2-10-12

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Remember Pepsi, in this picture I keep making y’all look at?

I meant to mention this before – Pepsi reminded me of Myrtle (actual name: Moondance), who is Joe Bob’s sister.

Moondance and Moonman (which was Joe Bob’s name before we adopted him) were with us for a few weeks in January/ February 2007, because they needed a break from the cage at Petsmart and we had room for them. This is Joe Bob, five years ago:

He looks really young, but he was about a year and a half old there.

(Myrtle/ Moondance was adopted at Petsmart. Joe Bob was adopted and then returned, and then when Spot passed away a couple of years ago, Fred declared that we needed to adopt Joe Bob because he’s such a good boy!)

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DUDE. Kanga is the long-lost twin of my kitty, Beth!

http://twitpic.com/8behmj
https://twitter.com/#!/thekittehonion/status/165586930917048320/photo/1
https://twitter.com/#!/thekittehonion/status/165587108638101505/photo/1

‘cuse the mess in the last photo, I just took the pic five seconds ago. But that’s SO FREAKY! Wow.

Also, I may have borrowed Stinkerbelle’s name for Beth (who was named Beth before I adopted her) because it’s so fitting. Seriously, the girl can clear a room. It’s pretty bad. (She answers to that and “Stinkerbean.” Rarely Beth, hah.)

Here’s Kanga, for comparison purposes:

I can see the resemblance!

Also, Stinkerbelle would like it known that she is NOT stinky, despite the awful name we saddled her with. In fact, she’s a LADY and does not use the litter box or burp or pass gas in any way. Never has. Her only unladylike behavior is hissing and smacking, and really – a lady can only take so much before she’s forced to fight back!

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Ellie Bellie sure takes a “wide stance” doesn’t he? Keep him out of public restrooms, for goodness’ sake. 😉

Indeed he does. And just WHAT are you implying? (HEE.)

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I am lazy, but would you please share once again what camera you are using again??? The photos you’ve been taking recently have been so amazing. Especially the close-ups!

Thank you! My camera is the Sony SLT-A55, which I’ve had since mid-October – you may recall that the Sony DSLR-A100 I had been using for the previous several years (I think we got it in 2006) was shattered when a cat peed on it (SIGH) and then I dropped it on the floor. I spent a long time dithering over what kind of camera to get, and in the end decided to stay with Sony. Every one of our digital cameras have been Sonys (our very first one took floppy disks. FLOPPY DISKS! It was 1832.), and I’ve always loved them, so even though I might occasionally send a flirty eye in the direction of Nikon, I’ll likely stay with Sony foreverrrrrrr. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, right?

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Are those big glass jars of cat toys on your bookcase? 🙂

My bookcase, let me show you it:

Top shelf, left to right: cat nip, 5 jars of cat toys (shaddup), polyfill for cat beds I have yet to make.
Second shelf: paint, canvas, ribbons, glue, paint brushes, a metric ton of Mod Podge (I am not a painter; I started a project wherein I Mod Podged pictures to canvases for hanging on the wall. It’s a project that I abandoned and keep meaning to get back to.)
Third shelf: Lots of fabric for cat beds.
Fourth shelf: Cook books, cross-stitch alphabet books, other random books.
Fifth shelf: Left, a plastic box full of HATS FOR THE CATS (am not a crazy cat lady, shaddup). Right, various and assorted instruction booklets for various and assorted appliances that we own.
Bottom shelf: Nothing. WHAT IF WE PUT SOMETHING ON THE BOTTOM SHELF AND A CAT WANTED TO SIT THERE?!?!?

Perhaps next week I’ll share a picture of the huge bin of cat toys that’s hiding in my closet!

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Dear sweet ole Miz Pooter Pie… My little old lady was an opinionated mess, but I loved her for 18 years (Well, longer actually since she’s been gone for over a year. Guess we’ll call it 20 years and counting.) I love all kitties, but the seniors steal my heart every.stinking.time.

Everett can’t help himself. Whatever is cooking in that pot just smells too good!! Little old Norman has turned into a scavenger… up on the counters, helping himself to whatever you were planning to eat. We forget we have to be on guard. I haven’t cooked a single meal lately where food prep hasn’t been interrupted by a gasp, quickly followed by a shrieked “Norman!” The other cats may be counter-sitters, but they know better than to mess with our food. Thankfully we have lots of counter space to allow them a “lounge”. After serious neglect, illness, and a long stint in the shelter, poor Norm is a bag of bones so I let him eat whatever he stakes a claim to. I imagine I’ll pay for that eventually.

Ha – Everett isn’t headed for that pot because there’s anything in it that smells so good. There’s nothing but water in that pot. Why, I know you’re dying to know, is there a pot of water on the stove? Am I going to boil some eggs? Make some rice? What?

That pot lives on the stove, and it is always filled with water. When I’ve used the stovetop to make dinner (or whatever), I slide the pot of water over onto the eye so that any cats who get up on the counter won’t try to walk across the hot eye and burn their feet. (I’d like to take credit for this brilliant idea, but a reader suggested it to me, and I’ve been using it ever since.)

The unintended consequence of the constant pot of water is that some of the cats prefer to drink out of the pot of water on the stove rather than one of the 63,000 other water sources in the house. Kara, especially, prefers the pot of water on the stove, and in fact I think that’s her primary source of water. Which means that I never use that pot for cooking, and I have to clean it out and refill it once a day.

Spoiled? My cats? NAH.

(But I do think that your sweet boy Norman (NORM!) deserves some spoiling and you might regret it eventually – or maybe when he puts on some weight, he’ll be a little less of a scavenger. Alls you can do is wait and see. 🙂 )

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Robyn, of all the cats you’ve owned in your life, who is your Favorite Cat of All Time?

I could give you a reason for why every cat I’ve ever owned is my favorite cat of all time, but I’m going to be honest, here: Miz Poo is my heart cat. I loved her the moment I saw her, and I’ve loved her ever since, even though she sneezes in my face and climbs up on me and blocks my view of the TV and then sits there and smacks her lips and somehow manages to put all her body weight on one paw so that it HURTS. I know that I annoy her, too, when I pick the boogers out of her eyes and make her stop licking herself in the middle of the night (she shakes the bed and OH it drives me crazy) and nudge her out of the way so I can see the TV. But I just love her so much, and she’s getting older and slowing down, and I know that she’s not always going to be here with me, so I make a point at least once a day of picking her up and giving her some extra attention because as much as I love her, she loves me too. (Which doesn’t stop her from greeting every visitor to the house with a panicked, desperate “My GOD, are you here to save me from this awful place?!” look in her eyes.)

(Also, Mister Boogers is probably in second place, but you know that I love the heck out of all my cats, right? Because now I feel guilty for having a favorite!)

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Miz Poo reminds me of an old (and MUCH loved) Raggedy Ann doll I once had. She looks like a sweetie-pie.

and

Miz Poo looks like she needs a squeeze, but I don’t suppose she’d appreciate it!

and

Miz Poo has such interesting pretty coloration. I’m sorry to hear she’s a mess. How old is she?

Miz Poo is absolutely a sweetheart, and if you wanted to pick her up and give her a squeeze, she would LOVE YOU FOREVER.

She’s 13 years old, I got her in November of 1999 and she was, I don’t know – 10 weeks old? Something like that. Unlike Spanky, who has had a really easy time of it in his 15 years, Miz Poo has had lots of physical problems and has had multiple surgeries in her 13 years. She’s still a happy girl, and most of her physical issues at this point are due to old age. She’s slowing down, but when Fred get out da bird, she lights right up and is present to smack at it.

Also, don’t you want to see a few pictures of her when she was a kitten? You know you do!

This is probably my favorite picture of her. I have it hanging in the hallway outside my room, and she looks so pretty, and the grass was so lush and green. I love it! It was probably six or so years ago – we’d gotten a new camera, and Fred was out in the back yard trying it out, and got that picture of her.

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Am I the only one who thinks cat paws are just the cutest?? Yes? The Corb Man’s little feets in that 2nd to last shot? Cute, or what!

Of course, my guys are all “oh man, she won’t leave my paws alone will someone please get her a profile up on eHarmony…man…” after the 702nd time I pet their itty bitty widdle pawsies.

Cat paws are the most awesome thing ever, and cats who will let you mess with their paws without protest are few and far between. Next time I have a litter of itty bitties, I’m going to see if I can’t train them to believe that paw massages are a good thing!

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So yesterday, as a work-avoidance technique, I was roaming through your archives [at Love & Hisses] and I noticed you started blogging in 2005 (an early adopter!), but there is a gap between September 2005 and April 2008. Being the curious person that I am, whassup with that? If you want to share of course.

Unfortunately, there’s no interesting story there – the entries between Sept 2005 and April 2008 exist, I just need to get my butt in gear and cut and paste them over. After Rambo and Jodie in September 2005, we had the litter that included Sugarbutt and Tommy. When we adopted the two of them, Fred made me promise to take time off from fostering until they got a little older (we’d had a couple of cases of upper respiratory infections go through the entire permanent kitty population), and I think I ended up taking almost an entire year off from fostering, until I got Maddy, my first bottle baby, in late Summer/ early Fall 2006.

But anyway, there will be a gap there, just not as much of one that’s there now!

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So everytime I see “da Corbs”, I end up saying it like the SNL skit “da Bears”! 🙂

And that’s exactly how I intend it! 🙂

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Sweet Maggie! I’m glad she is having such a wonderful life!! And how funny that you should post this now, since it appears that the Maggie look-alike that started hanging around my porch a couple of weeks ago is also “with kitten”. In fact this week-end I had resolved to look at the old Maggie entries today to take notes on the box set-up you fixed for her to give birth in, in case this turns out to be my next foster litter… So far my neighborhood search has not turned up an owner for her or the friendly, un-neutered Tuxie hanging with her. 🙁

Oh lord, kitten season is almost upon us, isn’t it? It sounds like some jerk dropped a Mag-alike off in your neighborhood and she was smart enough to find a place where someone would care for her!

I used a big carrier-type kennel (that I covered with a towel to keep it dark) for Maggie, and she liked it quite a bit. Next time I have a pregnant cat (I’m hoping there’s a next time!), I’m thinking I might take a huge storage container and cut a hole on one end for a doorway and use that – the kittens would be contained, the mother cat would like the privacy, and it would be easy to clean.

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Have you had to replace the end of da bird yet? Leo’s pretty rough on ours, I have to keep replacments on hand!

I haven’t, actually, our cats haven’t been too rough on it just yet. Give them time, though, I’m sure they’ll rip it to shreds sooner or later!

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The picture of Newt in the sink should totally be on Cats In Sinks – incidentally, one of the websites that I find most amusing, because it has a button with the text “Show me another cat in a sink!”

I actually tried to submit both of the Newt-in-sink pictures, but got this error in return email: Recipient address rejected: User unknown in virtual alias table (state 14).

I’m not sure what it means, but I feel I am being accused of a crime I did not commit. HMPH.

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Corbie looks like he’s been…. taking diet advice from Elwood. If you’re picking up what I’m putting down 😉

It must have been a bad angle, because there’s not an ounce of fat on Corbie’s body. He’s a big-boned cat and could actually stand to put on some weight. I sneak him the occasional treat when no one else is around, which is probably why he lurves me. He’s a skinny boy, but he loves his treats!

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Everett in the hang-time photo is all “Hey girl. I hear you like taking photos.” Everett meme!

HEE.

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A kitty question: We have a gorgeous long-haired calico that adopted us. She is the most loving creature… until you stop petting her. Then she will swat at you and sometimes lunge. It isn’t a huge problem but the kids are afraid to pet her for that reason. Maybe she is mad that the youngest one named her “Ned.”

She has gorgeous long hair and within the past month, she keeps getting stool stuck in the fur on her backside. It smells Horrible! As you can imagine, she does not appreciate getting her rear end washed so frequently, sometimes twice a day. We have been very mindful to make sure there is nothing for her to get into and no food left out for her to sample at night, which I figured was the problem. Maybe she needs fancy food? Surely someone has an idea what we can do. My husband suggested shaving her ass. He said it in jest but that’s not going to happen anyway. Her dragging her butt on the carpet, blanket, pillow… wherever she darn well feels like it is not acceptable either. Help!?!

If Ned (is it wrong that I love the name?) is having ongoing diarrhea, you’ll want to take her to the vet and have her checked out – there could be something going on with her that has nothing to do with the food she’s eating.

I actually think your husband might have a good idea – not to shave her butt, but it might help if you trim the hair around her back end. We’ve only had one long-haired cat (Mr. Fancypants) and we did keep the fur around his nether regions trimmed, and it helped a lot!

Okay, I know some of you readers out there surely have advice for Kristina – chime in here, please?

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What did you use to cut the hole in the tub? Yours looks so neat! I have one just like that, but it was a pain to cut the hole AND I accidentally cut it too low, so the cats still strew litter everywhere… in fact, what I’ve had to do is prop it up at an angle so they aren’t inclined to spill *all* of it out :/

I used a utility knife, actually. I kind of marked the spot where I wanted it to start and freehanded it. It’s not perfect, but it doesn’t look TOO bad. I had a hard time of it – I’ve read that if you use a hair dryer and direct the heat at where you want to cut, it makes the plastic soft and thus easier to cut, but I didn’t do that.

Fred cut all the holes in the bucket litter boxes, and I think he used a jigsaw? Maybe? Yes, I just called him and confirmed that, it was a jigsaw that he used.

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Your photo stories, and especially the seeds-falling-from-squirrel-mouth bit, reminded me of Julie Zickefoose and her woodpecker Garrett. Go back a couple weeks to start the Garrett stories. The “ptooi!” captions reminded me of your “thllurrrp” photo captions. 🙂

And now I have another blog to add to my list o’ blogs. I love her pictures and her captions!

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Alice Mo approves of Everett’s form.

This dive should earn a 6.0 from the judges. Look at that form!

Ooooh, and this one looks like a belly flop in the making.

He got it! I love how it looks like he’s swinging on a vine.

Sally, so annoyed at having to get out of the way.

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It’s PEANUT BUTTER CORBIE TIME!!!! (You know you’ve been waiting all week for this!)

When it’s rainy outside, Corbie, Tommy, and Sugarbutt take turns hanging out in the cat house, watching the rain. Emo Corbie is Emo. (When those daffodils bloom, it’s going to be really pretty out there!)

Doesn’t he have long, long toes?

He loves to stand on the back of the couch and knead on this blanket.

Snuggly Corbs, the most beautiful boy EVER.

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Previously
2011: Okay, so, the story on Reacher.
2010: Oh, M’Lynn. Break my heart, why don’t you?
2009: Miz Poo will put up with the kittens as long as they don’t get TOO much in her space.
2008: No entry.
2007: No entry.
2006: No entry.
2005: No entry.

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