QOTD: Trash Day

(Seeing me finally toss out the cardboard carrier that we brought Oscar home in ...)

Katherine: We're keeping him?
Me: Nah, but we can return him in one of the permanent carriers.

Actually, Oscar is pretty much signed on for the long haul.

Photo Friday: Three Of Kind

Sometimes, the boys all have a shared purpose:



This was after Billy had taken a closer look at Katherine's dinner:



Unfortunately (at least in their view), she never did share any.

Dawn Patrol: When the People are Away ...

We took the weekend off and went up to Victoria, BC for two nights. Our car sitter was in of course to feed and play with the boys.

No doubt Oscar didn't get enough play time without round-the-clock attention, because he was pure FRAP last night, and this morning he was running at full volume by 5;30 AM.

I tried closing the bedroom door (putting the humans in protective custody as it were), but he sat outside and meowed. So I woke up the bailiff and she remanded him to jail.

He seems to do this every time we leave town, so I expect (hope for?) him to settle down.

Photo Extra: Kitten Pile!

While we still have some concerns about how well Oscar is fitting in, pictures like this are very encouraging.



That's Oscar in the foreground, Whitey in the background. Nothing close to this ever happened with the Gray Mouser. And while Emily occasionally pretended not to notice tigers intruding within a few feet, actual fur-to-fur contact was simply not acceptable.

So we're making progress. Yay!

One kitten wrecking crew

There's a pass through between our kitchen and living room, seen in the background in this picture. This morning, Drew found paint and drywall dust on the sill in the opening.

Drew called me down to look. He had his suspicions, which were confirmed when I explained that Billy did it. He was chasing a bug (I think), launched himself toward the top of the opening, and sank his claws into the wall ... Where he discovered that he couldn't quite get enough purchase to support his weight, so he slid back down with much claws-on-chalkboard squealing and a certain amount of dust.

Dawn Patrol: Bench Warrant

After five days of peace, Oscar returned to his noisy morning ways.

The good news: He did it after 5:30 AM, not 3:30 AM.

The bad news: When Katherine decided to jail him, he didn't automatically follow her down the hall to his suite. Rather than hunt him down, she let him stay out, and he quieted down ~ 10 minutes later.

We can deal with this (more or less) if it's weekly, not every morning.

Hunter in training?

I think Billy is trying to teach Oscar to hunt.

I shut Oscar in his suite to give Billy some private playtime. Once Billy was done, I let Oscar go after the pom-pom-on-string toy Billy had been chasing. He was perfectly happy to chase it around on the floor, and onto low objects like the library's futon. But if I tossed it up a cat tower he just sat on the floor twitching his tail.

While Oscar was wondering what to do, Billy walked up, climbed the tower, retrieved the toy, and dropped it at Oscar's feet. All very casually, with nothing like his usual energy. After this happened a couple of times, I decided Oscar's problem might be that I was tossing it up too high. (He can climb just fine, but his sight lines are lower.) So I flipped the pom-pom onto a lower shelf, and then a lower one. Billy sat and watched, Oscar sat and watched. Finally, Oscar looked at Billy, looked at the toy (on the lowest shelf, now), and pounced.

No idea what Billy thought of all this, but I told him he was being an excellent big brother and gave him extra kitty treats.