Say it in an English/Pirate accent… “Elllllloooooo Poppet”

Sassy Cat # 3…

Little Miss Poppet… aka Pop-a-licious, Pop-a-dilly-ding-dong, Poppadopalous, Wobble-Bop Pop-Pop, and the list goes on.

She is our little Yooper kitty adopted from the wonderful Eva Burell Animal Shelter in Manistique Michigan. She is a bit balance-challenged due to some kind of a neurological problem but we adore her just the way she is.  She has never seen a lap she didn’t want to sit in and is the sweetest little girl.

She’s definitely quirky though… she LOVES to be spanked…  the harder the better and she makes chicken noises when she’s unhappy or feeling grumpy (which is mainly when you are moving her off of your lap so you can go to the bathroom or get the cramp out of your leg).

Everyone that comes to visit threatens to sneak her away with them when they leave.

A Mecca of Manliness

 So last Sunday we went with our wonderful neighbors, Nick & Jill  to Pennsylvania to the largest outdoors show in the country… possibly the entire world!
I’m fairly used to being glared at by taxidermied heads of dead animals, but sheeeeessh we were surrounded! Lions, deer, elk, bears, moose, you name it, it was stuffed and hung on walls by various hunting outfitters to convince you that their camp was the place to go to ‘bag’ the big one.
There was even a whole hog that was not much smaller than my brother’s old black V.W. Beetle!
Cam & Nick had already made arrangements to go to Montana next fall on a hunt with a group of guys so they wanted to go and meet the guys from the outfitter and to fill out some paperwork.

Jill and I patiently tagged along while the guys perused binoculars, bought raffle tickets, and checked out the latest and greatest in hunting, fishing and shooting stuff. There were a few booths that interested us too though… we both bought sets of super-shammies. I got some wondermous sticky mats that will hold any number of things on the dashboard of your car so they won’t fall off (it’s like a miracle!).

But my favorite booth was the one where I got this sign made…

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The best part of the night was when we stopped at The Outback for dinner. Had some great merlot ( Red Diamond from Washington State) and prime rib.

Mouse parts in the laundry

I knew I was going to love working at the BRWC but I didn’t realize how MUCH I was going to love it. It’s not pretty work most of the time… a lot of very dirty and really gross laundry to do, poop to clean up, mice and rats to chop… yuk! Certainly not glamorous work by any stretch of the imagination!

But when you see the animals making improvements daily and you know that they would have died if it wasn’t for the work being done out there… it’s just such a great feeling to be a part of that.

On Monday I drove out to New Market (a town about 45 minutes from here) and picked up a nest of baby squirrels whose tree had been blown down the night before. Their eyes were still closed and they were starting to get a little bit of gray fuzz.  February is really early for babies to start being born. I guess the warmer than normal days a while back got the parents feeling ‘frisky’ instead of sleepy. These little guys would certainly have frozen to death if the nice people hadn’t found them and kept them in the house over night. They are now in the hands of a home-rehabilitator who can give them the labor intensive care that they need. They probably wouldn’t have felt very comfortable in the room at the center that is filled with hawks and owls anyway!

BRWC

Yesterday was a good day at the wildlife center.

First thing when I got there Peg said there’s a Red Tail down in Woodstock (a small town about an hour or so away… no, not that Woodstock) so, we drove all the way down there and trudged though the woods on the side of a mountain but we couldn’t find it. The people that called said they had seen it five days in a row and were shocked that we couldn’t find it.  After a couple of hours and a pretty good workout we gave up and told them to call us back if they saw it again.  It was a disappointing way to start the day.

But then we went back to the center and started to feed the critters and things got better. Tater, the woodchuck who is a permanent resident and education ambassador came out of his den and chirped and make these adorable little noises letting us know that he wished to be groomed.  So we went into his enclosure and scratched his back really hard. He enjoyed it soooooo much that he started clicking his teeth together really fast… I can’t quite explain the sound in type, but I can tell you it was obviously a sound of pure rapture. The problem is, that when Tater is happy with his grooming he wants to return the favor and groom you back and that  hurts! In case you didn’t know, groundhogs are very soft… I was expecting him to have a very coarse feeling coat, but he kinda felt like a cat actually.

After that, I got Rudy out and did a bit of physical therapy with him. We are trying to help him remember what his legs are for. He is able to move his talons now and kick out his legs, but something short circuits when he tries to walk or stand on them. BUT, when I took him outside to a larger enclosure, he did run across it before he collapsed into a heap… sounds kind of bad, but it’s really a big improvement from when I first captured him. GO RUDY!!!

I’m going to go out again on Friday. It just feels good to be out there and helping .

Sunshine and Blue Skies

I went out to get the paper this morning and couldn’t believe the temperature! 64 degrees this morning with possibly a record breaking high of 70+ this afternoon.

Unfortunately, I can’t start on any major garden projects since they’re calling for severe thunderstorms this afternoon, but in the meantime I’m going to take my cup of coffee and sit on the front porch and enjoy this while I can.  I’m so thankful for sunshine and blue skies, but also thankful for the rain… so today will be a double-dip of thankfulness!

Sassy Cat # 2

  This is Roxanne. She is now our oldest Sassy Cat. Roxie lived on the hill even before us. She lived with and graced the home of our good neighbors, Patrick & Nancy. Patrick died of prostrate cancer several years ago and Nancy died only 3 months later of breast cancer. It was a sad time on the hill.  Nancy’s two sons live down the road from us and took Roxy to live with them. But Roxy kept coming back to her home over here and I would hear her crying to be let in at the now empty and lonely house. I noticed that she was becoming terribly thin and  I couldn’t stand it anymore so I began taking tasty treats to her, and lovin up on her until she finally decided to follow me home and adopt us.

The big problem was… and still is, Roxy HATES other cats! Any stray dog can walk right up to her and she couldn’t care less. But if another cat shows up, look out… claws and fur start flying! 

Naturally that presented a problem since we had three cats at the time. So Roxy became our ‘garage cat’ . We would love to bring her inside especially since she is well into old age for a cat… (we think about 17 years), but she will have nothing to do with it as long as there are other cats inside.

So the garage is where she lives with a very nice carpet lined house and a nice warm heating pad to sleep on.

Introducing the Sassy Cats

I was talking with Mrs. Schmenkman this a.m. and she insisted that I must have pics of the Sassy Cats on my blog.

Since posting pics of ALL of them at one time would be a huge task, I decided to do one at a time to make it easier.

I guess we should start with the oldest. About a month ago that would have been my dear sweet Buster.

 Sadly, my good old Mr. Dependable, Buster-Bean succumbed to cancer on January the 4th.

He was an awesome cat. I never really liked orange cats much, but I wanted a buddy for another good old cat of mine that has been gone a few years now, Boomer. (More about him later on.)  I had gone to the vet and saw an add for a free kitten, already neutered and declawed about the same age as The Boom so I thought… ‘Good deal!’ Cam and I went to check him out. I was pretty disappointed when I saw him since he was just a plain old orange tabby cat. But the lady handed him to me and he immediatly planted a big kiss on my nose! His fate was sealed… or should I say MY fate was sealed? I brought him home and introduced him to Boomer who didn’t really LIKE the idea of a buddy at first, but Buster quickly charmed him too and they became fast friends.

Buster made the big move from Michigan to North Carolina and then later on here to Sassy Cat Hill.  Through all of the changes and new kitty additions he stayed the same sweet boy. He was always the first one on my lap in the morning and the first one in bed with me at night. He had several favorite places throughout the house and I always knew at where he would be at different times during the day. He had a schedule and he kept it!  He had an extreme fondness for catnip and any other plant that he could eat… even fake plants! He always knew where the best ray of sunshine was streaming through the window and claimed that spot. He joined me when I was doing yoga and even continued doing it long after I stopped. He loved having circles rubbed on his belly… we called it giving him a hurricane belly because his fur looked exactly like a radar picure of a hurricane when we were done.

Until he got sick he was a healthy 18 pounder who could be counted on to wake me up in the morning by putting his full weight right on my full bladder… same time every morning too… remember, he had a schedule!

Capri D described him as being “the picture of forbearance”. I have to agree. He patiently dealt with all life gave to him; two big moves(the first one involving a plane ride!), new kittens climbing all over him and driving him crazy, and finally cancer.

He was a good cat, a good friend… I miss the old boy.