I am back!!

Dear friends, I am sorry that I have been gone for so long. My guardian was having a really hard time in her life, and needed my attentions. I'm going to try and be better about logging in and checking on my friends now. Since I've been gone, my guardian has added a canine to our group. Shilo is ok as far as dogs go, but the funniest thing is how scared Shilo and Gus are of eachother!

Wow spring is int he air and I am loving it!! I wish my guardian was loving it too, but she has started having chronic migraines...so she really doesn't like the sun right now. That's part of the reason why I've been gone, I've been busy taking care of her and trying to put the invader in his place. In honor of my guardian, I am going to pass on some information about migraine headaches. These are very debilitating, and from a scientific point, not very well understood.

There is some interesting information here My guardian has not had any auras, but she is very light sensitive, and she tells me she has had a headache almost every day for the past 2 months. Sometimes they are really bad, and she has to go to sleep to get it to go away, other times she can deal with the pain. When she got her first migraine, she got an appointment to see the best migraine doctor, who was one of her teachers...but it was for 2 months! This week, she had the appointment and she finally got some medication. So now we're hoping that these pills work to prevent the migraines. Did you know that if 1 parent has migraines, the child has a 50% chance of getting them, if both parents have a history of migraines the child has a 100% chance of getting them!! There are also as many triggers as there are headaches, so most people will never learn what causes their migraines.

On a lighter note, check out this recent Two Lumps I think these cats are hilarious, and now that the invader is around I like to think I play the role of Ebenezer, and the invader is Snooch. I swear that cat is just not very bright at all. But it entertains my guardian, which counts for something.

Quiet moments

Ahhh, I have come to greatly enjoy the few, brief quiet moments that I get lately. I used to have all the quiet time I wanted, most of the day after my guardian left for school. Even after she returned, she was generally fairly quiet. But now there's the intruder, and the other human. So my days are constantly interrupted by that idiot longhair, and my evenings are disrupted by my guardian and the other human laughing and talking and generally behaving very "girly". I have always been proud of my guardian for not behaving "girly", but she has disappointed me lately. I suppose I can tolerate the longhair, as long as he stays away from my cat tree!!


In the news: There have been two discoveries reported this week, that give even more support to concepts of Natural Selection and Evolution, and helps to refute the theory of Intelligent Design. ID, as it is called, is currently very popular in some segments of the American public. These people claim that there had to be an inteeligent force behind the creation of earth, because everything is simply too complex to have evolved naturally. Most scientist,s who have a much deeper understanding of the subject than the public, believe ID is a joke. My guardian counts herself as one of these people. She likes to point out that viruses are very simple, but can do very inetering things to a host cell, and cause very complex disease processes.

His name is Gus

So, apparently the intruder has a name now...Augustus the Gray, but I will only refer to him as the diminutive Gus. My guardian thinks it is cute to call him GusGus, like in Disney's Cinderella. Hmphh. More later...I need to go put him in his place (again!...stupid cat).

A New Arrival

Well, I knew my life was going too smoothly. I should have known my guardian was up to something. I should have assigned a cat to tail her when she left the house. Because I didn't, she brought home a stranger! Another cat! And it's a boy! And he's got long hair! He's the anti-Madeline (I'm pretty sure he's not very smart)!! So I have bee too busy making sure he doesn't invade too much of my territory. Fortunately, he's a big scaredy-cat (tee hee hee), so it doesn't take much for me to bully him. He's finally learned that I will only accept him living permanently under the bed.

You know what else is crazy? This cat has no name!! He's too scared of me to tell me his cat-name, and my guardian can't decide on a human name! So she just calls out a different name each time he comes near. So now she sounds like a lunatic. I really can't tolerate that. This cat will not be allowed to lower the IQ of MY household!! Don't get me wrong... I'm all about cats finding good, loving homes, just NOT MY HOME!!! I will welcome any and all suggestions for getting rid of him.

Samples

Sorry to have been gone for so long. The internet has decided that it hates my guardian, and by extension, me! First, I wasn't able to get on Catster for a week due to "cookies" problems. I don't know what these are...but I plan to read up on them, so i can fix it next time it happens. My guardian simply is not computer savvy enough to manage this kind of problem. After we got the "cookies" fixed, my guardians modem died, so we had no internet last week!! Finally, we have gotten a new modem, and I have commandeered the computer!

I have wanted to write on several different subjects, but I think tonights entry will be a random sampling of my thoughts.

1) If your guardian is a woman...and she wants to lose weight, she should check out French Women Don't Get Fat by Mireille Guiliano. My guardian has just started it, so I don't know too much yet...but it seems to be a very practicable "life-style change" rather than those extreme diets that so many humans like to follow.
2) I have a new human: She is a Kenyan medical student, from Eldoret living with my guardian for about 6 weeks. It's been very interesting, because she's a little afraid of cats...though I am slowly winning her over. In Kenya, people don't keep pets inside their houses, they live outside only, and are not as cherished as animals here in the States.
3)Check out the Alaska Volcano Observatory (AVO), you can peer into the volcano, Augustine and get updates on eruption activity.

Baghdad Girl

Sorry I've been absent for so long, my guardian's mom didn't like me using her computer to type, so I was banned from the study. Then I had to travel to Kansas in an airplane, and I lived with my guardian's siblings (and the 2 monster dogs) for a couple of weeks. Then my guardian came back!!! I knew deep down that she hadn't abandoned me! Unfortunately, we had to get back to Utah from Kansas...and that meant a long car trip...again. I did ok in the car, but I'm still not a huge fan of traveling that way! Now we are home and staying put (so she says)!!

This weekend there was a very touching story on NPR by Scott Simon...(listen here) about a 14 year -old girl in Baghdad, Iraq. She keeps a blog, Baghdad Girl. She posts pictures of cats mostly. Her blog says "Iraq forever, cats forever and Baghdad girl forever". It is so touching to see these pictures and know that this girl is trying to reach out to people through her love of cats. I think you should all check it out, then read the comments people have been posting. It's amazing and heart-warming to see how many people listened to the story and checked out the site.

Women World Leaders

This has been a great year for women in politics. Chile has just elected its first female president, Dr. Michelle Bachelet. She joins Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, Liberia's new president, and Angela Merkel, Germany's new chancellor as leaders of their countries.

These women have very impressive educational and political backgrounds. Dr. Bachelet was trained as a surgeon, and worked for the World Health Organization. Mrs. Johnson-Sirleaf was educated at Harvard and worked for the World Bank, and Dr. Merkel has a doctorate in physics! It is so nice to see women as accomplished as these, be recognized for their leadership through democratic elections.

At the same time, it is very sad to me that America, who tries to carry the banner of free and equal democracy, has yet to even field a woman candidate from the two major parties. Why must our country continue to hold to its puritanical roots?

If you'd like to read about Dr. Bachelet's plans, check out her website (it is all in Spanish though!).

Complete Discombobulation!

Happy Belated New Year Catsters!!!

I have such a story to tell (yet again!). My guardian has abandoned me in California at her parents house! It seems she has to live in Illinois for the month, and pets are not allowed (boo!) I have no idea what to do with myself. This house is so big, and without my guardian to play with, or talk to, I find myself wandering the house meaowing aimlessly. My guardian's mom has not yet mastered cat-speak, so I'm struggling to be understood here. But, never fear, I am being well taken-care of...I am treated like the princess I am, and have fully converted my guardian's mom into a cat lover. She loves curling up with me and watching tv and she frets over everything: my talking, my cold ears, my food and even litter box habits!

I finally managed to break into the computer room and access the internet, so I can now update my catster diary. I added pictures today too! These were taken at my temporary home by my guardian's sister. She got a new camera for Christmas and liked practicing, with me as her subject. I particularly like my new primary photo, outside on the rock. Another photo shows one of my Christmas presents from my dear friend Camilla. I love batting it around, particularly when I grab it by the tail and throw it in the air!!

The Great Journey of the Ark

Dear readers, I have a horrific story to tell you today. Prepare yourself, because what follows is part of every cats worst nightmare. I shall start at the beginning...

My guardian's brother and sister each have a dog, Koda and Sushi. The siblings didn't want to board them for Christmas and New Years, so they decided to drive from Kansas to California with the dogs. Their sister (my guardian) convinced them to come visit us in SLC for a few days, so they could do some shopping and skiing. This is the beginning of the nightmare; two DOGS living in MY house for 3 days!! Then, all 6 (3 humans, 3 animals) of us would travel together to California. Their parents said it was like Noah's Ark! Surprisingly, the visiting dogs weren't too horrible. They usually took the dogs with them, and when they didn't, they locked them in a room away from me. How kind and considerate! Monday night, there was a bustle of activity. My guardian started to pack her traveling bag and stuff in the apartment began to disappear. Very early yesterday morning (6 am!), they got up, grabbed me (and the dogs), and put me in the CAR! I get very upset when I'm being forced to ride in the car, and I usually throw up once or twice in the first couple of hours. My guardian's sister was assigned to clean that up. Ha! Then I settled down and slept for a very long time. Occasionally, one of the dogs would sniff at me, and I would have to hiss a warning at them. So we rode in the car. Usually this trip takes about 13 hours, and since I've done it twice, I was prepared for that. But the siblings hit some very bad traffic, where they went 11 miles in 1 and1/2 hours! They decided it would be beter to turn around, and take a "shortcut" through the Mojave desert! As they were driving, they came upon some interesting lava flows. Now, most people would drive by, and admire these flows...but keep moving. However, my guardian's sibling are getting degrees in Geology, so they were extraordinarily excited about the lava flows. So they decided to drive to them, which meant taking a little dirt road for about 1/2 mile. This was quite scary to me, as it involved many large dips and bumps! They scrambled around the lava for about a hour with the dogs! I though they had forgotten about me in the car! So now th trip has taken about 2 hours longer than usual. It turns out the "shortcut" added yet another hour, as it kind of made them backtrack a little. So, we finally arrive in Fresno at 9:30pm, which means I was in the car for 15 and 1/2 hours!! My guardian was very worried about my stress levels, but I made myself at home and seem to be doing very well.

I even played with one of my new mouse toys that my darling friend Camilla sent me for Christmas. It's so much fun to play with, I especially like to grab it by the tail, and then throw it in the air!

Well, I hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas, Hanukkah, and Kwanzaa! And a very Happy New Year!!