The Twelve Days of "Cat-Mas" (revisited)

Here is my take on the well-known Christmas song, which I wrote about three years ago and just cos I'm lazy and can't think of anything new, I'm re-posting  ;>)

On the twelfth day of cat-mas Austin gave to me:

12 fleas a jumping

11 scratches bleeding

10 books a tumbling

9 lives a losing

8 poos a stinking

7 bites a throbbing

6 furry cuddles

5 plaintive miaows

4 dirty paws

3 raspy licks

2 furtive looks

and a smashed up vase in the conservatory

Merry Christmas :>)

Snow time :>)

I live in the place where it never snows.... until now that is. 

This, as far as I know, is Austin's first experience of the white powdery stuff.  Being a little bit worried that he might be caught in an avalanche of snow falling off the roof, he's had to cross his legs and wait until I found my wellies in the back of the garage so I could accompany him out into our own virtual 3D Christmas card.

Having discovered and de-spidered the ancient green wellies, today was the day when we decided to venture forth. He was absolutely adamant that I should go first - being much more brave and having slightly longer legs! This is the result:

Up until today this was all he would do, safe, warm and ever so slightly superior!

"What's all this then?"

Bit cold for cotton wool?

If you can do it......

 "Where's my legs?  I've been robbed! (up to his .. errr .. armpits)

Ok, that's enough. Bye!

What's that spectre in the bottom right corner? lol

Funnily enough he's so overcome by his bravery he's been tearing round the house ever since like one of those over-excited footballers when they score a goal.  Difficult to get a photo of that, but did manage to catch him when he stopped to say hello to an old friend :)

Oh, and I'm still not sure whether he managed to relieve himself. However, he spent a good couple of minutes underneath the car. 

Have to go, as he wants outside again and I have to be there to hold his paw. Such a wuss-puss!

Little Orphan Kitty!

This beautiful kitten was found abandoned by a river by a softhearted friend of mine who already has umpteen cats and a few dogs too.  She has taken her in, but now the kitten needs a name.  Any ideas? 

I understand that though she fought tooth and nail when first picked up, since being inside the house, she's become my friend's number one fan.  She follows her everywhere.  Awwwww :>)

Mummy's little helper .....

I realise I've not been posting much, so's here a couple of photos to fill the void until the muse hits me once again (if it ever does!) 

Here is our hero being everso helpful while I was stripping the bed. 

"Oh there you are!"

I was very careful to make sure that ALL the lumps were smoothed out before loading the washing machine and then did a cat count before turning it on.

PS I'm extremely curious to know how the bottom sheet managed to get itself inside the duvet cover in the tumble dryer even though I'd done all the buttons up and only left about six inches open at the bottom? 

Change of subject.  Tigger is now pretending to be Austin by aping his meow at the back door.  It's very clever of him as he knows I don't check identity.  He's in, fed, watered and snoring away in Austin's bed before I've found my specs.  Austin is seeking legal advice.

Austin is Vetted!

I took Austin to the vets yesterday. It was not an experience that either of us are really able to talk about yet.  Good grief! It was only for his annual booster shot. 

I tried to explain.  I even made favourable comparisons with the NHS, saying that at least you could get an appointment when you wanted and weren't likely to come away with the wrong organ removed or MRSA.  The staff even smile and look happy, for crying out loud.

The scene I had in mind was this:

But the actual scene was this:

Austin is now taking steps to ensure he never has to go again:

As for me?

Oh No!!

I wrote the following on 29th June!  Don't know why I didn't post it?  Maybe it was because it's not finished, or maybe it's because it's just rubbish!  Anyway, I'll post it now just to get it out of draft. 

Austin caught another robin this morning.  This time it was a baby one and it was still alive!  He left it outside my window and jumped up to let me know how clever he was and I let him know how I felt about murder or injury inflicted on those innocents who are just going about their daily business.  We had to be content to disagree and then I had to deal with the aftermath (don't ask :(((! 

Thing was we had a bit of a storm last night!  After seemingly weeks of dry weather, it was a blessing to have the rain, that's for sure.  Normally I would stick my head under the pillow and try to ignore it, but I was aware of the fact that Austin was shut in the conservatory experiencing the full horror of thunder, lightning and torrential rain.  Also my mother appeared to be having a good stomp around upstairs.  So at about 2 a.m. we let him out and made a cuppa.  He went all low slung, like he does, and emitted this spooky mixture of yowl and a growl.  Poor little guy. 

Anyway after about 30 minutes we went back to bed and left him cowering behind a chair.  Big mistake.  It wasn't long before he was ripping up the carpet outside my bedroom door.  Now as I'm not one of those who enjoys being stared at by a cat all night, I wasn't about to allow him on the bed. The reason for this is detailed elsewhere.  So as I wasn't about to go through all that again, I got up and put him back in the conservatory.  Happily the storm had hightailed it off to Prestatyn by this time. 

This morning he was crawling up the door to be let out - legs crossed, the whole bit.  I don't know why he won't use his en suite facilities after all the trouble we took having it installed (well I had to go all the way to Pets R Us on Caernarfon Road for the tray and wood chips!).

Cat Stats

I'm not sure if anyone has noticed, but I've had a bit of a hiatus from blogging.  Thing is, apart from life stuff getting in the way, I've been rather diverted by the fact that Blogger have added this dinky new feature called "stats".  It's a wonderful service that allows me to track the traffic to my blog!!!  So now everytime I open blogger, instead of clicking on "new post" I find my click digit wandering over of its own accord to the "stats" tab. It's fascinating, really.  I can see which countries viewers are coming from and which posts they are reading and everything. 

Now although the traffic isn't exactly stacking up to get to me down the information superhighway, there are obviously some stoic and sturdy folk who are fighting their way down the beaten track just to get a glimpse of me and Austin in our quiet little blogosphere backwater. Apparently I'm quite popular in the Ukraine!  There's even "real-time" updating!  Ok, I must try not to get all OCD about checking every minute of every day, as this could lead to a serious case of delusional statopsychosis, a condition which would mean commital to a secure unit.  Wonders if they will have wifi?

Anyway what would happen to Austin?  I suppose he could come too; in a sense he's already committed, poor little guy, being holed up here with two old bats.  To be sure, if it wasn't for the diversion of Tigger the Massive he would be climbing the walls.  What am I saying?  He does climb the walls.

......... sorry just wandered over to stats again.  I can see this is going to be a long and painful process :( 

News of Austin?  Well, sadly he's developed a five-brush-a-day habit; it's getting beyond a joke.  It used to be just once in the evening.  Now every time he sees me he stands on his head, rolls neatly over onto his back, and makes like a giraffe with his neck.
 

He gets quite peevish if I ignore him to get on with more important things, like filing my nails or watching daytime tv. So I give him his fix and then he falls asleep in my lap - but not before he's carefully administered the requisite number of acupuncture needles in my legs (ouch!). Bless .......

....... Oh, while I've been chatting away here someone from Latvia has dropped by :>)