aceofkittens

As I may have mentioned previously, every morning at 6:00 a.m., I am awakened by what I call "The Alarm Claw." In addition to lovingly applying his claws to my face, Chip basically starts to do his best impression of a mountain goat by bouncing repeatedly onto my head. If I scrunch down to hide under the covers and Chip can't scoop me out, he goes over and starts to do the same thing to invisiblebf until the latter roars out something like, "Get up and feed the cats!" except with a few more expletives.

Meanwhile, Sprat just sits patiently and quietly nearby, supporting the wall in the way that he does. He has only tried to use The Alarm Claw on me once and it was more of an "Alarm-Purr." We like to pretend that Chip "deputized" Sprat to give it a shot, but Sprat just didn't pass muster. Maybe it's a very complicated game of "Good Cat, Bad Cat" that they're playing with me... I'm not sure. In any case, I'm not willing to give up my glorious nighttime kitty cuddles, not even for a good night's sleep. Besides, if we close the door, Chip claws at it relentlessly and makes piteous squeaking noises. Thus I live with The Alarm Claw as a fact of life.

So that's all well and good, except a few days ago, Chip decided that 6 was too late for breakfast and started applying The Alarm Claw at 5:00 a.m.! Perhaps this was revenge for the fact that we were gone for three days and my mom came and fed them at odd times (certainly never at 6:00 a.m.!). For the first two days, I alternated hiding under the covers, throwing Chip off the bed, and saying "NO" in firm voice, but all these pitiful attempts to get a few more minutes of sleep failed miserably. This morning, however, invisiblebf had had enough. After Chip jumped onto his face at 5:05 or so, he got up and ejected both cats from the room. Before closing the door, he cleverly placed two big pillows against it as a barrier to prevent Chip from scratching at it. Ah, blissful sleep...

It was 6:30 when we woke up next. "I guess I'll go ahead and feed them," I mumbled, stumbling to the door and opening it. The pillow barrier had held up beautifully and both cats were sitting to one side of it, gazing up at me with grave reproach. Also in front of the pillows: three dark lumps of poo on the floor. Nooooo! Well, at least I didn't step in it.

"I'm telling you," I said to invisiblebf, "Chip wore a satisfied look. Like: yeah, THAT's what I think about you and your pillows and closed doors and opposable thumbs." "Chip would never do that," invisiblebf replied, "It's my fault. I locked him away from his litter box and he didn't want to use Sprat's."

I was ready to stay grumpy, but then Chip jumped up on my pillow and put his paws around my neck and purred me back to sleep. All was forgiven.

This morning, I got to watch sumo wrestling as nearly 40 pounds of cat clashed in the hallway in a brief, but fierce battle. The earth shook, the angels wept, then we broke up the fight and the participants went back to their separate corners and pretended that they hadn't just done that.

My hope that Chip and Sprat would become fast friends has not been realized. So far, they mostly tolerate one another in a neutral way. Until this morning's battle, they had never fought to my knowledge -- occasional swats and slaps nonwithstanding. Sprat actually really wants to be friends and keeps trying to approach Chip. Chip wants none of this.

Many of you have heard me doing this shtick, and it doesn't lose its amusement value with repetition (of course, I think the more you repeat something, the funnier it is) — so the interaction goes something like this:

Sprat: You like food? I LOVE food!
Chip: Ummm....
Sprat: You like catnip? I am totally into catnip!
Chip: Er....
Sprat: You like sunshine? I dig the sunshine! Let's share this sunshine!
Chip: Listen...
Sprat: Hey, you like shoes? I really love shoes too!
Chip: *grumble*
Sprat: You like these people? I LOVE these people! We have so much in common! We should totally hang out!
Chip: OH SHIT NO!!! Just go back to hell where you came from!!!

I need to take more photos and videos of them. Time is passing really quickly. Today is the 6th anniversary of Peter's death. I still miss him so much. :( He was a great cat.

I don't know whether it's the fact that my ever-dwindling attention span is now only able to keep up with Facebook/Twitter, or simply that my love affair with LJ is finally coming to an end. I just know that I really shouldn't have wasted the money on that paid account renewal.

Some notable stuff from May through July:
+ Rescued some adorable kittens
+ Got to go to the annual toastmantom Memorial Day Weekend BBQ
- Got very ill at the annual toastmantom Memorial Day Weekend BBQ
+ Visits to LA by mzsa, mittenz, wyckhurst, and eto_theipi
+ Went to the beach twice
+ The ants have gone away
+ Went to both a Rhett Miller concert and an Old 97's concert
+ Went to a great concert at the Hollywood Bowl
+ Went to Infected Mushroom and remembered to bring earplugs
- Inexplicable sudden total irrecoverable failure of my laptop's hard drive
- I am an idiot who does not make regular backups :(
- All my photos from 2008-2009 are now lost forever, along with all my music and all my writing
+ A friend gave me a replacement hard drive for free!!!!!
+ I still love my Sidekick
- It's having problems with the headset, so phone conversations have dwindled
+ Celebrated our 4th Chip-a-versary on July 19/20th!!!!
+ Chip seems to be doing really well
- Chip is misbehaving horribly every morning, clawing and biting me as early as 5 a.m. in his quest for food
+ Going to Vegas this weekend for bigkgbguy's annual birthday party!!!

Well, that about sums it up.

...After an appalling journey, during which our luggage was lost not once, but twice.

Actually, not really. The drive was actually all right, best time in a long time. But Chip did not fare well. He threw up his valium and then when we got in, he was very aggro. :( And his blood sugar was not good. Sigh. He was growling and hissing at Kesha and us.

Two blissful weeks in SF stretch out before me! Hooray.

So. Drinks at the Orbit Room on Tuesday night. And maybe also Monday night. :)

Today is our 3-year Chip-a-versary! I found him on July 15, 2005, and I took possession of him on July 20, 2005.

( Oh the Chip )

Chip update: no change, he is still limping horribly. He otherwise seems happy and perky, and is behaving fairly normally. He doesn't seem to be getting worse, but he's not getting better, either. The vet on Wednesday said to give it time, but he had no answers. He didn't think it was a blood clot, but had no real ideas beyond that it's "neurological." I am at a loss as to what to do. I guess I'll wait. :(

Ok, so now I've got this quandary and I honestly don't know what to do about it. My company has won a major award for the project that has been my "baby" for the last year, the company Intranet. The award ceremony is in NYC on June 12 and my boss said that I can go if I want to. If we don't send someone, they'll just ship us the award — there's not much real "benefit" to the company to send someone (the networking opportunity is minimal). So this would primarily be a "reward/recognition" thing for me for all the work I've put in on this project.

However, I would essentially be going to NYC for one day. I'd fly out on the red-eye on Wednesday night, get there Thursday morning - bum around all day, go to the awards ceremony at night, then go back to LA Friday morning. ( reasons to go or not go ) What do YOU think?

[Poll #1196973]

Thanks! :)

We came home from Arizona on Sunday night (full update in a separate post), and were so tired that we actually went to bed at 10:45 p.m., which is simply unheard of.

I woke up to darkness, and the typical morning ritual of Chip spreading his paws over my face and biting my jaw. He has taken to doing this in an effort to get me out of bed to feed him, and it's usually at 6:30 a.m., the little rat. Funny enough, he never does this to invisiblebf; in fact, if I'm out of town or something, Chip will let invisiblebf sleep in as late as 10 or 11 a.m., unmolested.

As I struggled into consciousness, it felt like I'd already had a full night's sleep. In addition, it seemed that Chip had used the litter box and possibly missed. "You may as well get up and feed him — I'll clean the box," invisiblebf grunted, as we both rolled out of bed. Disoriented and pretty much blind without my glasses, I stumbled to the kitchen and doled out Chip's breakfast.

Then I squinted at the LED display of the cable box. "Tricked! He tricked us!" I wailed, "It's only 2 a.m.!" Over at his food dish, an innocent-looking Chip was eating noisily. :)

"And you know, he's going to do this again at 6:30!" I predicted. And I was right! But I didn't fall for that same trick twice in one day. Take that, tricksy kitteh! :P

Quite frequently, I have pretty weird/bad dreams. I have to write down last night's here.
( As they turn your dreams to sheep )
Then I finally woke up. :) Thanks for your help, vaznetti! I'm sure we totally defeated Count Dracula!

[Error: unknown template video]

Thanks to invisiblebf, I can now offer you this video clip of unbearable cuteness. It is a video clip of Chip washing himself. We're doing video!!!

This weekend, I went and visited Chip in San Francisco. Oh sure, I had a few other things going on... but basically, I couldn't wait to see my cat. :) Unfortunately, Chip was really mad at me and gave me the cold shoulder at first. He wouldn't purr for me and he jumped off the bed when I sat next down to him. I cried. :( But by the end of the weekend, he thawed out... just in time for me to leave.

However, while up there, we enabled our webcams, so now there's Chip-cam and Ace-cam, all nicely lined up and broadcasting in a secret location. I spent the evening getting my Chip-fix! And here are some screencaps. Be prepared to go: "Awwww."

( Necessary close-ups )
Well, anyway, I am back in LA now and ready to finish a bunch of stuff I've been putting off. No, really.