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The Art of Being Clueless

Well, I guess she isn't TOO bad...

The new little monster has been named...Elise. Actually, that's her pseudonym, but what Mommy calls her rather than her pedigree name. Elise was finally let out of her cage today, after Mommy took her to the vet for a wellness check, and after we had a few days sniffing at her through the bars of her cage. I hiss at her as a matter of course, but the only cat I've bopped on the head so far today is Currier, who just gave me a puzzled look. Nobody takes me seriously.

Elise isn't so bad. The only thing that bothers me is that she gets to eat high protein wet food while we're stuck with kibble. Chibi is eating it too, since she's nursing four kittens. I guess I'm never going to nurse any kittens...

Elise may be the friendliest of all of us. I can hear her purring when Mommy picks her up. I myself purr too, but it's almost inaudible. Chibi's purr when nursing is so loud you can hear it in the next room. Elise hasn't showed any fraidy-cat traits since coming here--a good sign. I was never a fraidy-cat myself, just didn't realize that I was supposed to love Mommy. Now I do. So do Spike and Currier, although sometimes I wonder what's going through Leila's mind. She keeps to herself most of the time. She's at Breeder Daddy's right now to make some more of those (nasty, nasty) kittens, but no one seems to notice her absence. On the other hand, Leila is a perfect lady with perfect manners--no toilet misdeeds or scratching in inappropriate places for HER.

It looks like the cat show agenda has changed. Elise will go to the show at the end of this month, because it's easier for females to win ribbons when they are still kittens. Currier will go to a big show in January, when Chanan is again supposed to appear. Currier will probably be able to make Champion in that show, although it's going to be a big one. She doesn't need to be a Champion until she has kittens (looks better on the pedigree), and that won't be until next spring. Why am I the only one here who finds them irritating? Otherwise, we all get along pretty well for a multi-cat household. At least Spike and I don't have any issues. Sometimes he even grooms me.

Yesterday, Mommy saw the house that she's considering buying. It is enormous compared to our present apartment, and thus ideal for a cattery. It's also only 15 minutes away by car from her university. But it's set in the middle of nowhere, and Mommy likes to jump on her bicycle and go to the convenience store or a family restaurant at any hour she pleases. It's also set on a steep slope, and Mommy's hips don't like slopes. Mommy says that she'll feel isolated and may go crazy there--she likes being able to move around freely, and cycling is her one form of exercise and her way of getting rid of stress. But, so far, this is the only house she can (barely) afford the down payment on. With the house comes Breeder Daddy (not that he has much to contribute, money-wise); in other words, it looks like Mommy is sort of being pushed into this marriage according to HIS schedule (he has to get out of his present apartment in January, and if he doesn't go to live with Mommy, will have to return to his hometown). Mommy is on medical leave for depression, and stress worsens depression. Worrying about this fact is making Mommy even more nervous than she usually is. I suspect that she's more enthused about having a house and a cattery than about BD. She'll never tire of living in a house (not necessarily that one, though--it's more than 3 kilos from the station), but she has a tendency to lose interest in things she was once passionate about--Japanese dance, her research, and the men in her past (heh heh, they were all a sorry group). She'll never give up having cats, but she may tire of the cat world and keeping a cattery. They say it takes 10 years for a cattery to get going, and that many people who set up catteries give up after a certain number of years. It's a big responsibility, towards the cats and also towards their future owners. Of course, I'LL always be with her, but who can predict the future? Mommy also suspects that one reason BD wants to marry her is so he can continue breeding. I think both of them are more interested in us cats than in each other. Which may not be such a bad thing after all.

It's raining kittens here...

Today was supposed to be a typhoon, but it basically only dribbled. No cats and dogs.

But, oh ho! Inside the cattery, it's raining kittens. First we have Chibi's four, and then suddenly without warning Leila disappeared to have another tryst with Umesaburo, and when Mommy came home, she had another cat with her, a four month old kitten. Breeder Daddy is closing up shop and trying to get rid of his kittens, and this kitten was of especially good quality, so he wanted Mommy to make it her fourth queen (he thinks she has too many torties). We only got a glimpse of the new kitten, who is to be named either Nora Joyce (Nora Barnacle had too many letters) or Sylvia P (Sylvia Plath also had too many letters). (I know this because I was listening in on their phone conversation.) Of course, BD had something to say about that, as he is always criticizing Mommy. The kitten and Umesaburo are sort of engagement gifts, but Mommy is still on the fence about this one. BD really does seem to be very fond of her, but when he gets in a critical mood (which is often) he is intolerable. For example, Mommy still can't figure out her new cell phone (the instruction manual is 300 pages long, and she was told that even Japanese find it hard to figure out). Mommy told us (or maybe we read her mind) that BD gave her a hard time for buying a cell phone that she can't figure out how to use, but to be honest, while he's much better at some things than Mommy is, he's a bit slow in some areas. It took Mommy around 10 minutes to convince him that she didn't buy a confusing cell phone on purpose, and that on Tuesday she's going to go back to the shop and have the basics explained to her. Anyway, that's the kind of relationship they have. She's hoping she can train him out of this habit. It's not abusive, just annoying, but when it goes on for too long--and it's usually about trivial things--it makes Mommy irritable. I'd bop him on the head if I were her, but she's not a cat.

Anyway, back to Nora Joyce (or Sylvia P). Now Mommy has four queens, all of whom have good and bad points. The new kitten (who is in a cage in the bedroom, which means that Spike, Currier, and I have only the study, the kitchen, and the hallway to hang around in) is a brown and white tabby with gorgeous classic tabby patterning. She has pretty eyes, a firm muzzle, and the best noseline of all the females. She also seems to have a sweet disposition. Since BD gave her to Mommy for free, she took her, as brown tabby kittens sell out fast, and Mommy would prefer not to be in the red all the time with this breeding thing.

Unless we move to a house, or bump one of the other queens, this is our limit for females. What we DO need is another stud. Two studs and four queens is a reasonably sized cattery. Anything bigger, and you end up being unable to give each cat some quality time every day. I'm lying next to Mommy's laptop right now, and she pets me every few minutes. Spike and Currier, who seem to like each other, are sleeping on top of a box a few feet away. We love Mommy, but would like more of her time.

Oh, and Chibi moved her kittens behind the enormous cat tower last night (she told us through the door when Mommy was out). BD came and inspected the kittens yesterday, Mommy weighs them every day (which breeding manuals say you should do--BD says that Mommy is being too nervous about the whole thing, and that they don't need to be weighed), and Chibi's supersensitive feline sense of smell told her that there was a NEW CAT in the next room. After returning the kittens and Chibi to their nest, Mommy zipped up the SturdiShelter (BD didn't think that was an appropriate birthing hut, and also said the air conditioning was too strong--blah blah blah), and pulled the fleece blanket down over the front to make the inside darker and more private. Of course, there's food, water, and a toilet in there, but Mommy will have to let Chibi out occasionally to let her get some exercise. The last time Mommy looked, Chibi was nursing her kittens, but she didn't look happy about the whole thing.

What makes the rest of us mad is that Mommy is giving Chibi the good stuff--Hill's a/d (about the best and most nutritious food you can find in Japan, if you like spending $4.00 per can), spiked with stinky, mercury tainted tuna fish. BD said that Chibi ate cheese (which he recommends for putting weight on cats) when she was at his place, but she won't eat it here. We're not so fond of it, either. We usually just give it a few licks and walk away. It's not that cats can't eat cheese--we can eat cheese, yogurt, and cottage cheese, just not liquid cow's milk. Spike and Leila are particularly fond of yogurt, although they only take a few licks. I can take it or leave it.

So that's the mews from here. Mommy is becoming a cat lady, may marry BD, may buy a house (not that she can even afford the down payment), and we suddenly have a new sister (whose father is Umesaburo, same as Leila and Chibi's kittens), but she had a different mother, so she's really our half-sister. She seems awfully sweet; I'm not sure whether I'll hiss at her or bop her or not. Nah, gotta show her who's boss here. I may not bop her on the head, but I'm sure I'll his. I hissed at Currier today for the first time in a long while. Maybe it was the pre-typhoon atmospheric pressure doing weird things to my chickpea-sized brain.

Oh, I almost forgot. There's that cat show feeling in the air. This time I'm not the one going (I'm retired), but Currier, who seems to have become part of our furmily by default (read: no one wants to buy her, and Mommy likes her). Mommy wanted Currier to go to a show with a foreign judge, since Japanese don't like torties, but she couldn't get Currier a CFA number fast enough to make the entry deadline. Instead, Currier will either go to a show sponsored by Mommy's new cat club, or to a show in Kobe (a waste of money for someone who's trying to scratch together enough money for the down payment on a house, if you ask me) because Chanan is there, and darkish torties like Currier are very hard to photograph. I'm sure Currier will be more cooperative than I was; she doesn't seem to have a nervous bone in her body, although cat shows can be rather nerve-wracking, so you never know. Kittens can be shown without a CFA number, but our new sister is only four months old, and kittens are more likely to get ribbons if they are a bit older and bigger. Not that she is going to have a show career; Grand Champion female Maine Coons are as scarce as hen's teeth (whoever thought of that metaphor, anyway?); better that Mommy should save her money for a very, very good stud, and make him a Grand Champion. But that's far in the future. Meanwhile, I only have to suffer the presence of Umesaburo.

Time to zone out again...

#16 Internationally!

Har! Mommy couldn't open the zipped file on the CFA Almanac page that shows a cat's rank by breed internationally. (Chibi would have been able to do it, but she's indisposed right now.) When she called the CFA (and even they had problems accessing the information), it turned out that I was the #16 Maine Coon Premier internationally (#17 Premier in Japan in the Allbreed Division). That sounds really cool, but overall, internationally, I was #150 out of 200 Premiers. That's like being in lower 25% percentile on your Stanford-Binet. The only thing I can say in my defense is that American cat shows seem to be bigger than those in Japan, which makes it easier to get lots of points. I had over 1000 points, which made me the #4 MC in Japan, but the #1 MC (American) had something like 4000 points. On the other hand, if you want to be a winner in America, you have to drive long distances or fly in order to get to all the shows. Here, almost everything is right in Tokyo. Wouldn't mind flying sometime though. But my show biz career is over and done with. Hmm, maybe Mommy will put me in the big National Show in America sometime. Then I can experience the pleasures of Northwest Airlines. I think I'll just have a cocktail or two (gin tonic or Bloody Mary, two of my faves), skip the movie, eat the chicken or beef, skip the salad and icky dessert, and sleep most of the way. I hope I get a window seat. I've never seen clouds from above. I like watching clouds.

By the way, IF we move, I hope we move to a place that has a bit more bird and car action outside the window than our present apartment. BD is folding up shop--the litter he's selling now is his last. Ergo, from now on, IF Mommy and BD get together, it will be HER cattery (the cats will have their names changed to the name of her cattery, not BD's--he's turning in his breeding license), and she's informed him that she refuses to have HER cats exposed to second-hand smoke. There's nothing more tacky than selling a pedigreed cat that smells like cigarette smoke.

He's going to give her Umesaburo AND a brown tabby and white female who is far superior to Leila, if not Chibi, and may be able to produce patched tabbies (torbies) which are very pretty and very popular. Great! A four-month old kitten that I can bop around! If BD and Mommy DON'T get together, though, she'll have to pay for Umesaburo's services and the kitten. BD is generally a good-natured guy, but sometimes he criticizes Mommy and gets angry at her. But when she says, "DON'T!" he usually calms down fast. And he doesn't hold grudges. She's still busy training him, though. At least he doesn't try to escape through screened windows or scratch the sofa or walls. At least not yet.

P.S. Argh! Mommy just told me that if we ever do go to an international show, I won't be able to ride in the cabin and watch the clouds while sipping a gin and tonic. I'll have to be put into the cargo area. Discrimination, anyone?