Tag: cats

In Today’s News…

I slept an (almost) uninterrupted twelve hours on Saturday night. Only my cats and my bladder kept me from reaching a state of perfection, but perfect people are so boring.

Studly Doright and I arrived home from our Thanksgiving/birthday celebration late yesterday evening. We’d flown from Amarillo to Orlando, and should have been safely back at Doright Manor around 5 p.m., but staggering holiday traffic and the resulting accidents on I-75 convinced us to travel backroads.

We stopped at a German bakery/delicatessen in Yalaha, Florida, for lunch and then meandered along two lane roads for much of the afternoon. After a couple of hours of aimless driving we declared ourselves lost, so we found a Walmart and purchased a gps.

The cats, Scout and Patches, welcomed us home around eight p.m. with meows and kisses. After quick showers we all snuggled into our bed and went immediately to sleep. There really is no place like home.

Mom, There’s Plenty of Room for Me

Patches let me know she wanted to join me on my trip to Houston in a not so subtle way this morning. Even after I reminded her that she detests car trips and would hate a two hour flight even more, she persisted in laying claim to my overnight bag.

Studly Doright promised to take good care of her and sister, Scout. Patches, though, thinks Studly is shady and never trusts his advances. She’s a smart kitty.

Peace, people!

The Cat in Question

The cat in question,

Snuggling, purring on my lap,

She finds her warm place

Never questions life,

Not a care in her safe world

Relaxed, yet still poised

The cat in question

A lady of advanced age

My boon companion

Two Wrongs; One Write

I generally have a blog post in the queue and ready to publish at 7:05 a.m. This morning, Wednesday, October 4, 2017, I had nothing. Oh, there were a few words typed into a draft: “milk, cat litter,” but only because I’d accidentally written my shopping list on a blank page in WordPress.

For a moment I wondered what I could do with those words. A poem combining the two concepts of homogenized liquids and cat hygiene, perhaps? Hmmm. Not today, but the topic has possibilities.

As I pondered what to write I heard one of my cats in the throes of dislodging a hairball, so I rolled out of bed to clean up the mess. With a box of baby wipes in one hand and a paper towel in the other I went in search of cat puke. Scout was sitting like a lady in the dining room admiring her artwork which she’d deposited on the carpeting literally two inches from the tiled hallway.

“Dammit, Scout, couldn’t you have turned your head to the right just a fraction and avoided the rug?” I asked, knowing that was a rhetorical question. She never pukes on the tile.

As I bent over to attend to the mushy hair ball mess my nose began to run. I swiped one of the baby wipes under my nose and continued cleaning. Not to be outdone, my nose continued leaking like a faulty faucet. I swiped at it again, only then noticing that my nose wasn’t dripping snot, but blood. So now I was dealing with two icky bodily emissions. Two wrongs, if you will, giving me something to write.

As I finish typing this the time is 6:55 a.m. Looks like I’ll make my self-imposed deadline after all.

Hurricane Cat

We adopted our precious cat, Scout, after Hurricane Charley in 2004. We lived in Melbourne, Florida, at the time, and Scout along with her brother had been found wandering alone once the storm passed through our area. I wrote a story about her adoption, and it never fails to make me cry. That’s like laughing at one’s own joke, I suppose.

https://nananoyz5formewordpress.wordpress.com/2014/08/22/the-rescue-of-scout/

Scout is now around fourteen years old. She’s still playful and likes to play fetch. She sleeps more than she once did, but she’s still a sweet cat who loves to snuggle. Some day we’ll have to say goodbye to our Scout, but we hope we’ll be graced with her presence for many more years.

I found her snoozing on a fresh from the dryer towel one afternoon. That’s my girl.

Peace, people.

Cat Dancing

Dancing in the light

Cats watch from their safe spaces

Their crazy human

Sway to the music

Now observe my nimble feet

And salsa with me

Cool cat on the floor

Tango, flamenco, olé!

No lessons required

Every morning I dance around my bedroom while the cats watch in either fascination or revulsion. Sometimes I swoop in and bring one or another along on my wild pagan romp. They endure the experience with a stoicism the ancient Greeks would have admired. Here’s my actual cat, Patches, watching my dance routine:

Love is…

Love is…

When you’re hungry, but you know if you get up to fix something you’ll wake up your sleeping husband and the cat, so you just sit and slowly starve to death.


They’re both snoring, by the way. 

Snapshot #184

There’s a great bit of drama in the backstory of this photo, but rather go into all that I’ll just call this one, “There’s No Way in Hell I’m Giving Up this Bed to My Sister.”

Inside on a Rainy Day


Is there anything more wonderful than a rainy Sunday morning? Plip plopping drops sluicing down the roof,

Streaking across the window panes in a hurry to puddle up with their brothers and sisters on the driveway.

Dreamers lulled back to sleep by age old rhythms, the roll of thunder, the silence in between, waking to the smell of

Coffee an hour gone by in a blink. Cats snuggled under the covers. One detests the storm; the other relishes

Being present for this unexpected treat of extra time spent pleasantly cuddled on a perfect rainy Sunday. 

The Work of Being a Cat


I cannot imagine how difficult it must be, the work of being a cat. Between naps in the sun, one 

Must stalk every individual dust mote that filters through a ray of light on its way from window to rug.

Then there’s the bathing of fur, pink tongue seeking out any hint of dirt or foreign substance with

A rough lick and a promise to bathe again should something upset the delicate balance between 

Tidy and soiled, anxious and calm. Pleasured purring while kneading must be exhausting work 

And is often closely followed by head butting and a thrice circled snuggle into mom’s cozy lap. 

Scratching at posts, and pouncing on catnip-stuffed felt mice often induce wide yawns and paws

Covering eyes. A quick burst of energy when the word, treat, is uttered, even whispered, results in

A mad dash to the food bowl where petting is tolerated, but just barely. “Mom, petting just wears me out.”