Tiger the Tub Cat

I am not writing of a heretofore unknown Dr. Suess title but rather of my weirdo cat, Tiger.  In his most natural state, Tiger is committed to a life of restful leisure.

I think he’s quite charming in this state because it is me that he loves best.  Together, we share a commitment to soft blankets, naps on the sofa, and vanilla ice cream.  Sometimes, we allow Lucy to join us.

But Tiger has another side and it’s weird: he likes to get in the shower.  Usually, he reserves his shower sojourns for the moment when someone has just completed a shower.  Then, while the bather seeks to extract themselves from the tub, he hops in and licks up the water in the corner near the faucet (this despite the fact that he has his own generous bowl of water refreshed daily). However, the temporary shower plastic to-prevent-further-leaking has cramped his style.  Now he waits on the edge of the shower while I shower, meowing his dissatisfaction with the current inadequate accommodations.

Imagine his response when this entire shower is torn out.  No doubt he’ll file a complaint with the ASPCA.  I am in the process of seeking legal representation.

Raccoons!

From time to time, a neighborhood cat pops up on the back porch and my very indulged indoor cats, spying the outsider from the sliding glass back door, promptly lose their minds, howling at the glass.  On Saturday night, T and I were watching Netflix when Tiger and Lucy went to the backdoor and commenced an alarm.  It wasn’t the usual howl, more of an announcing sort of meow.  We got up to scare off the cat outside but when we got to the glass, it wasn’t a cat staring in at us. 

It was a raccoon.

As we contemplated the best course of action, we realized that there was another raccoon on the back deck.

And a third, fourth, and fifth one playing in old man tree.  They weren’t full-gown, more like teenaged raccoons, and they were having a blast in the backyard.  

I’ve been known to be charmed by raccoons but this was no laughing matter.  I’ve never spied a single raccoon in the backyard, let alone five of them, and T and I jumped into action.

Well, actually T did.  She pulled on her boots and set out through the front door to scare them out of the backyard.  She brought a big stick and a rather impressive bark.  It took a few rounds, but she sent them packing.  Tomorrow, I’ll call the local animal control folks.  I’ll also call my tree guy to make sure the raccoons haven’t hollowed out a nest in the tree.

Until then, T is watching raccoon removal videos and contemplating how she’d look in a ‘coonskin cap.  As for Tiger and Lucy, they are napping, which they find to be a solid response to any number of troubling developments.

Life with Foamy and Whiny

The wood floors on the first floor of my house are being re-finished later this month.  Among other things, that means that Tiger and Lucy, the cosseted indoor cats who rule our world, have to be boarded away from the house while the work is completed.

To be ready for kitty hotel, the dynamic duo had to have up-to-date vaccines.  That meant a trip to the vet.  The vet who is closest to home did not have any appointments this week, so they sent me to another branch, just 6 miles away.  When I made the appointment it was with the knowledge that the cats don’t like to ride in a car, but as the saying goes, “needs must.”

On Friday, I set off with two annoyed cats in a carrying case.  JT, the in-house cat-wrangler, secured them in the case and loaded them in the car.  He gave me strict instructions not to screw things up, to text him with updates, and then he set off for a track meet.

I fired up the wagon and hit the road with two very unhappy cats.  Lucy began howling at once, stopping only to catch her breath and begin foaming at the mouth.  Tiger, increasingly covered in his sister’s drool, was more resigned to his fate, occasionally issuing a pathetic meow while his sister was loading up the drool works.  This let me know that he was alive.  And annoyed.

Six miles of travel on an early Friday afternoon in New Jersey involved nearly 30 minutes of stop-and-go-traffic.  Accompany that with the howling of very troubled cats and you’ve a recipe for one woman to lose her mind.

My frazzled nerves and I made it there, secured the required vaccines (and proof of said-vaccines) and then my furry friends were stuffed back in the carrying case for the journey home.  That was slightly less-eventful, because some of the traffic had thinned out.  When we got home and inside the house, I unzipped the carrying case.  They burst out and took time to look at me in an accusing fashion before they bolted upstairs, Lucy still frothing at the mouth and Tiger covered in drool.  There they have largely remained.  

Tiger has likely forgiven me the whole experience.  But I expect that Lucy has already made contact with PETA and is drawing up the papers for a magnificent lawsuit against me.  

They head to the cat hotel next Saturday meaning that this story isn’t quite over.

A Bridge Too Far

The air freshener above the basement cat box always does some heavy lifting.  This month, I selected a scent entitled “Timeless Joy.”  

I try to bring an optimistic outlook to the world, but this may be a bridge too far.

Lucy

Cats are not supposed to be on the table.  Neither of them cares for my silly rules.

Lucy pleads guilty as charged.

The Runner

Since the 7th grade, JT has run for the cross country team in the fall.  He started running under the direction of the amazing Coach L, a man who is as gentle as he is strong and whose patience with kids is extraordinary.  Those Middle School cross country years started slow, though JT ran well and liked it immediately.  When he started high school two years ago, he joined the cross country team in the fall.  This coach, a different Coach L, is funny and strong, and a fan of a work ethic.  JT respects her and looks to meet her ambitious expectations.  For two years running, he’s earned the Iron Man award, a distinction given to team members who never miss practice.  JT is a never-miss-practice kind of kid, so this challenge was right up his alley.

JT is a moderately good runner, with the tenacity to go long distances and enough energy to finish strong.  He’s an even better teammate, who has steadily brought his friends into the sport.  Last winter, when the cross country season had ended and wrestling was just under way, he and a group of wrestlers headed out on the cold mornings for some extra runs to maintain conditioning.  Something truly clicked on those mornings and a runner was born.

Throughout the spring and into the summer, he ran nearly every day.  He made easy 5 and 6 mile distance runs; he ran sprints; he ran tempo drills.  He was excited for the start of practice; the arrival of weekends finds him consulting Coach L’s instructions and going out for a run.  

On the weekends, Lucy the cat takes over coaching duties.  She's gone from supervising a little boy who played with Playmobil and ran around in the back yard to supervising homework and athletic practice.  She watches from the window when JT steps out the front door.

She stays in the front window while he stretches outside, a watchful eye on her boy.

She looks on as he consults his watch and sets his timer.

And then he is off.  

Lucy retreats for a nap, but stays downstairs because her boy will be back soon.  She must be ready to supervise the post-run shower and snack.

Home Sweet Home

Later today, JT returns home.  He’s been gone two weeks and both Lucy the cat and I have missed him something fierce.  Only one of us has stood in his bedroom and cried in a forlorn fashion, perhaps because the other of us has to work and run the household even in the boy’s absence.  But man, have I felt Lucy’s angst.

Hurry home, sweet boy.  Your squad has missed you.

On Two Weeks and Sixteen Years

Each year, JT spends two weeks of vacation time in the company of his other mother.  It’s a strange transition for me to go from 24-hour duty to no child responsibilities at all.  I usually enjoy the first 48 hours of my house staying clean.  As I adjust to the odd quiet in my home, I think about the future as well as the past.  

For a bit, I’m at sixes and sevens when the boy is absent.  The time feels different.  These days, I wonder if this is what it will be like when JT leaves for college.  When he was younger, college seemed so far away.  But this summer we’ve started to visit schools and talk about it in a way that is no longer unreal.  My nephew C is getting ready to move away from home and start college in the fall.  More than anything else, that process has set JT to thinking about his next steps.  Suddenly, life as a mama with an empty nest feels less like a distant prospect and more like a distinct possibility.

So two weeks are now less an apparition in our usual life but a preview of what will soon be the story of my days.  Weird.  Quiet.  It feels untethered to be without responsibilities.  Sure, the laundry is caught up and the food bill is dramatically reduced.  But the sound of a 16 year old moving up and down the stairs has faded and I find that I miss it.

The cats feel his absence as much as I do.  Lucy is troubled, standing in the doorway of JT’s bedroom and looking at me like I’ve really screwed something up.  Tiger, pretty needy in the first place, follows me around begging for extra time in a comfy lap.  It’s like the three of us still think that this little boy is the center of our universe.

Reality is that the boy at the center of our world is well on his way to adulthood, more a man than a boy.  

He makes the journey with our love overflowing from his pockets.  I won’t say that we don’t miss the little boy.  We do.  But we’re excited to see what he will do in the world.

Real Life Conversations with JT: Apple and Tree edition

The backstory:  Lucy the cat likes to eat holiday ribbon, especially the curling kind that shows up on holiday gifts.  Though she eats it, she shouldn’t, because it makes her sick.  Years ago when I made this realization, I quit using that kind of ribbon.  But there are holidays gifts from friends and students in the house, and Lucy is on the prowl for the ribbon.  Sunday morning, JT and I heard Lucy make the yowling sound that proceeds a cat hurl.

Me: She’s gonna hurl….get out of the way.

Then we watched as Lucy hurled up a pile of ribbon.  Twice.

JT:  Ribbon.

Me:  She can’t help herself when ribbon is involved.

JT: Well, given how much she enjoys it, I’m thinking of eating some ribbon myself. 

JT’s sense of humor is perhaps the most obvious evidence that I am his mama.  World, you’ve been warned.

Full Service Mama

Even though I only worked two days this past week, Friday night found me tired and ready to tuck into bed by 10 pm.  JT, who is either hardier than me or has the judgment of a 12 year old (or both), wanted to stay up to watch the second half of the Texas A&M-Oklahoma bowl game.  I gave him the thumb's up on this important task and he headed up to the playroom.  I set to snoring.

By the time he came downstairs to go to bed, I was asleep.  I woke up enough to dimly register that the toilet made an odd sound when JT flushed it.  Then I rolled over and fell back asleep.  At 4 am, I had to use that toilet and only after I flushed it did I remember the sound, which I was now hearing for a second time.   

Uh-oh.  

I turned on the light and grabbed my glasses, prepared to shut off the water.  But the toilet didn't quite overflow, though it was clearly clogged.

Awesome.

Some people would leave such a problem to be solved in the daylight.  I am not some people. So I set out to solve the clog.  Step one involved diagnosing the extent of the problem.  I have a two-story home with a single soil pipe running out of the basement, so it was entirely possible that I had not one, but two clogged toilets, or, more accurately a clogged drain.  I headed to the downstairs toilet to see if it could be flushed.  It could, which led me to conclude that my problem was with the soil pipe between the first and second floor.  I made the trip to the basement to get the plunger and headed back up two flights of stairs, now accompanied by the cats, who like to supervise my work.  Three plunges later, my problem was solved.  As my plumber has taught me, I flushed the toilet several more times, to be sure the clog was truly removed.

Then the cats and I returned to bed, confident that we had earned the right to sleep in this morning.

Crime Spree

My cats love Christmas tree season and for the first few days after the tree is set up, they bask in its presence, lolling about under the tree and sniffing its needles.  Then, having grown accustomed to its presence, the assaults begin.  The other day, we came home to find the most recent victim.

The accused wasn't talking.

The injustice was righted (and hung a little higher in the branches for her own safety).

If history is any guide, this won't be the last of the crimes.

Herding Cats

Some weeks just cry out for cute cat photos.  This is one of them.  Have a good weekend, Internet.  You've earned it.

May 1st: Front Yard Flowerbed

The careful observer will note that I like a lush and full garden.  In the case of this frontyard flowerbed, that means planting with an awareness of the timing of blooms.  Tulips and daffodils bloom early (the last of them are finishing up this week) and that's a good thing because the hostas at the front of the flowerbed have grown full and lush.

The rose of Sharon tree is starting to fill in and the azalea bushes are in their full glory this week. Things are lovely.

When we get home each afternoon, this is the first flowerbed that I see.  Often, there's a cat in the windowsill above to welcome us.  And life doesn't get much better than that.

Real Life Conversations with JT: Hierarchy edition

The backstory:  When he feeds the cats their daily allotment of kibble, JT hauls the kibble bucket over and announces that "King JT is here to feed you."  Tiger and Lucy come running, of course.  Who doesn't love a full kibble bowl?

Mama:  If you are feeding them, are you really the King?

JT:  I hadn't thought of that.

Mama:  Maybe Tiger and Lucy are the royalty.  You feed them; I clean their litter box.

JT:  We're their servants, aren't we?

Mama:  Indeed we are.

At least we know where we stand.

Well Behaved

My new cat, seen below, never hurls on the floor, doesn't complain when the kibble bowl is only half-full, and hasn't scratched the leather chair.

Yet.

Nine (Hard Knock?) Lives

Being home in the icy rain gave JT and I an opportunity to observe the behaviors of our local wildlife.  Tiger and Lucy were undaunted by our weekday holiday, convinced that we're just here to serve them anyway.

6 am
Cats experience a disgruntled awakening as it becomes clear that I intend to demand additional time and a fair allotment of space in the Queen-sized bed.  Lucy retreats to her princess pillow; Tiger opts to taunt the window-blind cord.

7 am
Both cats entranced by the sound of a bird chirping outside. Apparently, birds do not get a snow day.  Lucy goes to the window to check things out. Tiger takes advantage and attempts a nap on her royal highness's pillow.

8 am
Two-legged servants head downstairs.  Four-legged supervisors do the same.  They demand kibble and then, exhausted from their supervisory responsibilities, take a nap on the warm radiator in the dining room.

9 am
Tiger relocates for a nap in the study window, enjoying the heat of the radiator and the view outdoors. Lucy follows me around, meowing her complaints about the current regime. Checks of the kibble and water bowl reveal that complaints are unwarranted. Nonetheless, Lucy has something to say and I will be forced to listen.

10 am
Lucy is napping on her bed.  Tiger is in seclusion.  Probably napping.

11 am
Napping, part II.

12 noon
Napping, part III

1 pm
Human went outside to shovel the ice; cats watched the excitement from the window sills.

2 pm
All that ice removal work made them tired.  Nap, part IV.

3 pm
Napping, part V.  I'm sensing a theme here.

4 pm
My God, these cats are lazy.

5 pm
Tiger is watching ESPN with JT.  Lucy is watching the inside of her eyelids.  JT got a warm cookie delivered to his grubby paws.  Tiger got kibble.

6 pm
Nap time!

7 pm
Kitty wrestling match.  Tiger would play this game forever but Lucy eventually walks away and then he's left to assault me or JT.

8 pm
Both cats are watching basketball with me…..curled on the warm afghan on my lap.  They support Syracuse (who finally breaks their losing streak, beating U Conn).

9 pm
Upstairs for washing up and bedtime. Tiger and I have a tradition whereby I bring a glass of water upstairs and he stands on the edge of my bed, perched between the bed and the nightstand, sipping the water from the nightstand.  Lucy sometimes participates.  Then, exhausted, they curl up in the flannel nests with JT or me.  Last night, both kitties had a drink and then curled up on my bed while we watched a little more basketball.

10 pm
Lights out.  Lucy headed to the the boy's bed.  Tiger opted to sleep on my feet; always a risky proposition as he will attack as warranted, which means whenever he pleases.

We're headed back to school today, so the cats will be on their own.  I feel confident in asserting that they will sleep away their day.

Tree Removal Unit

JT hoped that I would consent to keep our Christmas tree forever; Tiger and Lucy concurred.  Besides the obvious (my mom is coming to visit in February and if she arrived to a tree still up in the living room, the shock might slow her down when it comes to catching up our laundry), the main objection I had to this arrangement was that the cats have become rather emboldened with regard to said greenery.

Lucy really loves Christmas trees and she spent a lot of time underneath the full boughs of this year's tree, pretending to be the commander of the forest.  Tiger had taken to batting the lower branches, and showing them who was boss.  Both cats had given an effort to climbing up the tree and sitting in the lower branches. 

As the tree grew drier and the cats grew braver, it was easy to see that a disaster was in the offing.  One of them would climb in the tree and lay in wait to attack the other and then the whole tree, the ornaments, and the lights, would come crashing down.  Most likely in the middle of the night.  To great caterwauling.

So on Sunday evening the tree received its eviction notice.  Just pulling it out from its corner was a rather tenuous affair, as the tree wobbled  dangerously.  But JT and I righted it, removed the ornaments and lights, and then hauled the now defrocked tree to the back deck.  On Monday, I threw it on the mountain of snow in the front yard to await a trip to the town mulch pile.

Yesterday morning, as I came downstairs, the cats were sitting in front of the back window, looking with longing at the tree, now on its side on the back deck.  I have to say that I too will miss it.  It was the most beautiful tree that we've had, the center of a very happy Christmas, and a magical reminder of the the power of believing.

Crime Wave

The victim: 

 The accused:

The motive:

The accused pleads not guilty by reason of temporary holiday madness.  Negotiations for a settlement are on-going.

Unexpected

The cats always love the Christmas tree and so it was no surprise to see Lucy headed underneath the tree for some rest and recreation.

A more unexpected development was to find the two legged creature underneath the tree.

I think it's the best tree we've ever had.  JT seems to agree.

Companion

A few months ago, I bought a soft red blanket that caught my eye.  I was already thinking about using the color in my living room, an extra blanket is always handy to have on hand, and it was $7.99 on the clearance rack at Target.  I call that a win-win proposition.  I first deployed the blanket at the foot of my bed, to protect my quilt from the cats. 

JT took an immediate liking to the blanket and he soon took to wrapping it around himself when he went to bed at night.  He gave it a name, called the blanket "my companion."  Since then, he's completely claimed the blanket for himself.  We don't even call it the red blanket; we call it Companion.  Mostly, it stays in his flannel nest, ready for the evening's sleep.

On Thanksgiving, he brought it downstairs for his marathon viewing of Mythbusters.  He stood before me, wrapped in Companion, and announced "Woot, woot.  Companion in the house."  Then he, Companion, and his feline companions, settled down to watch the telly.  This here is fine living, JT style.