Here’s some standard kitten cuteness. Oliver playing, first with a pompom and then with the best toy ever – a twist tie.
Archive for the ‘animals’ Category
Playtime
August 20, 2009Back to Work
August 19, 2009I’ve been back to work for a full week now. It will be another week before classes start. There is a distinct difference over last August, in that most everything is familiar, rather than bewilderingly new and different. I expect the stress level to be much lower this year and considering that the stress level last year was drastically lower than what I was used to before that, it is going to be a good year.
Oliver is terrorizing us. He is a whirlwind biting and scratching machine. We bought a bag of 50 plastic balls for him to chase around the apartment. This morning while I was getting ready for work, he took his first dip in the toilet. I had forgotten to put the lid down. He didn’t much care for getting wet, but then he stepped into the litter box while his feet were still wet. It is the clumping style litter, so it stuck to his feet and I had to rinse them off. So, he got more than his fair share of wet this morning.
Short version
August 17, 2009Okay, so not everyone has high speed connections and you may not want to watch 10 full minutes of my average cat. He doesn’t do tricks or play the piano or dance, etc.
So, here is the short version:
Oliver vid
August 16, 2009Here are snippets of Oliver’s first evening with us. The noise in the background is the construction of a temporary litter box out of the box that was shipped from the states (in the previous post). It may have rounded corners, but it can still be useful. We had to cut it down and tape it up a bit.
I think you’ll understand how Oliver charmed us into bringing him home when you see how social and talkative he is.
Settling in
August 15, 2009
Oliver seems to be settling in. He was rather wild the first few nights, keeping us awake by pouncing on our heads, all teeth and claws. He’s discovered “under the covers” where it is nice and warm and has slept longer hours allowing us to sleep longer, too.
I bought him some plastic balls which he is very good at losing under the furniture. I’ll have to get a bigger size, I think.
It is the height of the summer heat and we won’t have a car until next month, so I doubt that I will be having too many adventures outside the walls of our apartment. So Oliver just may be the height of entertainment for a while.
I am riding the bus to work which is much, MUCH easier than this time last year. They put many new double decker buses on the line that I ride and they come fairly regularly, close to the schedule. Last year, I could wait for an hour or more and not see a 13A bus. They are nicely air conditioned, too. The taxi companies have added many new taxis also, which is evident now as I stand at the bus stop and there is long string of empty taxis driving by, looking and honking to see if anyone at the bus stop wants a taxi. This is the complete opposite of last year when the buses were running very badly and there was stiff competition for any empty taxi that might drive by, which was very rare.
Oliver
August 13, 2009
I took this picture sneakily imagining it having one of those nature channel narratives about the Daddybird in his natural habitat. Little did he know what was in store for him within the hour.
We were joined by our friend Mali, with the intention of walking over to Al Muteena street for some chicken shwarma for dinner. However, on the way we encountered a stray kitten that changed all the plans. He was too friendly and too young for me to just put him down and walk away. So, we took him back to the apartment and Paul & Mali made an emergency run to the store for litter and food. We did eventually get our shwarma, too.
So, this is Oliver. Even though he’s white, he is a camoflage cat on our marble floors. 
I have managed to get one head on view. It is blurry, because he is always in motion. The video will take a little longer to put together.
As for Kazul’s question about losing hair with the seasons. That will stop now that he has become an indoor cat. With regular meals he should be filling out a little and putting on more hair. I am interested to see just how much hair.
He purrs a lot and Mali says he purrs like a Vespa scooter. He talks a lot too, as you will hear in the video later. He’s been good and took to using a litter box right away.
I can’t wait until he sleeps through the night. Ha!
Oregon Sights
July 20, 2009
Somewhere on Oregon State Route 26. It’s nice to see evergreen trees again.
Mt. Hood
Somewhere in Deschutes County, south of Bend, Oregon
Geese above and pelicans below, both in Klamath Falls, Oregon
Look at that!
June 12, 2009Go to Kazul’s blog and see the baby killdeer that hatched in her yard. So cute! All four eggs hatched. Pretty amazing.
Roach!
May 10, 2009I was walking to the car this morning and saw a large bug on the ground. I immediately thought of the scarab beetle we saw last week, so sidestepped. Then I realized it was a big roach. After I got over my heebie geebies, I stepped on it. Yuck.
Noisy little bird
May 5, 2009I heard an obnoxious sound and looked to see if I could find the source of this noise. I wasn’t sure if it was a bird or a large bug. It turned out to be this tiny little bird. He/she is about the size of a hummingbird. They fly rather interestingly – sort of a swooping motion.
(By the way, there are no hummingbirds in this hemisphere. Hummingbirds are native to the Americas. Too bad, I think they would like the Jasmine and some of the other flowers here.)
Living the Travel Channel 