All your box are belong to us!

Not exactly cuddling, but I'll take it

Or in their new favorite setup, with Maggie on the papasan and Deidre on the papasan’s footstool right next to her.  They’d be inches apart, but on separate pieces of furniture.

Then, the past two nights, Deidre was on the bed with me and Yuan joined us!  Deidre was about where she is in the above photo and Yuan up near where Maggie is.  I have yet to dare to climb down and try and take a picture; it could be that I am acting as the Great Wall of China as I have often done for Deidre and Maggie, and if I move, then suddenly all bets are off.

Just days ago, Yuan was hopping up, almost jumping on the bed, which would send Deidre in a fit of fear/rage that he was invading her safe space, and I’d hear hollering from her galore.  This did not deter Yuan in the slightest, as like any little brother, he seemed quite content to torment his sister.  I’d often have to cart him off, or stand in between and herd him away before poor Deidre’s ears permanently became flattened to her head and she gave herself a sore throat from screaming.

Here we are, the very next evening, me reading a book, and two kitties calmly and contentedly napping next to me.  Will wonders never cease?!

Now my goal is to get all three of them on there with me at the same time.  It could happen.  A girl’s gotta have goals…

In an unrelated note, I give you: stuff on my cat, catception edition:

A cat on my cat = Catception

Also the laptop belongs to her; she rubs her cheek on it leaving her mark all the time.

Maggie has been my mellow- but also frisky- brave girl; always coming over to where I am to hang out and say hi; not backing up in the face of her ferret-U-jumping brother; playing with toys like I haven’t seen her do until recently and she’s been with me for three years.

Ferret-U-jumping brother?  Yep.  Yuan sometimes will rush at her, but I really think it’s more playful than intimidating, as he ends with a sideways hop with his back arched – yes, I know the arching in cats is supposed to be making themselves look bigger, and hence being aggressive – but he’s HOPPING.  And she just looks at him now, like, “You’re strange.”  He doesn’t lunge at her or hiss or growl or anything, he just rushes up and hops at her.  I think he is inviting her to play “run around the house like mad”.  Since she has been getting frisky and playing with toys more, I’m hoping one day she’ll join in.  If those two could give each other exercise by running laps around the dividing wall in my apartment, that would be fabulous – but mostly I can’t wait for them to be friends.

Unfortunately, Deidre and Yuan’s relationship doesn’t seem to be improving as of late.  As I was writing that last paragraph, there was just a “GET AWAY FROM ME!!!” scream from Deidre when Yuan approached her where she was eating.  Le sigh.

Yuan has also reclaimed his old favorite hangout spot – the top of the washing machine.  It’s a nice cubby for him now that I have a laundry hamper in the bathroom and the top of the machine is no longer the place where dirty laundry goes.  It’s become routine that when I take a shower, he comes in with me and naps on the washer.

All three kitties are on diets, as all three of them are a little too fluffy – but they are doing great.  They aren’t starving and gobbling down all their food right away, or begging for more.  I feed them twice a day now from a measuring cup, and they seem quite content with it.  Usually the food lasts them all day – some days there is a little left over, some days the bowls are empty when I go to add more.  If I give them canned food, they get less kibble.  I just hope it shows the next time we go to the vet!  Sometimes I look at Maggie (my fluffiest) and think, “You look like you’ve lost a little weight!” and other times I think, “You don’t look like you’ve lost weight at all!”  I’m not going to bus them over to the vet (a trauma, if you ask them) just for a weigh-in so I’ll have to wait for their next check-ups.  One day when the money gods have blessed me maybe I’ll get my own scale for the kitties; I’ve seen them in a catalog for not too much money.

That’s about it for news on the kitty-front!  Purrs and headbonks! >^.^<

Eek, he's so cute!

Eek and Buddy were adopted from Maxfund seven years ago, but since then, their human passed away and now they are back at Maxfund looking for a forever home.  Of course Maxfund is not MANDATING they be adopted together, but it would be super nice since they are friends!  Could your home be their forever home?

So, Yuan using one of his nine lives.  The other day I let him out on the balcony.  I was sitting just inside the balcony doors at the dining table, so I could watch him.  Not 60 seconds after I let him out, he gets the spontaneous midnight crazies and leaps from the floor to the top of the air conditioner that juts out from the wall onto the balcony, then onto the giant cable spool that serves as my balcony table, then onto the green onions in a pot on the ledge.

That pot had been there for months, and he’d even climbed in it before (I always take him out of the pots as I don’t want him going on the ledge for fear of highrise syndrome).  It was stable and not hanging over the edge or anything at all.  But with his centrifugal force or whatever law of physics he was using to fling himself around as he did, the speed and angle at which he launched onto the pot caused it to tip off the ledge and down to the ground below.  He tried to leap from the falling pot to the lettuce (and somewhere in this mess the pot in-between the two got knocked off too).  The lettuce is the biggest pot of all the pots on my ledge and luckily held him, as he hung on by his front paws with the rest of him over the side, for the two or three seconds I had to react, which is to say that I screamed and ran out onto the balcony, and grabbed the other side of the lettuce pot that was beginning to spin and tip over as well to counter-balance his weight, and before I could grab him too, that gave him the leverage to scramble up and over and right into the apartment.

He happily stayed in his cozy chair for the rest of the evening and did not ask to go outside at all.  But before he camped out, I hugged him and nearly cried and died of a heart attack.  So, I used up one of my nine lives, too.

The second and third floors are the MOST dangerous for a cat to fall from, as they don’t have sufficient time to flip over and land properly as they might from an even higher floor.  I’m on the second floor.

The next day I figured if I got into the habit of taking him for a daily walk (we walk occasionally but not every day), maybe he’d get some exercise and fresh air and not want to go on the balcony so much, but he was not even interested in going for a walk at that point.

Now, normally he’s pretty darn good out on the balcony, and just rolls around on the cement floor and looks out under the wall to see what’s going on.  He often camps out UNDER the a/c, or on top of it.  Occasionally he’s snuck onto one of the plants but at that point I pluck him off and bring him inside to indicate that the ledge is a no-no, and he gets that.  It’s gotten to the point that I trust him enough to be chill that I’ve let him outside while I’m putting around doing things in the apartment, and I just poke my head out periodically to check on him.  He uses the spool/table as a giant scratching post and enjoys his balcony time.  Neither of his sisters have gone out there yet at all.  I know it was the spontaneous crazies that caused him to jet around like that recklessly, but still it scared the crap out of me!!!

We’ll try a walk again today, I think.

Why can't he just be mellow, like me? -Maggie

I am fuzzy and cute! ^_^

I also just had to share how FRISKY Maggie has been lately!  She’s playing with toys!  She’s playing with boxes!  She’s chasing her tail!

…and she startled Yuan today!

I repeat, in case anyone had a case of cat name dyslexia:  MAGGIE startled YUAN.  Not the other way around.

I predict they will soon be chasing each other around the apartment in play!  Let’s see how long it takes. ^_^

Today’s adoptable kitteh is: Solo!

Check out his cute goatee! ^_^

Perfect for the steampunk cat man?

Alright, you can sit next to me... but I'm watching you

Just a little update for today, with some happy news on the progress front.  Above you see the very first time in over three years that Maggie and Deidre have sat next to each other on the scratcher – and they even stayed put for a while!

What prompted this show of tolerance and peace?  The big, scary, noisy, yellow thing, AKA the vacuum.  Deidre had already taken refuge in the cubby, and Maggie hopped up to the other shelf when the vacuum came too close.  At first, I don’t think she even realized Deidre was there, or perhaps she was just the lesser of two scary things right then, as both the girls seem to agree that the vacuum is a demon from the seventh circle of hell.  There were some growls at first, but then they calmed down and settled in to weather out the invasion of the noise-making monster.  No swats, no fights.  It brought a tear to my eye.

Then just last night, all three kitties seemed to get a case of the midnight crazies all at the same time.  As Yuan is the more energetic of the three, I’m used to him having a moment of pent-up kitten-like energy and zooming around or trying to get into things he shouldn’t (the boy could rob museums he’s so ninja, is what I’m saying).  Maggie’s bouts of midnight crazies, on the other hand, are so rare as to be shockingly notable – but she’s had three frisky moments in the past week!  Last night was even more notable as she was playing with a couple of toys on the ground.  So, she’s playing with toys, you might say.  That’s not notable.

Except that toys, with rare exception, have historically either fallen into the “EVIL!  RAWR!  HISS!” category of unhappy Maggie sounds, or the “…and?” category of cat apathy.  She’ll lick a few, and chase a laser, but other than that, she’s never really batted them around or otherwise seemed amused by their presence.  But last night, she not only played with the Stinky toy from our furriend M-chan, but she also attacked a tribble!  I was delighted, to say the least.  She’s been opening up so much lately, it makes a mom proud.

Then Miss Deidre, who hasn’t been too playful as of late either, had a crazed session with a fur mouse the other day, and last night decided that the marker/magnet board that is mounted on the wall above my bed that she has ignored for months was suddenly *too* tempting to resist.  Deidre is like that – feign nonchalance at something for a long time, and then, after a year and a half, eats my betta fish (true story).  Well last night the siren song of dangling markers and paper held in place by magnets finally was too much to ignore.  As I was trying to sleep, I was laughing my butt off as she batted at dangling objects above my head.  I woke up and plucked magnets, markers, and paper from my pillow (remarkably, nothing clobbered me).

I love frisky kitties.

In 2.5 seconds after this photo, Deidre will: a) nap b) pounce the camera c) snuggle you. Choose wisely.

A few notes:

They are in the DC/VA area

They have a $100 sponsorship toward vet care

They need to be spayed/neutered

They are ten months old

They have people willing to drive them to your location – even out of state!

Please help these sweet kitties if you can, and spread the word!  Thanks!

I make homemade “frappuccinos” in my blender in which I use instant coffee.  Every time I make one, he’s on the counter wanting to lick the glass and/or spoon I mixed the coffee with (I take it away from him, because I’m not sure if coffee is safe for kitties!).  Then today while enjoying some balcony time, he became obsessed with a tin can I had left out there for when a friend comes over who smokes and needs an ashtray (he calls it his “vitamin N”) because I don’t actually own an ashtray.  He kept knocking it over and playing with the couple of cigarette butts that were in there, so I took the can and the cigarettes and threw them in the trash.  Then he rolled around in whatever ashes were left outside.

Dennis Leary Cat!