Sunday Stills :: All the Cats I've Loved Before

There have been many a cat in my 37 year history here on earth. My parents are cat people, so thankfully i grew up with a cat or two since i was a wee babe, barely able to pull on a kitty's tail. These days, we have 3 special cats in our life. Although most who visit here will already know here, let me formally introduce ya...

Sandwich (aka Sadie) :: Indoorus Felinious Spoiled-Rottenus

This is Sadie. Sweet lil tabby kitters with a 90 degree kink in her tail who loves nuzzling your face at the drop of a hat when you call "Sadie, kisses". She's been part of the family now for 7 years. She was Moose's birthday present back then...he walked into the kitten cage and from her spot on a shelf above him, she kept pawing a him. Melted his heart, poor chap. He didn't even have a chance to resist. We adopted her with her brother, who turned out to be a real bully, so we had to return him. Thankfully he came from a no-kill shelter, but i bet after him, the lady running the place thought serious about deleting that return offer from her contract. :) Cookie was almost two when we picked up Sadie. She had just learned to walk real decent and was talking up a storm by then. As we were leaving to get the kitties, i shot a video of Cookie talking about naming the kitties. She wanted three and their names where to be "Chicken,'Tatoes, and Sandwich." Thus began her love of naming pets after food. :)

Roosevelt (aka Rosie) :: Exteriorius Felinious Rodenti Saughterus

Rosie has been a real hoot. We picked her up from King County's Barn Cats -R- Us program in February. Although they said she was feral, we are having a bit of success in taming her with tuna fish and leftover salmon. We've set her up in a greenhouse and she usually sleeps on our porch. When she hears you outside, she starts running, mewing the whole way till she's a comfortable distance from you. Once she joins you on walkabout, she's purring the whole time and doing somersaults at your feet. :) I've touched her talk a hand full of times, which in and of itself is a kitty miracle. A huge blessing in Rosie's personality is her gentleness with the birds. This whole time, i've only seen her attack the ducks once. They deserved it though, because they were harassing her something awful. Here's a video of her usual interactions with Feathered Friends with a Death Wish.

Stoney :: Brotherus From Another Motherus

 

Stoney is my folk's cat, given the name of the boy they never had. By that reasoning, as my father says, he is my brother. :) He is a hoot and a half, starting with they fact that he weighs at least as much as a bowling ball. Especially nifty when he decides to jump in your lap. :) They resuced him from their local shelter as well, and have been spoiling him rotten since. Case in point, if you don't pay him enough attention, he'll keep pawing at your leg until you do. One of Stoney's favourite things is to pal around with my dad. When my dad is outside watching trains, Stoney goes with him. Have you ever heard of a cat who likes watching trains? Here's proof:

 

 

And when dad is talking a nap in the hammock, Stoney's right there with him. He also is the first cat we've had that can win a whuppin' contest with a dog 5 times bigger than he is.

 

But the feline who will forever have my heart is my buddy, Beamer, named because his pedegree title contained the initials BMW. :)

 

  Beamer was destined to be a show cat, before the unfortunate business of that forever protruding tongue came about. My grandmother was a cat breeder and show woman, and above all a cat lover (with some 20+ long haired cats to care for at one point in her life--bless her heart), so she decided to keep Beamer, in hopes that someday he'd live with me. The Beamster and i had many a fine times travelling the Northwest. He lived with my folks while i was away at college, but once i was out on my own, we'd enjoy our trips back and forth to my folks place before i met Moose, when i was polishing up my "Old Spinster and her Cat" routine. Beamer could smell Idaho. The minute we got within the city limits of my folks town, he'd start crooning--meow, meow, MEOOOOOWWW! And he loved car rides. He'd spend the whole drive in my lap, which was quite an entertaining sight for other motorists waiting at a red light, as you can imagine. Then, when we'd get on the backroads to my folks house, i'd roll down the window so he could hang his head (and tongue) out like a dog. Couldn't wait to get inside the house for a big ol' belly rub from "Grandma". :) He's a once-in-a-lifetime kinda cat and is missed very much!!

 

Wanna get your fill of kitterses? Go to Sunday Stills to find more.

Sunday Stills :: The Letter B

Over at Sunday Stills this week, our challenge was to find and photograph something beginning with the letter "B".

If catagorizing this under "Beauty" doesn't work.....

thankfully there are a few boats in there. :)

Visit Sunday Stills for more photos of "B" things.

Sunday Stills: Yellow

To see more Yellow inspiration, head on over to Sunday Stills.

Sunday Stills :: High and Low

If you look on the ground this time of year in Western WA, you see oodles of

 forget-me-nots and mosses.  The ferns are also unfurling.



The temps have been so unseasonably cool that the fruit trees are flowering later.

And the only day of blue sky we had this week provided a great shot of the spotty clouds below the towering raspberry canes.



Thank Goodness Spring didn't for get us.

Now, let's hope Summer's right behind her.

To see some awesome and creative photography, check out Sunday Stills.

Sunday Stills :: 4 Points

This week's challenge was to photograph the four points of the compass.

Did i mention it's been too rainy and grey to take decent pictures here in the Seattle area?

So sorry, but today you get photos from inside my home.

This is my favourite reading spot.

 When i sit in it (the southern part of my living room), i see the fireplace and fish tank to the north.

 And i can gaze out to the east and see the moonrise over the Cascades (when it's not pouring) :)

 or if i happen to be there in the daytime, i can see the snow covered Cascades.

 And if i look to the west, i can see the maps we keep on our walls, and daydream about where we'd like to visit someday.

Preferably a desert.  Or some other place where they don't get rain. :)

For more 4 Points pictures, click here.

Sunday Stills::The Boob Toob

We don't view thee ol' boob toob with great frequency around these parts. We do have shows we enjoy occasionally (i.e. Mad Men, I Love Lucy, news programs, sporting events, movies or the occasional cartoon.)

Last week afforded us a little more opportunity for toob-time with the arrival of this.

Many breaks were taken in between subjects, if not between pages of reading or computing, during Whit's Academy of Fyne Skoolin' last week. After all, as a homeschool, if you can't take a time out to play in the snow that almost never graces the Seattle-area, then you might as well be a kid in public school. :)

So while Cookie was out trapsing about in 4 inches of the white stuff and delivering a pep-talk to the Chicas...

i was sitting fireside, enjoying the blaze Moose left us with before he departed for work.

Which also afforded me the opportunity to watch one of my favourite newsmen of my generation:

Love this guy!

Especially because he knows the deal-ee-yo with our country's problems and is a virtual homeschool curriculum all on his own. Give Cookie Monster a couple more years, and Prof. Dylan Ratigan's School of Current Economic and Political Events will be on our roster. :)

Curious about what your favourite Sunday Stillers watch? Adjust your channel.

Sunday Stills :: Graveyard

I love cemetaries!! Who doesn't, eh? Thanks for the much beloved subject matter, Ed! This week's Sunday Stills is about graveyards. And while i could show you the teeniest postage stamped sized pioneer cemetaries around our city, the two Catholic cemetaries nearby, various internment centers for our nation's soldiers, or visit Jimi Hendrix's memorial, i decided to do something a little different.






A few blocks away from our house is a place called The Pet Haven cemetary.

The newly interned.

It's such a small area, but is set up just like a people cemetary. They have a mobile awning for incliment weather, a chapel (for visitation/open casket you think??) Right next to it is an apartment complex--it must be eerie to have a balcony overlooking the pet cemetary, eh?

For more photos of graveyards, visit Sunday Stills.

Sunday Stills :: Macro

Pinecones in macro.

If macro is your thing, please visit Sunday Stills.

Christmas :: Seattle Style

On Wednesday, we headed to Seattle with our dear friends for a theater production of Lyle the Crocodile. I had mentioned to my friend that i would like to show Riona around Seattle while it's all dressed up for the holidays. If you're there, it's something you should see. And you don't have to stay up late for light displays, since we are getting dark here around 3:30 to 4pm.

Here are some highlights of our tour:

The Space Needle all decked out with it's Christmas Tree on top.

Different holiday nutcrackers displayed all around town.
Outdoor lighted walkways at the Seattle Center
The Macy's Star (formerly the Bon Marche' Star) at 5th and Pine

and the gingerbread displays for charity by the famous local chefs:

this one is a tribute to the house boats on Lake Union

The city is looks great when it's all decked out for Christmas!

For more Sunday Stills holiday decorations, lookie here.

Sunday Stills::Green and Red

This week's challenge was kinda tricky. Especially since we were travelling to Portland so Cookie monster could attend another feis... where she made them all green with envy as she won 2nd and 3rd place medals

for her performances in the Single and Light jigs.

I think i pulled it off though.

This time of year, around the Pacific Northwest, there's a changing of the colour guard, if you will. Not just the leaves on the trees though...

but with our fish too.

The mature Chinook salmon start swimming upstream in the Fall to spawn. It is when they spawn that they change colours and the males get their funny looking jaws.
(the salmon above and below are exhibits at the Oregon Zoo, in Portland.)

I thought that'd be it for the extent of red and green at the zoo, but it turns out they had one more animal to submit for this challenge:

The Western Pond Turtle

For more Sunday Stills that will put you in the mood for Saint Nick's arrival,

click here!

Sunday Stills :: The Letter S

This-s-s week's post is brought to you by the letter "S", and by the number 4 (because 4 is the number of inches of rain we are over our usual amount of rain we get in S-s-september. Grrr!

I thought i would get a little s-s-silly and create "S" from things that start with the letter.
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Seeds on Salt

Then we found s-s-something that begins with "S" on our way home from our farm field trip.

And then i felt like a fool for being s-s-so literal, and i snapped up s-s-some better shots.

(Using my retro camera application on my phonebot i snapped these)

I've been attempting to teach myself to knit a sock.

The thing i will miss the most this Fall..."S"ummer days spent playing in our flip flops. Click here to s-s-see more s-s-super shots from S-s-sunday Stillers.

Sunday Stills :: Flags

It's been very soggy this week, so taking pictures of flags wasn't too interesting as they were all laying flat against the pole, a dripping mess. Poor flags. Sorry i had to go in the archives again.

Spokane Indians

County Fair

racing flags

Firefighter Day

To see more flags, visit the talented folks at Sunday Stills!

Sunday Stills :: Glass

In Tacoma, in this cool looking building, internationally renowned glass artist Dale Chihuly has a number of works on display and a glass blowing museum. We visit the skybridge every once in a while because that is a good spot for my dad to take train pictures.

And while he's taking pictures of trains, i am usually taking pictures of the glass inside the roof of the skybridge. Click on the pictures to see the full image, if you'd like.

If you'd like to see more pictures of glass, head to Sunday Stills!