Grumblings and 200th Post Contest

Mom hasn't let us blog in days, and we are mad! How can we keep any friends if we don't get to visit regularly? Here we are closing in on 200 posts, and our secretary won't help us go online. She says that she can check on some of our friends from her office, but that doesn't help us. We like to visit and comment. We took the blogger addiction test and learned that we're 55% addicted. It would probably be higher if our secretary were more tech savvy, and she didn't have a day job.

Lots of things are happening at our house, but we probably won't have any details to share until the end of next month. We're NOT happy about it.

At least Mom said that we can have a 200th Post Contest. As for prizes, Mom will make a donation in your name to the charity of your choice and give you a gift card to Petsmart. All you have to do is leave the 15th comment on our 200th post. Sorry, but if you are number 14, you cannot just leave a second comment.

~J&B

Tabby's Tummy and Tortie's Tuesday

I know what you're thinking. Yes, I do complain that Jake is a Blog Hog. And here I have my big chance for center stage, and I turn away from the camera. Just chalk it up to my Tortitude. I don't like to be cooperative and "easy." At least you can see my tortie patterns in this photo. ~Bathsheba

In yesterday's Man Cat post, I mentioned that I sometimes lure Mom and Dad in with my tummy only to put the bitey on them. Actually, I don't always bite them. Sometimes I enjoy the petting and let them do so without incident. This way I keep the element of surprise for when I do launch a fierce attack. I keep them guessing-hehe.

Mom wanted me to point out the hairless area of my underbelly. With all due respect to Dragonheart, she doesn't want me to have a bald tummy, and she's a little worried about my compulsive cleaning. That was one of my symptoms of my hyperthyroidism when it was diagnosed last year. I have blood work scheduled for July 5, and I'm NOT looking forward to it. Still, it might show that I need a higher dose of meds.

~Jake

Fierce ManCat for Monday

I may have a soft side for DaisyMae, but I am a fierce ManCat. I've been known to use my irrisistable tummy to lure in the unsuspecting Mom or Dad, only to put the fierce bitey on them. Here I've reserved my attack mode for the annoying camera strap.

~Jake

Miss Peach's Meme

Our new friends Karl and Anastasia tagged us with Miss Peach's meme, and we both will try to participate:

1. Favorite season? J&B: Summer--when our backyard jungle is full and the sun is very warm.


2. Favorite colors? Jake: I'm partial to Black and White (DaisyMae). Bathsheba: grey and white.


3. Favorite room? Jake: Cat/computer room in the winter, living room in the summer. Bathsheba: Kitchen and Mom and Dad's bedroom (though I'm not allowed to sleep with them when they go up to bed).


4. Do you like dogs? J&B: No, but we can make exceptions for really nice dogs like ones we've met on the web. Jake: Mom has a photo of me as a kitten holding my own and sharing a platter with two dogs (Grandpa's dog and my uncle's dog), so I guess I could like a dog as long as he didn't take my food. Please, no loud barking either!

5. Ever been in an airplane box? NEVER!

6. Do you have to get bathed? NO!

7. Are you in love? Jake: Of course--I have my lovely DaisyMae Maus over in San Diego. She's the queen in a house of cats. Bathsheba: Bubbles in Baton Rouge. He wooed me with the most wonderful Valentine video (even if I did look ridiculous). He's a great hunter, and a very patient big brother to Madness.

8. Where would you like to travel to? J&B: We have no travel aspirations. We do like to venture out of the yard and into the little woods behind our house. We have heard about a place called the beach where the fish are abundant and the litter box is endless. We might like that if it didn't involve that travel part.

9. What do you ignore? Jake: Mom when she's trying to discipline me. I love Mom, but only mind Dad. Bathsheba: I TRY to ignore Jake to no avail.

10. How many lives have you used up? J&B: Maybe some. We've both been in catfights and gotten nasty infections. Jake: I was in a fight just Friday night. Mom was going to bed about 1 a.m. only to hear bloodcurdling caterwauling outside. We went into the dark bushes when she went outside to investigate.

11. Do you have any dark secrets? Jake: I'm not telling anyone about the outcome of Friday's fight and I'm not saying who the intruder was. (Mom didn't see any injuries.) Also, it's not a secret since it's been reported on this blog before, but I like to spray in the house. I even peed on one of Dad's guitar cases and boy was he mad! That's one of the reasons I have to spend a lot of time outside. Except that's not much of a punishment since I like to be outside. (And yes, I had my "special" operation.) Bathsheba: A long time ago, I ran away from home for weeks at a time, not once, but twice. I'll never tell where I went.

12. What is your favorite holiday? J&B: We like laid back holidays like Memorial Day or Labor Day when the weather is warm and Mom and Dad are usually both home all day to wait on us.

13. Water or milk? Jake: I guess I will say milk, but I only get a little taste of it every now and then. I'm not much of a water drinker, either. Bathsheba: I guess you could say that I'm a big drinker. I LOVE milk, and Mom usually gives me a taste when she pours out her milk to have with dinner. (Yes, she's a grown woman and drinks MILK with dinner.) I have to say, though, that I also LOVE water, and I drink a lot of it all day long.

14. Why do you blog? J&B: For so many reasons! At first we just read blogs like Kismet and Skeezix, then we decided to join the fun too. We love all the friends we've made, and it's helped our secretary (Mom) learn more about our species and be more understanding.

15. Are you into extremes? Jake: Extreme cuteness and lovability. Bathsheba: I'm an extreme drinker.

16. Favorite TV shows? We don't like TV and we're getting Mom away from TV when she acts as our secretary for blogging.

17. Are you a pesty lap cat? J&B: NO. We occasionally grace our Mom or Dad with our lap presence, but only when it's well deserved (or we're cold).

18. Inside or outside cat? Jake: Indoor/outdoor. I generally have my servants at my beck and call when I scratch on the sliding glass door, but sometimes they think I should stay out. Bathsheba: I used to be more indoor/outdoor, but I'm much more indoor now that I'm nearly 16.

19. What makes you happy? J&B: Love from Mom and Dad, a comfy bed, sunshine, mealtimes, special treats, cheese. Jake: Hanging out with Dad on the deck. Bathsheba: Hanging out with Mom, getting water out of the bathroom sink faucet.

20. Your most embarrassing moment? Jake: Sometimes I'm embarrassed when Mom gets all kissy/kissy with me outdoors, and I think someone outside the family might see me. I have a mancat imagine to uphold, you know. Bathsheba: I recently tried to jump up to the bathroom sink without using the toilet as a stepping stone. I didn't make the jump, and it was very embarrassing. At least Jake didn't see my failed attempt, and Mom was very loving and understanding about it.

Whew, that was long! We don't think that our dear friends Rosie and Cheeto have completed this meme, so we tag them.

~J&B

Flower Friday Again

There's still time for Flower Friday so our secretary is taking over our blog. Again. Sigh.

This is a calla lily on top of beebalm. Calla lilies have pretty speckled leaves. They aren't supposed to be hardy here in Northern Virginia, but Dad planted them very deep and they've now been in the ground at least five years and have come back and bloomed every year.


Here are some pale specimens of purple coneflower (Echinacea purpurea).

More calla liles

And here's what happens to some of our lovely calla lilies--Japanese beetle damage. Mom and Dad don't use any chemicals in our garden, so they just pick off the pesky voracious beetles as best they can. I think we should close the fast food restaurant (bird feeders) and put the birds to work eating the beetles!

Daylilies

With all due respect to the Big Piney Woods Cats who started Flower Friday, I think I'm getting a little tired of being upstaged by flowers. This is supposed to be a CAT BLOG, so I'm going to insist on at least one photo of ME. Here I am making the world safer from a sucker upper machine. It can't do its sucking without being plugged into the wall outlet. I have conquered the evil machine!

~Jake

Wordless Wacky Wednesday

Wildlife Weekend

Welcome to my patch of wildness in the middle of suburbia.


Mom and Dad tried to create a wildlife sanctuary in the garden, and I think they succeeded. It is certainly an informal garden, but has a kind of neat wildness about it.



In our Flower Friday post, Jeter asked about bees since there is a lot of concern about their state of health nationwide. While bees are certainly having problems in Virginia too, we have our own colony of bees. Some years ago, Dad built a large birdhouse intended for "our" red-bellied woodpeckers, and he erected it high in one of our white oak trees. No woodpeckers nested in it, but we did have great crested flycatchers live in it. After that, bees moved in.

Here is a closer photo of the house, but without a good telephoto lens, you can't tell that bees inhabit it.

We have a family of bluejays in our yard. They are very colorful and beautiful, but they like to squack a lot. The youngsters perch on branches of the elm tree and flap their wings "helplessly" as their mom or dad go to the suet feeder and bring back food for them.

The young blue jays appear just as large as their parents--and fatter. It's no wonder since mom and dad must not have much time to feed themselves as they tend to their offspring. That must be why the parents like coming to the suet feeder in summer: it's like fast food for them in their busy lives.

Recently our friend Skeezix showed us some birds' nests from his yard, and now we have one to show. We think that this was the blue jays' nest in the photinia bush next to the sunny side of the house.

Our state bird the cardinal nested in our yard this year too.

Now let's take a look out front. What do we see in the sunny front bed but a female eastern box turtle! We know she's a female because her eyes are yellowish-brown. The male has red eyes.

Here's a photo of part of our wild (but controlled) front yard where the common daylilies (hemerocallis) are now in bloom. Dad calls them "freeway lilies" because they often grow along highways.

I love my wild yard, but I think that I am the wildest beast in it. Happy Man Cat Monday.

~Jake

P.S. We hope to get to visit our friends this week. Mom wouldn't let us on the computer here for several days straight and now it's getting late. Hiss!

Flower Friday

The Big Piney Woods Cats started something called Flower Friday so we thought that we would indulge Mom and show some of her garden flowers. These are some photos she took a couple of days ago early in the morning before she went to work. It had rained the night before.

This is beebalm (Monarda didyma) with Shasta daisy. Beebalm is native to the area and is very attractive to hummingbirds. It is in the mint family and that sometimes means trouble, but Mom doesn't find it nearly as aggressive as the purple-pink wild bergamot (M. fistulosa) that she also has.


Mom likes vines a lot and the clematis by the deck is still blooming fairly well. It started blooming in April.





The daylily (Hemerocallis) Stella d'Oro shone brightly in the early morning light.

Happy Flower Friday!

~J&B

Treats on Thursday and Every Other Day

I think that I finally have Mom pretty well trained. Each night, just before bedtime, she gives me treats. It's great! Here I am waiting patiently for her to come to bed and feed me some of my treats. It's quite the ritual, and I am trying to expand it to any other time of the day or night when she just happens to go upstairs.

Now I must confess that originally the treats were Temptations, but when she ran out (oh, the horror!), she filled up a container with regular dry cat food. I don't mind that they're not actually Temptations since I really love any kind of cat food crunchies. It's the individual attention from Mom that makes the experience special.

~Bathsheba

Wash Day Wednesday

Does this white blanket look dirty to you? Mom seems to think that it is brown toward the back, and that it's MY fault! She put this blanket on my favorite loveseat, and I like to sleep curled up toward the back.


I don't know how she thinks I could get it dirty when I'm very fastidious about cleaning myself.

See how thorough I am.

My photographer decided not to show me washing my private parts since this is a family blog.

Just because I like to go outside and lay in the dirt or roll on the sidewalk does not mean that I am dirty. How could I be when I wash so often?

Ahh, washing--I do such a good job that I need a nap afterwards.

~Jake

Tortie Toesday with Bathsheba

Since Skeezix mentioned me in his Toesday post today, I just HAD to do one of my own. These are my two front paws--extra toes and all.

~Bathsheba

Goodbye, Sweet 16 Suzanne

Along with her family and everyone else in the Cat Blogosphere, we mourn the loss of our friend Suzanne. She was the founder of the Sweet 16s club and well loved by her family. We will miss her.

~J&B

(Graphic courtesy of Skeezix the Cat)

ManCat Monday

Indoors -




Or out -

I'm always a ManCat.

~Jake




We send our best wishes to some of our friends who are not feeling well. Skeezix's big brother Mao has been ill, but we think he's on the mend now.

Suzanne, the founder of the Sweet 16s is doing poorly. Our hearts go out to her and her family.

~J&B

COLLISION

This evening Mom and I had a head-leg collision in the kitchen. There I was, racing through the kitchen, when Mom abruptly decides to turn toward the refrigerator, and her leg gets right in the way of my oncoming head! Smash! It was awful. I didn't cry or anything (I AM a big mancat, of course), but, boy, did I see stars! Mom complained that her leg hurt, the impact was so hard. She hoped I didn't have a concussion or something. I just went into the living room behind the big chair and rested for a while.

When I came out and lay in the middle of the room, she came over to apologize and make a fuss over me. I'm okay, but I lay the guilt trip on her, and she had to give me some of the yummy salmon filet that she and Dad had for dinner. I think my head feels okay now, but don't tell her. I may be able to get a few extra treats out of this episode.

~Jake




I've learned that under the table is one safe place to be when Mom is preparing dinner.

~Bathsheba


P.S. from Mom: Jake, I'm very sorry that my leg obstructed your speedway tonight. I'll try to look both ways before crossing the kitchen the next time.

Also, Bathsheba painted a rather harsh picture of me in the previous post. I wouldn't give up on her in just a few months. I would just give up on an active search. If she were gone that long, I might figure that she found a new family to love. I would certainly think the best if no evidence to the contrary presented itself.

Lost Cat

Yesterday's edition of The Washington Post contained an article about a woman searching for her lost cat. She last saw him in December 2003. My Mom says that she would have given up on finding me after a few months. A few months! I disappeared for a couple of weeks on two different occasions in my earlier life. I guess I'm lucky that I didn't stay away any longer or she might have replaced me or something. One of Mom's brother's cats disappeared April 18 and has not returned. They've pretty much given up on finding poor Juni-Purr.

How do you all feel about this? Is the lady in the article a crazy cat lady?

~Bathsheba

Dona Nobis Pacem, June 6, 2007

What I Think of the News

On the weekends, Mom likes to take time to read the newspaper. When the weather is nice, she likes to read it outside on the deck. This morning, I started to read it too, but there was so much bad news and violence that I decided to cover it up.


Do you think that will make the bad news go away?




Uh-oh. Where did Mom go? And what's that in her hand? Oh, no! The camera!

Oh, my, it has that enticing dangly strap that must be attacked.

My paw is moving so fast that it's just a blur.

And see how fierce I am!

Hmm. Maybe reading about all that violence brings out the attack cat in me.

~Jake

P.S. I thank all you cats who came to my defense in the previous post. I think I am aging gracefully.

~Bathsheba