Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!  As you can see, Mom didn't find the green bow tie when she went to the store, so she put this stupid hat on me again. Do you think I look as miffed as the last time she did this to me?

Karen Jo:  I don't think you look quite as miffed.  At least you held still so you weren't all blurry, like last time.

It only took you about elebenty tries to get the picture.  I kept tossing the hat off.  It's times like this I really miss Emma.  It was her turn to wear the hat.

Karen Jo:  I really miss Emma, too.  February would have been her second birthday and March 1st would have been her first Gotcha Day anniversary.  I am still debating on whether to send her dates to the Cat Blogosphere calendar.  This year the pain was still too raw to think about celebrating her birthday or gotcha day.  I did finally get around to telling the people at the shelter she came from that I had room for another leukemia kitty.

Don't cry, Mom.  This is supposed to be a happy day.

Karen Jo:  Sorry, Herman, I can't help it.  If you want to see a bad picture of Emma in the St. Patrick's Day hat, you can find it here.

Now that Mom has stopped crying, maybe we can get on with the good stuff.  Mom fills up the bird feeder and suet feeder and bird bath every day and the Bird Channel on Cat TV is great.  I even have different noises I make for different birds.  I meep at the little birds and make a kack sound at the ravens.

Karen Jo:  I find it fascinating that you differentiate between the birds.  I am glad that you only make your raven sound infrequently.  The first time I heard it, I thought you were choking.

I saw a fly in the kitchen window yesterday.  Another sign of Spring.  Are you sure it's going to snow tomorrow?

Karen Jo:  No, I am not sure.  It's nearly up to 60 today, but it is very windy, which could very well mean that a storm is on the way.

Or it could just be our normal March winds. I have been around long enough to know that high winds are normal this time of year.

Karen Jo:  That's right.  You are going to be five in June.  And in November, you will have lived with me for three years. That means that you will have lived with me longer than the early, not-so-good part of your life.

I really appreciate it, too.  Now, when do I get some more food?  I ate up that tiny lunch you gave me.

Karen Jo:  Not until ten tonight.  You have your dry food to carry you through.

I have been eating up most of that since you started measuring it. Aren't you supposed to be cooking corned beef or something right now?

Karen Jo:  That's right.  I need to go start dinner. Don't worry, I'll give you some corned beef.

I hope it doesn't taste too much like cabbage.

I Want My Mom Back

This picture is a couple of days old, because Mom has been ignoring me, but it's what I am doing now.  Mom got all wrapped up in her computer and has been on it day and night.  I want some attention!  Oh, she feeds me and gives me water and cleans my litter box and gives me treats and walk-by pets and cuddles me at night, but the rest of the time she is on the computer.

Karen Jo:  I have started rebuilding my blog list at Kitty Limericks and I want to finish it.

But you are only up to the C's.

Karen Jo:  I had some roadblocks along the way, but it should be a smooth road ahead.

Meanwhile, it seems that Mom and the ravens have finished their war.  The suet feeder still gets emptied every day, but Mom isn't mad about it.

Karen Jo:  It is their nesting season and they are hungry.  I can't stop them from flipping the feeder over the crossbar for easy access, but at least the starlings are getting a chance at it.  Still no sign of the flickers.  They may be smart.  I hear on the news that we may get snow again this weekend.

One good thing about Mom getting distracted by her computer is that I have seen no sign of a green bow tie around here.

Karen Jo:  I have to go shopping tomorrow.  I could still pick one up for you.

Noooo!

Award

Way back in February, Team Tabby gave me this very nice award.  Mom is just getting her lazy self into gear enough to post it.  Here are the rules:

Upon receipt of the award, one is to:
1) Link back to the blogger who gave it
2) Paste the award on the blog
3) Choose 5 blogs to pass this award to (they must have fewer than 200 followers)
4) Let the recipients know about their nomination by leaving a comment on their blogs.

It is very hard to pick only five friends to pass this along to, but I'll do my best.

Eric and Flynn
The World of Hansel
Furry Paws
Grrreta
Jan's Funny Farm

Now for a bit about what's been going on around here.  Mom measured the dry food in my bowl and it was just about right.  I would never eat that much dry food in one day.

Karen Jo:  I am going to start making sure that you have only 1/2 cup of dry food in your bowl from now on.  I think that even that is more than you eat in a day.  It looks like I might have to follow the vet's suggestion about giving you a light lunch after all.

I think I'll survive.  I rarely eat it all, anyway.  I have found a new way to tease my Mom.  I got her at dawn this morning for breakfast and as soon as she got into the kitchen I started eating the leftover Medley.

Karen Jo:  I think you were just trying to get two breakfasts.  You know I would never take a dish away from you while you are eating.

It worked, too.  Mom gave me fresh Stinky Goodness at dawn and fresh Medley when she got up.  Score!

Karen Jo:  You do realize that you got the same amount of food you always get, just split up into two breakfasts, don't you?

That's OK.  The plan was to get two breakfasts.  Mom brought a strange kitty into the house today.

Karen Jo:  I saw that same little kitty with tortie markings in my yard that I had seen months ago out in the snow.  This time she came up to me and rubbed against my leg.  She let me pick her up and read her tag, though she wasn't too happy about it.  Once I had the phone number firmly in my head, I brought her into the house and put her in Emma's room.  Then I called her Mom, who came to pick her up. She just lives up the street and is an indoor/outdoor cat who sometimes wanders.

Herman:  I am glad that her Mom came for her right away.  She hissed and growled at me while you were carrying her by.

She was probably just scared of you, Herman.  She was just about Emma's size and you are so much bigger.  I am just very relieved to know that she has a home nearby wasn't a lost kitty.  I felt really bad the time that I saw her out in the snow and she ran away from me.

Mancat Monday

Yet another picture of me lying around the living room.  Mom took this picture weeks ago and kept it as a spare in case she didn't get a picture taken, but found she had time to blog.  See my baby sun puddle?  I got too warm in the big one, so I moved to the baby one.  My fur is completely grown out again.  Mom has been really bad about blogging again.  She still hasn't done my award that I got weeks ago.

Karen Jo:  My apologies.  I have been very busy.  I had a lot of work to do with year-end reports for an organization I belong to and now I have to write another report for the state convention coming up.  I still haven't gotten my new computer up and running and I think I will let it wait until I have written my report.  A friend on mine has been having a rough time and I have been spending quite a bit of time with her, helping her unwind after some very stressful days.  All I can promise is that I will blog when I can.  I should be able to do your award tomorrow.  I also have to do my income taxes very soon.

Sheesh!  I had a busy day today myself.  I got taken to the vet for my yearly wellness exam. The great news is that I am so healthy that everything shows up as normal.  The good news is that I have lost 0.6 pounds since the last time Mom weighed me last fall, before the weather got too cold to take me in for a weighing every month.  The bad news is that the vet says that the weight isn't coming off fast enough, so Mom is going to have to take a little bit of food away from me.  The really bad news is that I need to have my teeth cleaned.

Karen Jo:  I am so very pleased with your wellness exam results.  The only change I am going to make this month is to start measuring out your dry food.  We'll check your weight again next month when you go in to have your teeth cleaned.  If I am happy with your progress, I won't make any more changes.  I am waiting a month to have your teeth cleaned because I have so much going on right now.

I can wait; in fact, I can wait a really long time for that.  I have been feeling really good.  I am playing with my toys more and talking to the birds more and running up and down the hall more.  I think I can feel Spring in the air.

Karen Jo:  You are really good at detecting it then.  We had snow just Saturday.  It wasn't much, but a bitingly cold wind came with it. Today it was really nice.  Some people's bulbs are coming up and the crab apple trees are budding.  The forsythia is getting tiny buds, too.

Mom's war with the ravens has come to a stalemate.

Karen Jo:  I thought I had them outsmarted when I put a twist-tie on the suet feeder.  One of them looped the chain over the crossbar of the clothesline pole and got the twist-tie off.  This time I put one of those heavy duty twist-ties that comes on computer cables on the feeder and they haven't gotten it open again.  They do occasionally loop the chain over the crossbar so they can get at the suet more easily, but at least the starlings are getting a share now.  The flickers haven't shown up yet.

Easy Like Sunday

I am just relaxing with my toys.  When Mom went to get the camera, I was up on the kitchen table, helping her read the Sunday paper.  I jumped down and came in here while she was gone.

Karen Jo:  You are really good at moving while I am off getting the camera.  So instead of a fun picture of you sitting on the paper while looking out the window, I got yet another shot of you lying next to your Star Chaser.  It looks like you are ignoring your toys again, but I know that you play with them.  I found fluffy beaver down the hall next to the night light today.

Sometimes I just like to play by myself, without any help from you.  Mom's war with the ravens over the suet feeder continues.

Karen Jo:  To recap:  first I put the suet feeder in the crab apple tree in the front yard, but the ravens found that they could unhook it from any branch I put it on.  Next I got a snap hook and put it on one of the eye-bolts on the clothesline.  They discovered how to get the cage open and take all the suet.  I wired the cage shut and they discovered that they could unhook the cage from the chain.  Once they got the cage on the ground, they could eat all the suet very quickly.  Now I have closed the hook from the chain completely and so far it is working.  I don't care if the ravens help the starlings and the flickers eat the suet; I just don't like it when they find a way to eat it all at once, so the other birds don't get a chance at it. I give the ravens Herman's left over canned food.

Not much else is going on around here.  Mom's new computer came in, but she hasn't hooked it up yet.

Karen Jo:  I am excited to get a new computer, but I dread all the stuff I have to go through to get it up and running.  My new computer has Windows 7 on it and I am afraid that most of my programs won't work any more and I will have to get new ones.  I might even have problems getting it online.

Moms!  All worry, worry, worry.  At least I can help her relax at night by demanding my petting.

Mardi Gras!

 We took the Mardi Gras Challenge from Jacqueline's Cat House.  That is Mom took it and dragged me along.

 Here I am wondering what the heck Mom put around my neck.  She told me it was Mardi Gras beads.  Wha?  I'm a MANcat!

Here I am putting the bitey on them.  Mom took them off before I could really bite them up.  You want to know that the problem is with a Mom that is all well again?  She has the energy to do stuff like this.  Happy Mardi Gras, everyone!

Mancat Monday

I am looking at all the toys Mom got out for me to play with today.  It's kind of hard to see, but there is a ball with feathers right in front of me.  I picked it up and smelled it right after Mom snapped the picture.

Karen Jo:  I don't know if Herman was interested in the ball with feathers for itself, or if it still has a slight aroma of Emma on it.  She used to play with it a lot.  He just picked it up, sniffed it and put it down again.  He hasn't been interested in playing at all today yet, but that is not unusual.  He prefers to play in the early evening, just before sundown.

I got Mom up again this morning.  It was just before dawn this time.  I wanted breakfast, but she wasn't ready to give it to me yet.

Karen Jo:  If I feed you that early in the morning, then you want lunch early, too, then dinner.  It's much better if I feed you later in the morning.  I did give you your breakfast the second time you woke me up.  I am feeling much better today.  I am almost back to normal.  All I have left of the cold is a stuffy nose.  Some of that could be my allergies.

We have nice sun puddles for me to lie in today.  Mom didn't go out and feed the birdies, though.

Karen Jo:  The sun is shining, but it is very cold outside and we have had some wicked wind. I only went out there to do what I absolutely had to do.  The wind knocked over the recycle bin and I had to go out and set it upright again and put some more stuff in it, so it wouldn't get knocked over again.

Mom had tomato soup with cheese shreds last night and I got some cheese shreds.  I love cheese shreds.

Karen Jo:  I am getting really sick of soup.  I think I will get some cheesy chicken out of the freezer for supper tonight.

Yay!  Mom got some real milk for the tomato soup and she gave me the milk ring to play with in the kitchen.  I watched it spin across the floor, but did nothing with it while Mom was watching.  As soon as she went back to her cooking, I started playing with it.  When I noticed that Mom was watching me again, I stopped playing with it.

Karen Jo:  I don't know why you don't like my watching you play.  It gives me a lot of pleasure.

I don't know, either.  It's just something I do.  Mom gave me a good brushing this morning.  I loved it.  She hasn't been brushing me as much since she's been sick.