Decatting the keyboard

I have found a lovely way to distract the cat, and free up my lap and right arm from demands for lap time and lots of attention - much less my keyboard and laptop!

I sacrificed a large chunk of my desk surface to a fluffy towel straight out of the dryer, free of any cat fur.

Spring snacks for cats

Yep, spring has sprung. The day before the mulberry tree started putting out leaves in earnest, I woke up to the sound of crickets outside the bedroom window. The mint has once again defied predictions of "I think I really killed it this time", and even the sage managed to survive the "It's dead, so no point in watering it."

The cats have gone from complaining that a closed garage door is an abomination unto Bast, but hurriedly changing their minds upon it being cracked, to wanting to spend hours in there. I was a little stymied - after all, we didn't change much over the winter (it's cold in there.) And there's no kibble in there, and Ashbutt tends to orbit the food dish like a growing kitten.

Did I mention the crickets are back? Ashbutt brought one back in from the garage to share with us, but when we weren't interested enough, he had the crunchy snack himself. 

*sigh*

Kicking a Ball

So, I have a house. (This is a good thing.) It has a guest room, with bed - because my darling man and I wanted to put up guests as they came through. I may have had to explain "I gotta repay my couch karma!" to my husband, but he definitely agreed with the plan and the principle of the thing.

I also have an office, large enough for the queen sized inflatable mattress Gay Cynic left. (He, being a mischievous man, was prone to calling it the "blow up... mattress" with a waggle of the eyebrows that rarely failed to elicit a giggle.)

Together, they managed to host friends and their small kids this weekend. The jury is still out on whether the chocolate ice cream stains / chocolate sauce stains will come out of the pillowcase on the first round or not. That two year old's reaction to her first taste of Blue Bell almond mocha fudge ice cream was... enthusiastic. Chocolate everywhere, from diaper to dress to hair, and then a food coma right on top of her brother. And the 4 year old managed to make his disappear so fast that he had plenty of time to hold up the bowl with big huge eyes and a poorly enunciated "Pwees?"

I also have a backyard. Because I like to wander out barefoot or sandal-shod in said yard, I put a lot of effort into killing fire ants, and I also pay good money to make it free of goatheads, thistles, and many other sticky stabby thorny varieties of plant. I miss fireflies, but I do not miss tweezing plant weaponry out of my skin.

Said backyard was just put to its highest and best use yet, and the time and effort spent on its grassy state repaid, with a simple phrase. "Your sister isn't done eating yet. If you're done, you may put on your boots and take the ball out into the back yard."

Yep, the weekend included kicking a little inflatable ball left over from physical therapy for the kids, and watching the hobby horse be "fed" the grass as it was ridden around, and the kids digging for dinosaur bones in the bare patch under the mulberry tree (the important part is keeping a straight face when presented with a twig that does, if you kinda apply a little imagination, resemble a bit of pterodactyl wing, or a piece of marble that must clearly be a T-rex "toof.")

I may not have kids, but beyond producing veggies and giving puppies a place to run, that's clearly what backyards are for, sure as guest rooms are for guests.

Sudden Feline Revelation

Today, I built a cupboard. First, I took all the pieces out of the box, and made sure they were all there. Then, I removed the cat form the shipping box, and put the styrofoam spacers in. Then, I started unpacking pieces from the plastic wrap, one at a time, as needed, and laid them out on the floor. Then I removed the cat from the shipping box, and threw the plastic wrap in the box. Then I removed the cat from the parts I was assembling, and screwed the first pieces together.

Then I removed the loose screws from the cat, and made sure they were tucked in the plastic bag where they couldn't be batted elsewhere. Carefully following directions, I built the left side of the cupboard, then leaned it against the wall and built the right side. Then I removed the cat from between the panels and the wall, so I could stack them a little closer for more space while building the doors.

All was going well (aside from the dirty looks from the cat about the shipping box filling up with not-cat objects), until I reached the magic moment, putting on backing panels, when the cat realized he was no longer looking at a stack of strange-smelling objects, but... A BOX.

The Sudden Feline Revelation meant that work slowed dramatically.