Things That Go Bump All Freakin’ Morning

On occasion, Obi will help his brother with the effort to annoy us out of bed. Usually it involves knocking things off the toothbrush table. Today, that something was the smoke detector that I think was broken and replaced by a new one – well, it’s broken now.

The annoyance also involves bump bump bumping the bathroom cabinet. Before our trip, The Boy and I had started closing the bathroom door at night. We haven’t done that since coming back and it has been fine.

Until last night.

But it wasn’t the cabinets.

Now Obi has learned to bump bump bump the bathroom door. He pushes it to almost closed but, since he is short and only ten pounds, he can’t push hard enough to latch the door. So it bounces back. And he pushes it again. And it bounces back.

“Obi. Stop.” Bumpbumpbump.

“Stop.” Bumpbump.

I got up and two kittens – the grey kitten had been crying for an hour – tore out of the room to avoid the anticipated spankings. I wasn’t even thinking about that, but whatever. I pushed the door all the way open.

Five minutes later: bumpbumpbump.

“Ooooobi.” Bumpbumpbump. Oh yes, and Oliver was crying again. Have I mentioned it was three in the morning?

I got up. Cats ran. I closed the door.

That’s when the smoke detector went down. And Oliver cried.

Then papers when off a shelf. And Oliver cried.

Then the blinds were played with. And Oliver cried.

I wanted to cry.

Lucky for everyone involved, The Boy had to get up early for the train club’s show here in town. He got up before I had to kill anyone. And I was close.

So close.

***

Kitten Thunder is recovering, slowly, from the trauma of our absence. They still cling. They still cry. But it gets slightly better. And Oliver’s sweet face, which was bloody and gooey from allergies, seems to be clearing up a little bit now that the stress of us being gone is alleviated. Whew.

Crying…Crying…Cryyyyyying

Last confession: The Boy and I weren’t home yet when I posted on Tuesday, either. We got home at about 9:30 p.m. after a very long day of travel.

After two and a half weeks, Kitten Thunder didn’t even consider punishing us. Obi was desperate for a belly rub. A very stressed out Oliver needed to be held. The Boy and I needed to sleep.

All night, Oliver woke me up to tell me that I’d stopped petting him. It was a long night. It was a snuggly night.

On Wednesday, the crying started. Now that Kitten Thunder has their people back they are frantic to keep them. Any time Oliver leaves me to get a snack, he starts crying for me and keeps crying until he is back in my lap.

While I was in the shower, Obi supervised. And cried. He hates the steam of the shower. I told him he could wait in the next room. He could not. He had to keep me in sight. And cry.

Then The Boy left the house. Obi cried.

Then I left the house. The Boy says Oliver cried.

Today we both left the house. Both kittens cried when I got back.

Then Oliver held me down.

For the first time in two days I am alone on the couch. Obi is on the floor. Oliver was disturbed by me reaching for the remote so he moved to the chair.

Slowly but surely we will all recover.

In the meantime, it is nice to know we were missed.

Bassackwards

Confession: The Boy and I weren’t home yet when I posted on Sunday. So there are more kittehs of Italy at the end of this post.

Lori, Best Kitteh-Sitter Evah, took great care of Kitten Thunder while we were gone. It wasn’t exactly easy. Winter decided to get in one more big storm, dumping ten inches of super heavy snow on Cheyenne. It must have been super heavy – it ripped a giant branch off one of our trees that was trimmed recently. Poor Lori had to drag the branch/log out of the street. Above and beyond.

She reported that she and the fuzzies had a routine involving a five minute brushing of Obi, then breakfast in the morning.

THEN breakfast!?! I can’t imagine howo unacceptable this was for Oliver. Oli doesn’t even think The Boy should waste time putting on pants in the morning before breakfast. And woe is The Girl who can’t find her glasses (because a cat knocked them off the nightstand) in the morning. She shall be verbally abused for the delay.

In the evening, Lori would return to watch some television. I left her a bag of treats to bribe the kittehs for affection. She has so bribed.

And on the weekend, Lori stayed at our house. Did I mention what a good kitteh sitter she is?

She’s a good girl. We’d rub her belly or scritch her ears if she wanted. Instead, we bought her gifts. Hopefully she prefers jewelry to inappropriate touching.

***

Kittehs of Italy!

This pretty girl was in Urbino. She showed us her doorway and asked if one of us might be so kind as to turn the knob and let her in. We did not so she asked the next group. And the next. As we turned out of sight she was talking to a priest about the doorknob situation.

This cat had the opposite problem. She wanted out. Or for someone to send up some sardines.

There’s no cat in this picture, just what I assume was a cat door in a palace. It was about a foot tall. I’d have had The Boy stand there for scale but just after I took this I realized that photography was not allowed.

Car alarms in Perugia are very sophisticatted. And okay with having their picture taken as long as you keep your distance.

This handsome boy was off duty in the piazza outside a chapel. If only he had been so kind as to tell us that it was his day off. And the chapel’s day off. We waited quite a while for a church that doesn’t open on Monday to open open open.

***
Dogs of Europe! Hey, we love the pooches, too. Not all of them got into the blog because there were dogs walking their owners everywhere we looked.

The dog of Split.

The bored dog of Mostar.

This is not a dog. I thought I had one more dog picture but I don’t. So, since I had to pick a picture…I thought this view in Dubrovnik was particularly special.

Kittehs of Croatia

Confession: For the last two weeks, The Boy and I have been in Europe.

We started in Rome where we were told we would see a whole bunch of cats. There are even calendars and post cards (Photoshopped) about the kitties of Rome. We saw none. Not one.

Croatia, however, had more. And some of them allowed me to take their picture for you. I promised them international fame.

This is from the top of the city wall around Dubrovnik. My accent in Croat-Meow must be bad – neither of these cats would even look my way.

This one was trying to understand me.

This one was off duty. He refused to pose but said he didn’t mind if I took a picture.

We affronted this lady with our picture taking. This, so soon after someone had the audacity to walk down her stairs without asking, was more than she could bear.

Each cafe had its own cat. This is the cat in the cafe where we hid from a rainstorm and met some nice people from Seattle.

Due to an ancient agreement that has lasted through a number of governments, Bosnia has a section of coastline that divides Croatia. We took a day trip to Mostar. Bosnian cats, like its people, have a population that is thriving and one that suffers.

Cafe cats are better off.

Our final day in Croatia was in Split where we caught the ferry back to Italy.

This cat was less than impressed by the notion of my international blog.

The book I’m reading has a one-eyed stripper. Weird coincidence, I think, that we met this mama cat who has lived hard at the ferry terminal. I fed her the ham from our left over sandwich. This is her afterward, giving us serious one-eyed purr face. I wanted to give her a scritch but I didn’t touch any of these cats for fear of creepy crawlies.

Back in Italy, we saw this handsome gentleman at his basilica in Ravenna. He posed for about 20 women who wanted his picture. Then a woman stepped wrong on the wooden walkway and the sound sent him running.

In Urbino, just as I was about to lose my mind from the need to scritch, we walked by a theatre and saw a couple with a cat. They saw us taking pictures and let us in. I got a purr of appreciation from him – he could tell I was cat trained and kitten approved.

But in all my travels for these two weeks, there is one simple truth:

There no scritch like home.

Thunder Fun Facts

Oliver is a grey domestic longhair. BUT his fur is white near his skin and turns dark grey toward the tips. If we gave him a crew cut he would be a white domestic shorthair.

Obi’s hair is black at the roots, and striped all the way to the tip. There is no doubt whose hair has hitched a ride when we pick it off our shirt away from home.

Oliver is a pudding head (nuttin’ but puddin’ up there in that noggin) but he is perfectly adapted for the life he would have had in the feral cats population, had he not been rescued. He has unusually long “saber tooth kitten” teeth. And claws that don’t retract. Also? Really long toe tufts – I know those are good for something. I don’t know that any of his physical attributes would make up for pudding-headedness.

Obi is well adapted to the out and would have zero problem surviving. He has a waterproof coat, big feet for snowshoeing, and he can climb ladders. And open doors. He has also figured out that if he puts a paw on his plate it stays in one place while he eats, while Oliver walks in circles trying to keep up with his breakfast as it travels around the kitchen.

The out can’t have either of them. They are mine.

And they are both PURRfectly adapted for that.

Ode to the Kitteh

I have no intention of giving up my day job. This should have been posted in April for National Poetry Month. Maybe it is better not to insult such a month with such bad poetry. So…with my apologies to all those English teachers who let me stay in the advanced class because they know I can do better than this…

Hey kitteh kitteh
You are so pretteh.
On a chair
On the couch
I love your hair
I love your pauch.

Hey kitty kitty
Oh my so pretty.
On my head
Or on my legs,
If I stay in bed
For food he begs.

Hey kitten kitten
With whom I’m smitten,
On hip lips
Or on his ears
I give my kiss
While he snears.

Hey cat cat
You are a brat.
On my paper
In my book,
Whilst I labor
You lay where I look.

A Special Guest Appearance

As you know, The Boy and I have a planned trip to Europe this month. Lori, bestest kitteh sitter in all the world, is lined up to take care of my precious fuzzies. She has even promised to spend the night several times for some intensive attention.

However, she is not available for the whole time we are gone. For the three days that Lori, too, will be traveling, we have lined up a special treat. Jeff, of The Jeff Channel, will be making a special celebrity appearance INSIDE the house.

He thought maybe he should meet the kittehs in person – and walk through what they’ll need – before he is actually needed.

Obi, of course, greeted him at the door. I swooped the brown kitten up into my arms so he could get a better look. He squinted a little at Jeff…something familiar about that guy…sniff…sniff…

Jeff doesn’t have cats now but he has in the past. He introduced himself like a pro, allowing several sniffs and even letting Obi taste him before going for an ear scritch. Obi thought the pet was a little premature; he tolerated it but wasn’t ready to enjoy it.

Jeff, The Boy and I talked about the kitchen for a while as we waited for Oliver to show up. Obi showed Jeff their plates. The brown kitten suggested he might want to practice opening a can and scooping food onto those plates. None of the people thought that was necessary.

Eventually I realized it was afternoon nap time and that Oliver was not going to come down on his own. I went upstairs and scooped him up off the cat shelf where he’d been sleeping deeply. He greeted Jeff through half closed lids and tasted his hand before leaning back into me to rest. When I set him down on the floor, the grey kitten stretched, grabbed a mouthful of crunchies, and strolled back upstairs.

I imagine, when he woke up that evening, Oliver reflected on that crazy dream where he actually met his favorite OutTV celebrity.

And in the not too distant future, Oli’s dream will come true.