I bought cable tv for my cat

Well, I call it "tv" ... most people would call it a "birdfeeder".

But I tell you what, Emma is in seventh heaven! I hung it outside my dining room windows, which are huge and can be seen from three different rooms.

Unfortunately, we all know Emma is NOT the sharpest tool in the shed, eh? And so she doesn't get that sitting right in the window keeps the birds from approaching the feeder two foot away!

Come to me, my pretties!

Eventually, she got a little more slick! Check out this bird watching tactic!

Ah ha, I fool you! Surely you can not see me now!

Sadly, the birds are still smarter than Emma. As Emma can't contain her excitement and pops right up as soon there is any bird movement near the feeder. Poor kitty. She'll get it right at some point!

In the meantime, there is a squirrel that she couldn't scare off! In fact, they both were shaking their tail feathers (so to speak) at each other for quite awhile! (note: the squirrel is hard to see but is on the limb to the right of Emma)

Yep, this is the best cat toy I've purchased in forever!! And it doesn't even contain cat nip!!! Who knew?! :)

Emma, it's a BAG.

That's right .... a BAG. "B". "A". "G" .... BAG. You're not a kitten, you HAVE seen these before. You've played in them, slept on them, chased them. Yes, that's right, a bag!

Oh, and that grey twitchy thing ... yeah, that's your TAIL. It's a body part. Of yours. Don't tell me I need to find those flash cards again ....

To all you cat owners out there!

I KNOW you've experienced mornings like this! (Funniest with sound, so turn up those speakers!)

Poopsie-daisies!

So I've mentioned that Emma is perhaps not the sharpest tool in the shed, right?! Yeah, well ... here is further proof.

I missed out on videoing the first 5 minutes of this venture, Miss Emma trying to find out where the poop smell was coming from! She kept blaming me and sniffing at me any time I came near. But no ..... it 'twas her own bum! It just took Miss Brainiac a little while to figure it out.

But the good news is .... she eventually did! I think she deserves a gold star!! ;)

My Little Helper

So one morning before work I walk into my spare bedroom (aka The Office) to find Emma lazily laying in the middle of the floor next to a live spider! She spots me and half-heartedly reaches out a paw toward Charlotte (I'm assuming that's the name she would have chosen for her new friend) as if to say "oh crap, I'm supposed to be killing this thing"!!

Of course, the attempt was so half-hearted that the paw reach towards said spider was barely perceptible. She then drew her paw back and continued to just gaze off into LaLa Land.

Which left me to have to quickly find Spider Extracting Equipment (in this case, a nearby flower vase and an envelope) and scoop up said spider and take it outside. All the while mumbling under my breath something along the lines of "damn worthless cat".

So to restore my faith in Catmanity, the same morning CJ steps up to help me wrap a gift for a coworker. Ah, I loves me that kitty! Look how cute!

CJ: "I'll hold, you tape!"

Faith restored! How could it not be with that face?!

Pop Quiz!

I won't tell you which of my two cats is the intelligent and fearless one, and which one is afraid of her own shadow (*cough*Emma*cough*). But let's see if you can tell from the following scenario:

I bring home a drinking water fountain* for the cats. Neither has ever seen one before. I assemble it, fill it with water, and plug it in for the first time. I call each cat over:

Reaction of Cat #1:

"Hot damn! Running water in a bowl!!! This is GENIUS!!! Mom, you rock!" (*slurp, slurp, slurp*)

Reaction of Cat #2:

"HOLY F!!!! What the HELL is THAT?!! AHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

I know, I know ... it's a tough call. But I have faith in you! ;)

*yep, I have copied you AGAIN, T2! Hopefully you take it as "imitation is a form of flattery" instead of "holy crap, it's time to get a restraining order!!!!!" :)

Friday Roundup - with pictures!

So I'm catsitting for my friend T2 and her hubby C and y'all ... T2 is a HOOT!

So they have this humungo entertainment system in their media room (yep, I said "media room" ... how's that for hi-faluten?! :)) and I said I would probably kick it there and watch one of their umpteen movies to spend some time with their cats each time I came over.

So C goes about pulling out all eleventeen hundred remote controls to show me which buttons to push where and in which order so I will know how to watch a dvd when I catsit.

It went something like this:

C: "This remote turns on the receiver....."

Me: (in my head) "receiver?????"

C: "...and on this one you'll want to press 'input' and then choose 4 if you want a dvd or 6 for cable...."

Me: (in my head) "oh god, 'input'?? And then which number was dvd????"

T2: "And this one is for tv volume also."

C: "This is the cable one...."

C: "....And this one controls the dvd ...."

T2: "Here's the actual dvd recorder ... you just put the dvd in here"

Me: "Wait! ... where did you just push to get the dvd to open??"

C: "And this remote works the lights..."

Me: (in my head) (and maybe aloud) "Lights?? GAHHHHHHHH!!!"

Me: "Okay, maybe I'll just bring a book to read instead??" (*whimper*)

At which point T2 said not to worry about it because she'd write up a Remote Control Cheat Sheet for me!

And she did!!! Look how cute!!! She did pictures and everything .... I couldn't stop laughing!!!

Ah too funny ... you've got to love a friend that will still love you even though you are perhaps completely and utterly Electronically Challenged!

Anyway, they also provided me with a fridge full of my favorite drinks in the whole wide world!!!!

Mmmm, mmm, mmm! So sweet! I am so spoiled!

And so I popped over Wednesday to hang with the cats for a bit and I'm happy to report that after a few trials and errors (word of advise: don't let your big fingers accidentally push buttons on the remotes not listed on your cheat sheets. Weird things happen and panic ensues.) ... SUCCESS!

So I watched Smokin' Aces starring Jeremy Pivens (above), Ben Affleck, and Ryan Reynolds (mmm, mmm, mmm ... see below).

And as you can see, one of the cats (Peeps) joined me. A grand time was had by all and I'm pretty sure I was able to turn everything off afterwards!!! (fingers crossed!)

..............................................

Speaking of grand times .... Miss CJ has been living it up on the deck lately!

She managed to find a few inches amongst my flower pots to lay and sprawled out in style! I especially like her "bed head" ("deck body"??) in the second one. And the fact that she learned my "if you stand next to something big, you look smaller and more petite" theory in that last one! ;)

After the sun moved off, she chose to steal MY chair instead....

So I annoyed her with endless pictures til she let me sit down too!

Not to be outdone, Emma came outside too and took time to smell the .... well, bamboo?

Oh well, she almost got it right. My "special" child. :)

..............................................

To celebrate the 4th, what's more "American" then heading out to a baseball game and downing some hotdogs, nachos, peanuts, and whatever else the food vendors bring your way??!!

That's right ... nuthin! :)

So that's what a couple of friends and I did.

Now Portland doesn't have much in the way of major league sports (I try to overlook the Blazers) but we do have a couple of farm teams .... one hockey and one baseball. The baseball is a Triple A farmteam for the San Diego Padres and they are called the Portland Beavers.

The weather was beautiful on the 4th and the stadium where they play is nice....

......the scoreboard is a hoot (they still do it "manual" so if you click on the picture you can actually see the person sticking their head out through the 10th inning slot to watch if the ump will next call a ball or a strike!)......

......I love the view (most people may find that Oregonian building ugly but I like it)......

.....there be fireworks after the game!!........

.....and the field is full of athletic men in tight pants!!!

Needless to say, I had a great time! ;)

As I hope y'all did!

..............................................

In closing, I thought I'd leave you with this Living Will from Maxine! It's a hoot ... I hope everyone enjoys! Have a great weekend ...........and I'll catch you on the flipside!!!

I, MAXINE , being of sound mind and body, do not wish to be kept alive indefinitely by artificial means. Under no circumstances should my fate be put in the hands of pinhead politicians who couldn't pass ninth-grade biology if their lives depended on it, or lawyers / doctors interested in simply running up the bills. If a reasonable amount of time passes and I fail to ask for at least one of the following:

A Glass of Scotch
Chocolate
A Margarita
Chocolate
A Bag of M&Ms
A Glass of Scotch
Chocolate
Chicken fried steak
Chocolate
Mexican food
Chocolate
French fries
Chocolate
Pizza
Chocolate
Ice cream
A Pint of Scotch
Chocolate
Chocolate
A Fifth of Scotch
Chocolate

Then it should be presumed that I won't ever get better.
When such a determination is reached, I hereby instruct my appointed person and attending physicians
to pull the plug, reel in the tubes, let the "fat lady sing". . and call it a day!

"Elegant" I ain't!

So y'all didn't think I drove all the way up to Seattle for that Millionaire Mind Conference and not pop into Ikea, now did ya?!

Yeah, I didn't think so. :)

Granted, finding time to get there wasn't easy. We arrived late Thursday night and the conference kept us busy, busy each following day til late at night.

Except for Saturday night.

That day's session ended around 9pm and folks could stick around for an optional mini-session. We pondered staying for all of two seconds, until we realized that we were only about 15 minutes from Ikea and that Ikea HAD to be open later than 9pm on a Saturday night. HAD TO!

Right?

"Right", said the concierge.

Ikea was open til 10pm!!

Whoo hooo!

So we skedaddled back to our rooms knowing full well that by the time we got to Ikea we'd have MAYBE 30-40 minutes in the store.

Didn't matter though ... because 30-40 minutes of Ikea shopping is better than no Ikea shopping at all. And you can quote me on that if'n you want! ;)

So, without much time there, I was impressed that I managed to scoop up a curtain rod, hardware, two finials and a two pack of curtains, all for my master bedroom window.

AND .... just so y'all know ... they even FIT! Whoo hooo!

Of course, I knew the curtains would be extra long .... I had seen the measurements on the package ..... but I also knew that I kinda liked that Elegant Pooling Of The Curtains On The Floor look. (do y'all know the look I'm talking about?! Have you seen it in the magazines??)

Yeah, well ..... I guess in theory the Elegant Pooling idea could work. But I've found a few flaws with regard to The Elegant Pooling Of The Curtains On The Floor look at my house.

First, "elegant" is really not a word one would use to describe ANYTHING in my home. I'm not saying my stuff is "crap" ... I'm just saying it's not really "elegant".

Secondly, The Elegant Pooling Of The Curtains On The Floor look really doesn't work well on wall-to-wall carpeting. Hardwood floors, yes. Travertine tile, most definitely. Wall-to-wall carpet .... not so much.

Thirdly, none of the designer magazines shows The Elegant Pooling Of The Curtains On The Floor with the following accouterments:

I'm not really sure why that is since these "accouterments" seemed to have attached themselves to the curtains ever since I installed them. So I'm curious as to why no other Elegant Pooling Of The Curtains On The Floor has them?!

Perhaps Ikea had a special deal?

I do not know.

All I DO know is .... the look is FAR from elegant.

Especially when I come home to The Pooling "mysteriously" looking like this:

Or this:

Geeeee, I wonder where a kitty is??

Could it be, I wonder, because of things like this and this?:

Ah well, so Elegant I ain't. But at least now I can finally unpack my suitcase!

You COULD call me "Lazy"....

..... OR...... you could call me a "Good Cat Mom".

My vote is for the Good Cat Mom. (who me? ... biased?)

Even though Emma sleeping on the suitcase which I last used over a week ago (oops) is only reason #5 of why my suitcase is yet unpacked and stored away in the closet.

Reasons 1-4 perhaps all have to do with Laziness. P-e-r-h-a-p-s. :)

But really ... she loves it SOO much ... how could I possibly deny her the pleasure? (see? ... Good Cat Mom! :))

How to Annoy Your Cat #1

Keep taking pictures (with flash, for maximum Annoying Points) while your cat drinks water.

Especially if your cat is drinking water out of the pitcher you just filled so you could quickly water your plants. But now you must wait and wait (and wait) while your cat drinks more than her weight in water simply because, as we all know, Water In Pitcher is to Water In Cat's Drinking Bowl as Champagne is to Toilet Water. Apparently.

Please note that this "Picture Taking With Flash" Annoyance Tactic also works well on Significant Others while they are trying to sleep (what?) :)

Catfish-ing

I say "baitless fishing" because this cat toy .... errr, FISHING POLE ...USED to have many feathers attached to it. Now ... nary a one.

I'd say it was The Mystery of The Century .... but I'd be lying.

Missing feathers* .... Many kitty teeth marks. Hmmmm. Should we call in CSI??

Now y'all, just for the record, I was GOING to throw this Now Ghetto Cat Toy out. But Miss Emma ... she LOVES it. She wants to pet it and love it and hug on it and "tell me the story about the rabbits, George" on it. So I didn't have the heart to throw it out. Sigh.

*though where the feathers ARE IS a mystery. Though I'm thinkin' one I would rather not ponder too much. If'n you know what I mean!

I'm ready for my closeup, General Mills.

So there is something about Honey Nut Cheerios that CJ can NOT get enough of.

Back when she was a youngster, she'd come staggering out every morning, still groggily wiping morning sleep from her eyes, as soon as she heard me pour my bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios. And we would sit and share and life was good. (this was obviously pre-kitty-liver-disease-diagnosis)

But I've not had HNC for years and years. Just happened to get the hankering the other day.

But, apparently, CJ has not forgotten them. Because one whiff and she was on me like flies on poop!

Just look at this pupil-dilated, hypnotic stare into the bowl*. You can just feel her willing that last cheerio to leap into her mouth.

"Come to me, you little honeyed tidbit of goodness"

And normally CJ abides by the rules. Ya know, the "no taking food not offered" rule. She can stare at me. She can stare at the food. She can even reach her paw out to cutely remind me that she'd like something. But there is NO taking the food off of my plate. Or outta my bowl.

Uh yeah.

Apparently, that rule goes right out the window when HNCs are involved. Because I turn my head for one minute and.........

Bad kitty.

And then, and THEN ... she had the audacity to give me the "what? I didn't do nuthin'" look.

Which may have been more effective without the incriminating evidence on her face.

Yeah, bad, bad kitty.

"Hello, my name is CJ and I'm a HoneyNutCheeri-aholic"

General Mills ... I'm thinkin' commercial**. Give me a call!

*I love this picture!
** yeah, I'm pimpin' out my cat! What of it?? :)

Some cat owner is going to have a very high water bill

Check out this link that my mom sent me. Too cute:

Toilet Junkie

It's funny because Emma has been fascinated with the toilet since I moved to my new condo too. (She hasn't been flushing it, mind you ... she ain't that sharp ... but she has been hanging over the rim looking into the bowl whenever I flush it). I've been wanting to take a picture but by the time I get my camera she has been distracted by something else. (hmmmm. Perhaps this A.D.D. stuff is contagious??? :))

Perhaps Shoe Whoring runs in the family?

Or perhaps it's simply contagious? I don't know.

All I know is that my baby CJ loves her The Shoes! Just like her mama! (what?)

I mean, just look at that happy face!

Of course, her kinda "shoe love" is a wee bit different than mine! Because when I say she "loves the shoes" ... I mean that she "LUVVVVVVVVVVVVVVSSSSSS (*wink, wink*) the shoes"! ... (if'n you know what I mean).

Oddly enough, she only likes the stinky ones too. So I'm thinking this old pair of sandals of mine are finally getting a bit ..... errr ... ripe, shall we say? Because normally she doesn't like my shoes and must wait til some unsuspecting stinky-footed guest comes into my home and makes the mistake of taking off their shoes. And oh boy, are they ever in for a surprise when they do.

But finally, a pair of my very own to provide my kitty with the ultimate happiness!

Here she is demonstrating her Stinky Shoe Courting Ritual...

"You will be mine, you Luscious Leather Vixen!"

And after the courtship dance, she gets right down to some outright molestation...

"Ah yeah, that's some good stuff!"

Until finally, she is done ... and enjoys a cuddle with the one she loves!

"Would you happen to have a cigarette?"

I know, I know .. some of y'all are going to think she's crazy. But not me. Nosireebob. And that has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that I had the urge to do the same to a pair of shoes that Buck was wearing on Sunday. Nope. Completely unrelated! She's just not crazy! Simple appreciates the shoes, that's all. So move along ... nothing to see here! ;)