Friday Evening; 1.8 Miles; And Flashbacks to "True Grit"

In case you've been wondering; I'm working the middle of a long stretch of 12+ hour shifts. Twelve hour day shifts (7am to 7pm) at a Long-term Care Facility (LTAC) yesterday and today; and tomorrow is 13 hours at the Dialysis Clinic (4am to 5pm) and then 12 hours at the the LTAC from 7pm Saturday to 7am Sunday morning.

Then church!

So, posting will be abbreviated until Sunday afternoon. My apologies.

So with all this time juggling Julian had to have my car to go to his Junior Prom tonight, so Ariane had to come pick me up after she got out of work downtown at the Dialysis Clinic (15 mile trip). So when I got done, I started walking from the LTAC to the Nursefinders office to drop off my paperwork.

So, I managed to work in a little Walk of 1.8 miles after work -- in 97 degree heat -- mostly uphill. Not a bad workout, really.

Then what to my wondering eyes should appear about halfway there then this:



A snake.

A BIG Goddamned snake!

A big goddamned snake two feet from my feet!

A big goddamned diamondback rattlesnake two feet from my feet!

Eeep!

When those seven rattles on his tail went off I jumped straight up into the air and screamed like a seven-year-old girl!

I took a movie, too:



At the time I thought I was taking a photo -- please excuse my ineptitude as I was busy peeing myself and whimpering to myself. Still, I'm astonished I managed to grow enough of a rudimentary spine to chase down the freakin' snake and take pictures, let alone movies.

The weird part is that this is the SECOND rattlesnake I've seen in two weeks. The first was a two-foot juvenile with no rattles at about 1am last Saturday in our own parking lot. (Julian witnessed that one -- it was too dark for the camera.)

Must be some kind of Texas thing.

I'm going to go lay down and whimper quietly now -- after checking the bed for snakes. . . .

~~JD~~

Tuesday Morning Sunshine Interlude

The Road Not Taken

TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

Robert Frost (1874–1963)



A small Savannah; oak trees all.



A Sure sign spring is coming; the wildflowers are sprouting. I have no idea of the name of this little beauty I found in the savannah of oak trees, but it's a pretty little thing.



Single Oak, blue sky, weather fine.



Another sure sign spring is here; cats in the sun. This is Jeannie, as in Jeannie the Gray cat (a play on the X-Men character of similar name.) She's a Russian Blue, and we frequently put a Russian accented voice in her mouth. Imagine Dolph Lundgren in Rocky IV saying, "I will crush you."




~~JD~~

Welcome to the American Political System

~~JD~~

"Alas, Poor Frisky, I Knew Him, Yorick!"

This is an actual tombstone from the Main Street Station cemetery in Moravia, Iowa. It's about 20 feet due east of where we buried my Dad last month. I just had to take this picture, with apologies to Timothy Lee Logan's survivors.

I just can't figure out if they buried the cat with Tim, or how that worked out.

~~JD~~

WORST - Dog - Haircut - EVER!!!!

We are NEVER going back to that particular PetsMart (281 & Bitters, San Antonio) ever Again! The groomer was behind schedule, he was rude to the customers, and instead of the "bath/#2 grooming/nail clip" requested, we got a "flea dip/#3 grooming/no nail trim" doggie.

Really, I don't think Samantha's ever been so embarrassed by a tail Pom-pom before in my life. (And for those noting that a lot of my pictures of Samantha seem to involve her in . . . "elimination poses", it's because that's the only time she stays still long enough to take a picture.)



Otis is terrified we'll take him to that same groomer, and hides in terror. (He's not a very bright cat, and doesn't realize we can see through windows.)

~~JD~~

Flurfy the Norwegian Forest Cat is Sailing the Fjords . . .

Flurfy died this morning at 9am. That makes three cats in just over five months. We've avoided the contam- inated cat foods, and none of the younger cats are sick, so this just seems to be old age catching up to them at once (they were all 18 to 19 years old.)

As you can imagine, Ariane is pretty broken up about this. I'm not doing so well myself.

If you need to refresh your memory, you can click on the title of this post to see Flurfy's original post here.

~~JD~~

Yes, I'm Still in Mourning . . . .

Get over it.

Best Damned cat I ever had.

Tomorrow, I promise.

~~JD~~

In Memoriam; Timothy Tiberius Quincy Bear-Cat; 1988 - 2007

T-Bear died today. He was 19 years old, and one of the first cats my wife and I got after we were married.

He was gentle, affectionate, loving, and incredibly intelligent -- I swear this cat understood English. When someone was sick or tired or depressed T-Bear was there to comfort them and wash their forehead with his big, pink, rough tongue of his. Many a night he woke me up out of a dead sleep washing my forehead with that rough tongue.

A Prince amongst cats, he was Lord of all he surveyed. I found him one day at Chievres AFB in Belgium when I went in to get some medications for our other cats at the end of the day, and found him forlornly sitting on the desk. The lady behind the desk looked absolutely miserable as she asked, "You want a cat?" Well, no Thanks, I already had four (three really -- one was AWOL never to return, but we hadn't quite figured it out at that point yet.) The lady continued looking miserable as she said, "We have to put him to sleep at 5:00 pm if we can't find him a home." Apparently he had been dropped off by someone going back to the States, and rules allowed them to keep the animals for a week pending placement. Bear was so loving and sweet they immediately named him "Romeo" and made him the clinic mascot. This continued for several weeks until one morning when the clinic commander was in the middle of chewing out someone in his office (at the top of his lungs, most likely) when Bear jumped over the room divider onto the commanders desk, meowing loudly. (I suspect Bear liked the guy getting chewed out and was speaking up for him.) The commander gave them until 5:00pm to find the cat a home or he would euthanize him personally.

So into his life I walked at 4:48pm.

Ever inquisitive and curious, he once got his hind legs caught in a plastic bag from a grocery store and ran full speed through our house, that bag billowing behind him making big WHOOMP- WHOOMP- WHOOMP! noises behind him as he ran. (Much urine was recovered from that bag that day, let me tell you.) A mighty hunter, he frequently brought us offerings of birds, moles, voles, and the occaisional squirrel (!!!) until he was confined to the house in later life.

Bear went with us from Belgium to Missouri to Indiana to Texas. In Missour he met Poupette, and he immediately adopted her. They were inseparable, and he declined pretty quickly after she died last fall. In the end he lost all his teeth and was bone-thin, with sores on his feet from sleping all day and night. When he lost control of his bowels and bladder, it was time.

He was a damned good cat. Best I've ever had, maybe.

~~JD~~

Thursday Afternoon, 1.2 miles

No, really -- I went out and walked 1.2 miles this afternoon.

Samantha and I went out for her usual afternoon "walkie" and just found ourselves on the old familiar pathways; so we walked north 0.6 miles along the main drag until we reached the base of our main hill to climb, then turned around. Low impact, low stress -- slow pace. Considering the longest walk I took yesterday was to the bathroom and backl and the day before to the parking lot, I'm pretty pleased with it. Tomorrow we'll try something more interesting.

Then, just to keep things interesting, I had my annual dental cleaning this afternoon. Getting into and out of the damned chair was a lot of fun, that's for sure! A good report all things considered, but I gotta work on my Wisdom teeth -- as usual. (Well, they're hard to reach!)

I'm down to a single Vicodin every 5-6 hours (from 2 every 3-4 hours right after surgery) with 2-3 Ibuprofen backing up the Vicodin. I want to be off the Vicodin altogether this weekend, if not tomorrow.

~~JD~~

Things to Remember for the Next Time I have Surgery . . .

1.) Narcotics, especially opiates, make me nauseous.

Really nauseous.

Really, REALLY nauseous.

(Note to Self; find out how much it will cost to have the car detailed to get the puke smell out of the front seat. Also, try really hard not to puke on your wife.)

2.) Fortunately for me, Ibuprofen (Motrin) actually works better than Vicodin. With Ariane, Motrin puts her out like a light. Go figure.

3.) Always remember to keep a pillow on your lap for two very important reasons:

(A) when you have to cough after surgery, you need it to splint against the surgery site -- and you tend to cough a LOT after surgery, and . . .

(B) When the dog decides to jump into your lap, you'll be able to cushion the dog and avoid the searing pain of dog impacting stiches. And try not to blame the dog; she just missed seeing you.

Ouchies.

4.) Try not to whine like a little girl when you're in pain; it tends to make family members giggle.

5.) Always wear clean underwear into the OR.

True Story; Swear to God . . .

Bear with me here; this one takes a bit of explaining, but the punch line's worth it.

The cat pictured above is our cat Fluffy. He's a Norwegian Forest Cat breed. We've had him since Missouri, almost 15 years now, so he's probably 17 years old or so. Over the years he's developed this alter-ego persona called "Flurfy", whom I vocalize with a pseudo-Norwegian accent that sound something like the the Swedish Chef from the Muppet Show would sound like if he was drunk. Flurfy is a curmudgeon whose snarky, sarcastic comments frequently have us in stitches -- especially me, because I frequently have no idea what he's going to say, even though his biting sarcasm comes out of my mouth at the most inopportune times.

I wonder if Edgar Bergen or Paul Winchell had this problem?

So, anyway, suffice it to say Flurfy is a part of the family. So when Ariane got this message from Flurfy on her cell phone at work yesterday morning, she didn't bat an eye:

"Hello Dere - Flurfy Here. Da fat guy forgot his phone, y'know. What are da chances of getting me some Herring dere?"

(Herring is the natural prey of Norwegian Forest Cats, of course.)

So about 2pm when she called from work, she calls Julian's cell phone. Why? Because "I had forgot my cell phone at home" according to Flurfy.

Uhmmm . . . . according to whom?

It took her three hours to realize what she'd done. She was absolutely furious when she got home. (Heh.)

~~JD~~

Sunday Afternoon; 4.6 Miles

Spring in South Texas seems to bring out the prettiest roadside scenery. Lady Bird Johnson made it her life's work to have wildflowers planted along all Texas highway right- of- ways so that this time of year right after the winter rains are full of bluebonnets, marigolds, and Indian Paintbrushes.

Ariane, Samantha and I took the Northerly route this afternoon, but kept going past Walgreen's to the Regent Care Nursing Home 0.75 miles past. This adds 1.5 miles to our standard 3.1 mile trip. It was actually surprisingly easy one we got past Walgreen's, as the land becomes much flatter. We saw lots of squirrels -- red squirrels, grey squirrels, and even a black rock squirrel, all of which Samantha thinks would be very tasty parts of her balanced breakfast. Fortunately or the squirrels, it was after lunch, and Samantha's fuzzy doggy butt was dragging pretty low from this extended excursion.

One of the cooler things of our "walkies" is that we walk by and under the glide path for San Antonio International Airport. I always thought the coolest part of driving limousines to the Chicago airports was getting to sit in the Staging Parking Lot watching the planes land. Southwest is the primary service into and out of SA, so their colorful and different jets are always interesting. Today we got to watch a NASA T-38 fly in, as well as a Medevac Army UH-60, most likely from Fort Sam Houston. Brings back memories of my Grandma Glynn taking me to O'Hare to watch the airplanes take off and land back in the 60's when you could still walk up to the departure gates.

Good Stuff. Good Memories. Good Walkies!

~~JD~~

Tuesday Evening, 2.75+ Miles

I have no idea how far we walked tonight. We started out on what I refer to as our "Southerly Route"; wherein we walk south 1.25 miles to the corner of two main thoroughfares; then over a little over a tenth of a mile to our Mail Drop and return. It works out to just over 2.75 miles.

However, Ariane is always pushing herself to walk farther and farther, so we made a little detour that pushed us well over 2.75. I won't know how far until I time it out on the car's odometer -- and Julian's out and about right now. I'd guess a bit over 2.9 by the way Samantha's tongue was hanging out. I usually don't see that until almost the end of our 3 mile walk (which we refer to as our "Walkies" -- Samantha starts drooling and leaping like a puppy when she hears the "Walkies" word.) That's the northern end of our southbound dog that's the black blob in the photo above as we walked the thouroughfare of choice tonight.

Morning glucose was right down where it should've been this morning at 64. (A blood glucose of 60-110 is considered normal.) The last four days had my morning blood glucoses in the triple digits, but the glyburide has fixed that fast.

Best news of the day: I wore a pair of shorts for this walk hat I grew out of last spring. Today they had room to spare. That right there is a great feeling money can't buy.

~~JD~~

Monday Night, 3.1 Miles

Sometime around Thanksgiving I started going for walks at night as a method of relieving the pain of my heel spurs. In a gross fit of irony, God saw fit to bequeath to me the same heel spurs my mom has. They started bothering me about two or three years ago, and I tried various methods to decrease or relieve the pain, from soaking my feet to elevating them to various creams, rubs, ointments, and pain relievers. Not much worked. The one thing that did work, oddly enough, was walking -- and walking a lot.

So I marked off three walking courses from the apartment and back. If I walk north along the street our apartment is on to the local Walgreen's and back it's 3.1 miles round trip, which was our trip tonight for me and Samantha the Dog. We like that route because it involves walking up a fairly steep graded hill about half a mile from the apartment (just enough distance to get a good stretch in the legs), then walking the next half mile uphill, then another 0.6 miles down the other side. When we reach Walgreen's, we turn around and re-ascend the hill for 0.6 miles, back down for half a mile again, and half a mile home. Tonight we ran most of that last half-mile, which Samantha particularly likes because she feels like a vicious wolf creature when she runs with her hair in the wind.

Or so I've heard.

The diabetes is fairly well under control. For some reason my pharmacy shorted me 75% of my glyburide medication to control my blood sugars, so I ran out last Thursday. I just got the replacements in the mail today -- during this last weekend my sugar was never higher than 174, and usually in the 130's to 140's in the morning, with normal (90's or so) reading before meals. I guess the "eating healthy" thing is working our pretty well. Ariane has lost almost 50 pounds since Thanksgiving and a good 2 inches from her waist -- and she tells me 2 whole sizes. I've lost about 10 pounds and 3+ inches from my waist.

The best part was buying a new, smaller belt today at Wal-Mart. (Deep sigh of satisfaction here.) What a great feeling.

Julian continues to be Julian. After his 1st-place performances at State (UIL) as an individual, his orchestra followed up with 1st-place performances just before Spring Break. He's pretty much assured 1st Chair next year, but he may not take Orchestra
to concentrate on his medical and language studies. (He's still going to take private lessons, though.) His pre-Spring Break trip to Mexico went very well. He managed to come back in one piece without Montezuma's Revenge (unlike a couple of his compatriots) and even named a few of the rats he met there.

Yeah, you read that right. He named the rats. Yup -- he's my boy.

~~JD~~

Wrapping Up 2006 With some Family News

You may (or may not) have noticed that I've been posting a lot less the last few months. One of the major reasons for this is the e-Blogger (the service I use) has Upgraded itself to version 2.0. While this has resulted in some neat new features being added to the 'blog (note the Interactive "Blog Archive" and "Labels" sections that have appeared recently) it also meant that the service that I use to upload photos -- called "Hello" -- has stopped working with e-Blogger; which is stupid, because they're BOTH owned by Google!

However, after a few concerted hours of poring over the Help File with this new version, I found out there's a way to directly upload pictures to the 'blog without using Hello. Case in Point:

Julian is driving now. He's actually quite good at it, too. He drove to and from church this morning with only a few small problems (keeps forgetting to check over his shoulder before changing lanes -- that'll hurt him someday.)

Julian and i went to Oktoberfest in, actually, November, here in New Braunfels Texas. If you think a town named "New Braunfels" sounds like it was settled by German settlers, you're exactly right on. For some reason south Texas attracted Germans like flies to honey (as we say down here.) We've got German-as-german-can-be communities like St. Hedgwig, New Braufels, and Castroville (settled by folks from the Alsace-Lorraine valley -- which means they speak a weird mish-mash of german and french -- that Ariane and I understand pretty well.) In fact, south Texas is home to Texas Lutheran University -- the second largest Lutheran school in the U.S. -- right after Valparaiso University. Behind Julian are the falls that power the Grist Mill the german settlers operated in early new Braunfels (look lower left in the shadow.)

And besides the fabulous pastries . . . the Incredible knockwursts and bratwursts and bloodwursts and schnitzels and strudels and turkey legs (guaranteed to drive my blood sugar through the roof) -- besides the margarita booths side-by-side with the german beer booths . . . . there were a lot of guys in lederhosen, like this guy. He was actually part of a band playing waltzes and oom-pah music and Heavy on the Accordian stuff -- most of which was playing in one of TWO circus tents set up for that -- as well as an honest-to-God Oktoberfest-type hall with a wooden dance floor and wood paneling and arches and ceiling, with plaques with the coats of arms of all the major families that settled New Braunfels.

Wonderful - truly magical. Reminded me of the one Oktoberfest I attended in Belgium. Very authentic! I saw this guy waiting in the line for fried -potatoe -somethings that were just incredible. Julian tried to weasel the recipe out of a very cute blonde girl wearing a St. Puli Girl type-dress, but to no avail.

A few weeks later Julian once again cooked Thanks- giving dinner for the family. Ariane wanted me to make the twice-baked garlic potatoes (featured prominently mid-center in the photo -- A-hem!) and the pies are store-bought, but Julian made the roast, the veggies, and the trimmings.

Not long after Thanks- giving we lost one of out cats, Poupette (pronounced "Pooh-Pet" -- it's french for "little doll.") She was 17 years old and the most unusual cat I've ever been owned by. (Yeah, like you thought humans owned cats -- shows how much you know!) She was half-siamese so she had an unusual amount of curiosity and intelligence for a cat. Whenever I called home she would meow into the phone while Floune talked to me, or vice versa. She used to climb in Julian's crib as a baby and would be very protective of him -- almost like at 'watch-cat" until he went off to school. In he later years she had problems swallowing and hyperthyroidism which left her painfully thin and frail. When she couldn't sleep and cried all night in pain, we knew it was time.

Best damned cat I ever had -- and that's saying something.


Have I mentioned how much I love south Texas? 65 degrees on new Year's Eve. Beautiful gentle breezes and sunny afternoon.

Work and school are going surprisingly well for both of us. Ariane got the maximum raise (yet again) from Univeristy Hospital for her excellent work and team- player ethic. She's really the glue that holds her little clinic together. She got three A's and one B in her classes (the B was in Anatomy Lab). I've gotten several positive comments at my new clinic and told just Friday that they're very happy with my work, as well as several positive comments from the patients (which always looks good for your boss.) I got an A in my Anatomy Lab and had an A in Chemistry until I had to drop it for health reasons -- but more on that next month when I know more.

See You Next Year!

Flying Cow Leaves Two Police Cars in Flames: Police Baffled!

Okay, I made up the "Police Baffled" part. Otherwise, that's a real-life news story from one of the local news organs here in San Antonio (and I mean the word "organ" in the most scatalogical way possible.)

You can click on the title to see the actual story (or watch a clip of the story at the site); or just read it here:

Talk about a wild night near Seguin. A cow came flying out of its trailer, sent DPS and police scrambling, and left two police cars going up in flames.

"It was almost hard to believe," said Detective Sergeant Maureen Watson. She has been in law enforcement for 15 years, and says she "never had a day like this. I mean the best way to characterize this it, is it's bizarre. It's really really strange."

It's strange because it started out with a truck towing cattle, and ended in fire. Watson told News 4 WOAI, "We believe the gate of the cattle trailer came open, and the cow, for lack of a better phrase spilled out onto the Interstate. It was pretty chaotic for a while." Several cars hit some of the cows. One cow died. DPS troopers called for backup.

That's when one officer was nearly run down by a speeding truck, carrying two illegal immigrants inside. Seguin Police were out looking for those illegal immigrants. They parked their cars in the hot grass, burning two of them including that brand new 2006 Crown Victoria. Watson said, "Well, all of a sudden, another officer who'd arrived on the scene, alerted the sergeant that there was a fire."

Everything inside was destroyed, including tens of thousands of dollars worth of equipment designed for the patrol cars. "You start off with kind of a bizarre accident with these cows spilling onto the interstate. That leads to other accidents, that leads to a car chase, that leads to a foot chase," Watson recalls.

The two mexican immigrants, ages 21 and 23, are in custody for illegally entering the country and evading arrest. Watson says they have replacement cars for now, but hope the city council will vote to get new cars soon.


The San Antonio Express-News article is barely more understandable:

When Cows Hit The Road, There's No Exiting The Trouble on I-10

In a wild series of incidents that started with a loose tailgate and ended with a grass fire Wednesday night, two Seguin police cars were destroyed, at least two cows were killed, three suspected undocumented immigrants were jailed and Interstate 10 was closed.

Pay attention. This is complicated.

At about 9:45 p.m., the gate fell open on an 18-wheeler hauling cattle east near the Texas 123 bypass in Seguin. "Cows started being deposited on the highway," Seguin police spokeswoman Maureen Watson said.

Five or six cows hit the road. One was struck by another 18-wheeler and dragged about a half-mile. Another was hit by a minivan. Both animals died, blocking the highway among the remaining injured cows.

Texas Department of Public Safety troopers arrived and started clearing the scene, using a truck to drag the dead cows off the road and rounding up the live ones. that's when a pickup, reported stolen in Houston, sped through the scene, almost hitting a DPS trooper directing traffic, Watson said. A short chase ensued. Three men abandoned the pickup and ran into the brush along the highway.

Two Seguin patrol cars that had joined the chase parked amid the grass along the highway, and the officers jumped out and chased the fugitives. They caught the men, but when the officers returned the prisoners to their patrol cars, they saw that heat from the engines had sparked a grass fire that torched both vehicles, one of which was brand new. Crews arrived to fight the rapidly spreading fire, and Interstate 10 was closed. Eastbound lanes were shut for about 45 minutes.

The men, believed to be undocumented immigrants, were brought to the Guadalupe County jail. Their names and charges against them were not available Thursday afternoon. The driver of the cattle truck was cited for driving with an unsecured load.

"The whole chain of events was pretty bizarre," Watson said. "The damage to the cars was $50,000 to $60,000."


And just in case you thought these kinds of stories are random items, here's another on from earlier in the week (also from WOAI.com):


Teen Shot in Fight Over Tater Tots
LAST UPDATE: 3/14/2006 11:03:08 PM
By: Walker Robinson

A teenager was shot Monday afternoon after he was arguing over tater tots with another teen, San Antonio Police said. The shooting happened close to 5 p.m. at the Spring Hill Apartments off Raybon on the northeast side.

Neighbors told police the uncle of one of the boys told the teens to stop fighting. They were ready to stop, but investigators said a 20-year-old man would not let them. “Another person out here in this apartment complex, I think wanted to see the young boys continue fighting,” Sgt. Rudy Cran with SAPD said.

The man then walked into a nearby apartment complex, grabbed a gun and started shooting, authorities said. He fired several shots into the living room where the boys were watching television, police said.

“One of those rounds hit the young man in the back,” Cran said. The boy was rushed to University Hospital, officials said. His condition was unavailable Monday night.

The suspect remained on the loose Monday. Police were looking for him.


. . . . . Apparently, I live in interesting times.

~~JD~~

The Cats of Casa Largo II: Flurfy the Norwegian Forest Cat

Flurfy was (and still is) a Norwegian Forest cat.




Norwegian Forest Cats are similar to Maine Coon Cats, in that they look like a regular housecat in the face, but lack the "smooshed" in the face look that Persian cats have. And, while Maine Coon Cats tend toward dark browns and stripes, Norwegian Forest Cats tend to be solid colors.

Flurfy believes this means he is related somehow to the cousins of this people who own him. Their family name ("Gertsmeier") is Norwegian in origin, and since so was Flurfy, it seemed a logical step for him.

Flurfy had mysteriously appeared in the parking lot of a burned-down Piggly-Wiggly store in Waynesville Missouri one dark drizzly morning. How he got there he never said, preferring to let the mystery linger, like bad cheese on a summer afternoon.




Which, coincidentally, was what Flurfy smelled like occaisonally.

His newly-adopted mother Ariane had originally mistaken him for a female cat; a fact Flurfy had never forgotten. In fact, It may well have factored into the day he bit Ariane. The story everyone told was that "a stray Siamese Cat" had bitten her, but whispered stories told of Ariane trying to break up a potential fight between Flurfy and another cat . . . so, he bit her. Although Otis, his sidekick and protege, just couldn't imagine Flurfy ever being so naughty as to bite somebody, really. What a terrible thing to say about them!

Flurfy liked to think his having actually bitten a human added to his air of mystery and respect among the other cats. The other cats, however, weren't quite sure if Flurfy was vaguely dangerous or slightly deluded.




Flurfy was a world-class napper. He could sleep for hours at the drop of a hat, and frequently did. Flurfy slept everywhere; on pillows, on beds, on the floor, on chairs, and frequently in the bathtub -- which the other cats thought was just weird. Flurfy said it reminded him of his ancestral home in the fjords, where the naughty Polar Mousies play, and are the natural prey of Norwegian Forest Cats.




Flurfy had a dream one night that he was sailing the fjords in his kayak. The Northern lights shimmered and danced above his little kayak. He shifted his weight so he could raise his parak-covered paw clenching his harpoon high over his head. The silvery scales of thousands of sardines reflected the Northern Lights as they swam under the nose of his kayak. (FLASH! FLASH!) Flurfy skillfully guided the kayak one-handed as he gently crept up on his prey, and raised the harpoon for the kill.




Flurfy like to tell this sdtory to the dog, because not only was she a good listener, she believed everything Flurfy said.




The dog, however, had her own opinion of Flurfy's tall tales.

The Cats of Casa Largo

Otis was a Junior Prince of Cats in Casa Largo, which was a very important position, indeed.

Junior Prince Cats at Casa Largo are in charge of pouncing on Mousies, and generally making sure that those very naughty mousies don't do anything nefarious. Otis wasn't sure what nefarious meant, but it sure sounded naughty to him -- which was good enough. Otis was also in charge of catching flies and other naughty flying insects. He was quite good at it, but being a Junior Prince of Cats he had more than his fair share of curiosity, and when he would open those fat little paws of his to just peeka little tiny bit at his catch of the day . . . . that naughty flying insect would fly away, laughing at him (he thought.)

And when he wasn't catching those very naughty flies and very naughty mousies . . . .


. . . . he liked to keep his napping skills sharp. Otis was not quite a world-class napper yet, but he was learning under the instruction of his Uncle Fluffy, who was able to sleep almost 28 hours a day; which is quite a long time indeed. (Uncle Fluffy was a Norwegian Polar Cat; and had a long, luxuriant, warm fur coat, which encouraged him to sleep a lot.)

Unfortunately Otis had something of a handicap to his being a Prince of Cats; besides not having a long, luxuriant, warm fur coat:


His mother was a dog.

She wasn't his real mother, actually. He didn't really remember his real mother, or how he had come to the new house. But he did remember the first time he had met his new mother. Samantha (the dog) had walked happily over to Otis and sniffed Otis' nose, which is the Traditional Form of Greeting in the Manner of Her People.

Otis had greeted Samantha in the Traditional Manner of His People; First by swelling up to five times his own size (apparently by swallowing a great deal of air) and then releasing that air rather explosively through his teeth in a very painful sounding HIIIIIIIISSSSSSSSSSSSSING sort of sound.

And being a very small sort of cat, he had punctuated his HIIIIIIIISSSSSSSSSSSSSING sound with an explosive release of his bowels. Twice, in fact; and much to everyone's surprise.

But that had been a long time ago; years ago, in fact, and Samantha had never mentioned it since. She was a very motherly type of dog, and loved her little Otis very much. Even if he did smell a bit too much like fish for her tastes.

Otis stomped his little furry feet like a dog. He licked his fur like a dog, which made a very loud noise when he did it that made the other cats giggle. (Dog lips are a very different sort from cats lips, you know.) Otis wagged his tail like a dog, thumping it about like an epileptic kielbassa on a leash; rather than suavely giving it a swift flink from side-to-side like other cats.

And Otis was big, like a dog. He had a solid tomcat's body with a dog's solid bulk, which made him very handy as a doorstop when he had a mind to be (which was not often) or equally useful as an enforcer for the King of Cats (which was less often, but more fun) as well as quiet noisy.

That bulk made Otis the subject of more than a few jokes as well. One of the cats thought Otis bore a distinct resemblence to Shamu the Killer Whale at Seaworld; partly because of his bulk, and partly because of his small fluffy black-and-white markings on his cat-tummy.


Which is how he got the nickname "ShamooOtis." Being a cat of very little brain, he didn't mind in the least.

~~JD~~

Otis and his "mother." (You thought I was kidding about him thinking the dog was his mom, didn't you?)

My cat Otis faxes well, don't you think?