kittehs and candies.

(If this story seems familiar, I may have told something similar (not on the blog) a week or 2 ago. We had nearly the same thing happen two times in as many weeks. Which probably means we are slow learners)

Yesterday, Mr. G rummaged through the cupboards for something sweet and came up with a movie-theater-sized box of nerds. Since someone in the house (*cough coughMrGcough cough*) is unable to properly open a box of nerds, he dumped them into a Ziploc sandwich baggie and brought the baggie into the office to munch on while playing on the computer.

La Doof Kitton nosed around the bag a few times. Mr. G reminded La Doof Kitton that as a cat, he doesn't like sweets because, as mommy has repeatedly pointed out, kittons lack the ability to taste sweet (Really. I swear). After the three thousandth, fourth hundred and ninety seven time shoo-ing La Doof Kitton away, the Mr. reached in the bag and pulled out one extremely large blob of wee sweet candy and set it on the desk for La Doof Kitton.

La Doof Kitton sniffed it very carefully. Then he pawed at it very gingerly.
A few moments later, the candy was skittering across the floor as a kitton tongue worried at it.

La Doof Kitton ate his piece of candy, climbed onto the desk to beg for more and waited until Mr. G was distracted (One must always strike when the evil opponent is distracted). At the moment of distraction, La Doof Kitton made his move. He dove into the baggie. NOT, as one might think, into the outside of the baggie but he tried to fit both his front paws and his head (most specifically, his tongue) into the baggie.
The baggie, however, being made to hold the average peanut-butter and jelly sandwich, wasn't able to contain a lot of candy AND the front 1/3 of a cat so it did the logical baggie thing to do and ruptured its contents all over the office. I had no idea nerds could spread themselves that far; we had rainbow carpeting.

El Gato fled in the commotion, Dawg was (thank heavens) outside, and La Doof Kitton worked mightily to eat/play with/stash under the closet door the candies before they could be cleaned up (until Mr. G got out the vacuum--even brave Kittons can't stand the vacuum).

So apparently nerds are tasty goodness that even appeal to those critters who are sweet-taste-receptor deprived. To bad I don't have any more nerds because they're all inside my vacuum.

A TMI tale

I know, I know, I said I didn't have time to post yet. That was the truth, I don't. But I will anyhow because I laughed.

This morning, Mr. G and I were snuggling under the covers, in that nice, sleepy morning state.

Suddenly, I felt my hair get pounced. I realized that Mr. G had snaked his hand under my pillow and was poking his fingers out, teasing La Doof Kitton into pouncing. He did this a few dozen times before giving La Doof Kitton a small nudge and saying "whoops, you fell off the bed" (That sounds much crueler than it is. La Doof Kitton seems to like the 'whoops, you fell off the bed' game).

Mr. G and I continued snuggling and moved on to things not G rated...which is when, from the top of the dresser (which he'd climbed onto after the last round of 'whoops, you fell off the bed), La Doof Kitton pounced exactly the way Mr. G has trained him with this playing--onto the hand that is moving under the covers.

Except, it was my hand, not Mr. G's. And it wasn't where it 'usually' is.

And, La Doof Kitton *ahem* kinda sorta missed the hand by an inch.

And he landed squarely, at full tilt, on *ahem* Mr. G. Which resulted in Mr. G curling himself into the fetal position for several minutes.

And I laughed a little to hard. Which means it's only a matter of time for the universe to sic my pets at me.

I promise more tom-foolery in April

It's not that the kittehs aren't entertaining right now it's that I don't have time to write about it for the moment. Life gets sane again in April.

So a short bit...
last night, I made cat stuff. I started by making the scratchy seen here:
http://www.designspongeonline.com/2009/01/diy-project-recycled-cardboard-kitty-pad.html

Mine isn't quite that pretty but is quite adequate if I do say so myself.
Thus far, La Doof Kitton has walked up to it, smelled it, and set to work chewing on a piece that I cut unevenly and El Gato has glared at me for sprinkling 'her' catnip on it and refuses to touch it.

So I decided toys might be a better choice since I still had cardboard. I made the toys seen here:
http://www.marmaladepets.com/owners/download_ball.html

(copy paper boxes = thinner than normal cardboard = easier to cut w/ scissors but cut the slits narrower than the pattern shows. And now you know)

The cats were mostly indifferent. Then, suddenly, La Doof Kitton decided the ball one was the best ever. He made 3 laps of the house with it before skidding to a stop and dropping it in Dawg's water dish. For future reference, cardboard toys + water = broken. I'll make him another someday, right now, watching him walk up to the soggyness that I scooped out and left on the back doormat and poke it with a paw is a bit of schaudenfraud entertainment for me.

forgive me kittehs for I have annoyed the piss out of you both

I was trying to get a picture of the scene that unfolds in our household dozens of times every day--that is to say, La Doof Kitton pouncing on El Gato.

So, I picked a day when they were doing a lot of this and I put batteries in the camera and followed them around for about an hour. And they did nothing.
So I decided to start something.

I waited until El Gato was napping and plunked La Doof Kitton onto the bed next to her.
Nothing:




So I grabbed the jeans La Doof Kitton was laying on and I dragged him until they were touching.
Nothing:



So I decided to make the noises of rabid squirrels under the bedspread (La Doof Kitton is convinced that scratchy noises and movement under cloth = rabid squirrel attacks) and instead of the normal reaction (El Gato = indifferent and La Doof Kitton = attack mode), La Doof Kitton acted scared and El Gato, being the loving older sister she is (HA!) attacked the blob to protect him from it as he used her as a shield:



I even tried to dangle strings over top of El Gato for La Doof Kitton to attack...which just earned me the reproach of both kittehs:


So pictures of a pounce/tackle are not forthcoming--I have to wait until I can take them in true photojournalistic, non involvement style.

things La Doof Kitton has messed with since I got home 3 hours ago

(It has been a long night. And this list is hardly conclusive--it just lists the things I caught him doing.)

1-A good pen (which I still haven't found) that I left on the desk.

2-A cheap ballpoint (which I HAVE found--he only hides well the expensive ones) that I left on the desk.

3-A hershey's kiss (at least one) from my v-day stash which he stole and dragged around the house and made me chase him for. I've got an inkling there may be more hidden throughout the house.

4- a rubber spatula (which I set to close to the edge of the counter while baking...he reached up, batted it off, and spread cheesecake batter across my floor as it fell)

5-a piece of venetian glass to go with a desk set (pen-rest) that my MIL brought me back from Italy. He stole it three times tonight and I had to dive for the door to keep from having to chase him everywhere to get it. He didn't drop it but did carry it around the office very primly. (he is now locked out of the office)

6-A melon baller. I was looking for a spring form pan in the laundry-room pantry and moved a box of seldom-used utensils...he took this opportunity to steal a melon baller from the box of utensils and put it (where else) under the drying rack in the laundry room

7-A dryer-lint bison. I cleaned the dryer lint thingy and dropped the ball of blue fuzz into the trash...It's now somewhere in the basement. (And think, this means poor Linty [the lint demon who lives in my dryer vent] is going hungry tonight. I should throw him a few extra mismatched socks just so he doesn't starve. )

8-the cord to my phone charger. Although this was funny--Because I yelled at him while he was chewing on it so he tried to run away with it. But it was still plugged in.
So he got to the end of the cord and there was a *sproing* sound and he's lucky he still has all his teeth.

9-A pad of post it notes. (he didn't get far with them because he rather doesn't like the feel of sticky notes on his teeth or fur)

10-An oven mitt (which I left on the counter but somehow found under the table...)

I think I'm going to bed. That won't make him behave but it means I have 8 hours before I have to deal with his shenanigans again. (although we're averaging 3.3333 debacles per hour that I'm aware of--a lot could happen in the next 8 hours)

The Kitty house...

Last Christmas, Sandy Paws got the kittehs a kittey house. It normally belongs to El Gato; La Doof Kitton tends to only get in when it will irritate another member of the house (namely, El Gato).

Recently, said kitty house moved from under one end table to under the one near the electronics in a vain attempt to protect the electronics from the pets--Dawg likes taking her bones under the table to chew on and the cats fight on and under any surface in the house. We theorized that, since animals must follow the same laws of physics we do, unable to occupy the same space as another object, the presence of the kitty house would make it impossible for Dawg to get under there to chew a bone or for both cats to fit under there at the same time. We were wrong (and I'm not sure who broke the DVD player/receiver but broken it is).

Tonight, Dawg entered the kitty house (or at least her head did) to work on her bone

And 5 minutes later, I got to take this picture (which I swear on my copy of James Herriot's 'All Creatures Great and Small' that I did not, in any way, set up--they did this all on their own)
He looks quite content with his bone. And he will probably now kill me in my sleep for mocking him on the interwebz.

Collars

Recently, I decided that the kitteh's collars (especially El Gato's) were looking rather grungy. I decided to try to fix that but, money being a wee bit tight right now, combined with me trying to learn to sew, I decided to DIY this.

I started with El Gato's. First it got a good washing (and let me say...ew. It looked so very much better after just a washing that I'm rather grossed out that I didn't try that before--no idea how 2 indoor cats generate that amount of filth); the clean collar looked like this:.
(You will notice, of course, that La Doof Kitton 'helped' at every step of this sewing project.)

I adjusted the collar as big as it could go, removed the tags, and pinned on a piece of ribbion like this, then sewed it on (three times, since one time I screwed up and had to rip all the stitches out)--notice the paws in the picture:

I'm holding it up high in this picture to keep it out of La Doof Kitton's paws--he has an unnatural affinity for ribbon.
(and I also must confess that the bow is only in place because, I am my grandmother's protogee. I kinda ripped the ribbon w/ my seam ripper so, of course, I added a bow to cover said rip)


El Gato would like to model for you:
.

During all of this, La Doof Kitton was helping by stealing the ribbon and sliding it under the door to my closet, as seen here:

SO, since my first attempt was moderately successful, I decided to do the same to La Doof Kitton's collar the next day....

Since both kittehs have breakaway collars, I figured it would be easy to remove the collar--after all, every time we try to grab La Doof Kitton, his collar melts away and I am left with a handful of collar while La Doof Kitton enjoys his furry freedom, sans the opressive symbol of his subjugation by furless apes. So, since La Doof Kitton decided he didn't want me to remove his collar properly, I just grabbed a bit of the collar and tugged...and it didn't break away.

You know that moment when you 'have a tiger by the tail...'? Having an angry cat (apparently and understandably angered by collar tugs) by the non-breaking-away-breakaway-collar ain't no picnic either. I eventually got the collar, bandaged up my wounds, and washed the collar. I left it to dry on my sewing table and wandered off to make my apologies to La Doof Kitton by way of a bit of leftover ribbon and make me dinner.

While I was distracted elsewhere in the house ("ooh, shiny!") I heard Mr. G say the words I hear 1000 times a day..."Hey, stop that!" I assumed that La Doof Kitton was into something he shouldn't be into until I heard it "HEY, cats, both of you..." and ran to see what happened (La Doof Kitton raises cain on days that end in 'y'. El Gato raises cain on the 12th of never) and how El Gato was involved.

I had apparently left the door to my sewing project ajar. La Doof Kitton was borrowing spools of thread and hiding them in various spots around the house. El Gato had wandered in, found La Doof Kitton's collar in progress and was attempting to destroy it. She was standing there, the collar hanging from her mouth, shaking it violently and attempting to rip it into small pieces of ribbon and collar. I'm not sure if she thought "I don't want my brother to have a collar like my new pretty one" or if she thought "ick, this smells like the other cat...KILL" or "hey, this tells people where to return him to...If I destroy it, then mail him to Abu Dhabi without return address..." but regardless, it was amusing.
(If you've no idea why El Gato might wish to be rid of La Doof Kitton, I should point out that she seems to miss being an only pet and she has [although I haven't been able to get pictures of it] been pounced by La Doof Kitton 3 times in the time it took for me to type this out)

And it obviously didn't work, seeing as La Doof Kitton is here to model his new collar (note this blog entry in the background :-P):



So, yes, they match, as seen here...but they may not be thrilled about that (but I'm amazed, a picture of them...TOGETHER! Huzzah!)