What Damage is Done All Unknowing

(I know, it's been ages. Oops.)

Last Monday morning I woke up abruptly at 3:30ish in the morning with a searing pain across my cheek and the definite impression someone had just traveled up and over my face.

I got up, knowing that cat scratches always swell up and get all red if I don't wash them out immediately. Stumbled (still half asleep) to the bathroom, washed it out with water (I should have used something stronger but, well, half-asleep, remember), put ointment on it, a kleenex (to keep the ointment off my pillow) and crawled back into bed.

When I got up for real two hours later, I was slightly miffed at the two boys who might have been responsible. (Apricot doesn't sleep on the bed. Also, future examination of the scratch would show that the paw size was too big for him.)

But by the time I got home from work, I had not only realized but internalized that whoever did it hadn't meant to, and being mad at them was stupid and counter-productive. They were both rather apologetic when I got home.

That night I finally actually looked at it in the mirror, and realized that wow, that looks way worse than it feels, and no wonder people had been asking me what happened all day long at work!

Note the lighter scratch above the main one.
That's from a claw on the other side of his paw.
That's how big one Maine Coon paw is!

From what I can figure out, I think it was Colby. He's the one who sleeps up next to my shoulder and would have been in line to leave rapidly across my head. He's also the one who prompted me to want to clip their claws the day before, although (obviously) I had run out of time and hadn't done it. In other words, he had a super sharp claw on the edge of one paw that I already knew about, although they all do a spectacular job of keeping their claws in (when they aren't startled) so it has to get really sharp before I realize they need their claws clipped again).

And Colby often acts guilty when Thimble jumps onto the bed and leaves as though Thimble makes him feel like he's not supposed to be there. (Thimble, bless his heart, is a bit of a bully. I try to ameliorate his behavior but since I'm only home and awake five-six hours a day M-F, it's difficult. And in his defense, he isn't doing it to be mean; he's doing it because he wants me all to himself.)

But by five days later the scab was itching, and it came off yesterday. So it's healing nicely.

And I just clipped everybody's claws, so we shouldn't have a repeat of last Monday again.

The Visit: Overview

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

Today I got to see my kittens for the first time in person.

My first impression is that of terminal adorableness. They are so cute! I've never been around such small kittens (relatively speaking) before. Young, how about that. The youngest kitten I'd interacted with was Pippin at 4 months. So these little ones at a month and two weeks were quite the youngest I've met.

They are so soft and fuzzy. And also the ends are prickly. I don't think they can retract their claws yet, and they aren't heavy enough for the claws to do much damage (I did get one minor scratch).

They were hanging out in the bathroom. Ginger lured them out into the bedroom and we both sat down on the floor.

To my surprise, Colby came right to me. He seems to be very outgoing but also easily distracted (I think that part describes all kittens though) and while he wanted to be petted and played with, he also lost interest and dived back into the kitten group (which sounds like they were all together, which they weren't).

Thimble held back a little and took a while to warm up to me, but after he did, he was the one who ended up in my hands the most often of the two.

The others all have names now, too. The one the other couple picked they've named Hero. Ginger is keeping Wolf, the no-white brown tabby. She named him that because he's always by himself and has been that way since day one (so it's a very good thing that I couldn't get him!). The little girl is named Spice to go with her big sister (possibly genetically related but possibly not) that the couple getting Spice had gotten last year. They'd named the first one Sugar, so this one is Spice.

Back to the youngest kittens: they felt so very fragile. I had to "calibrate" my hands to make sure I wasn't using too much force or too little. Like holding an egg. It took me about half an hour of picking them up gingerly and putting them down to get the hang of it, but then it was lovely fun.

We played with them with a wand toy that has five strands hanging from it and the strands each end with wooden beads. If you hold it just right each bead group spreads out from the others and you can get all five kittens involved at the same time. Of course, the kittens found each other's beads more interesting than their own, so it's not like it was one strand per kitten.

It was challenging to get Thimble to play because he'd step back and let the others rampage through the space he was just in, and that meant he wasn't getting a chance at a bead strand.

I have this vision of people coming to my house (that didn't meet them as kittens) and Colby comes out and they're all like, he's so friendly and so very big, as they're petting him. Colby is going to be the smaller of the two. Ginger estimates a final weight of 17-19 pounds on him. Thimble is probably going to be 22-25 pounds, she thinks. He's also got this massive head already, and simply looks big. So my visitors are exclaiming delightedly over the friendly out-going Colby, when in comes Thimble, ambling in slowly, like he did when I first met him, only his full size. And my visitors take a slow step back and go, "that's a cat?" and I'll be all, "don't worry, he's a sweetie."

Thimble in the back,
Colby in the front.

I also discovered something I found surprising. I decided to see how they'd take to an over the shoulder hold, the way I used to carry Pippin. Apricot doesn't like that kind of hold. He prefers to be held in front, so he can see out. I thought it was because of his feral background that he wanted to see what was around him in front.

Nope. Turns out that might be part of it, but it's also just a preference. Colby likes to be held the same way, in front, supported by both arms. That makes it difficult to pet him and hold him at the same time!

But Thimble ... I put him up against my shoulder, and he snuggled right in. He even inched himself up so his front legs were over my shoulder and his upper chest was right on top of my shoulder, which is exactly the way Pippin would do. (And when Pippin was frightened, he'd wrap one long paw around the other side of my neck, holding on to me. Sometimes he could hold so tight, just his muscles, no claws, that it got challenging to get a full breath!)

Shoulder cat!

Ginger very sweetly took pictures of me and Thimble and Colby, because it's difficult to take selfies when your hands are occupied with sweet fuzzy kittens.

I've been doing arm and shoulder strengthening exercises since I met Ginger and her cat family back in June. I wasn't actually expecting a large improvement. It's only me holding my walking stick out in front of me (and to the sides) and holding the pose for a count of forty (I'm edging up on fifty) while I'm out doing my daily walk, and repeating each hold for ten times (because I have ten fingers to count with).

But when I got a 28 pound box of litter for setting up the third litterbox, I was surprised at how not-difficult it was to get in and out of the grocery cart. So when I visited this time, I wanted to lift Wally again.

Wally is the neutered boy who is a pet cat and lives in the house. Wally is the benevolent uncle cat to the kittens. He loves kittens. He's apparently got good memories of being a kitten and loves to watch over them. While they were playing on the floor with the wand toy with Ginger and me, Wally was on the bed, his long arms stretched out over the edge and crossed comfortably, and a sappy look on his face. He's funny. Thimble is likely going to resemble him a lot, at least physically.

Wally is the one where I can put my hand on his head between his ears and my fingers don't touch the ears on either side. Big broad head. So he weighs (Ginger's estimate) between 17 and 19 pounds. Last time I visited, I could lift him, but it felt very unsure and he thought so too, because he gave me a "please put me down before you drop me" look.

This time I lifted him and it was easy. I could even hold him for a short while before putting him down. I am quite impressed with my progress!

I am going to put more pictures and commentary in separate posts. The day was very busy and I'm sure I'm forgetting things.

These Are My Kittens

Sunday, Nov 23, 2014

I just found out which of the three kittens are mine. Luckily I've just decided on names for them, too, so here they are:

These will be my two kittens.

He'll get called Colby for short.
(Thank you to my friend whose grandson
is named Colby without the "Jack" for
letting me name my cat Colby, too.)

 Hopefully I can resist trying to remove the spot on his face ... nah, it'll be like my sister-in-law's cat who has specks of black on her white front legs. Every time you notice them you try to rub the dirt off, and realize that no, whoops, that's just her. So let's amend that to hopefully he'll learn to enjoy having his whisker pad rubbed!

And he'll get called Thimble for short.
Thimbleberries are an old word for raspberries,
and Thimble is mostly because he's the
2nd largest in the litter ...

I've asked for personality descriptions. I don't know much about them as people, just the way they look.

Holding Apricot

Thursday, Nov 20, 2014

Last week on Wednesday we achieved a new milestone. Apricot does not like to be held while you're standing up. This makes sense because the only times anybody held him at the shelter like that, it was to take him to get something medical done. He really really doesn't like you to walk while you're holding him.

I've been slowly working on this. It's a deeply ingrained aversion and will take years to overcome ... if it ever goes away completely. He may always flinch a little when I pick him up. I'm starting the process by simply picking him up and then putting him back down exactly where he was. I've been doing this for months now.

He's progressed to the point where he doesn't always want to be down right away. Sometimes he lets me hold him for longer. As in seconds longer, but every little bit helps. And occasionally he'll let me hold him for minutes at a time.

Last Wednesday he let me hold him for long enough that I had to put him down not because he asked to be down, but because my muscle strength was running out. Now I'm a bit of a weakling, so it's not like we stood there for hours. It was probably five to ten minutes.

It helped that I was standing in front of the patio doors at the time. He's discovered that he has a different viewpoint from my arms than he does from the floor, and since he really likes watching his kitty tv, this is fascinating enough that it overcomes the aversion of a human holding him.

What was really encouraging was that we'd actually started about five to ten feet away from the patio doors, and I had picked him up and then walked over to the doors. He wanted to be down the minute I started moving, but as it only took seconds to get to the doors with their enchanting view, he didn't have time to get upset enough or frantic enough to not be distracted by the activity outside the patio doors.

Now he's "backslid" since then; we're back to moments only. That's understandable, though. When you do something for the first time that really scares you, even if everything turns out okay, you have to have time to think about it and gather your courage before you try it again. I can be patient. With this, at least! Like I said, it'll probably take years.

Kitty Cuddles when I get home from work
can sometimes lead to sleepy kitty!

Then this past Monday he came in while I was watching Once Upon a Time and got up on the couch, curled up with his head against my hip, and stayed there for the last quarter or so of the episode. I've been wanting him to do that sort of thing for just ages.

Of course, just like with the holding, he has now become skittish and unwilling to get up on the sofa while I'm watching tv. I'll grant you that the crime shows I've been watching since Monday are a little less "cat friendly" since they have sudden bang sounds and things like that. He will, eventually, get used to it.

He may get used to it faster if the kittens spend time with me while watching tv, just out of jealousy. I can do that too!

The kittens are six weeks old today. Another six weeks and I can bring them home. Another four days and I'll know which two I can bring home!

Two of these three ...

The Week in Pictures

 Sunday, Nov 9, 2014

The dark is here and my S.A.D. is already in full swing. This makes me want to hibernate and not communicate with anyone, and my eagerness to blog has a tendency to go downhill.

So I thought I'd try something different. In this post I'm going to put a series of pictures from last week and tell you what's going on in each, and we'll see how long winded I get.

Apricot on his kitchen outpost last Sunday

I got two short sitting stools with padded tops for the kitchen. The idea is that the cats can sit on them and watch me working with food on the counter while not actually being on the counter in my way. Hopefully it will get them out from underfoot as well. And they are much more convenient for a driveby petting or head kiss/bump too!

Apricot had to be coaxed up a few times, but lately I've been turning around to find him up on the kitchen outpost instead of right behind me on the floor (he cured me of stepping back without turning around months ago). This is quite lovely and I let him know how pleased I am. The more attention he gets while on the outpost, the more likely he is to use it!

- - - - -

Upside down, the silly boy.

On Monday I was very tired and Apricot echoes my mood, so the feather toy play was extremely unexciting due to both of us being lackadaisical about it. I ended up calling my mom while sitting on the ottoman next to the chair, letting the feathers rest in the braided rug basket.

Apricot came over and jumped in the basket on top of the feathers, and then rolled over so as to (apparently) pin the feathers to the bottom of the basket underneath him. You can see the black string running into the basket with him.

I had to put my poor mom on hold while I took pictures. But you see, this is the first time Apricot has been "safe" enough to go with a full upside-down pose in a basket that if you remember, he was first too afraid of to even go near. Look at that fuzzy tummy!

- - - - -

Apricot's back end

This was taken last Wednesday. I love how he has his back feet almost primly crossed, like a genteel lady. When the other end, inside the tunnel, is busy attacking the shadow of the feathers on the tunnel's top!

Since the tunnel remains a favored spot to play with the feathers, I have been getting this view quite a lot lately. 

- - - - -

Kitten pinwheel

On Saturday, two of my friends and I went to a Christmas craft fair in a nearby town. On the way there (I wasn't driving), my phone went ding and I found Mrs. McFadden had sent me video and a picture. The kittens were four weeks old on Thursday and their teeth are starting to emerge. This sort of causes weaning to happen because mommy Cinder is quite motivated to get them to stop nursing at this point. Anybody who's had sharp kitten teeth sunk into their skin can sympathize with her!

I think this is so funny, three of the kittens in a rotation. We're only missing the fourth part of the pinwheel! Cinder is helping the weaning process along by making them eat their vegetables before they can have dessert. I mean, she's making them try eating their milk-replacer-softened kibble before she lets them nurse. She's such a good mommy.

- - - - -

Max has melted

Saturday night we were at my brother's place. Last year his downstairs chimney had been blocked by something and wouldn't pull a draft so the whole winter he could only have a fire in the upstairs fireplace oven. This year he'd gone to great lengths to clean out the chimney and the downstairs fireplace stove worked a treat! It had flames dancing and everything. (The upstairs version burns too hot to have flames. It's a disappointment that way.)

The sofa is directly opposite the fireplace and it attracted nearly all the cats. Max was in his traditional spot on the sofa but he was all "melted" from the heat, sprawled out and toasty. You could even pet his belly without getting nommed on. Well, if you weren't the fourth person to try it, anyway!

- - - - -

What's out there?

I have started sitting for short periods of time on the litter box's box in front of the patio window. There is room for Apricot to sit beside me. The reason I've started sitting there is because Apricot loves this way of being together. He looks out the window and I randomly pet him or play with my phone. 

Today when I took this photo I had walked over to the box, said Apricot's name to attract his attention, and sat down. He immediately got up from where he was in the living room and raced over and up onto the box so he could be beside me. I find it so very sweet when he does this sort of thing!

- - - - -

Here are the kittens, at four weeks old. I do so love getting kitten videos from Mrs. McFadden. The kittens are stronger and more aware of each other as playmates now. Watching them play together makes me very glad that I'm getting two instead of only one. Just imagine poor Apricot if he had one kitten in the house wanting to play with him constantly!

In Other News: Kitten Developments

My kittens are a few days over two weeks old now. They are growing at an immense rate. To the point where Mrs. McFadden recommended I start an upper body workout because they look to be very big kitties when they grow up.

I'm rather pleased with myself because I've already started an upper body workout, in direct anticipation of just such an event.

She sends me videos and pictures, and I'm getting quite addicted to randomly getting kitten "stuff" in my inbox or text message box. She stays up later than I do, so every few days I'll wake up in the morning, check my phone, and there will be new kitten stuff!

Cinder is being a very good mommy. She is such a good mommy that when her kittens couldn't all get to all her nipples at the same time to nurse, she propped herself up in the corner to allow better access. She looks very silly and very adorable at the same time!

Cinder making life easier
for her kittens if not herself

Ten weeks to Arrival Day. I'm not sure whether to be excited or apprehensive. Our life, mine and Apricot's, will certainly change quite permanently when they arrive. I'll miss the spontaneous one-on-one time with Apricot, even though I can toss some toys and treats into a room and shut the door with the kittens inside to spend some scheduled one-on-one time with him. I may even have to do that sort of thing (and then go spend time with the kittens too, so they don't feel neglected) in order to keep Apricot from becoming jealous.

My sister says this is a problem you have when you have more cats than hands!

If I did this right there should be a kitten video at the end of this post. The top two are the two brown tabbies with white. Apparently they are always together now and love to play with each other. The other people are leaning toward getting the black and white (who is sleeping on the left in this video) and Mrs. McFadden is keeping the talkative brown tabby without white for her breeding program. So I may be getting the two that are friends, which would be perfect! (The other sleeping kitten is the tortoiseshell girl.)

I made the mistake of putting the laptop on the floor and playing the video full screen, with sound, for Apricot. He got quite worked up and wanted to know where those kittens were. He could hear them quite well, thank you very much, and knew there was no way they were in that stupid old laptop. They had to be somewhere in this house and he's been so lonely. Where were these kitties who could be friends? He didn't find them in the house so he concluded they must be (sigh) outside where he couldn't play with them.

On the one hand, I'm sorry I got him so worked up about it. On the other hand, it's nice to know that his instant response was to look for them and then be disappointed when he didn't find them. Makes me think that when they do arrive, he'll be happy to see them ... 

News for Apricot and I

October 9, 2014

I got some very welcome news.

Hey, Apricot! Guess what?

Your baby brothers have been born!

Okay, well, actually Apricot just rolled his eyes at me the way he usually does now when I'm trying to explain something that's going to happen in the future. 

He actually seems to be missing his shelter cat buddies. Since those cats weren't the same cats from week to week (as some got adopted and others took their place) it's not a particular cat he misses. Just other cats around in general. If what I (and my vet) believe is true, he spent most of his life (10 months) in the cat room at the shelter, and only 4-6 months outside by himself. And some of that he was a baby and probably doesn't remember much, plus, another cat (mom) would have been there at least long enough so he could survive away from her.

I'm hoping he will welcome the two little kittens that were born (starting at) 7 am October 9, last Thursday morning.

Cinder is the mom's name. She takes very good care of her kittens but occasionally needs some help from her human because, well, apparently between Cinder's personality and her hormones, she believes her kittens are the be-all and end-all of the universe, and actually eating and drinking for herself comes a far distant second. So human mom is having to coax her into eating and drinking, and also occasionally offering the kittens supplemental food in case Cinder's reluctance to take care of herself is leading to not quite enough milk at the moment.

Cinder is the gray one parked on my lap.
This is from my visit back in June

There's another person ahead of me in picking order who wants a single boy. Cinder obligingly had four boys. One of the boys is being kept for the breeding program. So whenever these other people pick, I will get the remaining two boys. So I don't know which of the three my two are yet!

I am having to apply liberal amounts of patience and I am rapidly running out. Not that I can do anything if I run out of patience other than drive my friends and family crazy by fussing about it!

Oh. Where you all waiting for pictures of the kittens? 

They are mostly just furry wiggles right now, not very kitten like! These pictures are all from Saturday, when they are just two days old. She sent me a newborn headshot of each kitten but I wanted "fluffy" pictures. She protested they aren't fluffy yet. I clarified that I mostly just meant dry.

Black and white kitten

This is one of the kittens I could be getting. Notice he is sleeping on Cinder's paw. Now I know she's a Maine Coon, but she isn't actually an overly large cat. She's what you'd think of as more normal size. Probably twelve pounds more or less (and that's a guess based on my memory of her size compared to Apricot). And that's her paw and leg underneath that tiny, tiny kitten. He's 4.5 oz, Mrs. McFadden said.

Brown tabby with white, left side of the face

The other two kittens are brown tabbies with white. Oddly enough, you've seen one, you've seen both of them as long as you have a mirror. The other one looks like the mirror image of this one. They're chiral!

For those of you who don't already know or for whom I haven't explained this before, chirality is the chemical property of being a mirror image of each other. Molecules can be chiral. DNA is chiral. It has a mirror image that twists the other way. We're all made of DNA with left-hand twist but the right-hand twist does exist in rare examples (not humans, other really weird life on our planet). 

Since I am a chemist, I find it quite funny that two of the three kittens I could end up with are chiral kitties! Well, their faces are, anyway. I don't think the rest of their markings are chiral too, pity that.

Look at his toesies! They're translucent!

That's the black and white one again. He has a bellybutton too, a black mark on his white tummy.

And look at that tiny little tail!

It's hard to believe these tiny, tiny beings grow up to be massive cats like this one:

That's Tank. He's Cinder's daddy.

Of course I have not yet decided on names for them. I had names all picked out, and then decided I didn't want to use those names after all. I think I will bow to destiny and pick food names on purpose this time. My best cats have all been food names: Pizza, Pippin, Apricot. Even though I specifically chose Pippin's name because (I thought) it wasn't a food name. Yeah, then I found out within six months of naming him that there is such a thing as a pippin apple.

I can't wait for more pictures. The internet says two weeks till eyes open. I suppose they just look like bigger furry wiggles until then ... 

I will know which of the three kittens are mine at six weeks. More patience must be applied ...

Visiting Br'er Coon

June 14, 2014 Saturday

Today I went to visit the lady who is going to make my Maine Coon kittens for me at her home, Br'er Coon.

The drive there was lovely. I have never seen a more gorgeous day. I'd left the interstate (on purpose this time; I got lost so often this trip) and was on a two lane state highway with no traffic and gentle winding curves. There were vivid green meadows on either side of the highway and deeper green forest trees beyond them. The sky was a deep cerulean blue with a few large puffy white clouds. And to make things even more idyllic, the meadows were full of sunflowers and daisies and other large yellow flowers which were being visited by a flock of white butterflies.

Such a lovely house--and she takes care of all those plants!

Mrs. McFadden's house is lovely--if you go to the website the main picture with the doors that open to click through into the website is her actual house.

When I came in, the cats who are pets and live in the main house eagerly came to greet me. Grandma (a cat) was stately and overweight and held back mostly because I gathered she has great dignity. The only kitten currently in the house is a bit of a Little Miss Snooty and didn't really want cuddles. Mrs. McFadden said she's not like her normal kittens and frowned at her and said, well, when you try a new sire, you never know what you will get. Little Miss Snooty is going into the breeding program when she grows up which is why she was still there. All the other kittens had gone to their new homes already.

Tilly, aka Little Miss Snooty

This is okay. Having lots of kittens around is overwhelming and I'd rather see what they are like grownup. They don't stay kittens for long, but the adult stage lasts much longer, so I'd prefer to see what I'm getting for the long-term rather than play with kittens.

Fire in braided cat bed

There are cat beds and cushions and trees everywhere, but Mrs. McFadden has that interior decorator's touch which makes everything blend well and look appropriate. We spend some time talking while sitting on some facing loveseats, and Fire, one of the pet girls, was curled up in the cat basket made of braided rug material on the loveseat. I was petting her and she was most appreciative, especially when I knew enough to simply let my hand rest against her tummy after she wanted a snooze. She coiled her paws around my wrist so we ended up staying there longer because I was in a cat trap :)

Across the breezeway (left main house, right guest house)

She has a large house and across a little entryway was the part of the house where the breeding girls stay, and Tank, one of the boys.

Tank's hammock where he is most
definitely not looking outside.

During the day he is in a cage so he can look out and the door to the girls' room is open with just the screen door keeping them in. During the night the door to the girls' room gets shut and Tank gets to wander through the guest bedroom.
In the house proper, one of the pets is a boy named Wally. Wally is a big boy, bigger than Tank. But somehow, despite physics, Tank is heavier than Wally. She let me hold Tank (who shoved his head up under my chin and wanted scritches, as if I could free even one hand to pet him when I was taxed to my limit to hold him confidently with both hands) and he is extremely heavy for a cat the size he is.

One end of the girl's room, with assorted girls.
(Tootsie on high, Cinder on floor, Teddy on right)

When we went into the girls' room, a large open airy room with many cat trees, a couple folding chairs, and a bathroom with a water bowl in the sink so they can play with their water all they want without getting it everywhere else, Mrs. McFadden said I should sit down and they'd be all over me, and she'd be in in a minute while she got a current list of cats and ages.

Cinder under my hand, Tootsie jealously
looking on trying to get a share of pets

So I sat down on the concrete floor (turns out she'd expected me to sit in a chair) and she was right about them being all over me. I was instantly inundated with cats. Cinder, a solid blue girl, won the rights to stand across my lap right next to me, and held this position for some time much to the annoyance of Teddy, Baa-Baa, and Tootsie. Eventually Cinder got bored and left, and then I had one of the others instantly there.

Mrs. McFadden wanted to know why I thought I needed
a "good" lap as her cats will take anything offered
as Tootsie is showing here on my lap,
bare legs, bony knees and all.

Cinder has a thing about hair, so I took my ponytail down (my hair is short now), and let her play with it. I don't think I would let her do this if she was my cat, but since I don't have to worry about being played with unexpectedly through the day, I was willing to let her have her fun. Later I was sitting there and petting one of them, and felt a cat land quite heavily on the ponytail (I'd put it back up) with her front feet and back feet on the ground, and start tugging on my hair. I said, "Hello, Cinder," in a put-upon tone, without looking around.

Mrs. McFadden thought that was amusing, that I didn't even bother to look and knew exactly who it was pulling on my hair.

Oddly enough, I got nibbled on by several of the cats, and this astonished Mrs. McFadden since they'd never done this before. I'm beginning to think it's my body wash, a vanilla scented body butter lotion. They always go after my hands, and since I use my hands to apply the body wash, it's going to be the most concentrated there. I'm beginning to think I need to return to using a citrus scented non-butter-type body wash. (Cats aren't attracted to citrus.)

Mrs. McFadden holding the densely muscled Tank

Then we went to visit the current courting couple in the boys' new home. Both boys will be here once they get the other side up, but it came damaged so only one side is working. This is a shed with air conditioning and heating, and the "sides" are open-work metal to keep the boys from each other's girls, I guess. She opened the side where Ms. Hattie and Mr. Green Genes were hanging out in their cat trees, and although they came out, and let themselves be handled, it was like we were both part of the scenery.

Mr. Green Genes in his cat tree watching Ms. Hattie

Ms. Hattie in the window seat

This was my first experience with the way hormones make the cats so very different. The two of them were entirely focused on each other such that I didn't exist and Mrs. McFadden, their person, barely existed. It was odd to be so ignored after the pileup in the girls room!

Ms Hattie may or may not be pregnant. They'll know in one or two weeks if she is. And if she is, she might be carrying my boys. Mrs. McFadden is reluctant to breed another girl right now, because the last time Ms. Hattie had a litter, she had 11 kittens. That's not a typo. She had 11 kittens and the humans had to help out with the nursing because she didn't have enough to go round, plus simply keeping up with and training that many kittens was exhausting ... since another cat had had kittens near the same time, a more normal 6, and that meant poor Mrs. McFadden was trying to care for 17 kittens. She said it just about killed her and she doesn't want to risk it again.

Tootsie showing off the black mark on her foot
which is where her name comes from

I had brought a stack of cardboard packing squares for her. I use them to make scratching posts (you stack them on top of each other). Since I get them from work, and they only get thrown away if I don't take them, I feel free in giving them to people (because if they don't like them, they can just recycle them and neither of us are out anything). 

After seeing her lovely and elegant home, I didn't know what she'd think of a stack of cardboard, but she loved it and started instantly thinking of ways of creating a background for photo shoots with it! I never would have thought of that. We put the stack in the girls' room, and although they didn't start scratching right away, they did start playing Queen of the Hill on the stack. As we were stacking them. We had to keep moving cats off the current top piece so as to add more pieces!

And then I drove back home, getting lost again, this time bad enough I had to resort to Google and GPS to get me out of the mess I was in instead of using just my paper directions. But as it didn't delay me much, only about 10 minutes, I wasn't too put out by it.