Kitty Magnet

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Maggie totally got the cat gene. I am shocked by the amount of strays she finds and how willing most of them are to let her haul them around. This poor thing we are told used to live at our house, and the previous owners just up and left her behind.

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She is a sweetie, but we can’t keep her due to my allergies and barely being able to keep the cat we do have (zyrtec, anyone?).

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This layout was fun to create- I cut the papers myself and created a ruffled border with paper and sewed it on. Very pretty Webster’s Pages paper!

My Couch Is A Yowling Ball Of Hysterics

When I brought the cat over on Saturday I had set everything she needed up in my bedroom with the intent to keep her quarantined until the hub-bub of moving had died down and she could explore the new home on her own, in her special, neurotically graceful way. Lissy, you may recall, became a part of our family during the last deployment when she showed up during a nasty rainstorm. I learned via her micro chip that her previous owners had moved to Germany and abandoned her, leaving her to fend for herself.

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Look at that face? Does she look like she can fend for herself? Not very well. She likes her jaunts outside, but ultimately needs a pillow to snuggle on and someone to brush her long, easily tangled hair. Food is also helpful, as she is skinny as a rail and even a little starvation leaves her completely emaciated.

So Lissy had lived on our block for a few years, even longer than we had. She had two homes, and several neighborhood hidey-holes and sight-seeing spots. This was her stomping ground, and I was really very worried about moving her. I’ve heard that old saying that dogs get attached to people and cats get attached to places. She was a nervous wreck watching our house being packed up, and I was nervous wondering if she was going to go outside and hide for an extended period of time. I was even more worried that once we got to the new house she would streak out the first open door and become completely lost.

Sunday, the first full day in the new house, rolled around and I allowed Lissy to leave my room. The house was still and silent. Lissy skulked about, low to the ground, jumping at every piece of lint in her path. I left her alone to do her thing, and for the next few hours I repeatedly stumbled across her squished into random hiding spaces. Lissy was behind the kitchen aide mixer. She was hiding behind a box in my laundry room. She was dislocating her hips to squish behind the entertainment center. Paranoid little thing.

Shortly before I left for church at one, I noticed that I couldn’t find her. I wasn’t terribly worried, I just assumed she had found a new spot, and she’d turn up when I came home. Three hours later I walked in the door and she didn’t come running. Lissy is an exceptionally needy cat, so this was odd. I called for her a bit and when she never came, I began to worry.

That morning I had opened the doors twice to put out the back and front welcome mats. I remembered being pretty careful to close the doors, so I couldn’t imagine when exactly she had sneaked out, but it wasn’t impossible.

I went to dinner with friends, and when I got home, still no cat. At this point, I was beginning to get a little mad at myself wondering at what point I had so foolishly left the door unguarded. I had searched every room, closet and crevice between boxes and she was clearly not in the house. I had called out the front and back doors, to no avail, but to the great excitement of the neighborhood dogs. Mmm, fresh kitty, I heard them bark. . .sounds yummy!

My children were due to arrive in the next few minutes, so it wasn’t long before they piled into the house like circus performers, running up and down the stairs, in and out of every room and closet all the while exclaiming over the newness and awesomeness of their new home. “Where’s Lissy?” One asked me, and I had to quietly demure that I wasn’t sure, but she’d show up soon. All I could think was, “oh crap, what if she doesn’t? The kids are going to have fits.”

About ten minutes later, while the kids were still all over the place on a frenzied sugar high (their grandparents had loaded them up with cupcakes and sugar and who knows what else, and then brought them home to go through detox on my watch) I heard a meow. It was faint, but there was definite meowing.

I ran to the backdoor. No cat. Jonas ran to the front door. No cat. We ran to the kitchen, checked behind the entertainment center, opened all the closets but. . . no cat. I told the kids to be quiet so I could better hear the sound. At this point, the meowing had grown into pitiful yowling, and in the quiet I realized that it was coming from my couch.

I looked under the couch, but couldn’t see her, so I assumed she had crawled into the base of the sofa. I flipped the couch over into an L shape (the only direction I could flip it, since I had gravity on my very pregnant side). There was a small hole in the underlining of the couch, and I assumed she had crawled in through that, but she wasn’t on the bottom of the couch. She was inside the back of the couch, which was now laying on her, which explained the escalated yowling. I managed to flip the couch up again, but needed to flip it the other way to let the cat escape.

I’m six months pregnant. I can’t flip the couch the other way; it is physically not possible.

I start calling friends, but no one is home. The couch is wailing in trapped frustration at this point and the kids are in hysterics. Finally, I call my friend Patience, who I know screens her calls, so if I want her to pick up, I’m going to need to talk into the phone until she gets there. I began telling her of the current chaos unfolding at my house, and when she answers, her husband is laughing his head off in the background.

Patience came over and flipped the couch. Lissy immediately scrambled out, and I just stood their shaking my head. Stupid, stupid, freaked out kitty.

The next day, while we were unpacking, the same disappearing cat trick occurred and thankfully I thought to bang on the side of the couch before my friend Cori left that night. Yup. Back in the couch. This time I used packing tape to close the hole. The next morning I watched Lissy flatten herself under the couch and return, very miffed a few minutes later after finding her spot sealed off.

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Lissy is still skulking about the house, only slightly less jittery than she began. She tried to go outside once, which I was not encouraging, but got spooked and stayed inside. I hope she keeps up that attitude for at least another week or two and contents herself with all of the lovely windows to look out of. Clearly, she is too neurotic to handle a backyard surrounded on every side by dogs, so I think inside is her best option until she settles down.

The Cat Came Back

Last night around 9:00 our neighbor’s cat Noah showed up. Noah has been their family cat for years- a strictly indoor, well fed ginger tom who is very affectionate and people dependent. A few weeks ago, they discovered that their youngest child is severely allergic to cats. They found a home for one cat, but Noah appears to have been just shoved outside.

I’ve returned him to them a few times, but now that they’ve gone on an extended vacation he’s fending for himself, obviously without food since he’s over here eating everything we’ve been leaving out for Lissy. He’s also been meowing to come in and get affection.

Last night I let him in, fed him, loved on him. He walked around yowling- totally distraught. I left the backdoor open so he could come and go as he pleased, even though I know I can’t keep him around because of my allergies.

I was a little concerned that Lissy wouldn’t come back if she saw Noah there. She is very territorial.

Well, I shouldn’t have worried because at about 10:30 I’m in the bathtub and guess who waltzes in looking like she’d lost a fight with a burr bush? Lissy. Of course I jumped out dripping wet and ran to hug her. She was very hungry, and a mess, but home and acting like nothing had happened.

Now I just need to figure out what to do about Noah. The kids let him in again this morning, and then played with him so much he was very happy to go back outside again. Still, something needs to be done with that situation.

Lissy, on the other hand, has been sleeping off her adventure in her bed on my computer desk. Occasionally she gets up to sleep on the couch or my scrapbooking counter if that is where I happen to be, so I think for all her nonchalance, she is quiet gald to be back. We have many theories as to where she’s been all this time, the most likely is that she hitched a ride to Disneyland for a few days. This photo from my friend Zarah may prove that. She seems quite elegant in the teacups, wouldn’t you say?

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No Kitty

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I have been to every animal shelter in the area. I have called vets. I have e-mailed everybody I know on this base. I called the people who pick up dead animals off of the side of the street and, thankfully, they haven’t picked up any cats on base this past week. I sent out a lost pet alert through Home Again, the microchip company we use. This alert should go to every shelter and vets in the area so I am praying that SOMEBODY brings my cat in before I go crazy. I am sick to my stomach over here.

Tonight I’m going to go door to door for a few blocks.

Lissy! COME HOME NOW! I cannot possibly make it through another deployment without you! You’re about the only thing that got me through the last one!

Owly

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It was a loooong weekend! I taught all day Saturday and classes went great, but it sure wore me out! Now I’m back home and work is so piled up. The Nook is closing up a month long challenge, narrowing down the first cut of a Design Team call and geting a virtual crop underway, in addition to the usual ordering for the kits and keeping everyone happy. I’ve found that my job goes in spurts. It is either smooth sailing or totally bottlenecked. I am looking forward to August when all of the hulabaloo is over and it will be back to teh regularly scheduled easy peasy lemon squeasy programming I’m content with.

Aside from work, it is going to be a busy day here. I have kids who need love, a bedroom floor that is,uhh, currently missing, company for dinner and a family who will mutiny if I don’t take them all to see Wall-E tonight! Heck, I’ll mutiny! I am also stalking my postman waiting for a package of goodies from Cosmo Cricket to hit my doorstep.

The funny thing is that come next Monday, I will have very little to occupy my time at all. My life attacks me several days at a time, and then it is smooth sailing for a few weeks. It always helps me to remember that when things begin to pile up. I can hit it hard today, but a sunset and time at the scraptable are on the horizon!

One bit of bad news- my cat, Lissy, is missing. We left for the weekend and I thought she was in the house, but I think she snuck out and now she is nowhere to be found. She is a very outdoorsy cat and has done this before, but she almost always comes as soon as I call her, so I’m worried.

The Lissy, The Kids, The Life

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Good Kitty.

chores

Chores.

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Landscaping Fun.

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Library Easter Egg Hunt.

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OMSH Coloring Un-Contest Efforts.
Rest.

Rest.

Happy Thanksgiving Dear Readers

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We Must All Say Goodbye Eventually

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This girl of mine was over 21 years old. In cat years that is well over 100. Baby was a beautiful stray who got adopted by a family that was allergic to her. While in their care she had a litter of kittens and after they found new homes, the father of this family put an ad up at the VA hospital where my mother worked and shortly thereafter we had a new addition to our family.

Baby was wonderful. She outlived every pet we had after her, except one (Fat Eddie, my sister’s cat).

In the past few days she started slowing down, and today she passed away. She was very lucky- vibrant and active and lovely until the end. We were lucky to know her.

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