England

So, it's been the longest time! I've been rather busy, getting bigger and annoying my sisters.
I've got a new collar, being that my old red one was getting too small. I like this new one, it's tartan, mostly red, and people say I look scottish, even though DEd is English. What else is new... oh, yes, speaking of English, Mom and DEd are off to a place called England in 2 weeks. My sisters say they do it quite often, but it's the first time since I've been around. Well, anyways, apparently it's quite far from where we live and much colder. I think it must be horrible there because it is now Summer and Mom is packing her warmest clothes! She tried to explain something crazy, like, if it's Summer here, it's Winter there, but I didn't really get it. It sure sounds like a weird place.
Anyways, The Girls say that whenever they go there Mom brings back a whole suitcase of treats and toys, not that we can't buy them here, but because she misses us and thinks of us everytime she goes to a supermarket.... well, it sounds good to me! Also, they were once gone for 6 months! They don't stay that long there anymore, they're only gone for about a month now. And Grandma comes to live with us then, so that our routine and environment doesn't change. I love her so it's never a problem when we have to stay with her, I mean, for her to come stay with us.
Well, that's about it. There's a fly in the house and I have to exterminate it. It comes with being the man of the house.
Purrs,
Cheese

I've been tagged!

.. by Pumpkin Puss!

Here are the rules:
Every player states seven random facts about themselves and add the rules to their diary.
Chose 7 random cats to tag and list their names.
Don't forget to leave them a comment stating they have been tagged.

Ok, so let me see...

1. I love hanging out with people and guests. I'm always around whenever people come and visit, but they're not allowed to touch me. Only Mom and DEd are. Everyone else is severely punished if they try to come too close.

2. I'm very very spoiled when it comes to eating. If I'm alone in a room, I'll eat my meal without causing a fuss, but if I can see any of my sisters eating, I'll stop eating mine and move on to their plates. If they then try to eat from my abandoned plate, I'll go back to it. In other words: I always want what someone else is having!

3. I love water. I love getting wet. And I see no difference between clean or dirty water - they're all game to me!

4. Even though I officially belong to my DEd's and love him dearly... I secretly prefer my Mom.

5. I hate brushing my teeth and my everyone says my breath stinks... but I just find it to be very manly.

6. I meow like a girl.

7. I can open drawers to get to my treats. And I lie to Mom saying DEd hasn't given me any today, and vice-versa.

Now I'll tag...
1. Sushi
2. Lemon
3. Snickers
4. T-Bone
5. Pancake
6. Dill
7. Stew

(food-names rule!

Purrs, Cheez-o

The Art of Opening Bottles

I love toys. I feel us cats should have more toys, generally speaking, and this is why I keep experimenting turning ordinary things into toys. I like the fact that some cats came up with the idea to play with a Brussel sprout, we need more imaginative minds like that in out cat community.
Anyways, I'm currently working on playing with plastic bottle caps. The Girls don't seem interested , except Beega, she occasionally has a go at it when I'm playing with one. I steal all bottle caps from water bottles in the house, DEd loves water bottles and he always has one around him. Now they're all capless. I hide the caps in a secret place under the sofa or behind the television, where no one can find them, and so DEd has to throw the capless bottles away and buy new ones, which means more caps.
It was hard collecting the caps, you know, waiting for someone to open a bottle and then snatching the cap away before they could put it back, but this week my cap research had a major advance: I've learned how to open bottles.
It only works if the cap hasn't been properly screwed back on to the bottle, but once you get the hang of it, it's not that hard. It doesn't work with Mom, she's a tight re-capper.
It's great fun, specially at night while they're sleeping. First, you attack the bottle, make sure you're noisy (preferably knock the bottle once it's open and spill the water), and then you play with the plastic cap (again, make it loud). Variations include placing the cap inside shoes or bringing it to bed with you. Humans love it, I tell you.
Purrs,
Cheese

The herbs

I've been very busy recently. I realize now that I am the man of the house - I mean, cat man, being that my DEd is the man man. I'm almost as big as The Girls. Anyways, DEd's been very busy, too. He's planted some nice herbs on nice pots and placed them on the window sill in his office. I love plants so I've been trying to help - I walk on them, sleep on them and I specially like playing with them when they've just been watered. The thing is, just because I've made the pots fall on the floor a couple of times I'm not allowed in the office anymore. I don't understand what is the problem with that: dirt and soil gets everywhere and the herbs are scattered all over the floor and that is really fun. Last time I managed to get 2 of the very big pots to fall and hit a glass jar on a shelf. So technically they could say that I was the one to break the jar, but in reality the pot did it. DEd got really mad at me but I made sure to have an extra cute expression on my face when he grabbed me and he ended up cuddling me.
Speaking of blaming me for things that are not my fault: Mom keeps saying that Beega is a bit too chubby, so how come I'm the guilty one when I try to eat her food? I'm trying to help her eat less!
Purrs,
Cheese

Little Red Riding Collar

I finally had a real adventure last night! It all started the day before yesterday, when I decided it was time to explore the other side of the front door. We live in on the 13th floor in a nice high-rise flat and, as you'd expect, we're not allowed out. So last night when Mom came home from work I dashed out, I mean, I wanted to know what was so interesting out there to keep Mom and DEd out of the house for so many hours. There's a plant, a doormat, 2 elevators and stairs. I ran to the stairs and stopped to take a look at my surroundings, and that's when she got me and put me in the house again. Some 5 minutes later DEd arrived and I did the same thing again. I could see the worried look on their faces and I knew they were talking about me, but I couldn't make out what they were saying.
So yesterday morning I was running around when Mom came in and put this red collar round my neck. It has a little red bell and apparently something else is having my name engraved. This way if I do get out without them seeing me, people in the building will know who to call. I'm not sure I like it, my sisters don't have a collar, Mom said it's because they're well behaved and don't try to run away. I feel like a toy with this bell on me. Most of the time I don't even remember it's round my neck, so I guess it's not that bad.
Anyways, here's the adventure: last night was DEd's birthday party and yet again I must question their ability to organize a social event. This time they were horribly dressed and DEd even had a pillow inside his shirt. I was worried about their sanity, but then I saw that the people who came here were also dressed in the most outrageous outfits. I was trying to help this guy get rid of this massive white veil hanging from his head when I saw the door open again... and Mom was too busy saying hello to see me sneak out... Well, I made it out and I heard the door being closed behind me. It was a bit dark but I could see the stairs and decided to go up.
Mom told me later that she felt I was not in the house, she looked for me and when she could't find me she called the doorman downstairs, to let him know I had escaped. He started to look for me, coming up the stairs, while Mom went up to the top floor. She was calling my name and just when she was starting to get really worried she heard the sound of my bell. I was a bit scared, I must admit, but when I saw it was Mom I relaxed, ran to her and started purring. I was all the way up on the 17th floor! She grabbed me, took me home and everyone in the party was cuddling me. That was a bit boring.
Well, right now I don't feel like exploring the outside again. It's not that interesting anyways, stairs going up and down, and never getting anywhere. My name tag will be ready today, maybe after it's on me I'll have another go exploring, but now it's cold and I'm quite happy to be inside the house.
Whoa, I'm tired just remembering all those steps!
Gotta nap.
Purrs,
Cheese

Girls are boring

My sisters are so boring sometimes. They don't like any of my favorite games, like Attack and Conquer, Bite-til-U-Drop, Ambush, Bite-and-Seek, Find the Jugular, High Speed Chasing... not to mention water. They don't seem to like it and they're not interested in exploring showers, sinks and toilets. Belle behaves like a stuffed animal most of the time, she doesn't want to do anyting that can mess her hair up or what she calls "degrading" behaviour, whatever that is. Beega is just too fat to be fun, although every now and then she does suprise me. She also seems to live in a state of permanent confusion. Now, Ginger is the not-so-bad one. She's nice, and when I do get her to play with me she proves herself a worhty opponent. But she needs to learn the rules of the games, because she often just leaves in the middle of it.
I have extra energy today because we got some tuna for lunch. I have to go now, gotta see who's up for some Bite-and-Seek.
Purrs,
Cheezo

Dinner parties, meatballs and cards

Yesterday some friends of Mom and DEd came round again. I was sleeping on Mom's lap when I heard that bell sound that always goes off before strangers arrive. As soon as the smily girl saw me, she picked me up. I didn't particularly like the fact that she hugged me so soon, but I wasn't about to be rude to a beautiful lady like that. I liked the girl, she was nice, but when the guy tried to pet me while she was holding me I didn't like it, so I hissed at him. I mean, I could just tell he was the kind of guy who would start taking too many liberties, like cuddling me without a proper introduction. I don't understand why people call me spoiled when I hiss at strangers who try to get too friendly, and I sure don't like it when they say in a baby voice things like "Aw, he thinks he's a big guy" or "The little kitten is a tough boy", I mean, of course I'm tough, what did you expect? And humans really have to make up their mind, one second they tell me how big I am, next thing they're telling me I'm this "cute tiny baby", which, by the way, is nonsense and deeply offensive.
DEd cooked a lot of nice food and if there's one thing you can count on Beega for is that she'll try to get some of it. So whenever there's food in the picture I try to hang around my chubby sis to see if maybe I can get some, too. It worked out beautifully: she managed to get a hold of a whole huge meatball while the humans were chatting. Mom went into the kitchen and saw us munching on it on the floor and she took it away from us, but I had had my share anyways, that was a whole lot of meat, I tell you.
It was a very tiring night as I had to come up with cute things to do all the time for the people to keep paying attention to me. Let me explain: they were all paying too much attention to some cards while sitting at the table. I jumped on Mom's lap to take a better look at them and I couldn't make any sense out of the whole thing. It seems you put one on the table only to substitute it for another one and eventually put all of them down. Extremelly boring stuff. I knew it had been a major entertainment blunder to choose an activity like that for a dinner party and to save Mom and DEd from a social disaster I had to take over the show. I kept going in bags, jumping on the plants, playing with my mice, attacking my sisters and it worked really well. I'm sure Mom realised it too as she just gave me some of my favorite treats. I guess she's just trying to thank me.
Purrs,
Cheese

Never trust girls!

It all makes sense now: the sarcastic grin on my sisters' faces when they told me about my visit to the vet, their idea of saying it was for something called "castraction", which made me think it was actually something good... they knew all along what the whole thing was about! Girls are evil!
Well, so I visited the vet again on Wednesday morning, but this time Mom went home and left me there. She did leave her fluffy nightgown that I love so much with me, that was nice. Anyways, next thing I know, the red haired vet and the short vet are ganging up on me again, to clip my nails. I hate that. I hissed and meowed and bit them to teach them not to mess with me. Then they stuck a needle in me and I started to feel too tired to put up a fight. When I finally woke up I was feeling drowsy and didn't really know where I was, but one thing I noticed right away: I had been shaved, I mean, my "private" parts, man! Who do they think they are?? I noticed I had a little cut on.. I mean, "there", you know? Anyways, it wasn't long before Mom showed up again and I had to listen to the vets telling her how spoiled and hard-work I had been, such drivel!! Good thing this vet place is near our house, because I couldn't wait to be home again. Yesterday I was a bit cranky and I was biting even more than I normally do. Today I'm back to my old self and I'm just still anoyed with my sisters and with this shaving thing.
I still feel a bit... empty. I can't really put my finger on it...
Gotta go bite my sisters.
Cya!

Drums, old pictures and more vet visits

I found a new nap spot: DEd's bass drum. There's a small round entrance to it and there's even a pillow inside, that's because Mom made DEd put it there to reduce the noise it makes. I'm not a big fan of the drums, I agree with Mom, they're too loud and noisy. Good thing DEd never plays it in the house now that he's got a piano again. Anyways, Mom's been trying to get a picture of me in it, but so far she's only managed to get one of me coming out of it... Speaking of pictures, I must have a word with her about my page - my eyes are not green anymore, you see, all these pictures are old, when I was just a tiny baby cat. Now I have beautiful hazel eyes, she should really update the photos.
I heard Mom mentioning that I have yet another visit to the vet next week. That's so boring. I hope she doesn't stick another needle in me again. Apparently she'll do something different this time, my sisters were telling me that it's something called castraction or something like this. Good, because I'm fed up with needles. I'm sure this castraction thing is much more interesting, being that it has the word "action" in it. Maybe she'll give me something to improve my agility or something.
Well, I'll keep you posted.
Purrs,
The Cheeze-meister

Vets, Water and Candles

Last week I visited my vet again. She's a nice person, but I really don't like her job. First, they clipped my nails as my sisters gave Mom a sign petition for it. Mom was a bit sad because she likes it when I climb her leg, but she wasn't too happy about a lot of big scratches on her hands. The Big Girls don't have their nails clipped, so how come the only boy in the house (that is, me) gets to have a ... manicure??? It's just outrageous. I made sure to express my feelings to the vets and to Mom while they were clipping them.
After that, just when I thought it was all over, I had to get a shot again! Oh boy, is that nasty or what? Last time I felt a little sick after it, this time it was much better and I made the most out of the extra attention I got when we went back home. Mom says I'm totally spoiled, just because I know how to make cute faces and pretend I'm drowsy when she's around, just to start playing and attacking my sisters when she's not looking.
Anyways, I found out one more thing I love: water. Isn't it fascinating?? I like jumping in the middle of plants when DEd is watering them, it's nice to get wet! I like the way water looks, the sounds it makes... that's why I love watching anyone go to the toilet and flush.
Well, that's about it for the last couple of days... ah, you know that candle Mom had been hiding from me after my little, uh, accident? Well, I found it the other day when Mom was using it again and I ran to it to look before Mom could stop me. It got my right eyebrow this time.
Cheers!