Tagged & Sympathy

I have been tagged four times by Cheysuli, Kimo & Sabi, Ariel and MaoMao.
But you are only getting 5 reaons total not twenty.


5 Reasons Why I Blog

1. Share my life with the world, the good and the bad.

2. Meeting fellow kitties and others like fluffies and a few woofies.

3. Having fun with my fellow kitties

4. Gives me a way to use my awake time other than mooching treats from mum.

5. It is allowing me to run for office, as Vice President, with Cheysuli.

I am not going to tag anyone, I haven't been able to make it around the blogs to see who already has played. Join in if you want.


Thanks for all of your sympathy on my 'digestive issues'. The blood work showed NOTHING. Everything was normal, kidneys, liver, electrolytes, blood counts. They even rechecked for FIV and Feline Leukemia just to be sure

When mum checked my digestive output this morning she started singing "Tootsie Rolls, I see stuff that looks more like tootsie rolls" and seemed very happy. Guess that is a good sign. But I think she is still concerned until I am back on track for several days

But let me see what fun stuff happened this past week. We gotted white crocus flowers to bloom and on Monday the 26th our first daffydils opened.

Plus mum is at it again. She is buying stuff that looks like ginger cats. Last year she did this too and we had some bird houses that looked like kittie heads.
So I jumped up to check out this years edition not sure about this. Looks nice but it is wearing flowers, might be a distanct relative of Skeezix. But a nice Smiley Boy just like me.
But in general I wasn't all that interested. So I left it for mum to deal with. It is hanging outside, hoping that some little biride comes to make its home inside.
TV Alert for those of you who have digital cable or satellite TV. Our local TV person gave this show two paws up. Mum and I plan on watching it.

What: "Cat-Minster: CFA International Cat Championship"
When: 6 p.m. Sunday, repeated at 11 a.m. April 7
Where: GSN - Game Show Network

Fang Shui Friday

Hairballs are bad ch'i. To transform the negative energy, deposit them in the correct corner of the room according to their color.

Orange hairballs in the west corner; blue in the south; green in the north; white in the east.


From Fang Shui by Catfucious, Peter Pauper Press, 2002.


This is a good week for this fang shui lesson. I haven't been fully sharing, this over the past few weeks, but I have been having some 'digestive issues' as mum calls them. They are NOT related to the food recall issue. I only get dry food.

About 3 weeks ago I vomited several times for a couple of days, but not with hairballs. Once now and then mum never worries about. So we made a visit to the vet and he didn't find anything obvious wrong. But I had gained 14 ounces since last May (does this mean a D-I-E-T?). The doc gave mum some pills to mix with my food, an antibiotic, after a few days my poop became loose and seemed to have a lot more volume. In the past getting an antibiotic has given me a looser stool. But it went away after stopping the pills, but not this time.
Last Friday, the 23rd, mum hauled me back to the vet. No fever, again nothing obvious. Weight 15 pounds 9 ounces! A gain of 5 ounces in just over 2 weeks! They sent mum home with a medicine that is like Imodium for humans. So I got that stuff with tuna juice for the next 5 days, no change.

I knew something was up last night. All my water dishes disappeared and my food dish too. No amount of staring induced mum to give me any treats. She went to bed and left me to starve. This morning I woke her up furry early, knocking a fake plant over in her sleeping room. Jumping on the bed didn't help either. When she did get out of bed, she stayed home and worked on the 'puter and phone for a while. But she didn't give me any food.
Then mum brought out the PTU and took me to the VET again. But this wasn't a short visit. Mum dropped me off and left me ALONE!!!!!! They took me to a different room than I have been in before. Now to say I have an attitude with the at the VET is putting it mildly. The techs laugh at how much I growl and hiss. I don't generally cooperate with them. Too bad mum does not have a movie camera that has sound, you might not believe the sounds I make!
So what happenned? Well, according to mum, they put me to sleep so they could get some blood, they took an x-ray of my insides and to make sure I wasn't dehydrated they gave me subcutaneous fluids. Mum came and sprang me from the office late in the afternoon and we came straight home.

I figured I would finally get some food, but NO. I didn't get any more food until bedtime. The verdict, well the blood test results won't be back until later today. My x-ray didn't show anything inside of me that would be causing my issues. Plus I mum has another pill to give me until my poop gets back to normal.

So I am ready to just chill today on Friday. I hope the rest of you are feeling good and not having any health issues. I feel OK, running and jumping all around the house. It is just my poop that is the issue.

One Lump

Hey, didn't you see the kittie napping on the bed? Mum? Mum? What is up with this?
Mum I like it when the sheets are all nice and fresh, but I don't like being UNDER the covers! Yes, I am under here, so what do you want? Leave me alone for my nap and take off the sheets.
NO, you are burying me here. Hey, now there is a whole more thick layer here. Mum, mum?
OK, let me see if I can move closer to the edge, yes, little by little.
Phew, made it out to daylight!
Don't do that to me again mum! I am not an under cover kittie. What, if I am in the way when the bed gets made, I am going to get buried again? Fine, then I will just go nap somewhere else!

ManCat Monday - Temper, Temper

Is temperment related to coat color? Most of the evidence is ancedotal, but so far it looks like black cats are less affected by untoward events, while red or torties care quick to react to stress.
Hmmm. Ginger kitties aren't quite red, but getting there. Maybe that is why I am so quick to put the bitey on mum when I want to be left alone!

We had a totally awesome day yesterday! Record temperatures in the high 70's. Mum opened so many windows, even the windows that go all the way to the floor! So much fresh air, birdie watching, hearing the birdies sing, hearing the wind in the trees and the little noise at night of some other little creatures.

Mum brought out the patio chairs and just sat around! Didn't really do any outside work, she said she just wanted to enjoy the first really warm day. She says she is allowed a lazy day now and then! She talked to the neighbors and met their new baby, who is already 2 months old. We had lots of little sticky things around, making lots of noise. But that is what mum says is nice. Everyone is outside and reconnecting.

First Flowers

Spring must really be here. Mum was outside and found the first flowers blooming in our yard! Just a few of the crocus peeking out of the front flower bed. Plus mum says if the weather stays nice, and it is supposed to, the daffodils may be blooming in the next few days.It is a bit foggy out right now and the TV man says we may get thunder boomers later today.
This was our backyard yesterday afternoon, and the little bit of snow that was still melting. But by the end of the day, the snow was gone. Another sign that spring is here.
Plus it was nice enough yesterday and today that mum opened a whole bunch of windows. Including the one in the front with my perch. So I could watch for and listen to the birdies and smell all of the scents in the outside air.
Thanks for the comments on the new look. Like Jake & Bathsheba said, it takes lots of time to change things over. So that is why mum waited for a day when she took off work, and planned to use some of that extra time for the switch. But now, if I want to change the colors, mum doesn't have to hunt through the code to find the spots and then put in funny stuff like CC6633 for the color.

But bummer that the header gives some of you a half head of me. Mum worked hard to get it to work out with just full shots. Well at least that what is shows on our 'puter. Mum says not to worry about it. We may still make a few changes, but will see. They won't be major changes like we just went through!

Renovations

So if you are really paying attention when you got here today, you will notice that the blog has changed. Mum switched it over yesterday to one of the new blogger templates. I really like the new header, me staring at you, times 5.

I like the wider area for postings and such. I know Luxor uses this and I like the way his bloggy looked. So when Blogger made us switch over to the new Blogger, mum looked at these newer templates. But she wanted to wait to switch so that she had time to get everything back in place like the links and buttons.

Most importantly to figure out how to put a picture of me on the top.The one I had on the old blog didn't look good here so mum found a nice head shot and kept cropping it to fit and getting the box adjusted to the correct size. I think she did a good job with her trial and error fixing!

I think we got most everyone's linkies back too. That probably was the longest thing to do since we had so many to put on! Look at how many furiends we have.But mum says it will be faster to add more as we find new furiends. Plus get all of the buttons back, the counter and the clock. Mum just had to copy the stuff over from the old template. But we couldn't do that with all of the linkies.

My little quiz yesterday on the two pictures. Max's mom, Thumper, gotted it correct. Both by Van Gogh and both called Starry Night. But the one on the right is fully, Starry Night over the Rhone. The more well known painting is just Starry Night. Mum needed some big pictures to fill up this wall and wanted something that was related to each other.

But I liked Oreo's answer, they are painted with a brush, purrty and in frames. That would be my guess too! But mum understands this sort of stuff. But her favorite painter is Claude Monet, but she couldn't find big pictures of his to put up here.
It must be spring, mum gotted a picture of a robin hanging out in our yard today. Mum also stayed home from work yesterday. She and Grampie had some business to do early in the day somewhere, then they came over here for a little bit and did some stuff outside. Then mum wented places and came home with stuff. More food for the birdies and me! She even cleaned the wheeled monster's room out some.

Me, heck, let mum work. I just napped. I hung out on the guest bed and soaked up some sunshine. I plan on doing more of the same for the rest of the weekend.

Fang Shui Friday

There can be only one feng shui master in the home.

Make sure the dog knows this.

From Fang Shui by Catfucious, Peter Pauper Press, 2002.
Or your beans, they must know that you are the master or mistress of your universe, the house, the yard etc. EVERYTHING!

Plus I have a question for all of you. There are two big pictures behind me. Can you tell me what they have in common?

Answer Cat

Seems my recent posts have generated some questions, so Answer Cat is here!

Luxor wanted to know what I was thinking when mum took the picture we posted for ManCat Monday yesterday. Well, several things. First, "oh no, not another picture. Don't you already have 40-11 million pictures of me already?" Second, "what did you do with the plant that was sitting on this stand?"
The plant gotted taken away since I started jumping into the plant! She was not happy with me doing this, 'cuz the plant kept getting crushed. Plus she was worried that I would start using the plant dirt as my litter box. So the plant is now out in the garage for now. Mum says it was getting a bit ragged, so maybe she will replace it. Maybe not! Then I have another spot to sit on!

Yes, my tags have my name on it. Here is a picture that shows it much better. The little tag behind it, blue in this picture, is my rabies tag. Last time I gotted a rabies shot good for three years. So now that tag is gold.
About the basketball tourney. Mum has decided that she doesn't care who wins so won't need to cheer for anyone. Hockey, well the Badger Ladies won the tourney this year for the second straight year. Scooby, Shaggy and Scout's hockey team The Sioux are playing in the men's tourney. We fostered them a Squillion last year named Sioux.

Thanks for your feedback on Andie Pandie. Mum forwarded your comments to his mum. We will let you know what happens.

And mum says thank you for your compliments on my snuggle pillow. It didn't quite turn out exactly how she wanted. She wanted to get more of a cat cup shape. She will work on this and see if she can do it.

ManCat Monday - Mystery

"The only mystery about the cat is why it decided to become a domestic animal"
Sir Compton Mackenzie.

Well, duh. I have someone who caters to my every whim. Why not?! I am a spoiled little kittie. I like that!
Plus Simba at The Weekly Hairball had a recent post of what he would look like to a mouse. He looks furry manly and if I were a mouse, I would be scared!

Bucky did not do well in the brackets. So no more games for them. Guess we will have to find a new team to cheer on. Any suggestions?

Mum wasn't around for the game at all. She wented out for the day with furiends for a long lunch. She said they had Italian food, surrounded by lots of Italian cars both Ferarri's and Maserati's. Both street and race cars. Plus lots of Aston Martins. Mum says the cars costed more that our house did. So she won't bringing one home any time soon. Gotta win the lottery first I guess.

Plus, we totally blew by our 15,000 visitor sometime in the past week or so. I totally missed it!

Look What Mum Made Me

Mum was furry busy yesterday doing all sorts of stuff. Using the big sucking machine, moving things around, putting things away. Washing things, the usual cleaning stuff, cooking. But when she was done with the normal stuff she did some extra projects.

First mum opened up a room that she has been keeping closed most of the time. She was keeping it closed as I kept pushing her flower plants off the table and onto the floor. She was not happy about that, telling me I was killing her plants.
She had four of these things and you can see that I moved a few off of the table just a few times over the past few months. So mum had been keeping the door closed to that room.

She got all four of those plants now in one big plant pot and now it is way too heavy for me to shove off the table. I think that is what she was hoping for. So now mum hopes they will grow better and bloom more! Plus she will have the different flower colors all in the same pot!
So what did mum make me? My very own hand made sleeping pillow. She boughted the stuff before Christmas, but then didn't have much time to work on it. She even hadded to buy a new machine to do the so-ing part, her old one wasn't working well and it was going to cost lots to get it fixed. It was less green papers to buy a new one. So she boughted a new machine for her birthday with the money Grampie gave her.
The outside is a nice soft fleecey fabric, in a purrty wild kittie fur print. And stuffed with one whole fluffy quilt bat. As soon as she was done, she brought it to me to check it out. I promptly climbed on an took a nap. It is furry comfy and mum says it is like a big pillow, just for me.

Thanks mum for the special snuggle pillow. It is nice and warm and makes me look good.

St. Patrick's Day

Happy St. Patrick's Day to those of you who are Irish, even if just for today. Mum is not wearing green today. Says she doesn't need to be Irish. But she did buy some Irish Soda Bread at the store today. Guess that is what she is cellybrating with

I want to introduce you to Andie Pandie. This is a kittie who lives with someone that mum knows at work. When she firsted saw him all she could think of was - Fat Eric! Don't you think they look alike? But while Andie is a wonderful ginger kittie, he is only 12 pounds and just over 1 year old.
Fat Eric is below, don't you think they look alike!? Other than Eric's, umm, beauty mark, they looks like duplicates. A doppleganger.But Andie might have to find a new home as he is acting up, his bean dad works furry hard and gets home furry late at night. But then Andie wants to wake him up early in the morning. So bean dad is suffering from lack of sleep. They have tried closing doors, keeping him another room but he meow's so loud he still wakes them up(they live in a small place). His mum came to talk with my mum about it. Thinking maybe she knew someone who might be wanting a new kittie. Mum says she would ask around, but mum assures me Andie won't be coming here. Plus mum told her about HAWS and that they are furry nice and he would be able to find a new home there. But they are going to try to work this out if they can.

Fang Shui Friday

If a room has too much metal energy in the form of white furniture, shed on the furniture to soften the energy.

The gentle curve of a sleeping cat can also aid in softening metal energy.

From Fang Shui by Catfucious, Peter Pauper Press, 2002.

We don't have any metal furniture in the house and we don't have any white furniture in the house. But I agree that a kittie can make any chair look better. This is a furry old chair that mum gotted from Grampie, but don't I make it look wonderful?

Almost Gone

This is a picture of the back yard tonight. The snow is almost gone!
The front of the house, this was all covered in snow less than two weeks ago.
Look at the tulips, pushing up out of the ground. Soon it will be purrty again with lots of flowers.
You can check back here and here for what it looked like less than two weeks ago. It is starting to cool off tonight. But Sunday it was in the 50's, Monday the 60's and yesterday it made it into the 70's. So nice, mum could come home and open windows. More fresh air for me to breathe. I think spring is ready to be sprung!

Brackets

Mum has been studying the back of the sports page tonight. It has all sorts of lines that pair up and then meet, getting reduced by half each time. Something about being mad for March.

Anyway, if you are into brackets, please pick our local team. The Badgers, ok? Thank you.

The sun was nice and sunny again. Our snow is going away and we can begin to see the grass again in lots of places. Mr. TV weather guy says it might be 60 degrees tomorrow. Wow, heat wave. Mum went outside when she got home and looked at the top of the house. Guess not all of the snow is gone from on top of the house. Mum is guessing in one more day.

And yes, I got treats. I just come and stare at mum sometimes and she gives me treats. She feels guilty I am sure. But I get them one at a time, she won't shovel them in my mouth. Doesn't want me to choke on them. Eat slowly and savor them she says. Just gimme the treat mum!

ManCat Monday - Gimme

"Cats seem to go on the principle that it never does any harm to ask for what you want." Joseph Wood Krutch.
I am probably asking for treats! See this big empty mouth, fill it with treats. NOW!

Plus mum said she saw a robin yesterday as she wented over to get Grampie to go to church. But no robins in our yard, at least not yet. But lots of snow going away as we had another bright and sunny day.

The snow is melting and we can begin to see little patches of grass. Plus mum wented outside and can see the tulips and daffs starting to push up out of the ground on the front side of the house which faces south. Hurry up spring!

Fresh Air

Yes, it finally gotted nice enough that mum opened the window in the kitchen. I was so excited I jumped up and smelled the outside. It was so nice, plus you could hear the birdies singing too.

Plus a few pictures from a week ago. See how deep the snow was! Mum had to walk through all of that white stuff to put food out for the fevvers. But since it is warmer, the snow is going away. Maybe we will see the grass soon.
And mum found some kitties out wandering the streets last night. She was driving home and was getting ready to turn on our street. The road is curvy, but she could tell from the street light that two small objects were right in the middle of the road. She though someone had just thrown a couple of large drinking cups or bottles in the road. But when the car lights gotted on the objects, it was two kitties! A black one and a ginger and white cat. Mum braked the car and the kitties ran off. They better be careful. The next driver might not be so careful.

The sun is out, the clocks are changed and things are good. Everyone have a good Sunday.

Back in Business

I had mum home yesterday and she wasn't working either. She gotted up late, for her, anyway. Said it was nice to snuggle in a bit.

She lefted for a while and came back with some bags. Did some shopping and also took away the library books she had. Plus she didn't bring any back! That means she has more time to play with me, instead of sticking her nose in a book.
After she came home she worked on the 'puter and gotted all the programs put back on. Says we have to practice 'safe computing'. Then she copied over the files that Mr. Geek saved for her. We had 4,577 picture files! Now not all of them were of me, but lots of them are. The she copied over the next disc with other boring stuff on it like letters and such.

The she updated all of the linkies to my furiends. We think we got everyone, but will have to check as we see comments. We put back over 150 linkies and some we didn't add as the kitties haven't blogged since 6 months or more ago. So I made it around the CatBlogoshpere and checked out everything that happend. Didn't leave many comments, maybe things can get back to normal now. We hope anyway.

But mum had time to find the pictures of me and the indoor windchimes. Actually we have two of them. The one by the front door, that is purrty glass that sounds nice. It is on the left of the Galileo therm-o-meter.
And the one in the opening between the kitchen and dining room. I set that one off everytime I go through! Mum has another inside wind chime that rings sometimes when the furnance blows. Plus the one that is outside. Do you think we have enough of these?

Fang Shui Friday

The pleasant tinkling of wind chimes invigorates the soul.

Batting the wind chimes around at 4 A.M. will invigorate the soul optimally.

From Fang Shui by Catfucious, Peter Pauper Press, 2002.

Update on the 'puter. It is back and pretty much working. Plus Mr. Geek did rescue the pictures and such. But mum did have a bit of a problem. At first the silver thingy wouldn't work in the drive. So she took it and the 'puter to Mr. Geek. They had put it on a disc that our drive wouldn't work with. Another hour out of her life. So they had to move the data to ones we could use. SUCCESS. Our pictures and such do still exist. YAY.

But mum didn't have time to find the picture of me playing with the windchime. So just imagine me, jumping around and making noise in the middle of the night. Mum doesn't have to imagine, I do it all the time.

Technical Difficulties

::SIGH:: Will it ever end? Mum computer started, but then just hung up, didn't really start at all on Saturday. So she call the fun helping people and they tried to fix it by running the operating system repair. No luck.

So then they said they could wipe everything away and start over. But mum said not so fast, she wanted to do "data recovery" from the hard drive. So she took it to Mr. Geek and they recovered the stuff. Like all of my purrty pictures!!! At least we hope it worked. If not, well we were going to lose it anyway.

Then last night and tonight she spent more time on the phone getting everything redone. From scratch. So now she has to put all over her stuff on the 'puter. But one of the first things she did was to get the e-mail up. So at least we can see our messages again, the easy way.

But we losted everyone's e-mail that we had. So little by little we will have to get them all back. ::SIGH::

Tuesday, Snow Day

Yes, it is snowing again. We managed to get some sun late Saturday, Sunday and Monday. Today it is snowing again. I WANT SPRING!

Plus mum went to the Green Walls Shelter on Sunday. She said she didn't see any Squillions or even anything that looked summery or for the garden. Maybe they are slow in getting the stuff out, but no kitties looking for homes. Mum said they had lots of candy for Easter.

Has anyone else checked their Green Walls Shelter lately?

Man Cat Monday

For ManCat Monday, a simple post. Remember the Golden Rule:

Do unto others, as you would have them do unto you.

We had a furry sunny Sunday and I spent the day napping in the widnows, catching as many sunbeams as I could. It had been a long time since we has such a wonderful sunny day. It made both mum and I happy.

Fun, Sun and Hugs

Happy Caturday everyone, or Saturday to the beans.

Fun
When I started doing this I was doing if for fun, meeting other kitties and making furiends. We had the occasional 'contest', when a blog would reach its "X" visitor. Lately the contest have been more over the top, with fancy pictures and stuff. Maybe some kitties like this, mum and I don't have time to do all of this, so we don't compete. Mum says I have enough toys and treats, plus I don't want to win clothes I won't wear. It is interesting to see the pictures that people come up with however.

If everyone is having fun with these contests, then great. But when it stops being fun, and kitties and their beans get their feelings hurt, then I think it is time to step back and think about things. There are two philospohies here.

One: "Winning isn’t everything; it’s the only thing"

Two: "It's not whether you win or lose, it's how you play the game."

I much prefer option two. I think back to the Catolympics. I tried my bestest in my events but I didn't win. But I sure had fun being with my furiends and competing. I won't like you any more or less if you win or not.

I enjoy all of my furiends blogs and don't want anyone to quit blogging because of this, but let us remember sportmanship.

Sun
My picture yesterday for Fang Shui was not one we have taken in the past week. It has been cloudy and snowy here since last Friday. The sun was out early this morning, very briefly and still is peaking out now and then. Mum has gone outside again to work with the snow eating machine. Here are some of the fancy snow drifts coming off the roof of the house. Mum took pictures and then knocked them down.





This is how the front of the house looks right now. Below is how we can't wait for it to look with flowers and green grass and all.
Hugs
MuShue has started a hugs campaign, guess that is something we could use about now to reconnect with our furiends. I have been tagged by both Gemini and DaisyMae Maus, so here are my hugs

{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{Ms. Princess Mia Bella}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}

{{{{{Skittles}}}}}

{{{{{George, Max, Tipper and Misty of Crew's Views}}}}}

{{{{{Patches, Mittens, Mistrie, Precious and Calico Mom Toni of the Big Piney Woods Cats}}}}}

{{{{{Zeus}}}}}

{{{{{Kukka-Maria}}}}}

{{{{{Skeezix}}}}}

{{{{{Beau}}}}}

I can't list everyone in the blogosphere. {{{{{Consider yourself hugged}}}}}. Pass it on.