the house, but as I am achieving this by stacking the various things that normally live in the hall in my bedroom or the sitting-room, I'll stick with the carpet which I definitely notice as incredibly dusty a lot of the time. (It gets vacuumed more, but needs it more.)

Alan rang this morning to find out if he could come round earlier than 4pm (the original appointment had been made for arrival any time between 4 and 5:30) but I said no, as I had my usual Saturday stuff to do.

Walked over to the pet shop (the nearest one to me that sells Hills Science Diet: I also bought a bag of Burns biscuit to see if Bob could also be tempted with that, and a wee bag of cod liver capsules, which I intend handfeeding to Bob on a daily basis (because it will make me feel better about her being so skinny, since you ask, not because the vet is specially recommending this). And as I was packing all this into my backpack, the assistant tells me they have a new litter of kittens in.

Cally's mother Amber came from this shop, back in 1988 - back then, before the SSPCA had got going on "Please sterilise your cat unless you intend to be a breeder", the "new litter of kittens" happened quite a lot. Less frequent now. Much less frequent now. The pet shop always used to accept a healthy litter, at least six weeks old and weaned, and offer them for sale for £5 each plus. (The plus would be where they made their profit: when Ajay bought Amber and Witch, she got a stack of stuff with them - the kitten food, litter tray, handbook, plus a load of free advice.)

Anyway, so, I went to look and stayed to squee. I feel slightly guilty because of the health risk (to the kittens: while my cats are vaccinated, no one asked me if I was safe), but I even picked two of the kittens up: a tiny little fluffy grey thing with four white paws who looked at me with amiable bewilderment, and a slightly larger fluffy grey thing with a ginger mask, who was practically dropping asleep from over-excitement (I put her back in the cage after a minute, and she went from bounce to nap before she could yawn). I was tempted - I really was - but Bob was not happy about Wolf, and though the pair of them are getting on much better now (I distinctly saw Bob sniffing/licking Wolf over last night) I don't think she'd be happy to be presented with Brand New Kitten. Though Wolf would probably think it was cute. But no. One should never impulse-buy kittens. Though I saw a couple of girls who were squeeing before I left who very evidently wanted their mum to impulse-buy kittens for them. There was also a very bouncy long-haired tabby, who if I'd been seriously on the look-out for a kitten, would probably have been my serious considered choice: awesomely pretty when she grows up, plus clearly extremely healthy, active, and definitely weaned. (The smaller kittens, I suspect, were still doing a "where's mum??" a bit.)

And then I walked down to Tattie Shaws and bought pears from Belgium and apples from France, and four satsumas, and ... my first strawberries this year. I've been resisting the berries flown in from Spain or elsewhere, because really, I know they won't taste of anything much: but Scottish strawberries, misshapen and slightly pale though they are, perfume the air: I bought a whole punnet, and ate half within minutes as soon as I got home. Yum. (The other half I kept for breakfast tomorrow.) You can get "fresh strawberries" that have been airlifted in so easily that it's way too easy to forget what strawberries really taste like - the scented, indescribably sweet, fruity flavour of a berry that was sun-ripened and attached to a bush only 24 hours ago.

The Alan finished, and my carpet is now way cleaner than it was. (He poured the water from downstairs down my kitchen sink, which I am none too happy with: I need to go buy sink unblocker now.)



Tags: berries, bob, carpet cleaning, cats, kittenlove!, nose of a nose, wolf

11:50 pm: Home safe, cats are fine, tired out
Wolf and Bob are both very obviously Not Talking To Me.

Also: this little dragon has 22 hours to live:


This little dragon has a couple of days to go:


This little egg was snagged as my home-from-Redemption dragon gift:


Tags: bob, dragon eggs need clicky, redemption, wolf

12:38 pm: So, I took Bob to the vet this morning
...and the scale wobbled back and forth between 3.3 and 3.4 kilos (same as last time) but the vet identified the worrying rash/scabs on her back as a standard reaction to fleabites. Even though I hadn't spotted any flea dirt, on Bob or on Wolf, and the vet couldn't find any either, he still thought the pattern was unmistakable, so I got a round of steroids for Bob to help with the swelling (and pick up her appetite) and fleakiller for both cats (and will go past Dofos and pick up herbal flea collars for them both). And made an appointment for two weeks time.

Tags: bob, cats, wolf

10:41 pm: Cat politics, etc
Picture this:

Bob is scratching the side of her head. Scritch-scritch-scritch.

Wolf is sitting beside her, watching her quite intently.

Bob stops scritching, sees Wolf watching her, hisses and whacks him.

Wolf snarls and leaps, knocking Bob over (he's a lot bigger than her these days, have I mentioned this?) and they spend about a minute with Wolf's paws and jaws locked in Bob and Bob snarling and kicking at Wolf.

Bob escapes from Wolf's necklock, snarls at Wolf, and heads for the door, Wolf following close behind.

No blood drawn: still just cat politics.

Tags: bob, cat politics, wolf

07:48 pm: FWIW - and not because I think you're at all interested
I find that a 2-kilo bag of Hill's Science Diet catfood lasts my two cats just under 4 weeks. I guess that means they're eating it at about 35g a day. They also get wet food, daily. Bob is looking very well on it: Wolf is blooming.

Tags: bob, wolf

12:32 pm: Things Of Misery
There's the thing. You know.

Also, ranging from the argh to the argharghargh:

I got hardly any sleep last night.
I am about to treat myself to a double-shot espresso and an almond croissant. (WOE and FAIL: all the nearby places that sell almond croissant had sold out. I went to three places and finally made do with what I thought was a pain au raisin and turned out to be a pain au chocolat cunningly disguised.) (Talking to a colleague in another organisation about the thing: she said "You need a cake.")
I made myself ten minutes later this morning hanging washing out on the line because it looked like it was going to be a lovely day, and it is now pouring with rain so the washing will be soaked and will probably (at least) need to be spun and hung up on the pulley in the kitchen. Argh.
I left windows open.
I think Wolf is out. (Though he will probably just find a dry spot to shelter in and complain at me when I get home.)
My roof still leaks a bit.
I have some stuff I have to get done at work before I can get home and I feel like I just want to curl up into a ball and pull the covers over my head.
I got hardly any sleep last night.

Tell me good stuff. I don't care what. Or share your misery. Or tell me something interesting or useful.

Something.

Argharghargh.

Tags: just my life really, weather, wolf

11:52 pm: Wolf headbutting me and purring
Not so very many months ago (Wolf is now about 16 months old) my wee black kitten used to settle himself across my bust and purr to bust himself.

He's too big to do that now.

He was trying for several minutes just now - in the awkward way a cat has when you change the accustomed furniture, or, I suppose, when a tom who's just had yet another adolescent growth spurt discovers he just doesn't fit somewhere he used to. But he really doesn't. Eventually, he settled in a more or less comfortable position, laid his head on my shoulder, and purred approvingly for a few minutes...

...and then got up again to have himself a snack.

Tags: wolf

04:50 pm: Coffee and tiny doughnut
I have just had a mug of coffee and a tiny sugary ring doughnut.

The coffee was excellent: the doughnut mediocre: but the combination was lovely.

I am due to go to the gym tonight. I packed a Stoats bar to snack on to avoid hunger.

Now why shouldn't the healthy snack of a Stoats porridge bar just kind of cancel out the unhealthy irresistibleness of, um... doughnut? (I'd had another earlier with my lunch, so I already knew they were slightly mediocre. I have high standards about doughnuts, on the, I feel, perfectly rational grounds that anything that bad for you really ought to be delicious. I feel the same way about mince pies.)

I had to go home again right after lunch to pick up a file I needed I thought I had emailed to myself, and as it looked to be set dry for the afternoon, and both Bob and Wolf wanted to go out, I left them both sitting on the steps, looking a bit surprised... they haven't both been outdoors at once in ages, it seems.

I have updates about Bob, but they can wait till post-gym.

Tags: bob, cat politics, coffee, food politics, gym membership, wolf

12:02 am: Wolf's new friend
( ...is called Scallawag )

Tags: kittenlove!, wolf

10:57 am: Naarmamo 2008: Day 1 and Day 2
naarmamo: Days 1-3 here.

( August 1: Light from a mirror )

( August 2: Hunter in the grass )

Tags: naarmamo, naarmamo2008, photos, reflections, wolf

10:54 pm: Wolf! Foxes are not cat toys!
I was coming home this evening, shopping bags in one hand, phone in the other, chatting to Mike (miking to Chat?) and this rough-looking fox-coloured ...oh, it is a fox! ...raced past me, out of my garden into my neighbour's garden and away down the street.

And after the fox, black tail bushed out and more than slightly bouncy...

Whether Wolf really did chase the fox, or the fox just heard me coming and ran and Wolf is crediting himself with scaring off the fox, or, Wolf got delusions of grandeur and figured since he could kill a mouse he could kill a fox...

...I dunno. On the one hand: it's extremely cool that we have a neighbourhood fox. Seeing a fox around our gardens is much neater than seeing rabbits.

On the other hand, eek. I am glad that Wolf is probably too big to be acceptable prey for a fox - my guess is an adult cat (and Wolf is big enough to be considered adult, even if he's got a year's growth to come) is too big/too well-clawed for a sensible adult fox to tackle. But I could wish that Wolf was warier.

Tags: wolf

02:51 pm: What bloody mouse is this?
( Feline mayhem )

Tags: bob, cats, wolf

05:47 pm: Hee!


By the way, I have discovered who the dominant cat in my household is: yup, still Bob, even if Wolf's bigger. Bob growls: Wolf gets out of the way.

Tags: bob, cat politics, wolf

12:28 am: Wolf, the Mighty Hunter
Wolf just brought me a cow.

(It's about as long as my hand, white-and-black and fluffy.)

He's also yelling at me when the cow doesn't move around enough by itself to be interesting. Unfortunately, while it did once have a string attachment, some overenthusiastic Mighty Hunter broke it some time ago.

( wibbling about Bob )

Tags: bob, wolf, worrying about my cats

11:32 am: OMG. Wolf is a sexual harasser!
I was working out that as I got Wolf on 7th August, and he was six weeks old then, that puts his birthday at about 25th June - so I can call him a midsummer cat and remember his birthday that way.

He is very nearly a year old, and he appears to be going through whatever kind of puberty a castrated cat can go through, housed with a human and a female cat who was spayed 10 years ago (Bob was 8 when I got her in December 2005: I keep not quite wanting to do the arithmetic, but that makes her 11 this year).

This morning, Bob was curled up around my hand and I was petting her lovely furry tummy and she was purring happily - and Wolf leaped up on the bed, eyed us both, did some sniffing around Bob's bum (which Bob ignored) and then he settled himself down behind her, which Bob also ignored... and then he bit her on the back of the neck and clung to her, which she growled at. Eventually he got bored and let go, and now he's sitting on the windowsill chirping at the birds, but...

Oh, Wolf.

( more seriously )

Tags: bob, cat politics, feminism, wolf