Scratcher of heads, rubber of bellies
Make that two monsters.
Templeton has been sleeping quite a bit in the warm bed he finally discovered yesterday (in fact, he’s zonked out in it right now). He was sleeping in it earlier today when Scout came up and discovered him sleeping in the bed she has avoided like the plague. Curious as to what he was doing, she jumped up beside him and he made a run for it. She decided to mimic her hero and curled up in the bed for a bit.
She didn’t stay long, but long enough for a few pictures.
We’ve had a bit of a cold snap in Portland lately. Templeton often seeks out warm places to sleep even during normal winter temperatures, so before Christmas my wife bought him a little bed that has an electric warmer built into the bottom. It warms up when the cat lies down, which seemed like the perfect thing for a sleepy cat. Only problem was, Templeton wouldn’t go in it. Scout seems to think it of the devil and won’t have anything to do with it whereas Templeton just didn’t seem that interested. I promised my wife that I could get him to use it in a few weeks. She washed the cover just in case it had a smell they didn’t like.
Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I present you with exhibit A: Templeton zonked out in his new bed.
He’s all curled up now beside me and snoring a little bit so hopefully he will continue to enjoy his new bed. On the plus side, if he sleeps here instead of my chairs, maybe it will avoid little incidents like I had today where I came home from a visit to Ridgefield and promptly sat down in a hairball he hacked up while I was gone.
Good times!
Throughout history, many societies have made their young people endure trials and feats of daring to prove their readiness to be welcomed into society as adults. These feats could range from the fairly benign, such as swimming across a raging river full of hungry crocodiles with a hunk of meat strapped to your back, to the so-dangerous-it’s-almost-suicidal, such as giving Scout a bath.
Anthropologists have long debated where one such feat fits into this scale of bravery: getting Templeton to take his medicine. The debate knows no end chiefly because it all depends on who is giving the medicine.
If it’s a stranger to Templeton who’s giving the pills, we’re on the nearly-suicidal end of the scale, much like trying to hold Scout while small children are around.
If I’m giving Templeton his pills, however, we fall into the fairly benign category. Much like trimming Scout’s nails, there may be a lot of noise and movement but there’s no real danger.
The little one won’t strike out at me in anger, and the feat of daring becomes more a feat of patience and resilience with a dash of cleverness thrown in. You collect him in your arms and he knows what’s coming. He gives you a look that says “I love you but I’m not taking that pill!” I look back into his beautiful green eyes and answer “I love you and you WILL take this pill” and then it’s on.
Templeton’s defenses come in two main thrusts. His first defense is to keep the pill out of his mouth in the first place, which involves a lot of head turning, a jaw clamped down with all his might, lots of squirming, and flailing legs that try to knock the pill away.
We have a little device that shoots the pill down his throat which has helped immensely. However, this is where his second method of defense kicks in. After you’ve shot the pill a hundred times and missed, every so often you’ll use the force (thanks Obi-wan!) and the pill will find its target. However, Templeton immediately starts to work it back up, and it’s a stunning sight to see how quickly he can spit pills back up. If only there was a way to harness this power for the good of humanity.
Templeton added a new wrinkle to his defenses this last time. He had picked up an infection and needed a pill in the morning for over a week. Once I got the pill down his throat, he wouldn’t try and work it up. He’d just sit there and wait to be released. He’d meow a bit in protest but otherwise was calm and I figured my will had finally overcome his. Feeling victorious, I set him free and he bolted away. It slowly dawned on me that during his meows of protest he had kept his mouth closed the entire time.
He hadn’t swallowed the pill at all! He was going to run off and spit it out when I wasn’t looking! These pills start foaming fairly soon after they come into contact with saliva, however, so he couldn’t get them up very easily and it looked like he was foaming at the mouth.
So if you want to know how I spent each morning that week, you can envision a mighty struggle trying to get him to swallow the pill, then me chasing him around the house while a foamy white spittle is hanging down from his mouth. I’d eventually capture him and get all the foam back inside his mouth (kids, don’t try this at home) and then try and get him to eat since the medicine was supposed to be taken with food.
Templeton would protest of course and not eat anything, even though he was hungry. I know my little one won’t hold a grudge against me for long, though, so I’d just go upstairs and then come back down and he’d usually eat for me right away.
That cat is a little too clever for his own good.
One unusual development this year is that Scout hasn’t wanted to be outside much during the supervised time the cats get in the backyard when I get home from work. She’s never loved the outdoors as much as Templeton, but she used to like to spend at least an hour or so outside. These days she’ll only spend a few minutes if she’ll even come out at all.
But then I noticed that she did want to come out once the sun set, and then she’d usually stay out until it got dark and I made both cats come inside. Tonight I suddenly realized what’s going on.
Scout’s a werekitten.
I’m on to you little one.
Portland was gripped with a record-breaking heat wave a couple of weeks ago. On Saturday I sweated it out in my office on the main floor. I figured the cats would stay in the coolest parts of the house, but they would often want to be near me and hang out in my office instead.
This picture of Scout is from that day, she was up on my bookcase and looking pretty pathetic. This wasn’t even her at her worst, I decided not to take the picture when her mouth was hanging open as she looked like she had passed on.
For the next few days, I took pity on the little ones and moved my laptop and LCD into my wife’s office in the basement, where it stays much cooler. The cats can’t quite understand why I don’t just control the weather like the old days, and my protests that I was never omnipotent and that the old house just had air conditioning fall on deaf ears.
Still, I have to admire their devotion to me that they’d suffer just to be near me.
One of the things I don’t like about our backyard is that it isn’t a very photogenic place to photograph the cats. We have a wire fence around the yard which is functional yet looks terrible as a background in pictures.
We’ve made some small changes to the yard, mostly just temporary changes until we’re ready to make some major improvements. This shot of Scout comes as close to a nice background as I’ve yet found, with the catnip growing beside her, the purple flowers of the clematis in front of her, and the pink blossoms of the purple coneflower behind her.
She’s such a beautiful little creature, perhaps no one can look away from her golden eyes to check on the background anyway.
I’ve been a night owl most of my life and have constant trouble adapting to the sleep schedule of an early-bird-gets-the-worm world. I’m insanely jealous of Templeton’s ability not only to almost sleep at will, but how he seems in perfect peace when doing it. I’m thinking of wallpapering my office with this picture, to help me on those nights when I need the master’s help in drifting off to dreamland.
NOTE TO WOULD-BE INTRUDERS: Make sure to look up when you enter our premises, as our security system is just as effective (and deadly) from above as from below.
Templeton has been almost his normal self the past few days after we switched him to a different type of kidney-friendly food, so I’m guardedly optimistic that he’s finally getting back to normal, 3 months after swallowing the sewing needle before Christmas. I’m not ready to declare victory quite yet, but I’m breathing a little easier.
This picture is from 2002 when we were living in Keizer. Scout loves to curl up with Templeton but he usually prefers to sleep on his own. If she’d catch him when he was tired enough, he’d decide it was better to let her snuggle than to have to get up and move somewhere else.
Templeton’s had his ups and down since getting his stomach operated on to remove the sewing needle he swallowed. After recuperating at home, he had to go back to the vet for a weekend to get antibiotics and fluids to battle a fever. Then he came home and every morning for the past couple of weeks has had the pleasure of me shooting a pill down his throat (and let me tell you, for a sick old man he sure could put up a fight).
A few days ago he really started coming around, back to about 70% of his normal self. He was moving around, wanting to play, meeting me at the door when I came home. He had another check up at the vet on Saturday and they will have the results on Tuesday. Today he was pretty quiet again and spent part of the day sitting in his cat carrier. I’m not sure if that’s a bad sign or if its irrelevant. Normally when we put him in there he goes to the vet, so I hope he’s not trying to tell us something. Usually he’s a bit more vocal when something’s on his mind. On the other hand, we usually don’t leave the carrier out like it is now, so perhaps he’s just trying out a new napping location.
The Christmas tree finally came down today, over a month after Christmas has come and gone. It’s so nice coming home and walking down the street and seeing the beautiful lights through the window, it’s a shame it can’t stay up year round. And Scout loves sleeping under (and in) it so much she’d love it if it was up year round too. In February we could decorate it for President’s Day, in March for St. Patrick’s Day, in April for Easter, in May for Memorial Day …
We’re also getting many of the rooms in the house painted, so the cats will get to spend the week closed off into the lower part of the house. Fortunately it seems Scout can’t open the door that leads into the kitchen, although I’m not sure we’ve seen her at her most desperate.
The picture above is Templeton with a catnip bag back in 2001 when were still living in Keizer.
Boolie 