Boolie

You Go Your Whole Life Without Ripping a Hole in the Fabric of Space & Time and Then …

I don’t even know how it happened.

I was happily photographing ducks back in the fall when I pointed my camera at the confluence of yellow and green reflections and suddenly a white spot appeared in the water and I felt the universe start to come apart at the seams. This wood duck drake swam by and its wake seemed to close the disruption and life as we know it was spared. All hail the mighty wood duck, silent guardian of all that we hold dear.

Today’s temporal disruption comes courtesy of an out-of-focus downy duck feather in the foreground

Wet Christmas

On this rainy Christmas day here in Portland (it did snow earlier so we had a shot at a white Christmas, but alas our more typical wet Christmas won out), here’s one of my favorite wildlife shots of the year, a mallard drake resting amidst the reflected colors of the fall leaves.

The picture was taken in late October at Crystal Springs Rhododendron Garden here in Portland.

Exhausted

Sam and Emma are resting after a good play session where they started to feel each other out. We’re going to keep them in isolation from Scout for a bit longer but after a good visit to the vet they are now both staying in the guest bedroom.

Emma had a rough night last night. We had been keeping her in isolation from both Sam and Scout in the downstairs bathroom, sometimes letting her wander the house when Sam and Scout weren’t around. At night when I went to bed, she started mewing loudly and clawing at the door of the bathroom. I went to bed with Scout, but my wife eventually woke up to the racket so I went down and slept with Emma on the floor for a few hours. After she was settled I went back upstairs where Scout was still sleeping in the bed.

In the morning, both Sam and Emma had their first visit to the vet, Laurelhurst Veterinary Hospital, who have looked after Templeton and Scout in the past. Emma was quite the lady except for when she was confined to her carrier in the vet’s office. She attempted a repeat of Saturday’s escape attempt, but this time she was thwarted by the plastic carrier and its metal grate — not that it kept her from trying. But otherwise her visit went well, she may have a mild case of upper respiratory infection that often occurs in kennels, and we’re going to have to see if she bathes as regularly as she should, but otherwise her health looks good. The rough night and the escape attempt must have worn her out, though, as I’ve never seen a cat in as deep a sleep as Emma was this afternoon. Perhaps it’s just her nature, time will tell.

Sam (pictured above) had a good night, even if my wife didn’t — she spent the night with him and between his loud and constant purring and his playing, she wasn’t getting the best night’s sleep before Emma’s woeful cries woke her up for good. Sam was the perfect gentleman at the vet, purring so loudly that the vet couldn’t get a good reading on his lungs until she distracted him and quieted his motor. Well he was the perfect gentleman until it came time to draw some blood, at which point he attempted to draw some blood of his own. To be fair, he let out a long and loud wail of warning before the claws started flying, so perhaps he was the gentleman even then. A towel was called for to keep his legs wrapped up while they worked on his ears, he had mites before and a yeast infection so they cleaned out his ears for us and we’re giving additional treatment at home. They also think he’s younger than the four months estimated by the humane society based on his size, you can’t tell it so well from the pictures but he’s a skinny little thing.

Scout is still not happy about the visitors into her home, but she did start playing with me today — more than she’s played at any time since Templeton died. It will take her a while to come around — after all Templeton taught her that all cats but the two of them were not to be tolerated — but given the personalities of these two, I think she’ll come around in time.

Say Hello To Sam & Emma

We’ve chosen names for our two new little ones, sticking with our tradition of taking names from characters in literature. With the previous two, we selected names from famous works, Templeton from E.B. White’s Charlotte’s Web and Scout from Harper Lee’s wonderful To Kill A Mockingbird. With these two, we’ve selected names from little known authors and forgotten works.

The little orange tabby we’ve named Sam (short for Samwise), taken from J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy. He purrs almost constantly and seems like he’d be a faithful friend, so Frodo’s faithful partner and friend seems an apropos choice. The older black kitten (pictured here) we’ve named Emma after the heroine from Jane Austen’s Emma. We chose her name because Austen is a favorite author of both my wife and I, and we think the name is lovely. She has a lovely personality, despite the intensity of her gaze here.

Escape Artist #2

Scout was an escape artist from the day we brought her home. We tried to keep her isolated from Templeton, but still let her see us, by putting her into the downstairs bathroom and putting a baby gate in the doorway.

No good.

She just climbed the gate like it was nothing. Then we tried stacking a large box in front of the door.

No good.

She just climbed the box. We added another box. She climbed that one too. Eventually we realized she’d just keep climbing and risk hurting herself if she fell, so we kept the door closed. Fortunately Templeton accepted her quickly so she didn’t stay in there long.

Before long she figured out how to open doors anyway. The ones in the old house had handles that she figured out she could jump up and pull down on to get the door to open. Her true master stroke though was her discovery that she could stick her paw under the door and vibrate it enough to jimmy the door open. This became her favored technique and made us all but give up on trying to keep her isolated.

We put her and Templeton in the upstairs bathroom one day when a contractor was working here (we had told him we would), but she jimmied the door open shortly after we left for work and earned both she and Templeton their freedom to wander the house.

I’m not sure armed guards could keep her locked up.

It seems we have acquired our second escape artist. When you adopt a cat at the Oregon Humane Society, they give you these temporary cardboard cat carriers to bring the cats home. We have a plastic one we used for Templeton and Scout, but we wanted each cat in their own carrier, so we used the temporary carriers which had been festively decorated for the holidays.

I didn’t realize just how temporary one of them would be.

We placed each carrier in the back seat and began the short ride home. They were both quiet at first but then I heard some quiet mews coming from behind me. I couldn’t figure out which one was speaking up, but eventually Emma’s carrier started to rock and it was clear who was unhappy.

When we got home, we left the cats in the carriers in the living room while we got their rooms set up with food, water, and litter boxes. My wife came upstairs to find Emma half way out of her box, she chewed and scratched a large hole in the carrier but was having trouble getting her hindquarters out.

Scout would have tried to figure out how to get the top to open up, but Emma apparently prefers a more direct approach. A little less Houdini-like, perhaps, but an escape artist nonetheless.

Christmas Presents

It was two weeks ago today that we said goodbye to Templeton. But today isn’t about goodbye so much as it is about hello — make that two hellos — as we went to the Oregon Humane Society today and adopted two lovely little cats. It’s a good thing we left when we did or we might have adopted a handful more, there were so many wonderful cats to choose from.

We haven’t chosen new names for them yet — the only thing we know for sure is that they won’t be Candy Cane and Purrana, their current names. They are each in quarantine, one in the guest bedroom and one in the spare bathroom, until they pass their vet exams on Monday (thankfully both have tested negative for FIV).

The little fellow in the picture above (originally named Candy Cane) was dropped off at the Humane Society on December 15th so he had been there exactly one week, the reason listed for giving him up was simply “last of litter”. He is four months old and had fleas and ear mites but has been treated for both, he’s also been battling diarrhea for a few days but the cause isn’t known yet. We’ve got him in isolation in the guest bedroom, he’s been curled up either on the bed or on a blanket on the floor.

It took all of about two seconds for me to fall in love with him when they first brought him into the “Get Acquainted” rooms. He climbed into my lap and didn’t leave until I handed him to my wife, he just purred and purred and that was that. I think the only reason he lasted a week without someone adopting him is that he was in a cage due to his illness and not in the normal communal kitten room (a place so full of cuteness that if you stare too long your head will explode).

The cat named Purrana (we’re leaning towards calling her Emma, sticking with the tradition of naming the cats after characters from literature) was dropped off on the 5th of December, so she had been there a while longer. Her previous owners felt they had too many animals, so this one and half year old is now the newest member of our household.

We selected her because she had been around cats before, had a good personality, and has a beautiful black coat — I’ve never had a black cat before but think they’re lovely, as does my wife, so I’m thankful we found her. She was sprawled out and sleeping in a great pose when we first saw her, which reminded me of Templeton’s various poses.

She was more nervous when they brought her in to visit with us, but she loves to rub her head up against yours and it didn’t take us long to realize we had found our second cat to adopt. She’s isolated in the bathroom on the main floor, which isn’t as photogenic as the bedroom, but I only got a couple of pictures of her anyway. She refused to leave my lap so I had to push her gently away with my leg just to take this picture, and then I let her climb back into my lap and start rubbing her head all over me.

Scout isn’t sure what to make of the visitors yet, she’s avoided going by their rooms but soon enough I’m sure they’ll get acquainted by sniffing under the doors. The two new ones seem to have such gentle and loving personalities that I’m hopeful they will soon all become best friends, but for now it’s best to take the introductions one step at a time.

Now we just have to choose their names …

A Little Good News

Scout passed her yearly exam at the vet with flying colors. My wife reports that she was even snuggling up to the staff and giving them her little headbutts — probably trying to make up for the last time when she jumped up to the little gap above the cabinets and settled in for a nap, forcing them to get a stepstool to get her down.

And no matter how it may seem, this blog hasn’t gone all cats, all the time — it has helped me a great deal to talk about Templeton here, but I’ll start mixing the cat stories in with some of my wildlife pictures, as I have a bit of a backlog building up.

Dreams

I had the nicest dream last night, which is certainly not the norm.

It was a sunny afternoon, and Templeton and Scout and I were all playing in the backyard, just like we did every summer afternoon. It was one of those dreams that just goes on and on, nothing but the three of us playing. When it was time to go in, I went to the door and called the cats. They came running to me, and as Templeton ran up to me he vanished before my eyes.

Gone but not forgotten.

Today’s picture comes from this summer, I had taken them outside after work like always. It was getting late in the evening but still plenty of light so not time to go inside. Scout was sitting in front of one of the rose bushes when a scrub jay landed on the roof, causing her to look up.

One Week

It was a week ago that we first realized something was wrong with Templeton and rushed him to the vet. We picked up his ashes this morning. On the way out the door, I was reminded of the Monty Python skit in which the undertaker tells a young man that they can cremate his dead mother and “then you get a box of ashes, which you can pretend are hers.”

The little tin we picked up (which was surprisingly heavy) has a sticker on the bottom that says the ashes are from a certified private cremation for Templeton, but I have my doubts. As we drove home, no ethereal howls emanated from the tin.

None.

Templeton hated riding in the car. Sometimes before we were married, I’d bring Templeton up to my apartment to visit for a week. When we left my wife’s apartment, he’d already be meowing at full strength. He’d keep it up during the half hour drive, somehow getting louder on the way, so that by the time we pulled into my parking lot the car windows were rattling and passers by were giving me dirty looks.

So you’ll forgive me for thinking that even death couldn’t silence Templeton during a car ride.

On the plus side, Scout has been doing as well as I could hope. She’s clearly bothered by his absence and staying closer to us than normal, but towards the end of the week she’s increasingly been sleeping in her old places. She’s eating and playing and sleeping with us at night. Today’s picture was taken Thursday night while she was curled up in the cat bed beside my desk.

We’ve been talking about the right time to add another cat or two to the household. I’m ready but it’s hard to say about Scout — I think she’ll be happiest with other cats, based on how much she loved having Templeton around, but I don’t want her to think we’re trying to replace him. She has her yearly exam on Monday so we’ll see what the vet thinks.

The upcoming holidays would be a good time since we’d be home as they got used to each other, but we’ll see.

A Gentle Soul

If you were one of the vets who looked after Templeton during his life, “gentle” is not the first word that would come to mind when describing him. Or the second word. Or the third. Or the tenth. Or the … well, you get the idea. He hated going to the vet. It was nothing personal, we had some great ones here in Portland and in Salem, but his personality changed completely and he got very stressed and hostile.

Legends were written. Tales were told.

“My name is Templeton, cat of cats:
Look on my paws, ye mighty, and despair!”

Even at home, he wasn’t too crazy about strangers, particularly young ones. He could run away to a safe spot at home, though, and he certainly mellowed out later in life and would even come up and greet some of our visitors. But with my wife and I, Templeton was gentle and loving, he loved to curl up on our laps and purr like mad. Even so, we weren’t quite sure what he’d make of Scout when we first brought her home in May of 2001, as he had been the only cat for much of his life.

We needn’t have worried.

He didn’t like to cuddle up with Scout, but he did play with her at times, he groomed her, and he just flat out put up with her when she had lots of kitten energy but not lots of kitten sense.

This isn’t the greatest picture, it was taken with a little compact camera, but it illustrates how good he was with her. She had been with us less than two months at this point, and would sometimes spring onto his back like she was a rodeo rider, and then start biting on his head. At this stage, he’d let her get away with it and let her work out her energy. Eventually he started giving her a gentle little wap to the head when she played too rough, training her on how to get along with others, and she came around and stopped the head biting and learned to play nice.

He never lost his love for play, even right up to the end. He lost some muscle mass in his last year or so and certainly couldn’t jump as high as he used to, but he and Scout would still chase each other around the back yard during their supervised outdoor time, and even at fifteen years old he was so fast that he could easily keep up with Scout.

We should all age so well. We should all live so well.