Chubby, the Silent Watcher

Chubby is our grey cat. Here's a picture of how he spent about 30 minutes of his time this morning (7/01/09), sitting very still the whole time.

And here's what he was watching, from his perspective.

The red & glass thing in the middle is a hummingbird feeder. There's nothing at it.

It's Tough Being Small and Tasty

A cute outdoor critter recently met his doom.

I was sitting near our open family room window and heard a commotion outside.  When I looked, I saw that a local cat (who is regularly roaming around our neighborhood) had jumped onto a tree in front of our house, and caught a chipmunk in his jaws.  The cat then ran off, undoubtedly to enjoy his snack.

Earlier in the week, I'd witnessed that same chipmunk being harrassed by a small songbird because, I guess, that bird didn't want the chipmunk eating some of the bird seed that had already fallen to the ground.  Of course, there was plenty of seed, both on the ground and in the bird feeder.  I think that bird, as small as it was, just wanted someone it could bully.

I will miss that little chipmunk.

1 Out Of 3 Cats Prefer Orbit Sweet Mint Gum

I walked into the house. The orange cat, Georgie, ran upstairs like he'd just been caught doing something he shouldn't have been doing. The other two cats, Blackie and Chubbie, were sitting watching me, as if they were on look out duty. Behind them, on the floor, was a package of Orbit Sweet Mint gum.

When I picked up the package of gum to return it to the table it had been on, I noticed that a corner of the package had been eaten into, some of the gum inside nibbled on, and it was all still moist.

Hmmm...

I later held the gum package to Chubbie and he acted like he'd never smelled anything worse. Blackie just wanted to rub her head against it. And Georgie is still hiding, like a guilty child who'd gotten caught swiping a cookie.

Birthday Celebration, continued

My wife, Sarah (with an "h"), received an awesome bouquet from her daughter Heather (with one "h").

The neat thing about this bouquet is that it was edible. The bouquet was made of orange slices, strawberries, and bananas dipped in either rich dark chocolate or creamy white chocolate.

Here's a top-down view of the bouquet.

Here's a side view.

And here's a silly cat picture.

Ninja Cat Comes Closer Without Moving

Be careful. Ninja cat is coming for you.

Christmas Day 2007

Now that it's March, I decided it was a good time to write about Christmas Day 2007.

How was your Christmas Day? Did you receive any presents you liked? Awesome!

Here's how we spent our Christmas Day.

Since our youngest family member is a teen, my wife and I were the first ones up. We had a nice brunch, followed by The Opening of the Christmas Gifts, supper, and just relaxing. For supper, when we had our Christmas dinner, we feasted on:

• Christmas ham with Christmas pineapple rings
• Christmas green bean casserole with Christmas french onions
• Christmas pudding
• Christmas stuffing

The cats really got into the spirit of the day!

Blackie walked around randomly, slept, sometimes ran quickly for no apparent reason, and meowed.

Chubbie walked around randomly, slept, sometimes ran quickly for no apparent reason, and occassionally acted scared. (Chubbie doesn't "talk" very often.)

Georgie slept, purred, frequently ran quickly as if he were being chased by Dementors, and generally acted scared... unless he was sleepy, in which case he was not afraid anymore and just wanted to be petted (and would then purr when petted, of course).

The day before, Christmas Eve, we were visited by my wife's older daughters, along with the grandchildren. That was an enjoyable time for everyone.

We did have some snow on Christmas Day, though nothing like the crazy amounts of snow we received in January. And February. My goodness! We got a LOT of snow in February. Anywho... As long as there is some snow on the ground on Christmas Day, then all is well with the world.

30 Days Until My Doom

Today is November 15th, which means that, in exactly one month, I turn 40. Huzzah! Most people approach such milestones in their life with a sense of doom & gloom. But not me!

To help with commemorating this date, that is today, nature has kindly provided us with a cold, grey, dreary, rainy kind of day. So, while I may not feel gloomy today, I guess nature does.

But that's okay... I actually like these kinds of days. Except when my vehicle loses its traction and careens into a ditch. Then it's not so fun. But that hasn't happened for several years anyway. And I got an SUV out of it!

The only thing I dislike about the weather we're having today is that we're not expected to get any snow. I like watching the snow fall, don't you?

Today is also the beginning of deer hunting season, rifle & shotgun edition. I overhead a group of deer talking about it this morning. As with past years, they're all planning to hide in caves & garages until the hunting season ends, at which time they'll return to their favorite activity... playing chicken with vehicles moving at high speed.

They were talking on the local news this morning about how all the deer hunters are whining about how ammo costs several times more than in past years. Babies. In my day, we hunted deer with slingshots. We were lucky if we managed to merely annoy a deer. And we liked it that way!

I once used a slingshot, I think when I was in high school. Yeah, I ignored my mom's warnings and managed to shoot myself in the eye. My friends called me "slingshot eye". But it's all good. And besides, now my eye is stronger than ever! But not as strong as Steve Austin's since he was all bionic and stuff.

Yeah ever wonder what a bionic cat would be like? We've seen bionic men, women, and even a dog. But what about a bionic cat? Would it's super strength help it sleep better on the couch? Or help it be better at ignoring you when you enter the room? If one of our cats were bionic, it'd probably bust through a window trying to chase after birds or squirrels.

We have several bird feeders at our house, which provide us and our cats with a lot of entertainment. The birds, that is, not the bird feeders, which really don't do anything besides just hanging around. There was a really loud bird at one of our feeders the other day. I secretly think it was using a little bird-sized megaphone.

TJ Is Gone

The oldest of our four cats, TJ, past away during the night. A few weeks ago, one of the boys said he thought she was losing weight, but we figured he was just seeing things. Especially since the kitten was now nearly as large as TJ. It seems his instincts may have been correct. During the past few days, it'd become quite obvious that TJ was not well, as she seemed unable to do anything other than lie very still. Especially yesterday.

TJ was a good cat. She was the mom of two of our other cats, Blackie and Chubby. She was quite adept at slipping through open doors, dashing to the freedom of the outdoors, which especially beckoned to her during this time of year. Once outdoors, rodents and small birds fled in terror, knowing that the mighty huntress was on the prowl.

TJ's favorite toy was elastic hairbands, the kind that have 2" or 3" diameter. She'd "acquire" one from someone's bedroom and then run through the house with the hairband hanging from her mouth and her yelling "rowr! rowr! rowr!". At least until she realized she'd been seen. Then she would drop the hairband to the floor and just walk away, as if thinking, "I don't know where that hairband came from! Eh heh. (I'm so embarrassed)"

One bit of silly behavior of hers stands out in my memory. Our family room's windows have top panes that can slide down, as well as the bottom panes being able to slide up. Sometimes I open just the top pane, especially when it's windy outside, to direct incoming air toward the ceiling. One night a few weeks ago I'd done just that. When I came downstairs in the morning, there was TJ, sitting INSIDE the window between the closed bottom pane and the exterior screen. Yep... during the night she'd jumped up to the top of the opening, and then either jumped or fallen down, and then realized she was trapped. Silly cat. :)

Our Kitten Is Trying To Kill Me

A few days ago, I was doing one of those things you always tell your kids not to do, but do yourself when no one's around... running through the house. I was getting ready to leave for work, and felt a need to move quickly from one end of our main floor to the other.

Unfortunately for me, our kitten Georgie decided that would be the ideal time to run at full speed up the stairs from our lower level to the main level, his path directly intersecting my own as we both ran, well for me "ran", through the house. He got caught up in my feet and spun a little off-course, while I tripped and almost fell, though didn't actually fall.

Later when I recounted this incident to another family member, her first comment was, "Is Georgie okay?" I could've broken my nose like Paula Abdul, but people are concerned about the kitten!!!

Lessons Learned

me: Don't run through the house when the kitten is in one of his hyperactive modes.

Georgie: meow! meow! meow! (loosely translated: "Where's my food, I'm hungry again!")

Sometimes I Chase My Tail

a blog post by Georgie (our orange kitten)

HI! My name is Georgie! I'm really happy to meet you!

I'm still a kitten, so I'm very excitable and energetic. That's why I use lots of exclamation points!

I joined Dave's family over a month ago. They are so awesome! I've trained them to put some yummy food on the floor every time I whine. It's yummy! Hehe, I meant the food, not the floor. Anyway, I used to be really tiny. But I've been getting bigger! YAY!!! But I'm still not as big as my buddy Chubbie. He's a grey cat, and the only other boy cat here. Wait... Dave just told me Chubbie's kind of not a boy anymore, and that soon I won't be one either. Mmmm... I don't really know what that means. But I really like kitten food! It's awesome!!! ROWR!

You know what I sometimes like to do? Chase my tail! Have you ever chased your tail? Oh, wait... Dave just told me that you big not-cat creatures don't have tails. Anyway... Sometimes I chase my tail!

Just the other night, I ran into the computer room to see what Dave was up to. Then I saw a recliner. So I climbed up it! Once I was on it and sat down to look around the room, I saw this orangey pointy thing laying near me. So I jumped at it! And it moved! So I had to chase it!!! But every time I ran closer to it, it moved away! A couple of times I got it and bit it a little, which hurt a little for some reason. Then, I realized I was biting my own tail! But that's okay, because it's so much fun chasing it!

Well, I gotta go be in a different room now. Bye! It was fun talking to all of you!

The Arrival of Georgie

About a month ago we added a new creature to our family, Georgie, to orange cat. This is a picture of him sleeping. Isn't he cute!

"Meow!"

Um, the cat just said "hello".

We now have four cats, three adults (Blackie, TJ and Chubbie) and the kitten. Chubbie, the only adult "male" cat, has gotten a long really well with Georgie. When the kitten is in one of his active periods, we'll often find the two of them wrestling.

Cry of the Hunter

We were sitting in our family room watching TV when we heard the cry of the hunter:

"Rowr! Rowr! Rowr!"

I looked around for the source.

Then I found it.

TJ, our home's head cat, had pounced on and caught an errant hair band, her prey. TJ saw me looking at her and cried out, "Rowr?", and ran off, freeing the hair band.

I walked out to the hallway to pick up the hairband. As I lifted it, I thought I might have heard a small tiny voice saying, "Help me!" . But, I'm pretty sure it was just my hallucination imagination.