04.31 pm
*puff-pant* *puff-pant* You know, there’s quite a lot to be said for “adopting”, or “rescuing” a couple of adult-aged cats, rather than a pair of cheeky, bouncy, energetic little kittens – though as a matter of fact, Sal isn’t a “kitten” any more – at 18+ weeks he’s now considered a teenager – with all the “I’m not talking to you anymore!” sulks, the sweet, gentle purring cuddles when he wants something, combined with bouts of wild exuberance and frenetic zooming around the house, as though someone had set fire to his tail, that comprises cat adolescence! Satai, of course, is still a bubsy, bumbling little kitten – full of volume and bounce (like a good shampoo?) and just like a human toddler, he’s into absolutely everything! I was given a beautiful embossed leather-bound journal with lovely hand-made paper pages for Christmas – an object to grace one’s desk, or the loungeroom coffee table, not locked away in a drawer somewhere… but it’s rapidly getting to the point where I’ll have to do just that, and hide it away “in a safe place” – or until Satai finishes teething, anyway! He’s now sitting on a corner of my desk – right next to the shelf where my nice leather-bound book is – and you’d think that butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth, sitting there looking at me with those innocent little kitten eyes… and then off he goes, exploring my desktop – just out of my reach (it’s a big desk!) and getting into stuff that he knows he’s not allowed to! Because both of them like to drink water out of a glass, as well as their own water bowls, I’d craftily put a card out of my card index box over the top of the glass of water on my desk… but the card being bigger than the rim of the glass, and Satai being small enough not to be able to see the glass underneath the card, thought that the card was just something else that he could climb on. After saying “No!”, and removing him – several times – from the ingredients of a disaster just waiting to happen, I had to resort to playing with him to keep him occupied and quiet – or what passes for “quiet” in a Bengal, anyway.
You can see a corner of my leather-bound book on the shelf in the background…
Isn’t he adorable? 🙂
Yesterday was my very favourite eldest daughter’s birthday, and as her husband is now back at work, she came over for the day. We took her to lunch at The Arena, at The Glen, and bought her some ### ###### for a Birthday Present (hashed out, because you never know – she might be reading this, and she’s supposed to have “forgotten” about them until her Big Birthday Bash on January 21st!) and afterwards came back here and watched episodes of “The Flash”, “Arrow”, and “Legends of Tomorrow”, until it was time for Julian to drop her off at home, where Neale was going to whisk her off for a Birthday Dinner somewhere…
The day before yesterday though – remember, we picked Satai up on Monday afternoon. He’d yowled all the way home in the car, and Sal wasn’t terribly impressed to meet his new little brother, though Satai took to him like a duck to water… however Monday and Tuesday were a little “tense“, shall we say, with Satai totally horrified by these strange giant hoomans who’d catnapped him and carried him off to a very different place to the one he’d grown up in, and also slightly reproachful that Sal, a fellow cat in a not very pleasant place, didn’t want a bar of him! Poor Sal, he didn’t understand why his happy idyll with his new Mummy and Daddy had to be ruined by the arrival of this tiny, spotty, noisy – and far too bouncy – piece of fluff! He slunk around, turning sad and reproachful eyes towards us… how could we do this to him! But… who can resist the charms of a kitten for very long! No matter how much he glowered, hissed, growled, and spat at the little scrap of fur, the little scrap of fur just kept on bouncing up to him, wanting to play! It didn’t take long until they were playing – then Sal would remember “Oh yes, I hate this horrible little kitten, don’t I!”, and with a hiss or a growl – and sometimes both – he’d stalk off indignantly. My very favourite eldest daughter took some photos of them yesterday – this is one of them:
As you can see… they get along very well now 🙂
But getting back to the day before yesterday! We took Satai up to the Vet for the customary “check-up to make sure we got a healthy specimen”… At this stage he was very reluctant to let us handle him for longer than 2.4 seconds at a time, hated going in cars, objected strongly and loudly at being shut up in the cat carry basket, and in other words behaved like a spoilt brat having a tantrum. Have I told you how noisy he is yet? By the time we got from Vermont South to Blackburn, our ears were ringing! Literally! He screeched, he shouted, he yelled, he screamed! It’s truly a wonder that we didn’t develop nerve deafness! We took him into the waiting room at the Vets – and he didn’t even stop to take a deep breath! He just kept on yowling! How something so small can create so much noise is totally beyond me! The nurses there were very kind, and made lots of soft, kind, and gentle “encouragement-type” sounds to the three of us – not that we could really hear what they were saying over Satai’s screeches! Then another nurse came out – she’s been there since the year dot. She’d been out in the back and had heard all the noise – and thought to herself “That sounds like a Bengal!” – which of course is exactly what Satai was busy telling everyone, whether they wanted to listen or not! As it turns out, she knows the guy who bred little Satai because he used to go there (to the surgery) many, many years ago, when the practice was owned by Dr. Peter Cullen – so that was somewhat comforting to me, because we started going to that surgery when Dr. Cullen was there – but that’s a very long story for another night! Well, Satai had his exam, was pronounced fit and healthy, had his claws clipped, and had his next inoculation, which was due around about then anyway. He’s a precocious little lad, and insisted on exploring the surgery (yelling the whole time) and then we brought him home. By this time I’m afraid I was at the snappy, snarly stage of telling him to “SHUT UP!” But once we got back inside and let him out of his cat carry cage, he calmed down pretty quickly – and do you know, since then he’s been a changed boy! He doesn’t object to being picked up and cuddled anymore, though unless he chooses to clamber up on you of his own volition – which he does a lot of – he’s sometimes very wriggly and difficult to hold, as he’s very easily distracted – and a distracted kitten is a very wriggly kitten! The first thing he wants in the morning – besides his breakfast – are pats and cuddles! He loves being with us and making us play with him! In between bouts of playing with him, he spent the afternoon curled up underneath a little plastic footstool close to my feet, under my desk!
Sal sleeps on our bed with us, but at the moment Satai is sleeping in the Library, because (a) he’s a chatterbox – he hardly ever shuts up, and (b) the bed’s still a bit high for him to jump up onto, and I don’t want to risk him hurting himself if he falls awkwardly, either trying to jump up, or trying to jump down. When he’s big enough to jump up on the bed unaided, I reckon the two of them will sleep on the bed with us… and hopefully Satai doesn’t talk in his sleep! Besides… he’s a Bengal… it won’t be long before he works out how to open the Library door, and by then he’ll also be strong enough to do so, too!
My weight’s been up and down like one of Satai and Sal’s toys! At the moment it’s gone down to 71.1 kg, which is good – but we had lunch up at The Glen yesterday and I had my usual BLT – which arrived with more bacon on it that I think I’ve ever seen on a BLT before in my life! Plus I had one of my very favourite chocolate caramel slices (drool!) Needless to say, neither of us had any dinner last night! Today for lunch I had our usual “bring home food” from Baker’s Delight, and tonight we’re having some delicious looking pork cutlets, pan-fried in a little lemon flavoured olive oil with a few rosemary leaves, with some more sugar-snap peas, chips, and our usual half a tomato. For dessert I’ll have a nectarine and a fresh fig, and a CHOBANI Lemon yoghurt (erm… and about three or four cherries, just because they’re yummy!)
We played a couple of hours of WoW this afternoon – and we made good going out of them too! We went up three levels, and have pretty much almost reached the end of the Hinterland quests – though at the moment we’re in Stranglethorn Vale, where we’ll pick the adventure up again next Sunday! 🙂 Auric and Dapple had their Fish House cleaned out yesterday, so they’re looking very spick-and-span, and thank heavens our cleaning lady will be back next Monday morning! For some very strange reason, the house seems to have broken and partly chewed feathers all over the place! And there you go – once more I’ve pretty much brought you all up to speed on all the comings and goings chez nous, so that’s really about “it” from me for this evening! Don’t forget to call in again tomorrow night to see if I’ve managed to get another catch-up written, and whether or not my weight has got sick and tired of going down, and has decided to go back up again “for a change” (I mean, two days of going down has to mean it’s time for a change, doesn’t it?) Anyway, until next time, do try to bee good, remember that life is a journey, not a race, and don’t forget to always drive carefully. to look after yourselves, and to keep cool – or warm – depending on your inclination…. but above all, please remember to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂
My Word! 