There’s a woman who rescues cats near Birmingham who could use help in the form of donations (or, if you’re in that area and looking to adopt a cat!)
Go read more here.
Edited to add: The recipe for the torte I mentioned in Monday’s entry is here. It’s the Black Forest Torte, and it’s goooood.
I love Cindy Brady with her unevenly cut bangs – I used to have a haircut like that myself!
That was Bobby Brady doing the Macarena in yesterday’s entry (but I get your point – and haven’t we all had haircuts like that in our sad pasts?).
Bobby and Cindy look a lot alike in the face, and this is how I tell them apart when I’m looking at pictures. Bobby Brady:
has a line coming off his right eye. And Cindy Brady:
has a line coming off her left eye!
(Together, they make one perfect makeup job.)
How many Christmas cards did your loyal readers send and did you do the break down of where they all came from?
As of yesterday, I’d received 134 cards. I’ve never done a breakdown of where the cards I receive come from, but I do usually do a breakdown of where the cards I’ve sent have gone. This year, however, I was a slacker and it was all I could do to get pictures taken of all the cards.
I’ll do better next year, I promise!
Robyn – give me the scoop on those bird/squirrel feeders that look like they are just upside down 2 liter pop bottles. Did you make them yourself and what kind of lid is on them? They look like they might be something I need for my backyard. I need details please.
When I was in Maine last summer, I visited the LL Bean Home store (LOVE THE HELL OUT OF THAT STORE), and they had these things that screw into the top of 2-liter bottles, and a handle that you put in the other end of the bottle to hang it from. They don’t seem to sell them on the LL Bean website, but this is the one I bought (well, I bought two of those).
I hesitated to buy them, because my mother pointed out that squirrels can chew right through the bottle to get to the seeds. I decided to buy them, and if the squirrels decided to be jackasses, I’d sell ’em on eBay. So far, so good. The birds like them, and what’s better is that they don’t scatter seed all over the place like they do with regular feeders. I’ve had them up for about 5 months, and so far the squirrels only chewed a small hole through the top of one of the bottles – which I immediately replaced. They’re kind of a pain to fill, but once they’re filled they don’t empty quickly. They’re also very easy to clean, if the seed gets wet and clumps together in the bottom part. I just use a butter knife to push the seed through. I like them a lot, and recommend them!
Every once in awhile I glance at your list of Previously topics and today I noticed that the 2010 comment was Mike & Gus go to their new home and I thought – a YEAR already? It seems like it was just a couple of months ago that they were fosters!
I know! Good ol’ Gus, good ol’ Mike, they were some awesome fosters. Last Christmas was pretty awesome, with the Wonkas and the Cookies running around. They were a couple of really good litters.
What’s up with her eyes looking like they’re different sizes?
Tiny Alice sat before her makeup mirror, her left eye rimmed in orange eyeliner and her right in black. She considered both eyes carefully.
“The orange makes me look like a sweet little angel,” she mused. “But the black looks badass. What look shall I go for?”
As she tried to decide, the door to her boudoir flew open.
“OH MAH GAWD!” her friend Chester the possum bellowed. “THEY REFILLED THE FOOD BOWL AT THE LUNATICS’ HOUSE! AND IT’S A NEW KIND!”
Alice perked up. Mr. and Mrs. Lunatic probably spent more money on food for wild animals and stray cats then the assholes who’d dumped her by the side of the road some weeks earlier, leaving her scared and subsisting on whatever food she could scavenge or hunt. She’d never been a very good hunter. Mr. and Mrs. Lunatic were known far and wide in the Smallville animal kingdom for making sure the bowl was always filled with the good shit.
“Let’s go!” she said, grabbing her purse.
“Dude,” said Chester Possum. “You going to clean that makeup off your face? Your eye with the black liner looks kind of big and bulgy and crazy.”
“Nah,” said Alice. “Who the hell’s going to notice?”
Have you ever used the Ace of Cakes staff for kitty names? Your new kitty put me in mind of that show…you’d have Duff, Geof, Mary Alice…
I hadn’t thought of that naming scheme, but I’ll add it to my list of potential future names!
Where are the cords on your t.v.??? I must live in hell because we have cords that have to be there supposedly!
That is not my TV – that’s the TV at the plastic surgery center! We have plenty of wires around our TV, unfortunately, and I haaaaaate them. Most of them are tucked behind the stand the TV sits on, but we have surround sound, and there are wires coming down the wall from all the speakers on the wall, and I looooooooathe them. (But I like the surround sound. Go figure.)
Mama reminds me of those commercials with Wilfred Brimley. I keep expecting her to talk about her “diabeetus.”
Oh HELL YES she does! I cackled when I read this, because I instantly saw the resemblance! Then I had to email the comment to Fred, who also immediately saw it. Then for the rest of the morning, I giggled whenever I thought about Mama and her “diabeetus.” HEE.
Walking through the Target parking lot last night, I suddenly thought (in YOUR voice) “Buster Brown gets around!” and thought you needed to know lolol
I love it when I infiltrate y’all’s day to day life!
Someone please tell me where I can find the wicker cat basket/condo. My cat would love that!
Jean (who gave it to us ’cause her cat had NO interest in it) said that it came from Costco five or six years ago. It’s called a “Willow Two-Tier Cat Bed” and made by a company called Seville Classics, but I’m unable to find one online anywhere at all!
In the picture of Cindy multi-tasking, is that Marcia looking all forlorn and abandoned next to her?
Indeed it is. Poor, poor Marcia, all “I might as well just go to sleep ’cause NOBUDDY LUBS ME!”
Remember a few years back on April 1 you posted that ultrasound with twins? Now THAT shit was hysterical!
I certainly do! (It’s here.) That was the first and last time I did an April Fool’s entry. Some people knew right away, but some people were SOME IRATE when they found out the truth, and I felt bad for foolin’ ’em.
When I was a little kid I had an old Aunt with a missing thumb. The reason? It had been bitten OFF by a pig. Better be careful…them pigs are dangerous.
Now when I feed them their evening cookies (which I rarely do, because it’s Fred’s job), I use tongs and I don’t care if it makes me look like a big scared baby. Those pigs are fucking VICIOUS about their food!
Parallel universe: In the February issue of Cat Fancy, there is a brief article with Christopher Knight about how he loves cats!
I have to locate my copy of Cat Fancy and check it out!
(LOVE Christopher Knight!)
LOVE IT!
Do your babies enjoy the pumpkin? I have an older kitty who is having trouble with hard foods, and I’m wondering if we couldn’t give her soft food mixed with pumpkin to entice her to eat more.
Yeah, most of our cats enjoy the pumpkin. I’ve never had a kitten turn up his or her nose at pumpkin (which I mix with canned kitten food), and Jake and Elwood love it, and will eat it straight. Sugarbutt is the only cat who doesn’t care for it, but he’s an odd duck anyway.
I just saw this. I love it.
Me too! (Love it, I mean!)
Robyn…you do realize that with the microfiber washcloths in the cat beds, your cats now have *SHEETS* 😉
You’re so right – and that is just WRONG, but it makes life so much easier!
Did Fred ever decide to build a wagon and lockbox to sell veggies on the side of the road like those photos I sent?
He didn’t – we get a lot of traffic down our road, but the few times we attempted to sell veggies in front of the house, not a single person stopped, so we didn’t pursue it.
Should you count Miz Poo as orange or black or both? Elphaba is black and orange so she’s the best of both worlds for me.
Torties and calicos are in their own weird category! 🙂
So – what is Fred doing [when making the cat platforms]? Using any particular type of wood? Looks like you are painting it first, right?
Fred is using the fairly inexpensive pine from Lowe’s. He puts the steps and platforms together, then paints them before he puts them up.
Shouldn’t Coltrane be added to the permanent resident section soon?
It’s on my list of stuff I need to do. Which is another way of saying that SOMEday I’ll get around to it, but it won’t be today!
I’m not sure if you’ll get this before you write the QnAPalooza for Friday, but I was wondering if you’ve any experience with any self-warming thermal cat cushions and if you have any kind of opinion on them? Or any kind of recommendation?
Last year I had a self-warming thermal cat bed, and I couldn’t get any of the cats interested in it. This year, I have bed warmers – two in the living room, one in the computer room, one in the foster room – and they’re almost always occupied.
Anyone have opinions/ suggestions on the self-warming cushions? Feel free to share in the comments!
I have a question…do you have any say in who adopts your fosters? For example, if someone comes to Challenger’s House and wants to adopt one of the Brady Bunch, do you get a chance to talk to them before a decision is made? Just wondering. You give your fosters so much love and care that I think it would be hard to just let them go to someone if you didn’t at least get to meet them first.
I rarely meet the people who adopt my fosters – and that’s a good thing, really, because the shelter manager and adoption counselors have been doing this for ages, and they’re better judges of character when it comes to this sort of thing. I’m afraid I’d always be of the “Well, they seem like nice people!” mindset, and miss the warning signals.
I mean, I imagine that if I absolutely didn’t want someone to adopt my fosters, they’d certainly take my opinion into consideration. But I always feel confident that my babies will end up in good homes with the awesome adoption counselors of Challenger’s House on the job!
I’m curious, did the plastic covering on the heating pad cord come with it, or is that something you did yourself? Chewing on cords is my #1 behavior problem with my foster kittens and I’d love some plastic tubing like that, but I don’t know where to get it.
I bought these cord protectors a couple of years ago to put over the cords to appliances in the foster room.
They’re nice and heavy, and there’s a seam along one side – you basically just wrap it around your cords.
My only gripe is that the “citrus scent” is kind of unpleasant. But it does keep the cats from chewing on cords, so it’s a worthwhile trade-off.
Do the chickens just jump down onto the dogs when they are asleep in front of the chicken house door?
They kind of jump over them rather than down onto the dogs. I don’t think the dogs would react poorly to having chickens jump on them (if they even felt it!), but I think the chickens would rather be safe than sorry!
(Also, that’s not the only way out of the chicken coop – there’s a door on the front that they can go in and out of, as well.)
Sleepy Peter, waking up from his long midday nap.
Bobby and Greg.
Peter cheers Marcia on in her Race! Around! The Room!
Cindy thinks Marcia’s tail needs a little salt.
“NO MORE MACARENA, you hear me?!”
Miz Poo in the foster room. She really likes hanging out in there during the day – it’s the warmest room in the house, with the sun coming through the window. She also likes to watch the babies play, but doesn’t so much like it when they get in her space.
Previously
2010: Exciting, no?
2009: So yeah, almost two weeks after Christmas, I’m finally in the Christmas spirit.
2008: No entry.
2007: No entry.
2006: No entry.
2005: No entry.
2004: What I hate most about flying is how incredibly fucking boring it is.
2003: Damn 8 Mile.
2002: I think we can agree that I’m all about the politeness
2001
2000: Fred: Well, what’s 8 times 1? Spud: 10?