Mickie does her best Elvis.

Taz and Mickie keeping me company on the sofa.

To anyone who hasn’t given up on me, I offer profuse apologies and gratitude. Back in January I got that extremely persistent upper respiratory whatever that was going around, and I really wasn’t 100% again till mid-March, at which time I was so far behind on everything that catblogging took a backseat—or may have even been consigned to riding around in the trunk. But at least this means I have a few goodies saved up, such as this picture of Taz in the cat tree.

...nor is it Photoshopped. Mickie is actually sitting on Taz. It seems to have begun as one of her regular pre-wrestling-match pounces, but something in the quality of Taz’s growls this time caused her to have belated second thoughts.  She actually stayed there for more than a minute, probably afraid to let go of the proverbial tiger’s tail. Taz made extremely rude noises the whole time. I think Mickie deserves a belt buckle.

You would not believe how little we actually feed this cat. One-half cup of Iams weight control kibble per day, and that’s it. According to the bag he should be getting twice that much, but I’m afraid to give it to him given his obvious tendency to gain weight. We try very hard to keep him away from the others’ dishes, too.

By the way, the catnip carrot and other excellent and durable toys are available from Nature Of The Pet.

Sorta scary, no?

None of our current pack of critters was a planned acquisition. Taz was the first of the bunch.

In January 1996 I went down to Norman, Oklahoma to attend some job-related training. While there, I caught up with an old friend who lived in town. She and her husband had welcomed their first child three months before, and I was eager to meet little Rosalie. Also, Donna and Kent are good critter people, and they had a houseful as usual. But there was one in particular Donna wanted to show me.

A co-worker of Kent’s had taken extreme exception to his girlfriend’s cat, and was threatening to drown him. Kent suggested to this savory character that he allow Kent and Donna to find the cat a new home instead. And so, here comes cat-loving friend to visit.

The first words out of my mouth were, “Ohhhhh… he’s gorgeous.“ I’m not sure I’d ever seen a flamepoint Siamese before. Cream-colored, with red tabby “points” on his ears, face and tail, and bright blue eyes. Donna put him in my arms, and he immediately started up with a raucous purr and began licking my face. I was a goner.

So, he had to go home with me. But home was thousands of miles and several plane rides away, in North Pole, Alaska. So we put him in one of those under-the-seat carriers (which he would never fit in these days!) and hoped for the best. I was very concerned that this unknown quantity would turn out to be a problem traveler, but he was just an angel the whole way, even when security made me take him out of the carrier and bring him through the metal detector in my arms.

He was about a year old, and we thought he was full grown. Wrong-o. Also, upon closer inspection, it turned out that his sides had “stealth stripes” in a slightly darker shade of cream. Those stripes have darkened somewhat over the years, and these days he looks more like his probable mixed Siamese-orange tabby heritage.  He is everything “cat” times ten—very loving, very temperamental, very stubborn… you get it. Definitely a cat lover’s cat.

Tazzber seems to have suffered a bop in the bazoo this week. (I suspect Mickie.) The poor boy’s nose leather is pretty messed up and sore. There seems to be a bit of swelling, too, as he’s breathing through his mouth on occasion. I called the vet’s office, and they said put Neosporin on it, and rub it in really good. Uh-huh… I’ve got exactly one shot at touching that nose right now. The Neosporin can get on there in approximately the right place, but that’s about the best I can hope for. This is day 2 of Neosporin, and I think there’s been some improvement. Unfortunately, the injured area looks kinda like a Hitler mustache. I think he took this post too literally.