A Child Of Atom

Ted sleeping in his favorite chair (you can tell from the amount of fuzz, right?) and one of his current favorite toys. He loves to bite it just behind the head and drag it around the house like a recent kill. (Back to derby girls tomorrow!)

Our cats have been having a touch of trouble lately. They seem to be getting into far more squabbles than they were a few months ago, though admittedly it is beginning to calm down again. Maybe they were just riled up because of the change of seasons? Regardless, Kid Flash and I have been searching for a solution to the problem. I think that this video may hold the answer (though KF disagrees.) Just imagine instead of two rabbits, two cats:

Tried my hand at sketching Ted today. It wasn't easy. First, he isn't a "still" cat. Second... he's entirely black, so getting a likeness is... harder. These were very quick brush pen sketches, while he was being as still as he usually gets.

Speaking of Ted, this is his new favorite toy, a length of blue polyester rope that was in our camping gear. he pulled it out during the move and has been carrying it all over the house, tucking it into random corners and chewing on it. I have NO idea why he is so interested in it.

Well, the kitties have calmed quite a bit. The program for the past two weeks has been Sarah isolated in the bedroom during the day while the house is empty, and at night when we sleep, and supervised visitations between them while we are at home. There has been very little hissing or spitting, most of it has been due to Ted's tendency to RUN everywhere he goes, and Sarah's dislike of seeing him running towards her. When he approaches slowly they can often get and stay withing 2 or three feet of each other for long periods with no problems.

Ted however can be a bit aggressive. The second he gets access to the bedroom he pees in her litter, which of course she hates, and I have to think that he knows running at her at full tilt isn't the best way to win her over. We have NO idea how to solve the litter box problem, short of changing it every night when we go to bed so that she has clean litter at all times. Once we stop isolating her however, we don't know what to do.

Ted has also gone back to "suckling" on clothing, though that has lessened as the weeks have gone on. I think he is just adjusting to a less social household. At the old apartment there was someone awake (amongst the three of us) pretty much 24 hours, here of course he doesn't have that, so he may just be lonely.

Sarah spends most of her time in corners and under furniture when they are both free, though she has at least started leaving the bedroom when she gets the chance. She used to sleep a lot in the living room chair, and on the sofa, but I haven't seen her in either place since he arrived.

We're hopeful that they are getting acclimated though, since as I said, there have been no major battles between them, and even the hissing has subsided. We'll see what happens in 14 more days when the MAJOR changes happen, all the furniture gets moved, changed, eliminated, etc. Almost everything in the apartment is changing in some way, so it should be an interesting time for ol'Sarah.

Happy Memorial Day everyone!

Tomorrow will most likely be spent doing some cleaning and preparing to move, we went to a barbecue today, and spent some time exploring the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens, so I guess that was our M Day celebration.

The cats continue their steady avoidance of one another. Ted seems to have taken custody of the living room, and Sarah has custody of the bedroom. Though they both slept on the bedroom floor last night just on opposite sides of the bed.

Maybe they'll come together someday.

I'm all tuckered out from todays explorations, so it's off to bed for me. See you tomorrow!

I have roughly a month until the momentous move up town to KF's apartment. In the last few days we discovered Sarah, that the cat KF has been cat-sitting (just like last year) was probably going to be staying on as a permanent feature. This was going to be an issue.

Sarah is an older cat, probably 5 or 6, and very very set in her ways. She also doesn't deal well with change. When her owner brought her for this last stay she spent a week or two under the bed, unwilling to come out and face the world even though she should have been familiar with the space, and the situation. Even minor changes like moving a piece of furniture is not very well received. She's been a single cat her whole life and isn't completely socialized we think.

Ted on the other hand is young, frisky, rambunctious, and pretty accepting of his situation. When we first picked him up off the streets and brought him into my apartment he blended in without really batting an eye. He was just happy to be somewhere warm and fed.

So, knowing that there were bigger changes ahead, furniture being rearranged, new furniture being brought in we decided that it might be a good idea to bring Ted over early since he was likely going to be the biggest and hardest issue for Sarah to overcome. We expected the worst frankly. Sarah can be a vocal cat, and is occasionally aggressive about letting you know what she wants. We were expecting either a big fight, or Sarah running and hiding under the bed for the next month.

What we've actually gotten has been a sort of uncomfortable Cold War. The two of them have done a little dance all day circling the perimeters of rooms watching each other and intermittently letting out a half hearted hiss, but nothing dramatic. Sarah has simply watched from a distant corner or from behind a chair or a door while Ted has sniffed and explored his new home, under the beds, in the cabinets, behind all the furniture, that sort of thing. Ted, as expected has settled in and just wants to know where all the new play spots are. Sarah is a bit more apprehensive about the whole thing.

I will freely admit that Ted has made some... passive aggressive moves. Sitting in her litter box, (thankfully just cleaned) while she stared at him from across the floor and growled. But so far no big momentous clash between the two.

We've set up two litter boxes for now, (though someday we'd prefer to get down to just one,) and we don't really know how the food situation is going to work, they are both used to being "grazers" just having a serving put out that they can nibble on all day. Whether they will eat out of the same bowl has yet to be determined.

I haven't done any catablogging in a while so I thought I'd update you.

Ted continues to be happy and healthy and is growing up to be quite a big kitty. His newest wrinkle though... he's declared war.

On toilet paper.

It started innocently enough. He'd unroll a couple feet of TP and roll around in it. Then he discovered that he could sharpen his claws in it so we'd often wake up to a roll with a claw mark or two.

The past few days though, it's been shredding, eating, ripping, clawing, digging, chewing and generally killing. This morning I discovered that he has affectively chewed and clawed a whole side off the roll.

A decision was made to start storing the TP inside the sink, and I went in search today of a new holder that I can mount there. When did TP roll holders become the height of chic? I just want a $5 piece of plastic that I can mount inside my cabinet door with double sided tape, but all I saw in the shops today were $35 piece of brushed aluminum designer swoopy wires that would require quite a bit to attach them to my tile bathroom wall. What is going on in the bathrooms of America that this has become the standard?

I haven't "cat blogged" in a while...

I took young Master Ted to the vet for the first time today, to get his basic wellness check and tests, etc. The vet says he's 4 or 5 months old, which is a bit younger than I had thought, and weigh 5 and a half pounds. He doesn't have mites or worms, (though she de-wormed him just to be safe). He has now been vaccinated for rabies and... whatever else they get vaccinated for. And let me tell you... that wasn't pleasant. He was relatively tame through most of it but the shots were not a happy time. His meow is usually quite small and meek sounding, but he was hissing and yowling at being held down and poked with sharp things. Blood was drawn for lukemia and AIDS tests, which we'll find out about on Tuesday. And we made an appointment to drop him off on the 5th to have hills little harbls removed.

I also asked about the 'wool-sucking' behavior and she said that he SHOULD outgrow it. He's actually been doing it quite a bit less since he got settled in anyway, so maybe its not an issue anymore. Now that he's home and safe and happy again he's settled down and is right back into routine. Life around here is good.

For months now I've been toying with the idea of getting a cat, possibly more than one. NYC has been going through a shelter crisis, and ... well... I wanted a kitteh.

I had decided while I was away that it was time to get this settled when I got home. Kid Flash was excited about it. Mark was excited about it... hell... even Mark's girlfriend was excited about it. This morning, after my first night in the city Kid Flash comes home from running and says "Hey, look who came to visit!" While he was running he spotted the kitten on the street, and it was friendly and loving and in need of love... so he came home with KF, and then home with me.

So now I have a new family member: Ted. I've named him after this Ted, not this one, (despite the joke in my title). KF is ambivalent about the name. I considered Creosote, and Sumi-E, and a few others, but... I think Ted is right.

He's probably a few months old, definitely out of the kitten phase, though he seems to have been weaned too early since he has a tendency to suck on my shirt, or a sheet whenever he is being petted or held. (Is that a habit to be broken, or left alone? The cat care websites seem to be split on it...)

I promise not to turn into a cat blogger. Though I guess this IS technically Friday Cat Blogging, and tomorrow IS Caturday...