Pets – Page 97

Suddenly Salmonny Sam

Sam and Emma get a serving of Tiki Cat wet food in the mornings. We’ve alternated flavors over the years, sometimes even getting a variety pack where they get a new flavor every couple of days. That was all good and well but now they’re hooked on Wild Salmon and won’t touch anything else. Emma I can kind of understand, she’s always been a bit picky, but little Samwise was a surprise as he’ll eat anything that isn’t a vegetable.

If they ever discontinue Wild Salmon, may God have mercy on our souls.

Even a Dog Likes To Be Comfortable

I don’t normally pose my pet pictures but I must confess to draping the blanket across Ellie for this shot. I would have preferred that she be asleep but it was a hot day so I only left the blanket on for a few seconds. The pillow, though, she sought that out on her own.

Comfort

We bought this Kivik loveseat from Ikea for one sole purpose: to give our sixty-five pound lapdog a place in my office to snuggle. We weren’t exactly looking for heirloom furniture given the abuse of paw and claw it will endure, and also went for comfort over style.

I’d say we chose wisely, wouldn’t you, Ellie? Ellie? Ellie?

I’m sure she’ll get back to us.

The Comforter Has Come

Sam lay beside me on the loveseat, too agitated by the 4th of July fireworks to sleep. Scout came in but walked past her normal spot in my lap or her cat bed and instead lay down beside him. Sam immediately curled into a ball and fell into a deep sleep, safe and secure in his sister’s shadow. Sleep wouldn’t come so easily for Scout, but hours later exhaustion took hold and she too fell asleep.

Soon sleep beckoned me as well and I walked to the bedroom with the darkness murmuring at my feet. The murmurs jumped onto the bed as I approached and I eased myself under the covers so as not to crush them. As Sam and Scout curled up on me the murmurs turned to purrs, the purrs to silence, and at last we all were at rest.

Mr. Ambassador

I’ve been doing a lot of work on my home office lately, but it isn’t just my physical life that’s getting organized. I’ve been shooting digitally since Christmas of 2000 and over the years my pictures ended up pretty scattered around. Worse yet I have gotten hopelessly behind in sorting and editing. Worst of all I wasn’t sure which ones were properly backed up.

So it was time to start getting my digital life in order too.

Thanks to a few days of drudgery, all my pictures are now stored in a common directory format on one big hard drive, loaded into Aperture, and being backed up onto a second hard drive as I type. While loading in my older pictures, I couldn’t help but take a break every so often to play around with a few.

For some reason I never edited this picture of Templeton back in the day, he was inspecting my 15″ Powerbook shortly after it was delivered in May of 2004. I’ve written about the two of them before, so it was kind of funny to see them together at the moment the laptop arrived. I was rather ambivalent about cats until I met him, but he was such an ambassador for the feline kind that I can’t imagine my life without them now.

What a wonderful little creature he was.

Attack Dog

When we first adopted Ellie a few years ago, it seemed pretty clear she hadn’t been in an urban environment before as she wasn’t particularly good on her leash and she was much worse when off it, at least in open areas. Inside the house, or in a fenced backyard, she was in top form, no worries there.

In the hopes of one day being able to let her off leash at the nearby dog park, I began working with her in the backyard on learning to heel & stay & come, even when excited, and eventually she got the hang of it. I got brave enough to try her in the dog park and she did well, but we also started a little game where I would sprint from one side of the park to the other and, if she stayed by my side the whole time, she got a treat.

We still run wind sprints together whenever possible, even though she has long outgrown the need for the training, because she just loves it. But the other day as she caught me from behind she bumped into my legs and sent me sprawling face first into the mud. I had been running pretty fast so I hit hard and as I tried to sit up, found it hard to breathe. It was hard to tell exactly where the pain was coming from, I suppose that must have been the adrenaline kicking in, useful for when you’re trying to escape a lion but not so much when you’ve been attacked by a giant goofball and only want to know what is broken. I forced a few deep breaths and was relieved there were no sharp pains in my chest.

I was also relieved when I could stand and put weight on both my legs without shooting pain, so my streak of never having broken a bone stays alive. Once I got home and a little time had passed, a bruise the size of a dollar bill appeared on my thigh with a matching silver dollar bruise on my knee. All from an accidental bump.

Although word around the house is that it may not have been so accidental but payback for having had to smell ribs cooking all day and then I didn’t even share one bite with her during dinner.

Lately she’s been sidelined not by my leg but by hers, she somehow hurt it so she’s been on bed rest but I think we’ll start up short walks tomorrow, because boy howdy is she ready. I lost count of how many times she pelted me with hedgehogs today. Here she is curled up with one of her favorites (as you can tell from the stuffing that is escaping) on the dog bed in my office.

Room to Snuggle

Heretofore the only real place to sit in my office has been the Throne of Kings, the recliner we bought when we moved here a decade ago to replace my beloved window seat from the previous house. It’s a Scandinavian style recliner, incredibly comfortable, yet small and lightweight and easy to move about, perfect for my small office. But it has a fatal flaw — there’s no room for a sixty-five pound lap dog.

I’ve been trying to figure out how to re-arrange my office to be able to both have something large enough for Ellie to curl up beside me, yet where I could still recline so that Scout and/or Sam and occasionally Emma could curl up on me as well. A visit to Ikea this weekend appears to have solved the problem. This Kivik loveseat is big enough for Ellie & me, while the footstool on the left is big enough that I can recline on it and the cats can sleep on me as before.

So how come it is Scout curled up on it in this picture (and Sam & Emma are sleeping there now), and not Ellie? Well, she somehow hurt her rear leg and is limping a bit, so she’s confined to bed rest in the basement for now. Not that she’s at all happy about it.

Soon, Ellie, soon.

WWDC Postscript

I loved watching Steve give Apple’s keynotes, even if I wasn’t interested in the products Apple was introducing, as it was infectious to see the enthusiasm he had for the company he founded and the direction they were taking the industry. So hats off to Tim & the team from Cupertino, for while no one on stage today could replace Steve, their love for what they were doing was obvious and I enjoyed the show from start to finish.

What I hoped to glean from the day was what my future computing setup might look like. I’m about to start on the second half of renovating my office and wanted to know what sort of desk arrangement I should plan for. I had been thinking that a MacBook Air / iMac setup might be better for my photography work, but after today I’m not so sure that an iPad / MacBook Pro solution isn’t a better bet.

The biggest surprise from the week came not from Apple but from Emma. She normally likes sleeping on the floor so I’ve kept a bed there for her, but lately she’ll only use the beds of Sam and Scout up on my desk. So I need to make sure my new setup has room for the cat tree, my TV, three cat beds up high, a couch with room enough for Ellie & me, and a desk for my computer.

A tall order for my little office, but I’m not complaining, I love snuggling with the little ones.

The Softest Alarm Clock

Many mornings I wake to these paws poking softly into my cheeks. It’s so adorable I can’t be angry. Plus it’s Scout, The Cat Who Can Do No Wrong. She’s tried a variety of techniques over the years but sticks with the ones that wake me in the best mood. Another technique I love are her gentle little headbutts. She crossed the line when she started flipping my lower lip, thankfully that phase didn’t last too long.

WWDC

We’re all waiting on pins and needles here to see what Apple announces on Monday at their Worldwide Developer’s Conference. We’re so anxious we can barely sleep! Well maybe not all of us. And in fact this picture of Lady Em was taken last summer as she tried to beat the heat by catnapping on the glass table on our porch as she and I enjoyed a nice day in Portland.