Monthly Archives: August 2009
Mom has been sneaking around now, trying to catch me doing different things, but the most she says she ever finds me doing is napping. I think she wants to catch me at the keyboard, typing my Blog, but I only work on this when she is away at the pharmacy for the day.
So here I am perched in my “cat tree” which is also, not only a “Lazee Boy” recliner, but a scratching post, too. In the mornings, Mom and I have a routine. I jump in the round bottom part of this post and she plays with me. I try to act like a wild cat to scare her by leaping around and grabbing at anything she flaps in my face, but after a while, all that jumping gets a bit tiring and I have to quit. I prefer to sit here and observe life.
Mom took a cat to clinic the other day who was named, M.O.T.O., which stood for “Merely Observing The Obvious.” Sometimes I feel like that is what I do all day long: watch everything and critique. Maybe my motto in life should be “M. O. T. O.” I am, after all, always scrutinizing my surroundings and stating the obvious about life.
For example, is it not obvious that humans are too busy? Why do they feel the need to have “to-do” lists and calendars and phones clipped on their hips to tell them how important they are because they are so overworked? I think that if you are truly important, you are like a cat. You have staff who takes care of the to-do lists and you get to snooze in the sun.
My advice is find someone else to do it. Delegate. Mom does everything for me.
I will have more to say in later observations about my new “M.O.T.O. motto.”
Yours (maybe I should delegate someone to write this Blog), Oswald P. Kitten, Esquire
Sitting in my cat tree waiting for a birdie.
We love getting photos of our former foster kitties in their new homes. Here is Artimus lounging in his “toy box.” Guess the toy box makes a better bed and it is good to scatter all the toys out on the floor!!
Artimus in his box
I was getting ready to leave the Union County Humane Society after picking cats up from one of our clinics when Steffen, the executive director, came running out with a t-shirt, which he asked me if I would wear. The humane society is selling a new t-shirt which features a dog and a cat and a nice slogan about adopting on the front and their name and web site info on the back.
We work with the shelter for our weekly clinics which focus on spaying and neutering stray and feral cats. It is a really good relationship and we hope that someday, through our combined efforts, there will be no more homeless cats in Union County.
If you would like to order one of their t-shirts, visit the web site, www.uchspets.org or call to inquire: 937-642-6716.
In the meantime, if you are out and about in Plain City, watch for me in my snazzy new shirt!!
Union County Humane Society t-shirt
www.uchspets.org
Oswald comes running when he is called.
I am a cat on a mission. I was laying on my bed, quite comfortable, when Mom pulled out the camera. I always hide my head when she wants me to pose–too many bright lights in my eyes. But Dad, said, “Hey, Oswald,” so I came running to see what he wanted and I said, “I’m coming” and then Mom snapped this picture of me with my mouth open talking. Thanks, Mom.
Oswald relaxing on dryer
As I was leaving the house this morning, rushing out the back door to get started with another busy day that will involve not only work at the pharmacy, but also collecting kitties for our weekly clinic on Wednesday, Oswald gave me a good-bye meow from his perch on the dryer. I, of course, went in to give him a rub down and tell him that I would see him again later in the day.
Looking at Oswald, laying in the sun atop the dryer, curled on his tartan sheet with light filtering in from the window behind him, I thought that it would be nice to live the life of a cat every few days or so. I wouldn’t mind curling back up to sleep in the sunshine for several hours–or until someone came home to make my next meal.
Oswald’s fur was warm from where he’d been stretched in the sun for most of the morning. He likes to lay on the dryer because it is tall and he can stare out the window at the roses and the front walk, keeping an eye out for Tucker and Herman, the outside feral kitties. Now, I do have to help Oswald climb to him favorite spot with a heave and a shove. He is too chubby to get on the dryer himself. The other cats use the windowsill as a step and from there, hop atop the dryer, but Oswald finds that too labor intensive. Rather, he will hang around in the laundry room until I happen to walk by and then he gives a loud meow to tell me he needs my help. I then tell him to “Turn around,” which he promptly does so I can pick him up. He is a big lug, so it is actually a major event lifting him onto the dryer, where he then kneads the sheet to make his bed more comfortable and falls over in a heap.
Some days, it would just be nice to trade places with Oswald and send him bustling out the door in a little suit and wing tip shoes to take care of my life, while I snoozed in the sunlight, curled on the dryer.
PetSmart, boy in cage
Well, no not really, but a little boy had to climb in one of our empty cages and pretend that he was locked in. His mom assured us that he’d had all his shots, was potty trained, and had just been fed.
Look at how the one kitten is staring at him. Felice and Baby Boo are wondering if that is a really big cat and hoping it won’t crawl in with them next!!
Hector helps Oswald brainstorm
I decided that I was getting nowhere with my ideas on how to help Mom with her rescue work, so I asked Hector, my chubby buddy (hey, I even look thin lying next to him) if he had any ideas.
Here we are in a brainstorming power session. I’ll let you know what kind of revolutionary ideas we come up with.
Well, Mom caught me this morning, loafing around when I am supposed to be writing my Blog or coming up with schemes to increase revenue. She even had to sneak up on me to take my photo to prove I was not working as hard as I should. I would not make eye contact. If you pretend they are invisible, your moms will go away eventually and let you get back to napping.
I tried to tell her later that my penguin toy was helping me gather my thoughts. The soothing catnip stored in his belly always helps me think better.
Secondly, I really need my nails trimmed. It is very hard to type with long nails. So what does she expect? It is her fault if my nails are not cut and I can’t perform.
These were the things I was thinking about as I laid on my plaid bed. Actually I was just getting ready to go to sleep when she snuck up on me.
Yours truly, too tired to type more, Oswald P. Kitten, Esquire
Oswald loafing around
So, here I sit in my favorite chair, trying to think what I can do to help Mom raise money for all those stray and feral cats she seems to like. Mom says that when I sit in my chair, I look like a little human. It is my favorite place to wile away the hours, in the wing chair in front of the fireplace. Mom says if I had a pipe and a little hat, someone would mistake me for a little old man. Mom thinks she is so funny.
But what can I do? How can I make some money off of this handsome face of mine? I can’t charge for “stud service” any more. Mom is too big into the spay and neuter stuff and she made sure I was neutered many, many years ago. So that blows that idea.
Perhaps, I could write a memoir of my eight years and my observations on how tiring humans can be–always running here and there. Slow down, Mom, and come lounge with me in my chair.
That Romeo cat has made my life too complicated. I just want to sit in my chair and cat nap, not try to think of money making schemes.
Yours truly, the financial cat guru, Oswald P. Kitten, Esquire
Oswald thinks of money making schemes.
Keeping snuggly warm in the freshly dried towels
Okay, so I would just like to thank Aunt Bobbie for alerting Mom to this workaholic cat named Romeo who has his own blog and is on Twitter. Now Mom thinks I should be doing something similar to raise money to help all the needy cats in our area. I say, they can get jobs themselves and let me go back to napping. Gee whiz, don’t I have enough to do without trying to keep up with a cat with the obnoxiously sweet name of Romeo!!?
So, here is how it happened: Aunt Bobbie was reading The Columbus Dispatch yesterday and there was an article about Romeo and his human staff. Romeo the do-gooder raises money for rescue groups through Twitter and via Romeo’s Blog, which just basically features tons of cute photos of this fluff muffin Romeo. Granted, I don’t have that much hair, but I am still just as cute!
Romeo is a Persian cat (can we say high maintenance?) who came from a rescue group in Marysville that Mom once wrote an article about: The Forgotten Persian Rescue and Friends In fact, Renee, who started The Forgotten had a lot to do with setting up many of the spay and neuter programs at the Union County Humane Society, which is where I came from.
Romeo has over 6,000 followers on Twitter who get messages every day about what he is doing. Let me explain a cat’s life to you so you won’t have to continue getting his updates if you are one of his Twitter friends: We eat. We sleep. We try to get Mom to give us treats each time she goes in the kitchen. We sleep some more. Some where in there we use the litter pan and try to get under Mom’s feet so she will fall and knock herself in the head and forget that she just fed us and feed us more! And that sums up the hectic day most cats lead.
But if you would like to check out the cat who has made my life less relaxing, go to www.romeothecat.com and read how Romeo wakes his human staff each morning. I’ll tell you how I did it this morning: I clawed my way through half of that fuzzy monkey on Mom’s head that she calls a hairdo. Once she is bald it will be even easier to wake her with gentle, perfectly placed stabs with my claws.
I guess my days of cuddling in a warm dryer of freshly laundered towels are almost over. Mom is all atwitter about this Twitter thing. She is not as technologically hip as Romeo’s humans, though, so it may take her awhile to figure out how to get me involved with that. So for a while longer, I’ll find a warm place to nap and hope the only “twittering” I hear will be from the birds outside the window.
Your humble, non-Twittering friend (so far), Oswald P. Kitten, Esquire