Our Feline Ninja

Anyone who reads this knows that Obi and Frosty Paws are recovering from some serious relationship problems. It amazes me how the kitty group dynamics can change seemingly overnight after years of peace and harmony. Think back to the days before the wall came down. Banu and Frosty coexisted for four years in apparent accord. In reality their problems must have started days or weeks earlier than his first assault on her, but the doltish humans were unable to perceive the subtle feline cues.

With Shirin's invaluable assistance, along with a little help from the pharmaceutical industry, a tenuous peace has once again descended upon the downstairs hamlet and our two Ninja. Obi receives his chicken-flavored Prozac pellet in the morning after a night without food (if he's full he won't eat it) and in the evening Frosty happily eats his chicken-flavored Anafranil pellet along with some Easy Cheese which he loves (so does Tita; I had to wrench it out of her hands as she was about to squirt it into her mouth - the Easy Cheese, not the Anafranil.) The skirmishes have for the most part abated. Last night we saw them nose to nose, which as catster.com says, "The nose-tap is the most common form of communication between cats that are friends. When cats share a nose-to-nose greeting, they're depositing their scents on each other and checking out where the other has been." :-) Friends? :-)

Early morning, when I'm preparing their bowls of food, has always been the primal point of Ninja conflict. Even before our recent battles Obi showed food aggression during this time, circling my ankles and lunging toward anyone who even looked like they were thinking about eating cat food that day.  For weeks now I have been feeding Obi on the counter and Frosty on the floor with the others. Yesterday morning as I was scrambling to make ready his bowl containing the magic pellet and a couple of pieces of food (which takes about 30 seconds, long enough for him to jump down to the floor) he was advancing on Frosty with his food-aggressive squawking. Frosty reacted a bit but nothing happened. (Yay drugs!)This morning when Obi attempted to replicate the scenario Frosty graciously walked away. (Just say yes!) Tomorrow morning? This slow-to-learn human will have Obi's bowl readied the night before so he will have no time (well, maybe 5 seconds but not enough time for him to jump to the floor) to launch an offensive. He will be whisked to the counter with the mind altering drugs under his nose before he knows what happened.

Will Frosty Paws and Obi ever be buddies? Nopers. Will they ever play patty cake? (see video below) Not bloody likely. But it looks like the crisis is almost over... for now... maybe.

This is a recent pic, although their usual hangouts are elsewhere. Obi likes to lie under the kitchen table - this is an improvement from his safe zone on our kitchen counter which is up and away from Frosty (who is too tubby to jump up that high.) Frosty likes the spot between the couch and cactus pot, a nice change from being locked in the computer room. We've even seen them lying two feet away from each other, Obi lying under the kitchen table and Frosty just outside the chair legs.

 But don't look for them to be doing this anytime soon:

Bird Feeder Evolution

Saeed has been working on the bird feeder arrangement. A couple of years ago his mission was to get rid of the marauder squirrels who were eating all the bird seeds. After heckling from me that squirrels were cute and had a right to eat too (and that they were an amazing North American version of monkey), he began to provide special feeders for them as well. The pictures in this post (taken through the kitchen window screen) from about a month ago are already 'old' because he has changed the feeders again to maximize attraction of various bird species, but show two species that we are seeing more frequently than previous years. I'm sure the feeders have a lot to do with it.

We have American goldfinches (Carduelis tristis) GALORE this year. They are primarily seed eaters though will occasionally eat insects. This image is so poor; I need to sit with my camera on our deck like Jim Brandenburg or something. It's so tempting to snatch a beautiful goldfinch image from the internet, but I'll resist.

Yellow - breeding range, Green - year-round, Blue - wintering range

We're lucky to have them all year in the green zone. They are beautiful birds. 

(image definitely snatched from the internet)

This is a red-bellied woodpecker, Melanerpes carolinus . What's odd is that I associate woodpecker eating behavior with pulling insects out of the bark of trees, but we see them (almost always sideways like this) cruising our feeders. Huh! After reading up on it they do eat bugs out of trees and even catch them in mid-air, but they are indeed omnivores and eat seeds and fruits too.

Red-bellied woodpecker range.

No wonder they're called M. carolinus!

(image snatched again from the internet)

I enjoy trying to capture the wildlife in our yard. I'll try to get better pics in the future, but it's hard without a fancy camera and telephoto lens. I'd also like to try to snap each of the species we see since there are so many, but you have to be in the right place at the right time. Too bad I have to work:-)

The Rest of Tita's Visit and Kai's Birthday

After Tita hung out with us in Rock Hill for a few days we drove down to visit with her twin sister and family.

This picture is actually out of order but it had to go first. It doesn't matter how old my girls are - I still love to see them together. (click to enlarge)

Not long after our arrival Tita and Cyrus were playing.

Tita kept trying to get Cyrus to make a funny face:


Tita, on the other hand, was very cooperative:

Cyrus discusses the finer points of color mixing with his mom.

Kai, on the other hand, is just a beginner.

Ooops! That doesn't taste so good, does it Kai? He looks like Mr. Pitt with his Hitler mustache (Seinfeld reference.)

It's hard to fly your three-year-old on your feet when your one-year-old is sitting on your face. Yum, diaper.

Kai gets some schmoozles from his Baba Saeed.

All that playing around made Shirin hungry, so Kai had to stab her in the back of her throat feed her:

Sunday morning the girls took us out to breakfast (for an early Father's Day) to Mama's Boy. It has regular food but also excellent vegetarian food. I had a tofu dish that was excellent.

Saeed impresses Cyrus with his coloring abilities.

Both the boys are very good in restaurants.

When we got back it was my job to watch the kids outside so everybody else could whip the house into shape for a prospective renter. Shortly after this was snapped Tita was recruited indoors.

Cyrus and Kai pushed this up and down the sidewalk a few times, but soon Cyrus snatched my camera to take pictures of...

... my rear end while I was trying to make sure Kai didn't take a dive into the parking lot...

... Tita who came back outside for something...

... and his friend Lucy and her Mommy and Daddy in front of their house.

Gabriel spent most of the weekend working on his new online business.

Tita gave Cyrus these really cool tattoos...

... of Sesame Street characters that...

... glowed in the dark if you held them up to the light.

We had sent Gabriel to the store with a list of items that included watermelon. The store only had a yellow watermelon so Shirin had to taste it to make sure it actually tasted like watermelon. It was great!

I think it passed the Kai test too.

Tita being held prisoner by one foot.

Buddies.

As Saeed is about to open his Father's Day presents Cyrus realizes that Tita's cherry pie looks really good and comes over for a bite.

It's a lucky boy who gets to pay a kiss for a bite of pie.

yum

family portrait

pictures of the girls in their BitCoin T-shirts
(go to the third banner to see them with Bren)

Recognize this as Tita's FB profile pic?

Another early celebration - Kai's 1st birthday!

Kai eating his "birthday cake" - actually he's smacking down his first muffin:

Concentrating hard on his new toy car-carrier truck.

Cyrus and mommy check out the new puzzle.

Is this puppy love or what?

We had to leave Kai to his puppy and everyone else to drive back to RH so I could go to work Monday morning :-( but it was a great visit.

Frosty Sleeps In Calvin's Spot

No sooner did I write the post about Calvin did I come home to see Frosty Paws sleeping in Calvin's spot between the couch, milk cactus pot, and the french doors. He's done that once or twice before, shortly after we put Calvin to sleep. I'm not sure what's so attractive about that spot but no one else sleeps there but the two brothers. Sweet.

If you don't notice the spot of white fur it could almost be someone else...

I know I'm behind in my blogging. I'll try to work some on the pictures from recent family gatherings. Right now chores have to be attended to.

Pecan Sandie Is Here For A Visit

We are so enjoying Tita's visit.We've talked, gone for a walk, cooked, watched movies, laughed and aw'ed over old photographs of the girls when they were little, and listened to her play piano.

Coming from an area of the country that doesn't have thunderstorms (I thought everyone had thunderstorms) makes her wistful for a good 'ole thunderboomer. Yesterday when we heard distant thunder she went running outside with her phone/camera to capture the sound, the wind, the smell -  the essence of a summer storm. This afternoon our weather did the same thing and so did she! I found her on the deck with her Daddy enjoying the storm.

Radiating pure happiness.

When the girls were little they used to make a lot of 'movies'. One of Tita's recurring characters was Pecan Sandie. Here's a glimpse of Pecan Sandie all grown up:


Tomorrow we're all (with Shirin's family) going to be together. Can't wait!

Calvin

I never blogged about Calvin. I just keep putting it off because it's so hard. But I do want to tell his story.

Calvin was the brother of Frosty Paws and Layli. We adopted them through Recycled Pets and because they were in a group with lots of other kittens they came home, unbeknownst to us, with a parasite called coccidia. The three of them stayed in the upstairs bathroom (to prevent spread to our other kitties) on medication for many weeks. Calvin was always the one who would escape the bathroom by darting out before we could stop him, only he would turn left and get stuck in an area where we could easily recapture him! Silly boy. If he had just turned right and he could've made us chase him for hours.

Calvin and Frosty turned out to be the big boys in the house but Calvin always behaved as if he were the runt, deferring to all the others except maybe Tippy. He would hide in the closet if someone new came over, and if one of us came home through the back door he'd peer up over the edge of the couch with great concern on his face to find out who it was. He was even scared of the collar we tried to put around his neck, and for nearly a year wore a blue curling gift-wrap ribbon around his neck to get used to the feeling. For a while his name was 'Ribbon-neck Boy'. And as much as he liked to eat, anyone, even tiny Tippy, could take over his bowl and he'd calmly move off to find another one.

One time around the holidays I came home for lunch to find the side door open from when someone brought a Christmas tree through the door. I fussed at the family and then counted up all the kitties to make sure nobody escaped. I couldn't find Calvin anywhere. So I went outside in my uniform calling out for him. It was cold and wet and after 30 minutes I still hadn't found him. I even called work and said, "I know this sounds crazy but I'm not coming back until I can find my cat who is lost somewhere outside." Eventually someone at home discovered Calvin calmly sitting in the middle of the kitchen, as if nothing was wrong. Apparently he'd gotten scared of something (the tree? the vacuum cleaner?) and hidden his bulky body where none of us could find him.

Calvin had the best purr of any cat I know. His sister Layli comes in a close second. His favorite thing was for Saeed and me to sit on the living room couch so he could squeeze in between us, happily touching both of us at the same time. He would then purr for a very long time as loud as could be, and I remember more than once having to raise the volume on the TV to hear it over the purring. If I were writing he had a thing about sitting on the paper I was trying to write on, and would grab my pen repeatedly until I just gave up and let him have it. Of course if I used a different pen he would then start grabbing that one. He was funny about the camera and I always had a hard time getting a good picture of him because he would turn his head away. For every good picture I took there were 20 of the side of his head! Chappu really loved him and followed him around the house and sat outside the closet door if he were in there sleeping.

Last summer it was clear that he was ailing. He was losing weight and one day he just looked at the food longingly but couldn't eat it. Cutting out the details, he was diagnosed with a renal lymphoma (?) and we had to put him to sleep at age 8. He was sweet even though all of that. The vets had a hard time listening to his heart because he was purring so loudly, and he purred in my arms for 30 minutes before the vet put the final medication in his IV. What a sweet, sweet boy.

Here are some pics and one video of our sweetheart Calvin.