Disco Kitten

Last year during the family Christmas shopping trip, I bought myself a pretty teal shirt covered in clear sequins. It seemed to be a perfect amount of festive and I was really excited about it.

Then I wore it.

Before noon it had rubbed sore spots on my arms. By the end of the work day I couldn’t wait to take it off. I’m pretty sure I did take it off the second the door closed behind me.

This shirt has been in my closet for a year. It has survived several rounds of culling because it is so pretty, even though looking at it made me sad because I was never going to wear it again.

But then! This week I realized that I could protect my arms and cover the more offending sequins if I wear a cardigan over the shirt. And so I did. Plenty of sparkle, no road rash.

And there’s an extra, unanticipated benefit.

Three solid hours of sparkle reflection entertainment for the brown kitten. By the time the sun stopped coming in my office window and the light show was over, Obi was ready for a nap.

His brother was happy to oblige.

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A Cry for Help

Kitten Thunder knew the day was going to be bad when I started ironing clothes while The Boy was brushing his teeth. You see, I don’t iron my tank tops and jeans. So I was doing the unthinkable: I was preparing to leave the house.

Kitten Thunder did not approve.

Oliver decided to handle it by going missing. He has found a hiding place somewhere in the house for his morning nap. I’ve got no idea where it is. I’ve looked every morning this week.

Obi followed me to the basement to help me get ready. He talked to me for a while from the chair outside the bathroom. Then his meows were further away.

And more urgent.

I went to see where he was and found him in the cutout in the wall to the laundry room. “I am going to get into the ceiling,” he said. I went back into the bathroom.

The cries came again with a hint of panic and I went to see what was wrong. The brown kitten was sitting on the dryer. “I am going to get into the ceiling,” he said.

“Obi,” I said. “I have a meeting. Please don’t make me send a text that says ‘kitten in the ceiling, may be late.'” He walked over to the washing machine and looked back at me.

“I am going to get into the ceiling.”

He sat down, so I continued to get dressed. Just as I finished, the cries from the laundry room became urgent. Panicked. Scared.

I ducked through the hole to the laundry room to find Obi up on the framework, right by the opening into the ceiling where he got stuck a couple weeks ago.

“I’M GOING TO GET IN THE CEILING!” he cried. “I have to. I AM COMPELLED BY FORCES BEYOND MY POWER!”

It was clear that he did not actually want to be in the ceiling, but that he needed me to intervene. So I reached up and plucked him from the framework. As I carried him up the stairs, the brown kitten head butted my chin and started to purr.

“Thank you, Girl.”

***

What does a kitten do after a near miss like that? He takes a nap on the desk – in his working box – of course.

The Thunder Channel

Jim and Mary live across the street from us. We don’t talk a lot about them because Kitten Thunder doesn’t seem terribly interested in what goes on past our sidewalk. But, if they are looking at their OutTV, this is what they would see this week on The Thunder Channel:

The light goes on on the porch at dusk and the front door, if it wasn’t already, is open so you can see light through the front screen. The Girl, holding the brown kitten, look out the windows of the screen. Sometimes they step out on the porch and look at the walls of the outside entry. Then they go inside.

A while later, the entry way light goes on and the porch light goes off. The Girl and the brown kitten look outside again. The Girl shakes her head and says something to the brown kitten.

Later, the porch light goes back on and The Girl examines the walls and ceiling of the outside entry through the window. She steps outside. Sometimes she holds the door open and waves her hands in the air. Sometimes she brings the brown kitten out and holds him above her head and HE waves his hands in the air.

They go back inside.

A while later, The Girl comes back to the screen door. She is in her pajamas; she wears pants and a t-shirt. She looks all around the outside entry through the screen door. Then she grabs a broom and goes out onto the porch. With one foot, she holds the door open as she sweeps at the ceiling of the outside entry. If a cat gets near the door, she jabs him with the broom as well. The Boy arrives to pick up the cat and turn off the porch light so the only illumination is the inside entryway.

The Boy and The Girl cheer. The lights are turned off and the door is closed.

The Thunder Channel’s evening program, Girl Gets Millers In The House, is over for the night.

***

I’m still dressed and I’ve already caught the first miller of the night. I nudged him off the wall and, as he flew into the air, I swatted him right into the house. Wa HA! I am master miller catcher! He landed on the wall at kitten eye level and Obi promptly knocked him down into the cold air return. The brown kitten wants a new miller. I told him he’d just have to wait for that miller to come back up.

***

Happy Father’s Day to all The Boys out there – whether your children are furry ones or people, you are appreciated. Especially my dad, who taught me the most important skill in the world: the claw.

Plumb Crazy

There’s a frost advisory for southeast Wyoming tonight.  That pushed us over the edge from “let’s just turn off the furnace and tough it out” to “let’s close all the windows.”

Kitten Thunder does not approve. Even if we did leave one window on the cat shelf slightly cracked for the afternoon.

 

You call this Smell-o-vision?

I was upstairs because The Boy is working on the leaks in our house and had to run to Home Depot. He called to send me upstairs for a part number. And Kitten Thunder thought they should get me up to date on the project.

It started with just Obi, who explained the project thoroughly.  Then, when Oliver came in, the brown kitten got up on the supervision shelf to see what the grey kitten would add.

Oliver thinks gaskets and O rings look like pretty good toys. When I wouldn’t let him have them, he decided to contemplate that. From his contemplating spot.

As I took this picture, I was contemplating the incredible rust stain that is forming in The Boy’s shower. Hopefully the new whatevers that are needed to stop the dripping will slow down this stain – I just scoured the stains from this shower a couple weeks ago.

Fully caught up on the project, I turned to leave. Oliver had a suggestion:

Let’s go take a nap.

Home Improvement with The Boy

Our basement is strangely configured. The spare room, where I get ready in the morning and where the grandpeople stay, is as far away from the stairs as you can get in walking distance – but actually only a couple feet away. So, this weekend, The Boy started the process of putting a door in our laundry room.

He started by taking down a wall. Behind it? He found another wall.

And behind that? He found another wall.

In all of these home improvement situations, there is – of course – help from Kitten Thunder. The Boy finds this funny. And annoying. But luckily for him, this particular project included power tools from very close to the beginning. And, when the power tools are involved, Kitten Thunder chooses to protect me instead of helping The Boy.

Protect me. Yeah.

And, when the power tools stopped, three of us went down to help with inspection.

Obi was shocked to see the shoddy work done on this wall. The vertical studs were well beyond the 16 inches they should be placed.

When there was just a window, he did not approve of the complete lack of sill.

Upon further inspection, he decided it was doable but not particularly comfortable.

The spare room is dusty. I’m really glad The Boy took me down to look at the second wall so I knew to quickly move all my clean laundry that was on the spare room bed.

While Oliver is not usually the most adventurous of our kittens, he was willing to try out the window.

He helped The Boy measure the space for a door. I took this picture and headed upstairs. I called Oliver. I told him to come with me. He didn’t, until The Boy started using a saw. Then he casually walked across the laundry room. Once he got to the floor and into the hallway, he allowed his panic to take over and raced, frantically, up the stairs.

The Boy, on my request, cut a second window at the floor level before calling it quits for the day. I didn’t want kittens attempting to thunder through a poorly supported window in the drywall, five feet off the ground.

Thunder on, kittehs. Thunder on.

 

Dog People

How were you at algebra? If the grandpeople leave Rock Springs at 1 p.m., traveling 75 mph, and The Boy and Girl leave Cheyenne at 1:30 p.m., also travelling 75 mph, when should we start looking for each other in order to wave as we pass?

My mom asked for tickets to an Avalanche game and someone to go with her to said game for Christmas. So, this weekend, my brother’s family and my parents were in Denver. The Boy and I agreed to Jigger-sit.  At first, Jigger was going to come to Cheyenne. Then we decided it would be easier on everyone if The Boy and I went to Rock Springs for the weekend.

The first thing we did when we got there was take Jigger for his afternoon walk. The dog was not sure The Boy and I knew his route. He was not sure The Boy was certified in leash management. Somehow, we managed to walk the dog and get back to the house without incident.

We kept Jigger up way past his bedtime. There was a little bit of concern that he wouldn’t sleep well up in my room, but that was unfounded. He was so tired that he tried to climb into his bed while I was carrying it upstairs. As soon as it hit the floor, he was in it and unconscious.

In the morning – way too early in the morning – Jigger needed to go outside. I let him out, fed Spade and Gracie, gave the dog breakfast, and went back to bed. A moment later, Jigger made it clear that it was not okay for me to go back to bed. I went downstairs to sleep on the couch.

Jigger convinced me that I should let him sleep on my belly on the couch. He said that’s what Mom does.

I texted this photo to my mother. She called the dog a con artist.

We took Jigger with us to Seedskadee National Wildlife Refuge. He loves birds and walks so we figured he’d have a great time. At our first stop, he led the way down a trail for about half a mile. Once in a while, he would have to stop because the trail was hard to see. As soon as The Boy would step down the trail, the dog would rush in front to continue leading the way.

He jumped over logs. He walked through a bog. At one point we lost The Boy who went through some wetland that Jigger and I couldn’t manage (sharp sticks at dog-eye level). Jigger was VERY concerned that he was out in the middle of nowhere with just The Girl.

By the time we got back to the car, Jigger was ready to get back in the car. At the next stop, up the road, he jumped down onto the floor of the car and refused to come out. He was done. We asked him at each stop and he refused to get out.

He slept through six swans, two bald eagles, several hawks, and a moose. He also slept through ice cream cones in Farson.

We texted my mother to tell her we wore out her dog.

When we returned to the house, exhausted, the dog was well rested and ready to play. We sent him to the back yard to run around while we plopped down on the couch.

Luckily, I had three critters to care for and Spade was ready for a nap.

Oh, Bi

We had this crazy thought that we brought the parsley in to eat it. Evidently, we were wrong. We brought it in for the brown kitten to stand in.  He does this at least once a day.

While I was watering the parsley, I decided to start my potato planters. They are already sprouting so I jabbed them with a fork and set them in a plate of water. Then I noticed Obi looking at the ceiling.

So excited.

The shimmering water reflection on the ceiling is now his favorite part of the day.

Yesterday, I was late for an appointment because the clock in the living room was an hour slow. I don’t know why that clock slows down instead of stopping, but it does. So today I changed the batteries.

Which drew attention to the clock. Obi noticed it for the first time ever.

At least for the first time since the last time I changed the battery.

Approval Ratings

The surveys are in. Polls have been taken. And my approval rating is at an all time low. I’m really going to have to do something special to improve or another Girl will be able to move in and beat me at the next election.

First there was Jigger-gate last weekend. Enough said.

Then, once we finally got that resolved, The Boy and I both made bad political moves by returning to work on Monday. Not only did we not ask Kitten Thunder if it was okay, we disregarded their opinion when they reached out to us.

And it was a busy week.

I had what some might consider a “crap ton” of client work, plus two bracelets to finish for the silent auction at the Fur Ball that is this weekend. The Boy had a 6:30 a.m. meeting (WHA?!?) and a meeting Monday night. I also had a meeting Monday night, but I couldn’t find it. Instead, I spent half an hour driving up and down the road looking for it before giving in to my headache and going home. Where I had more client work. And bracelets. This meant NO snuggle time for either kitten.

Unacceptable.

Tuesday was more of the same. I worked all the way through the day with no lunch break. Oliver supervised from his box on my desk. He mostly expressed his displeasure in no snuggling. But I did NOTHING to fix the situation, other than suggest that HE should come sit in my lap. Why, he wanted to know, should he do all the work?

On top of this, Obi wasn’t asking for belly rubs. Tuesday night we finally confronted him. Was he giving up belly rubs for Lent? It turns out, he wasn’t asking because he didn’t want to be rejected. Now that is cleared up and The Boy’s approval ratings have soared. It also doesn’t hurt that The Boy is fighting off a cold so he’s had more couch time than usual.

In an attempt to bolster my own ratings, I announced my plans for Pajama Wednesday. Kitten Thunder loves Pajama Wednesday. But, after a small spike, my ratings plummeted when they discovered that I intended to work. At my desk. And THEN, in the afternoon, I got dressed. IN CLOTHES! (This last paragraph isn’t quite true…I didn’t actually intend to spend all day in my pajamas and only realized I wasn’t IN the clothes I’d ironed when I started thinking about leaving) And then I left.

Unacceptable.

This morning, I was the one with a crack of too early in the morning meeting. The day started out great with my curling iron going berserk and frying a chunk of my bangs. It was so hot, the whole section just disintegrated. And it smelled horrible.

Obi did not approve.

Then I was gone all morning. When I returned, I sat on the couch to eat lunch. Oliver was not coveting on the back of the couch and he wrinkled his nose because my hair still smelled like I’d set it on fire.

Oli did not approve.

Then I left again.

No one, not even me, approved.

Now, all the big projects are done and tomorrow is just another work day. Hopefully the kittehs will stick with me until Saturday. I think I can pull out all the stops on Saturday and recover in the polls.

After all, I have a great platform: the couch.

 

Squirrels on Rye

The Boy and I don’t eat the same kind of bread. Being the only people in our house, we hardly ever finish a loaf of bread before it gets stale or molds or I just buy another loaf because I forgot to see what we had before I went to the store. This leads to a lot of extra bread.

Squirrel bait.

The same happens with tortillas, though not as often. When it was -20 degrees, I wasn’t putting out food because squirrels aren’t crazy. That is the exact type of weather that they store nuts or whatever for. So we had a surplus.

A giant stacks of the ends of breads and tortilla dregs. I did what anyone would do in this circumstance: I set up a taste test.

The results: Squirrels prefer rye bread over tortillas. But they’ll eat them both.

Next week we’ll be testing to see if they like my wheat bread over rye. Seriously…who wouldn’t?

Oh Brudder

I’ve mentioned that we have a new morning routine. That includes Oliver leaving our post-breakfast snuggle to take a bath in the recliner. Then The Boy comes by and covers him with the blanket. At first he was tucking the grey kitten in. Lately, though, he’s been carefully draping the blanket over both arms of the recliner, making a nice big cave.

 

Oliver can stay in this cave for hours. Unless his brother wants to thunder.

This morning, Obi came tearing across the living room and jumped onto the “flat surface” of the blanket. He didn’t know Oli was under there, he swears. The blanket started to move and Oliver’s head popped up between the blanket and the back of the recliner. He climbed out of his cave.

Obi jumped down and ran a couple feet. He looked back.

Oliver resettled himself on top of the blanket and went back to sleep. Somehow, the blanket remained held up, slightly, by the arms so the grey kitten enjoyed a hammock. For a while. Then the brown kitten returned. Obi climbed into the cave and poked his brother from below.

Then he jumped down and ran a couple feet. He looked back.

Oliver was not chasing him.

Obi came and sat with me, sighing. After he’d maxed out mom time – about five minutes later – he went back to the recliner and tried again. Climb. Poke. Jump. Run. Look. It didn’t work so he went to get a snack. And tried again. Climb. Poke. Jump. Run. Look.

Nope.

The brown kitten tried all day to get his brother to thunder. As far as I know, it never happened. Eventually all the effort wore him out. He stretched out on the loveseat for a nap and I draped the big quilt over the whole seat, kitten and all, to make a nice big cave.

And Oliver has hopped up on top for a nap.