It's been four months since I last blogged because I've been so busy and all sorts of things have changed. In April 2008 my Daddy moved house, and my new place is a townhouse with two floors and a staircase that I love running up and down, like this:
And there's a banister I like looking through, like this:
And I 've been the only cat in this whole house, and I miss my brother Gerald so much, since I've never had a new house all to myself, so until now I 've really been wanting some cat company.
Then last night at about 9:30 pm, Daddy came home with his friend Andrew (he’s babysat me a couple times) and Andrew was carrying a cage with a girl-cat in it! And I figured she must be Andrew’s cat, and I could hear her growling inside her cage as soon as she saw me, and her growl said, “My name is Pussy Galore, and I’ve never met a big black cat before, so get away from me!” And she looks like this:
So I poofed up my tail to three times its size because I was so excited, but Daddy put me upstairs in the bedroom and I wasn’t allowed to see Pussy Galore for a long time so that she could wander around my house first (and notice I said "MY" house!). Daddy told me later that she came out of her cage very, very slowly and sniffed the floor around her cage, then she sniffed a potted plant, and then she sniffed the drapes by my bay window, and then she crouched down by the window and hid behind the curtains. Daddy put out food and water and a litter box for her and let her sit right where she was behind the curtains which is where she felt safe. And here's a picture of her once she got out from under the curtains:
And I was waiting for Daddy in the bedroom, and was very curious about this strange girl-cat in my house, but I didn’t make any fuss about letting me out. Daddy got up after a couple hours and still wouldn’t let me out of the bedroom; but he told me that Pussy Galore had left the curtains and had started to sniff out the rest of the room and gradually the entire ground floor, and she was very methodical, as if her nose was a vacuum cleaner going over every inch of the carpet, and if she ever caught Daddy’s eye, she’d run away. Daddy went back to bed for another couple hours, then finally I couldn’t stand it any more so I tried waking him up by pawing his shoulder, and when that didn't work I bit his ear, and when he swatted at me I sat my butt on his face, and that worked! So Daddy opened the door, and this time Pussy Galore was in the hallway right outside our bedroom, just sitting and waiting for us to come out! But Daddy picked me up and put me in the bathroom and shut me in there, and all the time Pussy Galore was growling because she had seen me! But Daddy turned on the tub so I could have a drink of water, which I did, but what I really wanted was to suss out that new girl-cat! But sure enough, Daddy came back to the bathroom and scooped me up and put me in the bedroom with him and shut the door, but I could smell Pussy Galore’s stank on Daddy’s legs, so she had already started rubbing him and laying claim on him.
Finally in the morning, Uncle Kevin got up and let me out of the bedroom, and I ran straight to the bathroom where I smelled Pussy Galore’s pee on the bath mat, and I found Pussy Galore sitting in the cupboard on top of some clean sheets, and Kevin got the surprise of his life when Pussy Galore started hissing at me from inside the cupboard—so of course I started hissing back. Daddy zoomed in and dragged me back into the bedroom, and Pussy Galore apparently ran downstairs and hid underneath the living room sofa.
It was finally about 10:00 a.m. this morning when Daddy fetched Pussy Galore from under the sofa and took her upstairs, and I heard him say, “It’s time to put these cats together for better or worse, and I don’t want Pussy Galore to feel like she’s in a corner, so she needs the chance to stand her ground when Oscar comes out.” So Daddy opened the door, and I poked my head out very slowly, and Pussy Galore took one look at me and growled and darted down the stairs, and of course I zoomed afterwards, and by the time I got down there, Pussy Galore was back underneath the sofa growling, so I stuck my head underneath to look at her and poofed out my tail, like this:
Now, if you’re not a cat psychologist, I’ll tell you that we cats prefer not to fight with each other if we can help it, and if we’re afraid and sussing up a stranger, most of what we do is posturing, so there was some growling and hissing, but Pussy Galore and I kept our distance from each other, so there was no biting or scratching or fur flying, and after about five minutes of sussing her out, I decided to let her be and proceeded to sniff every inch of the house where she’d been, starting with her food dish—and naturally, I decided to eat her food—plus the spot where she had hid behind the curtains. I was moving as slowly and trance-like as she had done, and she had a very peculiar smell, and after about half an hour I had gone into the other rooms of my house, but then Daddy decided to take Pussy Galore back to her home and let me feel like I had the place back to myself, so he let me suss out Pussy Galore one last time while she was in her cage, where she would feel safe, and where I could see that she was leaving, and it ended up something of a hissing match, but at least we said farewell.
When Daddy and Uncle Kevin got up this morning they opened up all these present that their friend Jim had sent from California and I got to help:
And that was my seventh Christmas in Melbourne, Australia!
Daddy says today is Nikolaustag or St. Nicholas' Day which is the best day to start decorating the house for Christmas since St. Nicholas is Santa Claus who brings presents to all good kitties on Christmas Eve. Nikolaustag is a German holiday but I'm not a German kitty and Daddy's not German either and we live in Australia not Germany, but what the hey. So Uncle Kevin started unpacking the Christmas tree and I decided to watch:
And he and Daddy put up two trees, one of them tall and thin and I love to sit underneath it:
and the other tree is small and on a little pedestal and decorated with only blue and silver decorations:
Now it's only a couple more weeks until Christmas!
My Daddy left town today for a three-month visit to Canada and was teary-eyed when he left the house today but he bought me a very special present which is a water fountain that runs all the time in the kitchen. Daddy knows that I love to drink running water which is why I hang around the bathtub all the time but now I can have running water whenever I want and I love it! Uncle Kevin will look after me while Daddy is gone but I'm going to miss my Daddy and I got all anxious when he was packing his luggage 'cause I could tell he was going to be gone for such a long time. And I miss PG II 'casue it's been almost three weeks since she went back to her own house and I remember how fun it was to have some cat company and I still find tufts of her fur all over my carpet and her stank is still on my kitty tree.
My friend Pussy Galore II had to go home today, and I don't know when I'll see her again, but I have great memories of the five weeks that she spent with me, and here are some photos of our last moments together:
It's been eight months since my brother Gerald died, and that's a long time to be without a cat friend, and PG II says she's never had a cat friend, but only a puppy friend, so I don't want her to leave!
But then Pussy Galore started sitting in my favorite places, and she started to sleep in the bedroom at night, and she jumped up into my kitty tree and got her stank all over it, and before long she would let me sit in the same room with her, as long as I didn't talk to her. Here's a picture of us ignoring each other yesterday:
And she eventually told me that her full name was Pussy Galore the Second, or "PG II," and she wasn't Andrew's cat after all, but belonged to Daddy's friends Louise and Brian, who had to be out of the country for a while, and that's why we were looking after her, and suddenly it all made sense! Her sister is Asta, that terrier puppy that I see sometimes, and that's why I hissed at Pussy Galore when I first met her—she smelled like dog! But once PG II figured out that I was a friend of her sister Asta, we got along OK. And PG II explained that she was less than two years old, and she'd never met a boy cat before, or one that was as old as me (I'm thirteen!), and she was named after her mommy's first cat (Pussy Galore the First) who was named after a character in some James Bond film. So PG II and I have started to get along better, but we're not as chummy as Gerald and I used to. But PG II likes to pretend to ignore me while I eat, like this:
And if you think cats are good at ignoring people, you have no idea how good we cats are at ignoring each other!
And there's a banister I like looking through, like this:
And I 've been the only cat in this whole house, and I miss my brother Gerald so much, since I've never had a new house all to myself, so until now I 've really been wanting some cat company.
So I poofed up my tail to three times its size because I was so excited, but Daddy put me upstairs in the bedroom and I wasn’t allowed to see Pussy Galore for a long time so that she could wander around my house first (and notice I said "MY" house!). Daddy told me later that she came out of her cage very, very slowly and sniffed the floor around her cage, then she sniffed a potted plant, and then she sniffed the drapes by my bay window, and then she crouched down by the window and hid behind the curtains. Daddy put out food and water and a litter box for her and let her sit right where she was behind the curtains which is where she felt safe. And here's a picture of her once she got out from under the curtains:
Now, if you’re not a cat psychologist, I’ll tell you that we cats prefer not to fight with each other if we can help it, and if we’re afraid and sussing up a stranger, most of what we do is posturing, so there was some growling and hissing, but Pussy Galore and I kept our distance from each other, so there was no biting or scratching or fur flying, and after about five minutes of sussing her out, I decided to let her be and proceeded to sniff every inch of the house where she’d been, starting with her food dish—and naturally, I decided to eat her food—plus the spot where she had hid behind the curtains. I was moving as slowly and trance-like as she had done, and she had a very peculiar smell, and after about half an hour I had gone into the other rooms of my house, but then Daddy decided to take Pussy Galore back to her home and let me feel like I had the place back to myself, so he let me suss out Pussy Galore one last time while she was in her cage, where she would feel safe, and where I could see that she was leaving, and it ended up something of a hissing match, but at least we said farewell.
Last night there were possums outside my window! At first I thought it might be angels, since we kitties can often see angels at night (but I can't tell you which ones, 'cause that's one of my kitty secrets), but it turns out it wasn't angels this time, but possums! And this isn't the first time they've spooked me at night. I think there's a baby and a mommy, and they like to run around the bushes outside my window at about 3:00 a.m. and I put myself in the window and hit the glass with my tail because they get me so excited!
I remember how the squirrels in Michigan always got me excited, but they were nothing compared to Aussie possums!
Daddy came back home last night after being in Hawaii for a couple weeks visiting Popo and Uncle Joel and while Daddy was there he took some of Gerald's ashes and spread them around some special places on Oahu which is one of the most beautiful places in the world that Gerald never got a chance to visit. Come to think of it, I've never been there either, but Daddy showed me the pictures.
It was very windy up there and Gerald's ashes went whoosh into the wind. The Daddy drove up the east coast of the island to the north shore and stopped at a beach near Haleiwa and put some of Gerald's ashes in the water on the rocks near the shore, and it looked like this:
And hearing about it made me very nostalgic for Gerald and it's only been about two months since he passed away...
so I'm going to spend the rest of my day sitting in Daddy's lap or Uncle Kevin's lap and thinking about my brother who I miss so much.
