And Then There Were Three

Jan3

Ever the crafty woman my aunt happened to have two half grown kitties in need of a new home at our family’s Christmas gathering this year.

Gypsy

Did I ever tell you that John loves cats?

John loves cats.

Cassandra AKA Cassie

I know that John loves cats because on the four hour plus car ride home with the two of us, the two dogs, the three overtired, over-sugared girls and the two new cats – he smiled.

A man that can put a purring kitten on his lap and drive in a car full of the likes of that and still smile – loves cats.

I know that John loves cats because as we slowly introduce them to Fiona (our current cat) and the dogs, the new kitties have been living in our bedroom. We heat our house with wood. The wood-stove is not the bedroom. The door between the bedroom and the wood-stove is closed. The temperature outside is what the forecasters call “bitterly cold.” My husband who hates to be cold is still smiling.

John loves cats.

The Unappreciated Cat

Nov18

I was thinking about the cat today and how she’s really rather unappreciated in my blogging world. I double checked and discovered that there are five tags on posts with “cats” and 41 for “dogs”. It just so happens that I took this picture of her the other day so I thought it would be a great opportunity to share a little Fiona story.

That’s when I came to the realization that she’s not under appreciated.

She’s just boring.

In addition to boring she is also frighteningly outperformed in her cat duties by one large Great Dane.

Cat duty: Spend the day sleeping in the sun in an inconvenient place.

Fiona – check

Piper -Sleeps in an inconvenient place but takes up 20 times more room and when you oust her from that place sighs loudly and often farts in your general direction as she moves off.

Cat duty: Kills rodents or other small animals.

Fiona – Doesn’t know what to do with a mouse when given to her on a silver platter.

I know I’ve tried.

Piper- Kills rats with relish. Also death on possum, skunk and other small creatures that invade her kingdom.

Cat duty: Being a general cuddly animal.

Fiona – Waits until you are almost settled in your chair/bed/what have you and then sits on you. If you attempt to remove her she will somehow sink her freakishly sharp back claws into you on her way off.

Piper – Such a good cuddler that I actually kicked John out of bed late in pregnancy with Ivy in favor of Pipers back warming skills.

Fiona also is worse about stealing food off the table and pukes in the house more than Piper does.

To top it off I prefer blogging with pictures, while Fiona is a beautiful cat her coloring makes taking a good picture of her very difficult. This is exacerbated by the fact that she is a cat so immediately looks annoyed and haughty while turning her head away from me while I try.

I’m no longer confused about why the dog posts have outnumbered the cats.

A Rare Day

Nov1

It’s a gorgeous day outside, sunny, warm, little wind, a rare treat for the first of November.

Even more rare was my urge to clean the kitchen, so I’ve been missing out on the beautiful weather to accomplish this:

Those of you who are perfectionists are probably wondering why there are still cobwebs, a back tag hanging above the sink, dirt chunks on the floor, a hole under the counter where a dishwasher should be and why we still have a counter that was chewed on by a certain Great Dane puppy many years ago.

Those of you who saw my house yesterday probably fell down in shock at the expanse of white counter top visible, pre-chewed or not!

I always run into a problem when I do a major clean, there are just some things there are no good spots for.

The binos, they live next to the microwave. Do we need 3 pairs there? No. Do I have any other place to put them? No.

The oatmeal doesn’t fit in any of the cupboards so it stays on the counter along with the deep fryer.

And then there is the bowl of miscellaneous small items. Screws from the dove cage the girls ripped out that haven’t gotten fixed, tiny bits of hardware for the ice maker water line, and the cat skull that I re-found behind the microwave.

Sometimes my life makes me wonder.

Just as I was beginning to think it was completely ridiculous that I had a cat skull hiding behind the microwave Ivy saw the skull again and said, “MOM that’s really cool! Is that a cat skull?”

Then the two of us had a conversation about what cats eat, (Eyes in front likes to hunt.) what holds teeth in, why skulls are hard and if Granny would like to see it.

Now I’m no longer wondering, we may have some unorthodox adornments in our house but it’s worth it!

(If you are wondering where the skull came from no need to worry it wasn’t a family pet, it was the remains of the cat in Confessions Of A Lawn Hater.)

Ivy’s Michigan Stories

Aug25

Ivy went along on the trip with John to Michigan. Talking to her you’d never guess that they were there for Storms surgery, nope, clearly in Ivy’s world the trip to Michigan was all about the pony ride.

It comes up in conversation (or out of the blue) like this:

-“MOM GUESS WHAT? … I got to ride a pony!”

-“MOM you know what I did? … I rode a pony with Uncle Jim!”

-“MOM you know what feel you better? … Riding a pony!”

-“MOM I rode a pony with Uncle Jim like at the fair. …. It was better than the fair.”

-“MOM we go to Michigan again and I ride a pony?”

Clearly the pony ride was a big hit!

Only two things can compete with the pony ride.

The stuffed pink poodle that she got as a gift that she actually threw(? lost? dropped?) out the window on the drive home. Lucky for Ivy Dad was the hero and went back for it.

“Mom, my puppy flew out the window, and you know who turned around and got it? DAD! And it wasn’t even dirty!”

Since it’s rescue it has accompanied her everywhere and has been called either Grandma Mary or Finley, she might not be sure of the name but it’s not getting let go of long enough to fall out a window again that’s for sure!

And my favorite, her story about the kitten:

“Mom you know what I did?”

“I held a tiny kitty, I held it like this” – mimed cupping hands against chest

“It was soo tiny and so black Mom, it was so black”

“And, and it’s eyes were closed!”

-I asked how big it was-

“It was NOT big Mom it was TINY!”

After our conversation I saw the picture, she was right it was tiny!

Confessions Of A Lawn Hater

Jul16

It has been two weeks since I mowed the lawn.

Today while mowing the lawn I found a dead cat.

If that bothers you please stop reading I doubt this story is going to get any better.

Fortunately years of mowing at high speeds with minimal before mowing lawn pick-up have honed my swerving skills and I was able to stop next to the cat. It took me a good thirty seconds of staring to identify the flattish, orangeish, hairyish, splotch in my yard. Without the ear and tail I might have been stumped. So I probably don’t need to say this wasn’t a freshly dead cat. The good news is that if you find a dead cat it gives you plenty to ponder while you finish mowing your lawn.

There are questions with probable answers:

-Where did it come from? I’m guessing the neighbors barn cat or a feral cat, there are lots of both around.

-Why is it in MY yard? Well cats do come through the yard occasionally although the dogs really dislike that and so it’s not real common.

-If John had been mowing would he have run it over? Probably, he is color blind and runs everything over with the lawnmower, a classic case of if I do it really badly I won’t have to do it anymore.

Questions that I can only guess at the answers:

-Did something kill that cat?

-Does that explain why I also lost three ducks while we were on vacation?

-Do things that eat ducks not eat cats?

-What is wrong with my dogs, that they haven’t noticed it?

-Thank goodness my dogs haven’t noticed it!

-Can I convince John that dead cat removal is a mans job?

And questions that might indicate I spent too much time in the sun:

-Would running over a dead cat be better than running over a pile of chain?

-Would I have to extract dead cat from the mower deck if I did that?

-Would that require taking off the deck?

-Does my Dad’s knowledge of lawnmower fixes include dead cat damage?

-Would anyone help me if that was my problem or would they just laugh?

And the biggest question of all:

-Why am I mowing a patch of lawn that we use so infrequently that it can have a very decomposed cat in it without anyone noticing?

Good Mousers Needed!

Jun24

Yesterday I watched a mouse run across the kitchen floor right in front of Clara and our cat Fiona then dash under the dishwasher to safety. Only Clara tried to catch it. I already wrote about how our cat Henry (above in orange) was the worlds worst mouser but Fiona(black) is right up there with him. Henry was awful because he could catch mice, never did anything to them and would eventually let them go. Fiona just seems to be lacking any hunting instinct whatsoever. I have never, ever, seen her with a mouse. And believe me, in our house, there are plenty of mousing opportunities. The worst performance by Fiona was about two years ago on a dark and stormy night. OK probably it wasn’t dark and stormy. In fact I really have no idea what it was doing outside, I’m not even sure of the season but I suspect it was winter since that’s when the mice really invade. Whatever was going on outside, inside John and I were both in the kitchen when a mouse ran across the counter and hid behind all our liquor bottles in the corner.

– A note on “all our liquor bottles in the corner“:

We used to keep these all in the pantry before a home improvement disease took over our house. Now our pantry has no shelves, and things are stacked on the floor or kept in Rubbermaid bins, not a good place for glass bottles so the bottles were relocated to the counter. Now, when I use the word ALL it seems like we are crazy party animals with a full bar but they are actually a strange collection of mostly empty bottles that are a minimum of 4 years old collecting dust next to one bottle of whiskey. There is no dust on the whiskey.

John and I closed in on the mouse and then tried to figure out what to do. I thought, ” We’ll get the cat, brilliant!” (this was clearly before I knew she was one of the two worst mousers in the world) I ran and got Fiona and put her on the counter next to the bottles. Then while I tried to keep Fiona focused John slowly started removing bottles. When we were down to just three or four in the corner (we don’t even drink them I swear they just show up and never leave!) the mouse poked it’s head out and Fiona saw it. “AH HA she’s got it!” we thought, but we were wrong. Fiona went up and tentatively poked her paw behind the bottles. The mouse stuck it’s head out the other side, Fiona never noticed. John put on an oven mitt (we were in the kitchen after all) and poked the mouse, the mouse ran and stuck it’s head out by Fiona, she poked it back to John…. You get the idea? After this went on for many minutes (while I helpfully laughed in the background) John brought Storm into help. Now Storm is a hunting dog, she has hunting instinct, she is even what is known as a versatile hunting dog, but she is NOT a good counter top mouser. The mouse went back to hiding behind the bottles. Finally John ripped all the bottles out and smashed the mouse with his oven mitt clad fist.

Every now and then John talks about getting another cat. My new criteria is that it has to be a better mouser than he is!

Henry the Cat

Apr29

While we were at the feed mill today Ivy started playing with one of the mill’s cats. This started a discussion between the owner and I on how cats have been their most effective form of rodent control, better than poison, which got me thinking of our own rodent problems, and that got me thinking of Henry. …Because he was the worlds worst mouser. In addition to being a horrible mouser he also bit, ate everything (and I mean everything, he ate newspaper bedding once), was constantly escaping or getting into places he wasn’t supposed to go, and was in general incorrigible. His big redeeming factor was that he was great with Ivy. Ivy could do anything to him. The cat that would hiss, spit and bite when you threw him off the counter would let himself be dragged around the house, pet and generally mauled so long as it was done by someone under three feet tall. It will be two years this summer since we had to put Henry down. My foot has lost the auto blocking reflex I used to have when opening any exterior/pantry door but sometimes, when Fiona runs away from Ivy, I miss him… and then I remember how used to bite my toes under the table! Fiona’s main expertise is the art of camouflage so now days some visitors don’t even realize we have a cat, and as nice as Fiona is she’s nothing to talk about, she’s got no crazy escapades to tell. Henry, now that was a cat with stories, he must have been trying to pack them all into to his short little life. Here is my favorite of his “I’m the worse mouser in the word” stories.
Henry and the Freezer Mouse

One night when I was home alone and John was working second shift a squeaking noise got me out of bed to investigate. It was, of course, Henry with a mouse. Part of Henry’s completely horrible mousing skills had to do with the fact that he never, ever, in his life killed a mouse. Sometimes he would catch them but they always escaped him in the end. So the desired action when he would catch one was to try to take it away and kill it so that it didn’t just escape back into the house when he got bored with it.

So, I got out of bed and found Henry with a very lively mouse. Henry was holding the mouse and growling at it because the mouse was biting him. Then Henry would let it go, the mouse would try to run away and Henry would catch it again. Over and over and over. I grabbed an empty coffee can and tried to overturn it on the mouse, I completely failed to catch the mouse, and instead spilled bits of straw and feathers that were in the can (it was my egg collecting bucket) all over the kitchen floor. To make matters worse now Henry knew I was after HIS mouse. We raced around the downstairs of the house until I locked us all in the office.

There we were sitting on the floor, Henry growling at me through his mouthful of mouse while giving me the evil eye as I sat waiting with my coffee can. Then the mouse bit him again, he dropped it, I tried to catch it with my coffee can, missed and Henry grabbed it again… This went on with slight variations (mostly involving a bookshelf) until I finally caught the mouse. Then I didn’t know what to do with it. I had a live mouse under a coffee can what was I thinking?? (I’d like to add here that I was quite pregnant with Ivy at the time so I was probably tired and not thinking) It was at this point that I called John at work for advice. His advice, flip it over with a piece of cardboard and shake the mouse into a plastic bag and throw it in the freezer. We had finished off quite a few of Henry’s mice by throwing them in the freezer. I know that sounds kind of odd but we also froze and saved mice we caught in traps to give to REGI for the birds there so it’s not that odd. Anyways, I took Johns advice and using a folder to trap the mouse in the can, flipped the whole works over.

I didn’t hear anything.

I had expected to hear some sort of little thud when the mouse hit the bottom of the can. So I slowly peeked in the top, and fast as lightning Henry swooped in and grabbed the mouse back out of the can. And we were back to fighting over the mouse. Finally I trapped it under the can again. Deciding I had had enough I put three huge books on top of the can, threw the cat out of the office, closed the door, left a note for John to take care of it (it was his *#@ cat after all), and stomped back upstairs past the straw mess on the floor. John came home and dumped the mouse in a plastic bag and put it in the freezer.

The End

Just kidding…

Nobody thought about the mouse again until three days later when I went to condense my mouse bags. (Alright, fine, having bags of frozen mice is odd but it’s for a good cause!) It was easy enough to identify the bag the mouse had been in from the hole chewed in the corner… But, you guessed it, no mouse. That started me on the unpleasant task of looking for a dead frozen mouse somewhere in my freezer. I found it quickly. (Or should I say, it found me quickly?) The mouse had been hiding in a plastic bag, and when it stuck its little nose out at me the very first thing I noticed was that it was most definitely not dead and frozen! Startled I slammed the freezer door, spent a few minutes wondering how I get myself in these situations and then set a mouse trap in the freezer.

Snap traps have always worked better than cats in our house.

The End (of both the mouse and the tale)
Mousing is just the beginning of the Henry stories, there was the chocolate milk, the almost getting flushed down the toilet, the reason he got de-clawed… the list goes on and on. We love Fiona, but she’ll never have the tales to tell that Henry did. And perhaps she likes it that way, she is the queen of camo after all.