Happy Spring

And you don’t know how bad I wish it would arrive.  It’s been quite chilly here (about 20 degrees below normal) after we had a couple of teaser days that it was actually warm enough to put on shorts.  Yay!  But I know it can’t be far away now.  That thought keeps me going.  I’m very tired of being cold.  I need to bake in some 80 degree weather for a while.

I apologize for being absent so long.  I couldn’t believe it’s been two weeks since I turned my computer on last.  Where does the time go?  It gets away from me all the time. 

This is me three months after my surgery

I’m still recovering from my eye surgery, but things are going very well.  I’ve been working hard to get this huge bill paid off.  It’s definitely worth it though when people tell me how good I look and that I’m so much better than before.  I have to admit I was awfully tired of my drippy eyes.

So you may wonder what I’ve been doing.  Well besides working, I’ve been getting everything ready to file taxes.  I hate this time of year.  Plus, hubby had eye surgery on the fourteenth so he’s needed some help with that.  It’s quite an ordeal to go through all this.  Medical procedures are necessary, but not always fun.  His eye lids were interfering with his vision so that should be remedied now.  It’s just a long healing process.  I have to say he’s doing much better than I did at this stage, so that’s a very good thing.  I’d rather him have it easier than me.  I have a lot more patience for things. 

Other than that my life is one big blur.  All the days blend together.  I never know exactly what day it is.  That’s bad I know, but our weeks at work run from the middle of the week to the next so when the weekend is in the middle of the week it really screws everything up in my head.

Raven and Koki in the bathroom

Koki walking on top of the shower

My cats are getting along better, so that makes for a happier experience around here.  However, they’ll never be best buddies.  Raven always wants to play, or wreak havoc, and Koki has her moments when she’ll put up with him.  But Koki will be thirteen in May so that’s quite a difference from being four like Raven is.  But she still has a lot of spunk about her.  I caught her on top of the shower bar a few days ago.  She loves to scare me by doing her daredevil things.

This is the squirrel who lives just beyond our wall.  He may lose his home if they build back there.

We’ve had visits from the wildlife that live in the desert behind us.  I’m not sure how much longer that will continue.  Right now that property has been sold to a developer that wants to build homes back there, so all the neighbors are up in arms.  We’re trying to stop this before it starts.  There is a law on the books that may help us.  We’ll see.  More on this later.

Happy spring equinox everyone.

Entertainment and other things from the desert

Living in the desert brings a ton of wildlife to the backyard because we have desert behind us and no neighbors.  Our lawn has died long ago.  We’ll replace it with rock once the weather cools off.  You don’t have to water rock and it won’t be a constant struggle to keep it alive.  This summer has been very hard on all the plants and trees.

 Quail and other birds

A quail family

But the birds are having a blast in the dirt that was once home to our lawn.  They peck away out there and take dirt baths.  I have no idea why they like to roll in it while flapping their wings.  We’ve also seen lots of baby quail this month.  Everything seems to be off schedule.  This is also true for us, as work has become a full time job this month.  Usually August is slower for us.  At least it’s cooled off to the low 100’s, or the upper 90’s, so this is a good thing.

 Here's a baby roadrunner

As you can see the baby roadrunners are still alive so they must be catching enough food to survive.  I don’t know if you can tell this is a young one or not, but he’s about half grown.  The day I took this we had four roadrunners in the yard.  I’m not sure if the parents were here with the “kids,” but I think that must have been the case.  Unfortunately, I was unable to get all four of them in one picture.  In years past we’ve never seen this many at one time.

 Laser cat toy

Koki and Raven waiting for the laser

About a month or so ago, I bought a laser for the cats at Walmart.  It was the best $1.98 I’ve ever spent on them.  But I suspect it’ll cost me a lot in batteries to keep this thing going.  It did come with a spare set, which I had to install already.  Raven cries waiting for me to get it going.  He and Koki will chase it all over the place.  My hands seem to wear out before they do, but I play with them about fifteen minutes a night with this thing.  Raven will bat it all over the place, or knock it off the counter trying to tell us it’s time for laser play.  I imagine he’d turn it on if he knew how.

I want to apologize for my erratic posting.  I’m so beat when I get home from work that getting on the computer is the last thing on my mind.  I do good to get dinner ready and the kitchen cleaned up.  There isn’t a lot of time left before bed.  I still have to soak my feet every night and put on my ointment.  I go back to the foot doctor next Wednesday.  By then my orthopedic shoes should be here.  People sure do have to put up with a lot of crap when they get older.  I never think I’m that old, but it seems to be one ailment after another.  Thank goodness I have a positive outlook and try to keep a happy attitude about all this stuff.

 Beautiful clouds we've had lately with thunderstorms at night

On another note, I’m excited for the solar eclipse that’s coming on Monday.  I imagine I’ll be inside working though, so won’t even get to see it.  That’s a bummer.  This is the first time in 99 years that it will be seen by all of the US.  This probably won’t happen again in our lifetimes.  Total darkness will envelop a path throughout the US while the rest of us will see a dusky sunlight for a full two minutes.  When this happened centuries ago, it’s no wonder people used to think the world was ending.

I still have some vacation posts to write and pictures to share from my time in Texas in May.  Hopefully, I’ll be able to do that soon.

Raven can be very destructive

He chews on us all the time, but he loves to chew on everything and reminds me of a puppy sometimes instead of a cat.  My arm isn’t a bone.  But he seems to think so.

 The new toy started out like this

This is what the toy looks like now

 

I ordered him a new cat toy and he tore the thing up in about 30 minutes.  It didn’t take him long at all to dismantle it.  I thought I might try to glue it together for a while, but its way beyond that now.  I still haven’t thrown it away.  I put it on the floor in the pantry and tucked the little yellow ball back in there too.  He loves to go in there and dig that yellow ball out every night.  He knows I’m playing a game with him because he’s so smart.  If I don’t put the ball back in there, he leaves it alone.  He has fun so I really don’t care what he does to his toys.

Sometimes he’s too smart for his own good.  I got a new laser pointer at Walmart and he knows where the red dot comes from because he brings the thing over and wants you to shine it so he can chase it.  I’m sure he’d turn it on himself if he could.

He’s really something else.  He still flops over at my feet in the kitchen when it’s dinner time.  Somehow he never hurts himself.  I love watching him and Koki after a tiring day.

Naughty Cats

Sometimes Raven thinks he’s a dog rather than a cat.  I’ve never seen a cat chew on so much stuff.  He’s two and a half now so shouldn’t be cutting teeth anymore.  At least he’s almost stopped chewing on me like he did when he was a kitten.  He’d bite me all the time and didn’t realize he could hurt someone with his teeth.  He thought it was all play.  Now he nips at my leg and my ankle if I don’t get his food ready soon enough but I know he’s just telling me “Hey, I’m down here and I’m hungry.”  He doesn’t try to hurt me.

 This is Raven after he's nipped at my leg and takes his place on the counter waiting for me to get the food

 

But he gets a wild hair and chews on the furniture too sometimes and the dried plants.  Some of you might remember me writing about his achievement of making it to the top of the linen closet in the bathroom a few months ago.  Well all that was fine and I didn’t mind him jumping up there to lie under the A/C vent.  But then hubby discovered he was chewing on the corner of the wood cabinet.  Oh dear, not another “cat fix” to come up with.

So here I was in my PJ’s in the garage on the cement floor with a box cutter cutting up cardboard boxes so that I could block the top of this cabinet before I went to work.  It was hot out there and I really didn’t have time for this extra little thing, but I didn’t need to have the cabinet replaced either later on.  So this is what I came up with on short notice.

 I have to live with this thing in the bathroom for now, but you do what you have to do.

 

Yes, I know it looks tacky but so far it’s working and right now that’s what counts until he outgrows this stage.  I hope he does.  At the moment my house is “cat proofed” so nothing breakable is out where a cat can get to it if he gets bored.

 This is Koki sitting in front of my desktop

 

I’ve had to do such measures with Koki, my daredevil, too when she was younger, but nothing to this extreme, although we did have the curtain rod blocked for a while so she wouldn’t get up there and walk it.  She would slip down behind the bookcase in the middle of the night and get trapped back there.  She outgrew that idea and so we could remove that obstacle.  I don’t remember any of my other cats being this naughty, or maybe just plain curious.

Cat Chaos on my desk

This is what I came home to the other day.  I walked into my office and was shocked.  I figured Koki and Raven had a chasing match while I was at work.  I’ve never found the top to my paperclip dispenser.  I imagine it’ll show up one day.  My keyboard didn’t come unplugged either so I was lucky there.  Nothing was broken so it was just normal cat chaos.  Thank goodness.  I’m sure there’s more of this to come.

The Tricksters are at it

I got a rare moment at my sewing machine and Koki and Raven conspired against me.  They were into everything, grabbing my spools of thread to bat back and forth.  Anything was fair game as they came after more stuff they could seize with their teeth or paws.  Maybe I would do the same thing if I was a cat.  Who knows?  But they love to get into my stuff.

 Raven is one of the tricksters and of course he has a partner in crime.

Koki's always ready for an adventure and mischief

 

They make themselves part of any kind of project I get into. 

It’s funny to think that when Raven was little, Koki wouldn’t have anything to do with him.  Now they chase each other every day and get into mischief all the time.  I wouldn’t have it any other way though.  I like to have them near me, even if they are grabbing at thread and anything else they can get a hold of. 

 It started out with swiping one spool of thread to bat about the room

 

I took up some shorts today and these old eyes have trouble threading my machine with black, or any dark colored thread.  It’s disgusting to get so old that you can hardly do that anymore.  I finally grabbed the needle threader and had trouble using it too.  I decided I would sew anything I need to in that color so I wouldn’t have to tackle that again for a while.  That’s pathetic, isn’t it?

 It evolved into more.  They get bored easy and come after new "toys."  I had to hide the elastic, buttons  and pins.

 

After all my sewing machine work was done for the day, I sewed some buttons on that I haven’t gotten to yet.  We try to buy all of our white shirts for work at thrift stores because they get messed up so fast.  There’s no use in spending a lot of money for them.  Why we have to wear white tops is beyond me.  I had a blouse that was missing two buttons and because it was I got it for cheap, so I changed out all six buttons today and have a brand new blouse for work.  It’s a miracle it has no stains, not yet anyway.

Before I knew it, the time said 3:30 and I was bound to get the table cleared off today before hubby got home.  We changed out the gas cook top and had to move all the stuff out of that cabinet so the guy could cut the granite to have a bigger hole so the new cook top would fit.  We’ve had it in there but not hooked up for a couple of weeks.  It was no big deal.  I have my electric skillet and the oven and I’m not so hot on cooking anyway.  We eat a lot of salad around here, especially in the summer.

So that’s how I spent my day off this week.  Of course it was beautiful and sunny and about 80 – perfect weather in my eyes.  I had the windows and the skylights open to let in any passing breeze.  I wish it would stay like this all summer but it will be triple digits before I know it.

L is for Lover Eyes

Well I couldn’t let this competition get away without a cat post. 

 "Here I am," Koki says.

 

Koki is the one around here with the lover eyes when I’m on the computer in the evenings.  She usually waits a while and looks at me while perched upon the modem and router combo.  It’s warm up there and she’s small enough to lie there comfortably.

 Naptime

Usually she makes her move way before I’m ready and when I’m right in the middle of a post, or some important email.  Sometimes I can coax her onto my lap until I finish.  She wants to head butt me and nuzzle my face when she looks at me with half-closed eyes.  Her dreamy state makes me what to squeeze her.  She knows it and purrs loudly with contentment.

 To jump or not to jump...

 

She isn’t like this all the time.  This is my little daredevil we’re talking about.  She might be tiny weighing in at about eight pounds, but she’s mighty and will take on anything coming her way.  Koki has a stubborn streak too and let’s me know it.

 "I'm Queen of the hill.  Watch out."

 

Now that she’s almost eleven she doesn’t get in near the trouble she used to, but I can tell the pull of danger is still on her mind.  She walks the banister railing regularly looking at me to see if I’ll scold her.  If I did she’d probably jump for the tile below, so I know better.  She did that in her younger years and broke two teeth that had to be pulled. 

 Shower stall fun

 

She still tries to pull the drainer basket out of the kitchen sink too.  Some of you will remember my post from a few years ago when I woke up to find the drainer basket in bed with me – a present from Koki who probably worked most of the night to get it out of the sink and carry it across the house to the bedroom.  I wish I could have caught her in the act.  That picture would have been priceless.

 "I love boxes!"

 

I’m just glad this little fur ball ended up under my car that day way back in June of 2005 when she was a wee babe that could fit in the palm of my hand.  She’d been hit by a car and had a broken jaw.  I took her to the vet and had her fixed up.  I’m not sure she would have been near as lucky if she hadn’t wandered to my house.

"Hmmm...I wonder what's in here."

She became cat number six in my home.  My hubby knew I’d never let him take her to the animal shelter here.  Some of my older cats have passed away since then and I got a new baby two years a go, so now she’s number two in line around here by age.  But Koki and Raven both push Tootie around.  She’s the oldest cat and won’t scrap back with them.  I think they’re both disappointed by that.  There’s nothing like a good old rumble.

"This is one of my baby pictures before they got to know me.  Don't I look innocent?"

Raven has a new bag

And you can see how long they last around here.  This one lasted a week.  He plays in the bag every night after dinner.  He got carried away a couple of days ago and played about two hours eventually tearing this hole in it.

Raven after my feet

From there it was downhill.  We got the laser out and Koki got involved too. 

Koki

 This is how things ended up.

Raven

So now he has another new one again.  I’m glad they opened one of these grocery stores near us a couple of weeks ago.  You can’t find paper bags in many places these days.

 The new "cat sack"

 

At the end of the night everyone was worn out and ready for bed where Raven has taken to sleeping on my pillow.  He’s a pillow hog, but I don’t have the heart to throw him off the bed.

Does anyone else want to share a pet story?

Challenges

Rising too all the challenges in our lives…or maybe not.  Sometimes days are full of one challenge after another, evident by my lack of blog posts lately.  Simply put, I have too much on my plate.

The newest, biggest challenge for me is getting to work on time and still having the time and energy to write, read and do the things I enjoy while also doing my chores of cooking, dishes, cleaning, laundry and taking care of the cats, etc.

A stormy desert

Today was a dreary, rainy day here and colder than I’d like.  I’m already counting the days until we see 80 again.  I don’t do well with cooler temperatures at all and am grateful that we don’t have long winters here.  So, as I always say, things could be a lot worse in so many ways.  Yet in winter, I really need to remind myself of this all the time.

Naturally, the day got off on the wrong track again and I never accomplished what I had intended when I got out of bed today.  There’s always tomorrow.  I’m off work so maybe I can get a few things done.

Inside the Mad Pita restaurant

 Hubby wanted to make a few stops today so, instead of staying home to do chores, I went along.  We decided to stop at the Mad Pita to enjoy gyros sandwiches as a late lunch about 3 PM.  We love that place and haven’t been there in quite a while.  While waiting for our sandwiches, we watched a poor man with tremors trying to eat his lunch.  It brought to my mind a couple of my friends with Parkinsons.  I was thankful I’m not in that situation and made a mental note to send a short message to them to let them know they’re in my thoughts.

That lunch ended up being our dinner when another friend, who is computer illiterate, stopped by.  She needed help filling out some forms for a job I helped her apply for a while back.  I’m so glad she’ll be working and hope she’ll stick with it because she really needs to get her act together and get on with her life (she’s going through an ugly divorce).  I was happy to help and again I felt fortunate that I could understand things like computers because I know not everyone can wrap their minds around that.  Don’t get me wrong, they still frustrate me at times but I don’t let them win, not if I can help it anyway.  Attitude is so important in everything you do in life.

I’m way too busy with my job, but it’s fun, the day flies by and I enjoy the extra income.  No one’s going to hand you a stack of money on a silver platter.  Wouldn’t that be nice?

I’m way behind on my NaNo word count this year, so far.  I don’t think I’ll finish by Thanksgiving this time, as I usually do.  I’m going to have to kick myself in the rear to finish at all.  I seem to be lacking in the motivation department.  I’ve been too tired to think clearly enough about my novel.  It’s pretty bad to fall asleep when you sit down too long at one time.  I’m either getting old, not used to working on my feet and talking all day long, not sleeping well or enough, or maybe a combo of all those.  My dear sister, Tedo, I know how you feel.  She’s always falling asleep when she sits down.

Koki

Of course, I have to mention my cats.  My furry friends are my constant companions, but sometimes I wish Koki wouldn’t sleep on my legs all night.  She gives me cramps in my legs and feet, and a backache from lying in one spot all night.  This cat knows I’ll never kick her out of bed though, as well as Raven who chews on my head.  When it’s cold, they want in the covers with me.  Tootie will be back in the bed soon too because she’s doing so much better on her arthritis meds that she can jump up on the couch again by herself.  Maybe we won’t even need blankets with three cats in the bed.

Tootie

Raven

Until next time…

Daredevil’s Birthday

Koki

Over the weekend, right after the challenge, my little daredevil, Koki, had her tenth birthday.  It’s hard to believe I’ve had her that long.  Time is flying by too fast.  I can remember the day we found her all bloody behind my back tire.

I don’t know if any of you celebrate birthdays for your animals but I do because they’re my kids.  Usually on birthdays, they get their favorite food.  In Koki’s case, this is cheese, something she got used to when she had a broken jaw as a wee baby.

The vet sewed a baby button on her chin after he wired her jaw shut.

I thought this was amazing.  I'd never seen anything like it before.

  
And I make them a birthday hat if it’s a momentous birthday, which ten qualifies for.  Of course, Koki isn’t one to sit still for a picture of her in a hat so I made her a necklace instead.  She didn’t particularly like that either, but I did manage to get a somewhat suitable pic. 

Koki turns ten-years-old

Later I got to thinking I should have gotten out the wrapping paper and pretended to wrap a package because she loves to get into the curling ribbon and always lets me put it around her neck.  I know this is because she thinks she’s really getting away with something.

Cats are so much like people in that regard.  It’s a whole lot more fun to do something you aren’t supposed to than to do something you’re told to do.

Anyway, my daredevil feasted on cheese because it was her idea.  I have to pretend I don’t notice her eating or she’ll leave the room.  This is her way of staying in control of her situation, or so she thinks.

She has calmed down some but still does some daredevil feats if it crosses her mind.

Happy birthday baby girl.  I hope I’m writing a post for your fifteenth birthday.

Counting noses

Raven

I have to do this every night to make sure the cats are accounted for before going to bed.  Last night Raven was missing and I finally found him the pantry.  He’d been in there at least three hours and never made a peep.  When I opened the door, he strolled out and waited for me to pick him up and give him a squeeze.  Then he headed for the laundry room where I keep water, dry cat food and the litter boxes.

I guess he would have stayed in there all night unless he finally made enough noise trying to get out and woke us up.

 Koki

Last winter, Koki was missing one night so we gathered a flashlight, put on a jacket and were getting ready to go out and scour the neighborhood for her.  It was raining and cold, so I reached into the entry closet to get a raincoat and she came walking out.  She’d been in there for hours and never made a sound.

I don’t know why the cats are like that.  Perhaps they think they found a new place to play, a secret hideaway to explore.  Cats can fiddle with something for hours, so I don’t think they ever get bored enough to make enough noise to be found.  They’d have to leave their fantasy and get back to their ordinary world.  What fun is in there to that?

Anything’s a Toy

Raven trying to make up after he got into trouble

Raven gives me so much pleasure.  He’s a little rascal though and finds himself in trouble quite a bit.  He loves to get into the vases and the floor pots and chew on the plants.  I have to keep things out of reach – just like a kid – but with a cat, they can go anywhere they decide to go.  LOL.  Most stuff ends up out in the garage temporarily.  That place is such a mess I’ll probably never get it straightened up.

 Raven and the shoe string

Raven and the shoe string

 

Raven likes to pack his toys around and somewhere he found this old shoestring and starting dragging it around the house.  OMG was it ever cute.  He figured out fast how to keep from stepping on it.  Raven kept looking behind him to make sure the string was coming along with him.  It was precious and I couldn’t help myself and had to take more pics of this little cat.

Koki - Raven's partner in crime

At night and early in the mornings he has a playmate in crime – Koki.  They make so much noise chasing around at night and jumping on the bed.  I always cringe that they don’t wake my husband up.  It’s all part of being a cat and I’m always awake anyway.

 Raven and Koki on the cat tree

But I have to watch them with an eagle eye.  Yesterday Koki ate one of my vitamins before I got it away from her.  It was selenium, so only a mineral and she seems to be fine.  I watched her and almost called the vet.  I had visions in my mind of having her stomach pumped out.  She loves to smell inside the vitamin jars when I’m getting my vitamins out.  I never expected her to eat one.  Now I know and told myself to be more careful in the future.