Autumn May Have Come

Before the thunder and rainstorms rolled over us this afternoon, the keeper and her friend J headed downtown for walking and a lunch. It was chilly and we had to stay in, but they walked through the SAM Sculpture Park. Very whimsical pieces, as seen here.

The keeper got home just as the rains were pelting the flowers and the vegetables. Obviously, we had to stay in tonight as well. It is good the keeper did all of her work outside yesterday. She painted the little bench and flower box in the side yard, finally, after 10 years, and stained the lattice on the deck to make it match the floor and to hide the less than beautiful carpentry of a

certain friend. She also put away all of the outdoor furniture for the winter. A sad moment for us all. What a grand summer we all had! Heat, sun, so much time outdoors. But because we had such a nice summer we are more ready than we usually are for autumn and its chill and rain and darker days.

We watched a touching independent film with the keeper tonight, Wendy and Lucy, about a young woman down on her luck trying to get to Alaska to work in the canneries, and her dog, Lucy. It is a story of loss, and love, and letting go. A sturdy little film. We gave several claws up.

By the way, I think the bitter awful pills worked. I am feeling much better. She has also stopped giving them to me now. I must have swallowed enough to make a difference.

Autumn Saturday

It is feeling more like autumn. A few leaves are turning and the strange palm like plant in the side garden has a flower stalk that popped open with beautiful orange seeds.

Today was a beautiful Saturday. Alice and I had to get the keeper up this morning so she could drive to Sammamish to a Forum on Immigration and then she drove back to Seattle to check on another program and then arrived in time to experience the last hour of the Liturgy Day at St. James and the Mass of Blessing for Liturgical Ministers. lLater in the afternoon she headed over to CK for the Fall Fest and had many wonderful encounters with her former flock. It seemed a little thin attendance -wide...she said she found parking on Phinney next to the office. The wonderful part of it for us was that she finally let us out again in the afternoon. It is still warm, and Alice chased squirrels around the yard like a kitten and I climbed over the gate twice. The bitter pills must be working. This morning the keeper finally found out where I spit them out .

The moon is also beautiful tonight and we had to stay inside while she photographed the moon through the wisteria.

Rose City

The keeper spent the day at the Archdiocese of Portland Pastoral Center in a workshop. The Center has a very different feel to it from the Seattle Chancery, she said. More homey. Very welcoming. But the meeting was in a room with no windows and artificial lights. So she ran out at lunch to walk around the neighborhood, and smell all of the roses still blooming in carefully kept little gardens of the small older homes. They drove home in three hours. No traffic in PDX, into Seattle. Lucky day. And the mountains to the east and west were shimmering in the pink light. She caught Mt. Rainier all shiny and pink at 70 mph.

By the way, I am feeling better. The pills are working even though they taste like they are going to kill me. The keeper is learning how to use the pill injecter, and that helps.

Fog and River

The keeper awoke at 4 am in order to leave for PDX at 5. She said the stars were incredibly beautiful and the air was fresh. As they drove on a very quiet freeway, the fog started lifting over the Chehalis area and by the time they saw the first signs of the Columbia River, the sun was coming out. She always sighs when she sees the first signs of the river she grew up with.

House Arrest & Luna Bella

Autumn is here, and the moon is glorious. And the truth is that we could not go out to howl or watch it tonight because I had to go to the vet this morning because of the bacterial parasite that won't leave my stomach. I was having a perfectly good morning until suddenly the crate showed up and I was shoved into it and carried into the car and next thing I was back with Dr. Smalley at Northgate vet. I got home, full of drugs and water. (They plumped me with water like a non-Foster Farms chicken.) Then I had to stay in lest I drink from some slimy puddle again. Hmph.

But it was a beautiful night. Even though tonight I had to take the most bitter tasting pill that made me feel sick.

The keeper, meanwhile, is making us go to bed early because she has to get up really early and drive to a meeting in PDX tomorrow. That means we will have to be inside again. Hmph.

Autumnal Equinox

Fall. . . it's here now, but it was 88 outside today. A wee too hot for the felines. The keeper was in heaven. She read on the deck in the hot afternoon sun. But we were happy to find spots in the shade and rest. I even chased a baby squirrel and several bugs today.

The keeper was home until evening, and so we were content. She went out and picked up our newest rug ( all of our rugs are new now, thanks to the natural latex backings that disintegrated and caused a big stink) for the den. We love the new rugs and are lounging on them. They feel clean and they do not aggravate Alice's delicate sinuses. The keeper also met her friends at a restaurant worth mentioning called The Rusty Pelican on No. 45th and they celebrated birthdays of KM and V. Combined ages: 149. That's a lot of good living and some room for some wild days too. (I should know, I am 108 in human years. which is 14 in cat.) A good chance to catch up and visit and celebrate the birthday ladies, who are so deserving of celebration.

Spider and Rose

Today was a beautiful Sunday, and the keeper let us live outside today. We checked out the damage which the raccoons inflicted on our yard--the garden angel was knocked over, the solar lights knocked over, the glass balls in the birdbath strewn around. They had a regular free for all out there. It must have happened after the neighbors ended their party at midnight. Libby the next doors dog was patrolling until then.

The keeper spent most of the day out, mostly working at churches, and was happy to get home and watch MYSTERY. She was a little bummed out that the Storm lost to LA today. she actually listened to the game in parts.

The Last Days of Summer

The sun came out again for a bit and Alice and I are anxious to spend as much time as we can outside. It was a little soggy, though, but we stayed outside with the spiders. They are particularly busy spinning webs right now. The keeper is trying not to walk into them, and apologizes to them when she does. It seems a little silly to us.

Beat LA!

The fabulous catsitter Julie and her family invitd the keeper to a Seattle Storm game. Now, even we know that the keeper is not a sports fan at all. Well, this may change. She came home all charged up and had lost her voice from screaming so much. The Sotrm beat LA in a playoff game in the last 14 seconds of the game. It was CRAZY. She liked the fact that the Storm played as a team, and without the glitz, and show and egos of mens' basketball. These chicas are amazing!

They may have found a new fan. next thing we know we will be wearing little Storm Tshirts for cats.

Hurrah for Hilltop Service Station

We want to say thank you to Ricky and for everyone who works at Hilltop, and to Mike who owns it. What a place! The other day our keeper drove in for her regular fill up and Ricky was back from his music tour. She says that he is one of the most observant people she has ever met. He noticed that one of the front tires was lower than usual and checked it, and sure enough found a screw embedded in it. They fixed it on the spot! Ricky finds light bulbs out, tire gashes, all kinds of little details. We are very grateful for his careful attention to our keeper's machines because we need her, even though we get crabby every once in a while.

And on the thank you's again. The keeper is still so grateful for the Prestige Copy and Print people. She went in tonight to pick up an exquisitely printed order, and realized that this business is an inter-religious crossroads. Here she was getting printing for Catholics, and an Orthodox Jew came in to pick up an order for some tickets, and all being served by a family of Muslims.

Fall Dancer and the Dance

It's starting to seem fall-ish. Yesterday the sky stayed grey, you know the grey that is like the inside of the vacuum cleaner bag? It was that kind of sky. But today the sun came back out mostly, and we found a leaf dancing in the breeze. Alice tried to catch it, but it was too high. I saw the spider web it was clinging to. Just a tiny filament turned our maple leaf into dancer and a dance. Watch our film.

Runaway

The pepper and the eggplant are putting along nicely and we keep watching them in case the squirrels or raccoons try to snatch them. Last night however, Alice decided to run away. It was dark, and the keeper called, and knowing the dangers that lurk in the dark at this time of year, I came in fairly quickly. However, Alice decided to run out the front door and sit on the neighbors porch and taunt their cat. It was warm out and the stars were out. The keeper chased her and caught her and carried her home, but just as she deposited Alice in front of the back door to let her in, Alice tore off over the back fence into dangerous territory. She didn't come back for several hours. The keeper called and called. But no cat. So we shut the doors, and the keeper made chowder..oh what a rich smell..fennel, cream, leeks, lemon....And she was MAD. Finally around 10 PM, Alice shows up at the deck door, and the keeper let her in silently without a word, not even a "Bad cat!" She ignored her stonily for a long time. Alice, the attention hog, understood quickly that she was felina non grata. I took pity on her and licked her head and neck and tried to tell her about the raccoons and what they had once done to me. Today, all is well, and of course, because of Alice's escapade, we were grounded all day and night inside.

Sometimes when I am around Alice I feel very old. I have learned so much in these last 14 years. I have made many mistakes and paid for them, and no one could have talked me out of running into the woods to find the raccoons. I am just grateful that the keeper was there to chase after me, tend my wounds, and let me and my wounded pride heal. Alice will have to learn the same thing for herself, I suppose.

The Phone is Our Friend, Most Days

The phone is a source of aggravation. These past few days the keeper actually thew the phone down to the ground and yelled many bad words. She said that only we and the recorded music and message voices heard her. The first time she was trying to get hold of a carpet cleaner for the house at the beach. She was on hold for 1/2 hour and was dropped three times by A Tand T as they tried to figure out why she got direction to call them when she called the carpet cleaners. She said ATT thought she was the carpet cleaner who hadn't paid her bill is many many months, and she kept trying to tell ATT that she only wanted to hire the carpet cleaner. When they all figured that out, ATT tried to sell her new phone service. That was 90 minutes of a beautiful day. Pffft!

Then her bank didn't send a payment on time to a major credit card co, and she asked them to fix it, but in order to fix it, she needed to have 3 way conference call with the company and the bank and it took 2 weeks to get everyone together on both coasts to get rid of a $10 late fee, and today it was another 20 minutes on the phone answering security questions so they could get her permission to allow the bank to talk to the credit card people. PFFT.

Then, she had been trying to reach her attorney about some routine paperwork since July, but no one was returning her calls. Finally today he called and he is very ill. He is a lovely man and it is very sad. However, since she belows to a special Legal Service plan she called to get the name of another attorney who could help. They are based on the other coast. She got the name of a new attorney, and after setting up an app't, found out the law office is 3o miles away from our home. Big PFFT! So she told them no thank you. she was too weary to call the Legal Service back. Besides, it might have gotten dark and she wouldn't have been outside all day.

She also wondered about how the people who answer the cutomer service lines stay sane. If they had a call like hers every ten minutes, it could really drive one over the edge.

No wonder the spirit of meanness is pushing its ugly head out everywhere we turn.

She did go out and put Bondo ( the most foul smelling stuff--don't ask what's in it) on the cracked windowsills outisde and then painted them again.

We believe she needs a much simpler life.

Re-Webbing

We had a lovely day outside. The keeper worked out of the house today because she needed to put out a newsletter and do a pile of reading. That meant we got to stay outside all day. And we got to start the day with more real chicken and some baby food with rice for my delicate digestive system, due to my puddle slurping this week.

The keeper spent some time outside reading and kept bumping into and destroying spiders' webs. She apologized and tried to move what was left of the webs to a nearby post or beam. But she was fascinated by a little spider whose web she ripped apart earlier. Several hours later, the little golden arachnid had respun another web. Resilience! And it also preserved the other insects it had caught earlier. It just wove them into the new web. WOW.

We were amused by the story of the cattle stopping in at 7-11 in Puyallup and the cowboys riding their horses into the store to round them up. We are also amused by the lengths people will go to connect with saints. Someone has produced a Virgin Mary Flash Drive with a red LED heart which beats when data is transferred. We are sure that Archie McPhee's may end up stocking them, we doubt we will see them at Kaufers anytime soon.

On another note, we watched The Golden Compass tonight. Not that great We liked the daemon companions though. The keeper is reading Flannery O'Connor stories now.

Garden Fruits and Vegetables

What a wonderful day! It is hot again, and once the keeper got home from her office, we got to stay outside or hours! Just to soak up the sun on the deck, to chase the squirrels. Do you know that the apples on squirrel's grave have not been stolen? They know! We know they know!

But the rest of the squirrel clan is back in the yard raiding apples, and bringing us things we don't grow, like walnuts.

The keeper collected some more of our vegetables tonight. It's not a lot, but it's wonderful to be able to grow something that people can eat. We suppose she wouldn't live very long on the little bit that she can grow. And all those flowers are just not edible. We are not too interested in the vegetables, ourselves. But we are impressed that she would be able to grow anything!

Requiem for Squirrel

Today the keeper went back to work and we stayed inside. It's hard to stay inside when you know that there are many exciting things going on and many lost opportunities. The blue jay did not return. However, we did hear the squeal of the squirrel as the car hit him on the street as he was trying to run with stolen fruit in its mouth. The car didn't see him and he may never have seen the car. But from our window we could see his little body lying still on the road. No one moved him. Kids walked over him, kicking him a little. But he lay there getting cold and stiff throughout the day. When the keeper came home, she listened to the president--of course, we had to listen too if we wanted to eat. We think he challenged people to grow up and grow together working on this huge issue. We are lucky because we have pet health care, but we are aware that we have better health care than many people in this country, and certainly way more than many millions across the world. We are just pets, but we sure wish people would think as kindly about each other and especially the most vulnerable, at least as much as they think about their pets. We are hoping that the adults will grow up and take of this. Anyway, I digress.



So, the keeper finally got us food, and then she went out with the shovel and we didn't go with her, because we knew what she was after. he invited us to come and help bury the squirrel in the shade garden, but I watched from a distance. When you are an animal, life is fragile, and it's hard to see other animals hurt. But she dug a grave, lined it with pine needles and leaves and placed the squirrel in it, and after covering it with the dirt, she put on layers of leaves, and a frame of pine cones, and finally, decorated it with apples because the squirrel had been carrying an apple when it got taken by death. It's a nice tribute. It's funny, there were no squirrels in the yard this afternoon and evening after the accident. Maybe they will visit the grave and have an apple. We will be watching.

Aubergine with a Violet West

We will have a little eggplant this year! Remember we showed you the flower over a month ago! The keeper was checking on the plants this afternoon, and lo and behold she found the eggplant! Right now it's the size of a Roma tomato, so we don't know how much time it has to get to full size. I, Stassi, have been feeling quite poorly. It's my own fault. I was so excited to see the rainwater lying about in pools and in the plates under the pots, I had to taste it. It has so much flavor and tells sotries of dirt and bugs and hints of other animals. Not at all like the purified water in our dishes or in our cat water fountain. The up side of being sick is that the keeper poaches chicken for us both. Alice doesn't need it but we know that she will steal mine if she doesn't get her own.
The keeper left for a Mass tonight in Issaquah, and said that the traffic to get there was a crawl. We could have walked faster on I-5, she said. But on I-90 coming west this eve, she told us that the Olympic Mountains had become violet and the clouds on the horizon were fushia and it was pure delight driving home, as if returning to us wasn't enough!

Blue Jay Morning

This morning the keeper was still on her break and so we all got up late. The keeper stayed up finishing Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. But no sooner had we headed outside than we were harassed by the noisiest blue jay. We don't know if he was mad or hungry or lost, but he dive bombed us, dug up the dirt in the hanging pots, and eventually flew

away screeching all the way. It was a pretty bird, though, as birds go. The keeper spent yesterday constructing the potting bench which she gave herself for her birthday. Today, she wheeled it out to its place in the backyard. Our opinion: very impressive. We know she will become an even better gardener now. Meow. But it will be one more place for us to perch.

Labor Day Picnic Inside

We had company tonight. J and W came for a Labor Day picnic inside because they didn't get together for July 4th outside this year. And I was on my most obnoxious charming behavior. I scored a chunk of chicken breast for Alice and me. I just kept whining at the keeper and she gave it to us in the hopes we would go away. We did. For 15 minutes. Here I am most daring. It got us a little more chicken in the other room. They were having green pesto pasta with chicken. Then I sat in the extra chair and posed and watched J and W dine and chat with the keeper all night. J brought a homemade peach pie that they all oohed and aahed over. It seems like they had a wonderful time. No one wanted to go home.

Rain, Sigh II

Well, it is coming down like nails, and we are stuck inside. The keeper went to church, and we sit and wait for relief. It will take a lot of energy to wander around and remark all of our spots. Not a happy day. But the garden angel doesn't look any too happy either outside.

The keeper did finally come home and when it stopped raining we surveyed the hints of fall. In fact the pine needles are now covering the new garden and turning it golden.

Full Moon, Slimy Visitors

Our Garden angel seems a little preoccupied at the moment.

But when the moon rose full--all gold and shadowswept we were all eyes. Alice and I wanted to stay out with the moon, but the keeper told us there was a cougar out there. Then later we heard it was 15 miles away from us. Hmph.

Rain? Sigh.

We hear that the rain is coming this weekend. The keeper is moving lots of stuff inside. It is beginning to feel like Fall and the Black-eyed Susans are poking their faces out, and the spiders are webbing everything up. They must be catching insects for the winter. The keeper isn't paying too much attention because she is frantically trying to put together a sermon in Spanish for the weekend. We don't understand what could be so difficult about that. She loves to talk, and we know that if all those people in church are like us, we don't listen too carefully unless she mentions "treat" or "salmon".

Lettuce Living Large

Today the keeper went off to her office, and we had to come inside. She reminded us that she goes to the office and that's why we eat premium food. OK. But tonight when she came home she pulled out monster mutant lettuce from the refrigerator, and told us she had bought this from the organic farmers at the Lake Forest Park Farmers' Market on Sunday. She said that no hormones or steroids or anything other than good compost was used. It took up our whole sink!
We don't eat lettuce, so we didn't try it, but she said it was really tasty. Personally, we prefer the green pasta with chicken. We think she will not have to buy lettuce till December.

September, already!

August slipped through our claws, and it rained on the first day of September! The keeper was a little put out because last night she was having a group of friends--can you believe they call themselves LEMMINGS?-- over for dinner and she planned on having it all out on the new bright red deck. Ha! They all came inside and stayed and stayed. We didn't mind getting to stay out beyond our curfew, but it was a little wet out there. We finally got to come in and had some green pesto chicken pasta. One of the LEMMINGS was allergic to us, and we didn't want her to feel too bad, because she was snorting and coughing up a storm. Although we like company, we are always happy when things get back to normal around here. The keeper hates to see them all go, though. They all seemed pretty happy with whatever it was they were talking about, though.