Halloween!

So Halloween is approaching and because many of the people in our night class, including the instructors, are parents, it was decided that we would take the night off and finish the class a week later in December.

So, now I have a free night to spend with the kittens! Question is, what are we going to do? How do you make Halloween fun for cats?

Usually, on Halloween, I curl up with all the snacks you shouldn't eat (you know, that spare bag of candy you picked up for the "trick or treaters" in case you didn't have enough with the first 8000 chocolate bars you bought). I pull out a case of pop, not caring about sugar or calories. I grab my favorite quilt, my best horror movies and I enjoy a night of fear.

But see, Peewee doesn't seem to like horror movies. Jingle doesn't really either but as long as she can hide under the quilt in my lap, she's happy.



So, with only two weeks to go, I need some advice. Enjoy my horror night and scare the crap out of the cats? Or enjoy a night of Finding Nemo, A Bug's Life and Harry Potter and please the "kids"?

Any suggestions?

Jingle and Peewee, part 2...

"Oh where, or where has my sanity gone. Oh where, oh where can it be?"

Oh, what an eventful few days. So lets start with the first night, with Peewee sorting through my fruit bowl at 3am. The ensuing conversation with our father....

"Don't worry honey, Peewee hates bananas, he's just curious."
"Okay Dad, I'll take your word for it."

The next night, I hear Peewee on the counter again in the middle of the night. I ignore it, trusting my father. I wake up the next morning to find a mangled, chewed banana on my kitchen floor. Poor banana. What a brutal death.

Then, there's Jingle, all snuggled up on her pillow at night. Peewee decides "I'm going to curl up the cute chicks on the bed, maybe get a scratch. There's half a bed for me anyway, Jingle only takes up one pillow and that silly human who always kisses me only takes the other half of the bed." So instead of sleeping alone in the living room, he decides to join. He barely lands on the bed and Jingle, only lifting her head up, starts hissing like mad. Peewee promptly turns and runs to the condo in the living room with his tail between his legs. Poor Peewee.

Then, Jingle decides she's going to put yet more toys in the water bowl (after it's 5th cleaning for the day) and this time, instead of just drinking around them like he always does, Peewee puts his paw on the side of the bowl and tips it over to release the toys from their watery grave, then tips the bowl back over to take a drink, forgetting that the water drained with the toys. Poor Me.

I came home from work yesterday and stepped in the door and promptly kicked a decorative tin. The same decorative tins that reside on the top of my kitchen cupboards. Fearing the worst, I step over the tin and head to the kitchen and low and behold, there's three more tins on the floor/counter/sink. Complete with fresh new Peewee dents. Poor tins.

So tonight I come home after my class. It's 10:45pm, I'm exhausted, hungry, and ready for bed. I walk in and find Peewee waiting for me, meowing for a scratch or hug or any kind of attention. Letting me know that after having a mother who stays at home most of the time, it is entirely not okay for me to be gone for 15 hours. Just as I lean down to pet him, Jingle comes bounding around the corner and racing down the hall to greet her mommy and when she gets about 4 feet away from us, Peewee whips around a lets our a hiss that clearly said "Buzz off, she's mine right now." After a moment of shock, Jingle hisses back and stalks away to the bedroom. Poor Jingle.

But now, it's 1am, and I have watched the cats play together, each come up in turns for scratches and rubs on the couch while I chill a little before bed, and kiss each other on the noses. And you know what? All that stuff above? I wouldn't change any of it for the world. That's the stuff that keeps cat lovers on their toes, that makes our pets our kids, family, not just animals.

So bring it on you two! What new event am I going to celebrate and laugh over next time?

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?

So, Jingle and I had company this weekend. Mom and Dad (Grandpa and Grandma to Jingle) came for the weekend and brought Peewee and Holly. It was so wonderful to have them. They arrived late on Friday and we immediately cracked open the beer and rum. On Saturday, mom and I did some running around, Dad has his own running around to do. Then they left to have dinner with their friends John and Karen to celebrate John's 60th birthday. While they were gone, I had grand plans to watch a great Disney movie that the three "kids" would enjoy but by the time I got halfway through my own dinner, with one cat beside me on the couch sleeping, another on the top of the couch sleeping and yet another in the cat condo, you guessed it, sleeping, I lasted all of another 5 minutes before the infectious sleep took over and before I knew it, the parents were back and the cats hadn't moved. But, you know what? A wonderful nap with the cats was more than needed and totally enjoyable. Even if I couldn't move after being squished onto one half of the couch. Someone please explain to me why a tiny 7lbs cat needs a whole half of a couch to sleep when she fits into a cereal box!

So the parents returned and with mom's help, we fixed a treat for lunch the next day. Since we couldn't be together for Thanksgiving and I knew they wanted to hit the road fairly early so they wouldn't be back too late, I planned a thanksgiving dinner for lunch. A wonderful boiled ham with carrots and potatoes, slow cooked in the crock pot. And I got an Apple Pie and Pumpkin pie for desert. Although the parental units seemed to enjoy it, it delayed their leave as the meal seemed to cause them to both need a nap. But it was worth it.

So they leave, to head to TO to see my sister and her husband, and I turn around to find.... Peewee! They left him behind! So Jingle and I have a new roommate for the next month until we meet again for my birthday!

Okay, okay, we planned it ahead of time, they didn't forget their cat. Everyone needs a little Peewee company every once in a while so we all decided that Peewee would come stay at the resort for a while. Give me some extra company, play with Jingle, get a little break from Holly (okay, give Holly a break from him really). So after a day on our own, I was anticipating broken dishes, half eaten fruit, books on the floor, anything that Peewee could "explore" and get into. Thus, the humour of Peewee. So I come home from work and low and behold........... nothing. Jingle is still asleep on top of the fireplace, and Peewee is still asleep in the condo. Yeesh. I guess the weekend really wore them out. And instead of two cats coming to greet me at the door, I get half open eyes and a look from each saying "Oh, it's you" before promptly returning to sleep.

I'm not worried though. I think after a few days here, the two will get their energy back, start fighting and playing. Go back to pushing each other around for the softest warmest spot on the bed.

So welcome to our home Peewee. Now, the only thing to figure out, is how to keep you around another month until Christmas. But I promise you we'll have fun. Jingle, don't bite Peewee's ear. Peewee! That teacup isn't a toy! Jingle, jumping on Peewee isn't very nice. Peewee, don't eat the bananas!

You know what, I better go sort this out. Cheers!

Dancing With The Stars

Just wanted to say, I've watched DWTS since the beginning and have seen many wonderful performances, fun, sad, great, wonderful. You name it.

But, I must say, I'm not sure I've seen many dances more elegent than Jane Seymour and Tony dancing the Veniese Waltz to Piano Man. It wasn't a perfect dance and they didn't get the best score, but, Jane Seymour is just so naturally beautiful and elegent and watching her waltz was, in my opinion, breath taking.

Just wanted to say that.

We need more time!!!

Phew! As if Jingle and I weren't busy enough with work. Now, we have more work and a weekly night class too! So this means that we have basically no time to blog.

But, we'll try to catch everyone up.

First off, Happy Thanksgiving to anyone I didn't talk to this weekend.

So yes, work has been crazy, still haven't had a holiday, but hopefully soon I will. But it hasn't been too bad. Work is good. Just need to keep plugging.

And I've started the Dale Carnegie course too. It's a leadership and management course. For the post part, the course is about communication. So each week, we do a series of small speeches and presentations. Not nescessarily about work, just in general. It's a really great course and I'm loving it. Each week the trainers really force you out of your comfort zone. But everyone is very encouraging and so you can't help but feel safe. You know that no matter what, you're not going to be judged and so you feel safe to say anything. So it has been wonderful.

And talk about small world too. Not only is there a wonder girl in the class who happened to attend St. Mary's school with Chantelle and I, who I haven't seen since grade 8 (she was a year behind me), but I found out there is a young man there too who is a friend of Tyler's, my cousin and another man my age who is best friends with Val's brother! I was a little scared at first knowing that these people knew me and considering how open we need to be in the course, but like the others, they are wonderful and completely non-judgmental.

And Jingle of course has been wonderful as always. She is still using the pillow on the bed as her new home, spending most of her nap time and the night there. It's still sweet but I'm still occassionally waking up to find she's turned around and I'm nose to butt with her. And other times, she decides she wants to get closer and move to my pillow and lay against my face. This is usually promptly followed by me waking up in a panic because I'm suffocating. But she means well. But in short. Just is just as happy and bubbly as ever. What a godsend in these stressful times.

So that's us, not really a whole lot to report and we've just been busy, but that is us nonetheless.

Hope everyone else is doing well. It looks like you all have been busy too. Chantelle, I love the new website, I'll get on to post a comment soon.

Love you all!