Wordless Wednesday: My Yard at Night

Henry's Wordless Wednesday

Clyde's Outdoor Fun

Hey guys, it's me, Clyde. I have something exciting to share with you all. Guess what it is? The Lady and Senor have been letting me outside! Can you believe it? It all started when it got nice outside and everytime someone would try to leave I would dart out the door. They got tired of chasing me and just gave up. The Lady said if you want to go outside then that's fine, go outside. So I did. The Lady goes outside with me and does yard work. I just hang out nearby and play in the dirt or sometimes just sit around. Doesn't it look like fun?


There is just something that I love about having the dirt squish between my paws. (My Lady got to clean that whole patch of yard out. She was not too thrilled). Anyway, there is a really nice little creek that runs through the neighbors yard. I really like the creek. You wanna know why?


Duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucks! Quacking ducks!!! They are moving toys with wings! I was very nice to the ducks. I watched the duckies walk through the yard. I didn't chase them. I was a very good kitty, see.


All I did was look at them. Okay, well maybe I did try to chase them a little bit. They didn't seem very phased by it.


I had so much fun playing with those ducks. They haven't been back though. I'm not sure why. Anyway, when The Lady was ready to come back in she yelled my name and I had to stop playing with the ducks and I ran back home to My Lady.


I can't wait to go out again!

The Book Meme & an award

I got tagged by Sly to do a meme. It has been a long long long time since I have done a meme. I really thank Sly for tagging me for this and I think every kitty should go and visit him. He is still kind of a new blogger since he just started in January. Anyway...

Here are the rules:

1. Pick up the nearest book.
2. Open to page 123
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people and post a comment to Empress once you post it to your blog so she can come see!

Products. (What new reports, new forms, new physical items, new procedures, or whatever, will result from implementing the change?) Cost. (What will it probably cost, and how did you determine that? Remember that kinds of costs, e.g., personnel versus capital equipment, are important distinctions in some organizations.) Appendix. (Include any back up charts, computations, survey data, references, lists, or other items which, while necessary for the decision, would interrupt te flow of the proposal if included in the body of it.)

Yep, that's it. My Lady is taking some business classes right now. She is really tired of it, but it has to be done. She told me that if I copied this out of the book that I was going to have to cite my reference. I gave her the bitey and hissed at her. I think she caught my drift. Anyway, I am going to tag any kitty that wants to play since I know I am playing this a bit late and most other kitties have already played.

Now, second and just as important, we were given an award from Karl over at The Cat Realm. This is really a great award that Karl is passing on to us kitties here in the blogosphere. Everykitty who was around last year went through a lot when Anastasia went missing. It was really a shock and so unexpected. Karl, it has been great to be friends with you. I'm very glad that you did not stop blogging over Ana's disappearance. I know it was hard to keep going and I am so glad that you did. For those kitties who never got to know or meet Ana, click here to go to her tribute blog created by her loving brother, Karl. You can get to know this great and crazy gal that we all grew to love so much.

Karl, Happy First Blogoversary to you and you are a very valued friend of mine.

I hope they are okay

Henry's Wordless Wednesday

I got an award!

Yes, you heard that right. I got me another award! I really like getting award. It gives me something neat and new to add to my sidebar. I got this award from my bestest friend, Dr. Tweety or Tweet as I like to call him. I am very glad that he thought of me even though I don't blog a whole lot anymore.

I was hoping to get to blog today some, but The Lady said she had yard work to do. We didn't have a yard to worry about at the apartment, the servant (The Lady called him the landlord) kept the grounds for us. Here, it's like a downgrade. The Lady has to keep up the grounds. Psshht! Whateva! Anyway, she spent many many hours outside today. She dug up some grass and some plants and dead old rose bushes that Senor didn't take care of very well. The Lady said she hates thinking about how much money she is going to have to spend to make the yard look pretty again. They live in a yard-conscious part of town and our yard is literally the yuckiest on the whole street.

Here in a couple of days, Clyde gets to do a post on his recent adventures in our yard. He has it ready, but we are just waiting on The Lady to download the pictures from the camera to illustrate the post.

The One Who Came Before

Sometimes other kitties in the blogosphere post a story about the kitty that was their bean’s pet before they were even born. I asked My Lady if I could post a story about the kitty that she had before me. She said yes. This is a long story, but one that I hope you read. This is the story of Jim, the one who came before.

When The Lady first moved to Downing Street, she was 25 years old and it was the first time that she was going to live completely on her own. She was very excited about this since it seemed nice to have no kind of roommate whatsoever. She did know that she still wanted a companion, but more like the furry kind. She went to the animal shelter several times before she found her match. The Lady has never been partial to any particular look. It is more of an emotional decision with her and she just knows when she sees us.

Jim was no different. A six-week old kitten sat in this big cage completely by himself, but still happy as can be. When she looked into his eyes she knew that he was the one. When she first brought Jim home he wanted her in his sight at all times. The Lady decided to put him on the floor so she could watch him run around. She plopped him on the carpet and lied down on the couch and covered up with this old ratty comforter that for some reason she hadn’t gotten rid of yet.

She laid down looking nowhere in particular, but couldn’t see Jim from where she was. Suddenly, she felt a tug at the comforter after only about fifteen seconds. It was Jim. Not wanting to be away from his new mom he dug his claws into that comforter and pulled himself up onto the couch. He spotted The Lady and their eyes locked. He meowed as he ran up her chest, burying his tiny little body into her hair and purred like she never heard a cat purr before. She was his mommy. He knew it from the moment he saw her and so did she.

Jim spent much time buried in The Lady’s hair even when he got to be almost full grown and could only bury his head because he was too big to fit all of him like he used to. He still tried though. What The Lady loved most, besides when he buried himself in her hair, is when he would lay on her chest and stick his nose in the corner of her eye and fall to sleep. She said that he seemed his most content at that time; still she always questioned why he did that. She always let him though. It was something unique about Jim that she just loved.

Jim had all the looks of a cat, but the personality of a dog. He so eagerly ran up to new visitors, stretching his body against them waiting for acknowledgment – a simple petting. He loved to be loved and he was loved by many. He played fetch with pens. She would throw them into the kitchen. He would go and pick them up in his mouth and bring them back to her for another round. The Lady always loved his beautiful gray furs, a perfectly solid color with steel blue eyes. Those eyes never went away, he kept the same eyes he has as a kitten. Jim was with The Lady during some rough times. He would curl up on her chest when she was sad, his signature pose with his nose in her eye. She would cry and he would lick the tears off her cheek.

The Lady didn’t know it, but her time with Jim was going to be short. When Jim was not even a year old, he started to act a little funny one day. He sat over his water bowl, tongue licking, but nowhere near the water. He badly wanted to drink, but something was stopping him. The Lady took him to the vet where they did xrays and tested his blood trying to figure out what was wrong with him. The vet suspected some kind of poisoning, but still said she really couldn’t figure out what was wrong. She gave The Lady some medicine and told her to stay home from work if she could so she could monitor Jim. She did just that and the next day she found out what the problem was.

The Lady had just bought a new pair of sweatpants to wear for lounging around the house. It had a small drawstring in the front of the pants, not the kind that went around the entire waist, but one more for decoration, about eight inches long. Jim had gone into the litterbox, something he hadn’t done in two days and low and behold, that drawstring started to appear from you know where. The Lady went through many emotions at that moment, one of relief that she finally knew what the problem was and another of plain and simple ew! The Lady took Jim back to the vet and told them what she “found”. They chuckled and laughed about it a little, in all honesty she said it was kinda funny.

The vet said that the entire drawstring must have been lodged in his intestine during the xray which is why it hadn’t shown up. She gave him some charcoal to help in clearing his system of any toxins and gave some more medicine to take over the next few days. Everyone thought that Jim would be fine. He wasn’t. The next day Senor came over to watch a movie. Jim lied on the couch next to The Lady while they watched the movie. After it was over, The Lady couldn’t believe that Jim had slept through the entire movie. She picked him up and sat him on the floor. Jim started to walk around in circles, his nose dragging on the floor.

Of course, The Lady started crying. She picked Jim up and looked into those eyes. They weren’t his eyes. Something was missing, The Lady noticed it immediately. It was 1:00 in the morning when this happened. The Lady called the vets office to see if there was an emergency number. There was so she called. She met the vet at the office right away. She ran a couple of tests and gave him a shot. The moment that My Lady will never forget, a moment burned into her eternal memory, was when the vet picked Jim up and looked him in the eyes. She said “Jim, where’d you go boy?” The vet told her that he had a “depressed state of mind” and she feared that the chemicals left behind from the drawstring were not overcome by the charcoal and the medicine he was given and that he was being poisoned.

Jim spent the next week at the vet’s office. The Lady would visit him, but never felt that it was him. Jim was no longer in his body, he had already gone and only his shell had remained. The next part gets very hard for The Lady to talk about and is the reason she will never again go back to that vet. After the week was over, the vet had called and said “I think that Jim is ready to come home, you can come and pick him up today”. It was a Saturday. The Lady knew that Jim was not okay when she and Senor picked him up at the vet’s office. Even so, she paid her bill and took him home. She had bought a large dog crate to keep Jim in his first few days back home.

She brought him home and into the livingroom. She picked him up and looked into his eyes. Again, Jim was not there. His eyes were glazed over, his pupils barely visible. He was blind; it was obvious to her as soon as she looked at him. It was as if Jim had no idea who he was. He wasn’t aware of his surroundings or even himself. So, The Lady and Senor put him in his cage and he began to scratch in the corner. He scratched and he scratched and he scratched some more. This went on for over five minutes. With no sign of him stopping, The Lady put her hand on his back and he went to the bathroom all over himself. Jim was not okay. Why the vet called her that morning and claimed he was is beyond her. She gave her so much hope, she was so happy to hear the words of that phone call.

The Lady knew what she had to do. It was almost 5:00pm that Saturday when Senor got into the phone book and started calling vet’s offices to see if anyone was still open. She refused to take him back to the vet’s office he had just come from. Senor finally found an office that was just getting ready to close. He told them the situation and they said that absolutely they would stay and to bring him right over. They put Jim into his carrier and he took the last car ride of his life. They walked into the vet’s office where the paperwork was already ready. The Lady held Jim in her arms, kissed his head and told him she was sorry. She was so sorry. The woman took Jim from The Lady and carried him into the back of the building.

Jim went to the bridge that Saturday. The Saturday after Valentine’s Day. It was the 18^th of February in 2005. My Lady’s baby boy with the blue eyes and the penchant for hair and eye corners was no longer hers. He was never again going to lie on her chest and lick her tears and never again going to curl that overgrown kitten body into her hair. He is now only in her heart and in her memories. The Lady keeps a picture of Jim on our livingroom table and on her bulletin board at work. She has looked at those pictures of Jim every single day since that Saturday. She will never and can never forget him. He was there at a time The Lady needed him most. She thinks that he was put here just for that reason.

I want to thank all of you who have read this story. It means a lot to My Lady to get to share the memories, good and bad of the precious little furboy who stole her heart. This is Jim’s story. He was the one who came before and he is the one who will never be forgotten.

Mar's Wordless Wednesday

Good Bye Smudge

I did not know Smudge. He started blogging around the time that My Lady started to make me take these breaks. I'm so sorry that I didn't know him. It makes me feel sad that I didn't. I think that I really missed out.

My Lady wrote a story about the one who came before me. I think that I might post it this week for everyone else to read. I'll have to ask her if I can.

Rest in Peace, Smudge.

Things aren't going exactly as planned

Hi old friends. This whole blogging thing is not going my way. You have no idea how much I wish I could blog like I used to. The Lady simply no longer cooperates with me. She is either working on the house, doing homework or spending time with Senor. It seems like she is just to busy for me lately. The only time us kitties get to spend time with her is at night when she is in bed trying to get some sleep. It is really frustrating.

When we were at Downing Street, it seemed like we were always getting to cuddle. Even when The Lady did her homework, we would curl up with her on the couch. We aren't allowed on the couch here at the new house since Senor doesn't like it. I have to admit though that we break the rules quite often. Things just aren't the same anymore though. This place is so much bigger it is like we all are so far apart from each other all the time. It's lonelier here. Don't tell My Lady I said this, but I wish we could go back to Downing Street.

Clyde and Mar still fight and now Mar and I fight too. The Lady has gotten used to it. However, it still annoys her and probably always will. The Feliway diffusers have not helped here. Actually, it has gotten worse since now Mar and I are fighting. One thing though is that all four of us will sleep on the bed together which is something that we didn't do before. Mar wouldn't come into the bedroom when we were here. I think that Mar really wishes things would go back to the way they were and we would leave. Then again, I think he would be lonely if we did.

I hope one of these days that I will get to blog again like I used to. I thought that would have happened by now. Unfortunately, The Lady has other things to do right now and blogging isn't one of the bigger priorities. I really think that it should be.

My birthday is Saturday. I will be three years old. No party for me though. The Lady said she has a lot of homework to do and a group project to work on. It's Clyde's honorary birthday, too. We really don't know when he was born (for some reason he won't tell us). We do know that he is about four years old so we have decided to celebrate it on the same day as mine. No party for him either. This sucks. Helton out.

Check this out

You see that little guy in the middle. The really cute, pale one. That was me when I was a little kitten! The animal shelter where The Lady got me has a website and this is the picture that was on it. The Lady actually saw it after she brought me home. I was in the cage with another little guy that looked just like me. He was my brother, but to be honest I don't remember him. I was too little My Lady says. Those other three guys just happened to be there at the same time. They weren't in the same litter as me. My twin brother was in the cage with us, but he was off in the corner so he didn't show up in the picture. At least this is what My Lady figures since he isn't in the picture.

This is the only baby picture of me. The Lady had a bunch when I was a kitten and then the memory card got all messed up and they got lost. My Lady was so sad about that that she cried for days over it. She can't ever get them back and we didn't have a computer then so there was no backup. There gone. All gone. Oh well, I say. The Lady has so many pictures of me now I don't know how there is room for them even on the laptop. Add that to all the pictures of the other three kitties in the house and Holy Moly! It's just too much.

My sweet, purr-ful apologies to my sweetie, Scout. I am sorry that I have not blogged in over a week. Charlotte stole my blog on Wednesday and then The Lady was just too darn lazy. No matter how much I whined, she simply ignored me. It was annoying, but what can I do. I wish I could take her food dish away from her when she acted like that. That would get her up! Anyway, beautiful darling, thank you for thinking of me and getting My Lady to help me blog!

P.S. Scout has a very pretty picture of her on her bloggie today. You all should go and see it.

Charlotte's Wordless Wednesday

Award Time!

Hey guys. It's Mar here. I'm just hanging out licking the wall with half its wallpaper missing. Hope you all are having as much fun as me. Well, guess what. We got an award from Ariel! My new stepbrotherkitty, Henry is being extra cool today and letting me do the post about it. I really like that cat.

Can you believe it? We got a Great Blog Award. I think it's pretty cool. Henry said that I can decide who this award goes to. We are going to award it to the following way cool kitties:

1. Monty Q

2. Dr. Tweety & The Fab Five

3. Henry's Sweetie, Scout (he would kill me if I didn't give it to her!!!)