Christmas with the Excellent Cats

[TheShellBeach]

......... Silent Night.........

Well, maybe not so silent when there's a cat about who wants to be fed.

Join us in the run up to Christmas 2023!

Basil does 'sploofed out fluffy bloomers' too. You're right - it's very endearing 😁

Thanks @CeciledeVolangesdeNouveau This is a better picture of it.

All is quiet here today, I'm afraid, very afraid. I think they're saving their energy for madness, mischief, and mayhem later!

Heavens Rum that’s beautiful!! Did it take ages to do?

Rum, That has an amazing trompe l'oeil look about it. Most impressed by your 3d cat tattoo.

@RumNotRun thanks! It’s so realistic I kept getting confused when it was in the picture with an actual cat. Must have been agony though - aren’t tattoos over bones really painful? I don’t have any myself but always get praise for my “bravery” when I get cannulated in the hand or foot. Is it a tribute to a special cat or just an expression of your inner cat?

Cecile, I can't bear getting a cannula in my hand. I've never had one in my foot, though.

Thank you everyone. I think it was about four hours by a very talented gentleman in Bournemouth. It isn't any special cat, just a general cat tribute to the whole tribe. It was surprisingly painless, especially compared to a tattoo I have on my foot. I am quite covered with them and have travelled all over to get them done by great artists.

I’m very lucky as someone who needs frequent hospital treatment, but is OK with needles. The foot did hurt, though, and none of the nurses had ever seen it in the foot before! I’ve had it in my inner wrist as well, which was unpleasant, and on that big vein on the upper outside of your arm when I was very much thinner. They hurt more going in, but they’re much less restrictive and don’t trigger so much beeping from machines if they’re in unusual places.

Anyway, back to cats! I’m in charge and Velvet has immediately gone to bite the tree, chew the Christmas lights and climb on the kitchen surfaces before showing off her catflap skills several times, attacking a chair and finally collapsing onto my bed in exhaustion. At least when I’ve served her lunch we can have a nap undisturbed!

Apologies if this is a repeated photo. Velvet decided to make her own fun with this practice lacrosse ball (made of foam) last night. It was very cute but she may have met her match!

Velvet looks unbearably cute there.

Velvet needs a modesty leaf 🍃

Perhaps Basil can send her one.

Velvet doesn’t think she does! She’s quite unpreoccupied with the social conventions of modesty and embarrassment. Most cats I’ve known will make a rare mistake and fall off something then adamantly insist it never happened, how could it possibly have happened when they are so elegant and anyway they aren’t here at all and currently visiting France so bye-bye. I’ve see Velvet fall off the same item of furniture three times in a row and just get back up and keep at it in an equally deranged fashion.

However, if Basil did send her a modesty leaf it could be the start of a beautiful friendship!

@CeciledeVolangesdeNouveau I love hearing about Velvet, your descriptions bring to mind all the cat memories I've got, especially the daftest ones. Can Velvet be my virtual NMC?

Re my own NMC efforts, there were footprints in the snow out the back the other morning, but by the time I thought to take a photo the clatter of 6 jackdaws (yes, that's one of the collective nouns for them) had obscured them in their joyous squabbling over half a cold pizza. I have now moved (to next door!) so when I am settled will put some effort in.

Of course @SequentialAnalyst! She says you sound nice and she wishes your house were in her territory so she could have a bigger audience for her idiocy (not her actual words, and she makes me laugh so much falling off or running into things, I love her). She would particularly appreciate a lot of extra meals and some energetic playtime to give mummy a little break sometimes.

Toad, Lexter, and Frankie have all decided they must be on the heated blanket this morning. The blanket is not turned on, nor is it the only fleece blanket available, but in the classic cat thinking "If I fits I sits"

Adorable photo of your three lovely black cats (although from the angle one of them looks slightly squashed).

More news from the Velvet channel later! But suffice it to say her willing slave had to clean up her enthusiastically scattered litter twice more after I last posted yesterday, finally giving up when she demonstrated once again that she firmly disapproves of a room without a fine covering of cat litter and is going to do her level best to keep that covering in place. She also escaped from her rooms and went out through the catflap while I was changing her water at 11pm so I stayed up, anxious about her (we’ve had cats injured by badgers and, oddly squirrels before). Made up for it when she returned very happy to see me and did sideways rolls all over the sofa - not sure why - before settling. I am getting a lot more empathy with parents (and realising my OCD symptoms have got worse since we last had horses) by caring for her. But there’s nothing like her wandering or running up to me for a fuss, trilling (I’m pretty sure our conversations are still something like “guess what? I saw a fox! Explored three gardens and found evidence of two feline neighbours, it’s very cold” then me “the windmill IS in the washing machine, I enjoy a nice evening with paper, and you need to put jelly on the car”)

Going back to that lovely night-hued trio, Velvet is an odd exception to if it fits I sits. She sleeps in our old cat’s bed (he was more than twice her size and fitted neatly) and will sleep with her paws stretched out outside of the basket most of the time. She’s also not a huge fan of boxes unless she’s playing and wants to hide. Maybe she will benefit from a seminar from the likes of Toad!

It's actually just two black cats - Toad to the left on the photo and Frankie at the front looking like he wants me to do something about the fact he has no space. Lexter was a striped tabby cat with white patches when he was younger, but then strangely lost all his fur and is now more tabby but a bit patchy in places still. No one knows why it happened but he's happy and healthy so it's all good.

I'm sure Toad will happily teach your mini demon how to cat. He loves other cats and often tries to play kiss chase with the rest of the tribe even though they don't want to. He's about 10 but acts like he's still a kitten 😁

Oh bless Lexter - sorry if I offended him! I know from my DP that men can be offended if someone mentions their hair loss :( also Velvet would probably love to play kiss chase with Toad honestly. She’s not a demon but she’s unequivocally a little flirt and a mischief-maker :)

@RumNotRun Toad would probably get on great with Phoebe! I always say she's nine years going on nine months.

Hiding from Chris, our Evri delivery man.

And taking a first look at the rug we've bought to give to DS2 for Christmas.

Further exploration of the rug

Humphrey trying his best not to be festive!

Went to see my brother and SIL. They are dog people through and through. These are pinky and bluey who visit regularly because they get lots of dreamies 🤣🤣 think they are cat people now