I'm having another one of those weeks/months/whatever where trying to do anything feels like slogging through pudding (both physically and mentally). I was at home most of today working on my lab meeting talk for tomorrow and waiting for the maintenance guy to come by (we got fancy new toilet and shower heads), trying my hardest to concentrate. I did get a little done, but more often than not the second I started working in earnest, something like this would happen this is from the computer's eye view-- I heart Photo Booth).



In other news, this week sucks. Lousy luck abounds for me. Add that to aforementioned pudding slog and the fact that my one major accomplishment of the week was to schedule what will hopefully be my penultimate thesis committee meeting (defense being the last) for December 18, reminding me how little I've actually gotten done and causing me to wonder exactly how much crack my advisor is on if he thinks I can easily graduate next spring, and you get one thoroughly demoralized Robin.

And I still don't get an actual day off (sure, I've got fun things, but I don't have time to just sit at home and recharge my introverted little brain, catch up on to do lists and the like) until... November, actually. Turns out Sal's parents are coming into town this weekend which means it's oh-crap-clean-the-house time (after I finish the lab meeting talk and paint the cornhole set for Saturday's tailgate). I'm exhausted just thinking about it. I need a lab minion stat.

Because we knew from the moment we met them that the cats would be difficult to keep from weaseling out doors, we constructed what we lovingly refer to as a catlock (like an airlock, but for cats). Two makeshift doors swing out and close off our front entryway and latch together.

Lately, Strange has been running into the entryway ahead of us whenever it looks like we're going somewhere. He'll sit or lie down in front of the door and look at us as if to say "where we going, guys?" It's cute and all, but we pretty much just remove him and then secure the catlock door.

This morning, we were heading to the front door to leave for work and I noticed Charm was lounging in the entryway next to the mirror. He got up as we approached and tried to slink toward the door sneakily. As we were watching the whole time, we grabbed him and set him back in the dining room, Sal latched the catlock door and I opened the front.

That's when Sal yelped, and fortunately my response was the correct one: to close the door quickly. Strange, the little bastard, used his brother as a decoy to try to get out the front door with us. While we were busy removing Charm, he hid under the card table that's folded up against the wall. It's like those scary spitting dinosaurs in Jurassic Park. I don't like where this is headed.

I mean, it's all fun and games until they start refining uranium. Which one of them will do while the other rolls around on his back asking for demanding belly rubs as a diversion. So if you don't hear from us for a while, get ready to welcome your new tabby overlords.

I present (no, not Nathan Fillion in a kilt again, though that can be found here) the Matrix: Reloaded Burly Brawl as performed by common household pets:



In other news, I AM SO OVER THIS COUGHING CRAP. Wonder when my trachea will get that memo. Dry coughing fits HURT.

It's not daily, nor consistently weekly, so I'm going with "sporadic." It's a good word, if nothing else. And most people my age (particularly women) learned it from the movie Clueless.

Anyway, more pictures up at my Picasa page. A teaser:


The cat boys were very, ahem, helpful, during the last stages of editing my paper.

So, the good news is, I'm on my way out the door to get a shiny new computer!

The bad news being that it's because my laptop bit the dust-- HARD-- yesterday. I had never seen the legendary translucent screen of death, but now I get it if I open more than one program at a time. What, I want to have Firefox AND email open? Bah, silly person.

I'm not super thrilled about the expenditure, but it was inevitable I suppose. My hope had been to hold out and get a new one for my birthday, but that's just not going to happen. It will be nice to not have to wait 10 minutes every time I hit apple-P though, that's a plus.

I've been pretty remiss with the blogging lately. It's been kind of weird inside my head, plus I'm still busy as hell with work (my advisor upped the "n" required for some of my experiments from 3 to 6, luckily I'm badass enough to get that done in a weekend and have the data tomorrow afternoon) and the writing struggle (for which I've kept browsers closed and AIM logged off), and I've been tutoring a lot lately as well. So, apologies for the incommunicado, but it's likely to continue.

( A few quick things worth updating: )

When we got home, the commander-in-chief's ball was in full swing, covered by Rachel Maddow and MSNBC. President (!) Obama gave a very good small speech that was very military-focused (so I was kind of hoping my Obama-dubious soon-to-be-marine-wife sister caught it, it might make her a little more comfortable?) and had a satellite feed to some soldiers from the Chicago area serving in Afghanistan (the president was chagrined to find that all but one of them were Cubs fans, rather than White Sox fans). Then he introduced his wife, to much applause. After a pause, he turned around and said "I think I might have been stood up..." just as Michelle came out in a really beautiful white one-shouldered dress. And they started to dance. To "At Last." It was just a really wonderful, blub-inducing moment. Made me think of Peter and Sara, who danced to that song first at their wedding.

As Her Dark Majesty put it over AIM: "Where do they get off being so damned adorable? They're the presidential version of your kitties."

Indeed.

In the interests of my sanity (hah!) I spent most of yesterday and today finally watching Arrested Development (I'm halfway through season 2 now), playing with the kitties, tidying the apartment and messing around with my paper's figures and organization. Today I had my cute circuits blown not once, but twice. First, earlier this afternoon I went looking for the little crepuscular beasties, and eventually flipped up the couch cover to find this:



Gah! With the cuddling! And the tango arms! Yes, I know I should have let them be, and not flashed the flash at them (a few times) but... really, what am I supposed to do?! Again, the squinting has more to do with the flash than with the irritation that I admit is pretty clear on their faces. I think.

Then later I was folding laundry on the bed, where Charm had been napping, when Strange hopped up and went to bother his brother. There was mutual grooming and I think the pitch of my squeal probably isn't even audible for dogs. It's ridiculous. I said "Sal, you must get in here right now!" And the second he sticks his head in the doorway, both cats look up at him with this clear "what? we didn't do anything!" look, and all I could say was "you jerks." Strange eventually flopped down rather unceremoniously half on top of Charm and both went back to sleep.

Anyway, to bed. Throat still hasn't gotten any better and now for some reason the insides of my ears itch, which may be the most infuriating thing I can think of. Gr.

I know, it's been entirely too long since I provided fodder for your cute fix. In penance, I first offer this scientific study, which in recent days has proved uncomfortably true. What is it that forces me to talk in a stupid voice whenever I get within range of the boys? Yeesh.


Next, more pictures are up at the cat depository.




Nothing really to report, other than they're fuzzy and adorable. And feeling much healthier, so stampedes are more frequent. How can two tiny fuzzballs sound like galloping elephants? Also, Sal has been admiring my range of not-at-all-cute nicknames for the beasts. I started calling them snot monsters while they were sick, and I haven't stopped. Also booger-head. Because booger is a fun word to say. And poop-factory (because boy howdy are they). These nicknames have a general bodily-secretion theme.

Also: these are probably the best cats ever. They actually scratch on their scratching posts! And not once on our furniture (yet, knock on wood). Though once on Sal's pant leg, that was kind of funny.

Okay, I was never really sure how people could be capable of treating animals badly-- I mean, I'm the girl who didn't want to hurt her stuffed animals' feelings and all, but it just didn't make sense that other people could want to hurt living animals. But lately it's becoming even more incomprehensible-- I mean, I feel terrible giving Strange his medicine, even though I know it's good for him. So I can't even conceive of a reason mistreating animals might be considered okay by some. It's not like the animals don't make it obvious when they don't like what you're doing.... Just, wow. I don't want to think about it too hard though, I don't need to hate humanity this weekend.

If it's not one thing it's another with these cats! The snuffles seem to be gradually clearing up, but we still have 10 more doses of amoxicillin (though I am getting much better at doing it quickly, so that's a plus). And now one of them has the runs (which I kind of think could be a result of the antibiotic, but of course I don't know for sure and I wouldn't know what to do about it anyway since I don't want to stop a course of antibiotics!). And they still think 6am is a good time to wake up.

I do love them to death, since they are soft and fuzzy and sweet. We're certainly not going to give them back. I'm just a bit exhausted trying to deal with each new special case!

Does anyone know how worried we should be about kitty diarrhea? I know to be careful about giving them lots of water, but as usual searching the internet really only gives the scary information. We gave them some wet food with brown rice in it, as recommended by their foster mom, but that's about all we know to do. If nothing else, we'll probably drop by to see the rescue people at Petsmart tomorrow I guess. *sigh* *yawn* Time to go pet kitties. They do have their advantages, even if they're being medically tricky....

---

ETA: Thanks to Theresa below and Allison, pet-taker-carer-of extraordinaire (who says it's almost definitely the antibiotics), I have successfully calmed. The issue is that I *think* stuff like this isn't too big a deal, but WHATIFITSNOT?! And the internet is not helpful in that regard. So thank you, experienced people ;)

Strange was not happy with us this evening. We wouldn't let him up on the table during dinner, even though he kept jumping on people's laps and trying to sniff at our falafel. Then it was medicine time again, and mister squirmy managed to get away after only half the medicine was dispensed. So I had to track him down *again* and pin him down *again* to get the remaining pink goop in his mouth. After that he pretty much hid under the sofa all night.

Until a package arrived from Aunt Sara and Uncle Peter containing gifts for the boys. And there were even more toys inside the box! (Though the box was the primary object of Charm's interest at first.) The first is a collapse-able tube made of material that makes a lovely crinkly sound, and the second is a puff ball on a spring for batting at. Charm immediately began sniffing around, particularly interested in the loose tie-strings on the ends of the tube. But as you can see from the picture, our little lurker had his interest piqued...


(that's Charm in the tube, and Strange emerging from under the couch to take a look)

And mere minutes later, mister lethargic had lept into action. As you can see here.... So thanks for the toys, Auntie and Uncle-- they're a huge hit :)

More pictures up here. Explanation of title reference here.

Because let's face it, I wouldn't mind being 'Liss when I grow up (and thanks to Andrea's suggestion, and because who *doesn't* need more fuzziness in their life?)....



As Willow says of Miss Kitty Fantastico in Season 4 of Buffy: "I keep thinking 'Okay, that's the cutest thing ever.' And then she does something cuter and completely resets the whole scale."

Strange has been a bit antisocial yesterday and today, which we think is due to his cold getting worse. We took the boys to the vet this evening (though I think I was more freaked out than they were), and I hope that one day they may forgive us for causing their temperatures to be taken. The vet was very nice, and asked if we were physicists. He said most rescue cats come with the same upper respiratory virus, and they should get over it in a week or two. However, Strange's nose may have a secondary bacterial infection (mucus is pretty cloudy) so the vet prescribed a week of amoxicillin. The bottle says for veterinary use only, but it smells like bubble gum, so I think it's the same stuff that Shelby used to take all the time when she was little. The problem is that when Strange is already feeling a bit timid, and kind of skittish after the vet (particularly with regards to being held) and THEN we pin him down and squirt bubblegum down his throat.... He does seem to be a bit more active after a couple hours downtime (of course, right before bed) but as I found out cats are obligate nose-breathers I can't imagine he's having much fun with all the snot.

Charm, on the other hand, is having all the fun. His two favorite games are ribbon-on-a-stick and flop-over-onto-people-and-look-cute. The former is hilarious because he'll actually play tug-of-war like my sisters pit bull mix, and just like cousin Tommy, when he "wins" he drags the toy on a victory lap and then to his lair under the bed. The latter is just plain adorable. He jumped up next to me on the couch and flopped over on his side, and only avoided falling off because I caught him. It's still a bit odd to me to pet a cat's belly, but he seems to love it. Anyway, that's the source of the picture. And it was so cute I *almost* forgot that the beasties woke me up at 6 by sneezing in my face....

Also, as usual, the pic site has been updated. And let me know if I'm being irritating/gloaty, I can make a filtered list for the squee-ers among us so as not to annoy anyone!

More pictures up here


There. Killed that for you.


strange likes tall things


The lurkers below (the couch)

Okay, Peter still has us beat, but we still feel the uncontrollable urge to take and post ridiculous numbers of pictures. So, here's the album.

Yes, they look almost identical. So far the most reliable way we've found to tell them apart is that Strange's eyes are yellow, and Charm's are green. They're not used to wearing collars (Strange gets very preoccupied with catching the tag) so we're only putting them on for short periods at a time, but eventually they'll be color coded that way. They're also easy to tell apart by personality-- Strange is very outgoing and loves to explore, and is quite fond of batting at and carrying around toy mice (he also hasn't stopped purring since he got here). Charm is quieter and more reserved, prefers to stay on the ground while his brother jumps onto every available surface, and prefers the stick-with-ribbon toy to the mice.

( there's more, cut for your convenience )

Finally got in touch with Bay Area Cat Rescue and they'll be delivering our furry little creatures tomorrow evening! So we're scrambling to tidy a bit (mostly because we don't want the volunteers to think we're slobs just because all our Christmas stuff is lying about) while getting ready for the New Year's party we're going to. And I'm still a bit nervous, but mostly just really excited! So if you want to see fuzziness this weekend, let us know via email-- we're hoping to spend tomorrow night and most of Friday just us, but then we were hoping to socialize them a bit with other people, so that's where you all come in, if you can stand the horrible torture ;)

Meet the new Trujillos:

kitty1, known for now as Rudolfo:

(Do ignore the "first time father shell-shock" look on Sal's face-- we had just been in the car 4 hours to get home from Redding, having left at 8am and he was tired. And admittedly, we were both a teensy bit overwhelmed.)

kitty2, known for now as Nevada:

The Cat Rescue volunteers, who had stepped out of the room to allow us time to discuss, but were spying on us through the door in the window, all burst out laughing when I took this picture-- it's not zoomed at all, Nevada was quite happy to have his picture taken.


( non-photographic details below the cut )

(Because a) I was reminded by the adorable felinity on the card we got from Theresa, and b) we were out of town this weekend and thus didn't get to visit petsmart)

The Bay Area Cat Rescue website has been updated, so there are pictures of all 3 pairs of kitties we have looked at (none of whom have been adopted in the meantime! though that's just going to make us want to take ALL of them home, even though our building has a 2-cats-max rule....). Here they are:

Giovanni and Santiago (my current favorites, but only by a bit)
Holly and Noel (definitely the saddest story-- they were in a litter of seven set to be put down, and the rescue lady could only save two)
Eric and Marble (Sal's current favorites, but only by a bit)

I need to get some paper work done, but I'd really rather do the OMG KITTEHS thing ;)

got to watch doctor who second (new) season finale last night, SUPER good episode. apparently when it aired in the UK, it got more viewers than the world cup finals! and today we get last week's "new" episode (scare quotes since this season is already over in the UK) followed by this week's. so i'm getting my davidtennantness (good golly he's adorable, particularly in the cardboard 3D glasses). and also my catherinetateness (speaking of: found this a couple days ago, was very amused).

our christmas tree is up and running, with only one minor hitch when we realized most of the way through the box of ornaments that tinsel garlands should go on *before* ornaments. we've had our pine candles going to make up for the whole fake-tree thing. but it's awfully nice. i had the nutcracker on dvd while we were decorating, but it's still 75 degrees and sunny, so it was pretty hard to get into the mood. working on it though, once it gets cold i'll be good and ready. i'm making dough for gingerbread and sugar cookies tonight so we can cut and bake them tomorrow. with a party on saturday i have to get my tush in gear!

and, finally, the ( cat hunt continues )

let's do videos first. this one's a classic, but i can't seem to get enough of it. 'course i'm a sucker for polar bears, and when it's a baby, what am i supposed to do? also it's stephen colbert. doing a german accent. so win all around.


this has made the rounds, it seems, but i had only seen a (for some reason) tiny version. and it's fairly apropos, particularly given that kim and mike do in fact have a roomba (they call it herbert). thanks for the real one, daniel!


and this... well, it's just weird. very, very weird.


( now, for the cat stuff: )