Lle Llywela

Had a lovely week in Devon last week with the whole family - parents, siblings (and in-laws), nieces, nephew, the whole shebang. We stayed in a big converted barn on a flower farm - the flower farm in relatively new hands and looking a bit neglected, sadly, but still lovely. We could have lived without all the flies and wasps of mid-August, but had a great time hanging out together and sightseeing around and about.

It was a Monday to Monday holiday, unusually, so after arriving home on Monday I headed off to the cattery to collect Poppy, and while I was there, the lady who runs the cattery (Angharad) asked if I knew anyone who wanted a kitten. It turned out that at the end of last week, they'd got up one morning to find that someone had dumped four kittens (approx. 5-6 months old) in a taped up bag and bin by the side of the road at the bottom of their driveway - there isn't even a pavement there and it is a busy road, so it was a horribly dangerous position for the poor little things to be in.


Two of the kittens, from the bag, were slightly injured and were taken in by the local Cats Protection League, but they didn't have room for all four, so the cattery had kept the other two, who were in good health, and were looking to rehome them. Both girls, we think, although not 100% sure.

Well, as it happened, my sister C and my parents had promised the Oldest Niece a kitten for her 8th birthday next month (how is she that old already?!?!?!), to live with Niece and my parents at their house. C had made a tentative arrangement to take a kitten from one of her flatmate's colleagues, but it wasn't definite. When I told her about these abandoned kittens, that was that, we were having one.

I spent most of yesterday morning on the phone to the cattery to discuss our interest in the kittens, and made an appointment to go and see them at 6.30. C and her flatmate K both came with me, with Dad. One look was all it took, and that was that - both kittens came home with us! One has been given to Niece as an early birthday present, to live with her at Mum and Dad's house. She has named it Emerald, because it has lovely green eyes:


And C and K have taken in the second kitten, which they have named Midnight:


Both kittens have had a good first night and first day in their new homes, and are settling already. Welcome to the family, fur babies!

Three weeks after the move, I have started this weekend (in between torrential rain showers that have caused flash flooding across the city) to introduce the cats to the great outside world beyond our door, aka the back garden. One at a time, a little at a time, just so they can begin to get familiarised with what's out there.

It looks as if this could be quite a lengthy process.

I started with Poppy. She clung to me like a limpet, all "no, no, I got out here on my own in the dark last week and IT WAS SCARY DON'T MAKE ME GO OUT THERE!!!" and tried to get back in through the window she'd escaped from the other day (which is still closed). She relaxed enough to sniff around a tiny bit, but she was very nervous about it. Her stir craziness was completely cured by that brief escape! She's so freaked out, it's going to take ages to get her comfortable with going out again. Which is fine, the slower the better, really.

Then I took Alfie out and he was far more excited, "yay, outside world, new smells, it's all so interesting, I want to explore all the things, this is brilliant...okay, that's enough excitement for one day, time to go home," and that was that, he's had enough now!

We'll try again next week...

This is what I have to contend with these days, every time I want to use the bathroom for any reason.




Yeah, Alfie has developed a deep and abiding obsession with running water that shows no sign of lifting. If I go upstairs, he runs ahead of me to jump in the sink, just in case I might feel inclined to turn the tap on so he can play with the water. He even puts himself to sleep in the sink, which is apparently just the right shape and size to be cosy. What can I say? He's nuts.

Poppy, who is much more sensible, prefers to curl up on a nice, sunny windowsill, thanks all the same.

Today feels like a day for a kittyspam to entertain me over lunch, so here are some pics of Alfie sleeping on top of Poppy and Poppy not really caring very much



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Came home from work this evening to find a dead bird on the front door mat, all over the mail (thanks for that, Alfie) and my cotinus bush half collapsed all over the back yard - more of a tree than a shrub, really, it's about 15 feet tall and grows up the back wall on two main stems. One of those stems had just bent right in half, irreparable. Luckily I'd seen it bending before work this morning and ran out in the rain to rescue a few pots from beneath it - and also the washing line, which is just as well, since by this evening it had collapsed so far the washing line would have snapped if it had still been caught! So, I've spent my evening so far disposing of baby bird remains, cleaning bird blood off my mail and performing tree surgery! My garden is now a sea of sad, chopped up branches. Now keeping my fingers crossed that the other stem, which is swaying worryingly, doesn't also come down overnight. This wind can die down any time now, please!

So to brighten my mood, let's have a cuddly kitty-spam! Poppy and Alfie love nothing better than cwtching up together, especially in stormy weather like this. :)

I just spotted an alien cat in the kitchen that I think might have been the long-lost Macavity the Mystery Cat! I haven't seen him in over a year! I didn't get a good look, though, so I could be wrong, but the glimpse I caught did look like him - and it would explain why Poppy's rejected food has been vanishing overnight lately...

Today's the day for intruder cats, it seems, as earlier on I caught the neighbour's cat, Tabitha, in my front room, the little minx - she's got a perfectly good home of her own she could hang out in and although she gets on well with Alfie, she knows Poppy doesn't like her, and the feeling is mutual. Actually, when I heard Poppy having a hissy-fit in the kitchen just now I assumed it was Tabitha back again, so it came as a surprise to see a tabby back retreating out through the cat-flap instead.

I hope it was Macavity. I'd been worried about my little stray.

In other news, I had forgotten how all-consuming fic-writing can be, when you really get into it. All my review-fu is currently being channelled in a more creative direction. It's been a really long time since I got all caught up in a fic like this. I've missed it!

I think Alfie has found a nest of mice somewhere in the lane behind the house. Just lately, every night when I get home from work I find sad little chewed up mouse remains waiting for me on the mat - usually little more than a pair of feet, and sometimes also a tail. I'm assuming he's been eating the rest, since I have yet to find any more remains stashed anywhere around the house! And this is the cat who wouldn't dream of eating cat meat, or even real roast meat that I've cooked (unless it is smothered in mayonnaise, he'll gobble it down then, because he is weird).

Yeah, cats are fun.

Poppy, on the other hand, remains incapable of catching so much as a spider. Alfie ran back and forth past her with a live mouse in his mouth six times last week, as I attempted to get the wretched thing off him. She didn't move a muscle. Just sat there and blinked at him in bewilderment. Bless her.

My parents' little Chess cat died this morning. She was very elderly and had been increasingly frail and senile for a long time now, but she was the feistiest, most indomitable little cat that ever lived and had been with us since before Chelsea, so it's hard to believe she's gone. She spent most of her life being cantankerous and reclusive, but had mellowed tremendously over the last two or three years, as she grew old and senile - but always retained that feisty spirit. Just this summer, she spent a wonderful afternoon dancing around my sister Deb's dog Amber out in the garden - you could practically see the thought bubble above her head: "I reckon I can take it, yeah, I can take it, I can definitely take it. Okay, pounce!" Whereupon we had to hastily intervene because the dog was six times her size! She was such a tiny cat, never reached full adult size, but her personality was enormous!

This is Chess when she was young and healthy


Chess enjoying the garden this summer


And Chess as she was just last week - in her last couple of months she decided to live permanently on this table, alongside both her food and the radiator, and rarely moved off it.


On Christmas Day she was still lively, ate loads of turkey and cried for more. But by Thursday she was starting to decline and then over the weekend she stopped eating. There were no vets open to take her to, and they couldn't have done anything for her anyway. She wasn't in any pain, she was just fading away. She spent her last few days being cuddled and loved and was perfectly content.

So now my parents' household is cat-free for the first time since feline leukaemia swept through the neighbourhood in the mid 1980s. They have lost three cats in as many months - both Chloe and Ginger went missing in September/October and have never been found, poor darlings. :( It has been long enough now that it seems clear they aren't going to be found. So here is one last picture of those two, as well.


Goodbye Chess, Chloe and Ginger. We loved you.

But to end on a happier note, here's a pic of Deb's dog Amber making herself comfortable on my sofa over New Year!

They do this rather a lot!