Hint, hint

Mom and Dad came home from a Thanksgiving trip to Cincinnati to visit Dad's family and found a gingerbread man toy in our empty food bowl — a not so subtle hint that we want some treats. 

One year ...

It's been one year since our big sister Maggie crossed the Rainbow Bridge. She was the best big sister, teaching us so much about being a McKitten-Cat. We're still figuring some things out, being just two young boy cats, but we're managing. We love on Mom and Dad as much as we can, as often as we can. Maggie was around for a good 16 years, longer than Mom and Dad ever imagined she would be considering her struggles as a tiny baby cat. But you always want more time. Hug you people tonight, purr for them real loud, and maybe (just maybe) let them sleep in a little tomorrow morning.

Watching the stove

Don't mind us, we're just watching the stove. You know, just in case something happens and Mom needs our help. Aslan has a tendency to want to jump on the stove (99 percent of the time when it is off) so he can come up and snoopervise so either Mom or Dad has to keep an eye on him when the burner is on to make sure he doesn't make a poor choice. So far, so good. We have gotten few treats for "helping."

Black Cat Appreciation

Happy Black Cat Appreciation Day! For those who never met him, this is Huggy Bear. He was Mom and Dad's lovable house panther, always by your side, the cat with the Insta-purr the second he saw you, night hunter of all the toys, and a big fan of whatever you were eating. He crossed the bridge in 2019 and left big mittens for us to fill. Mom and Dad miss this guy a lot, but they are so thankful for the 14-1/2 years of love he gave them. 

Dads say the craziest things …

Dads can say the craziest things sometimes. Like the other day Dad looked at us and said, "You can't have treats all the time. You just had some five minutes ago." Like, who says silly things like that? Mom sure doesn't. 

Dad's catsitting nightmare

When our neighbors go out of town Dad will go down and check on their cats for them. They have to big Mancats, Moochie and Zach, and sometimes the neighbor's daughter's cat Gracie will be there too. They have a cat door from the kitchen into the garage where the litter boxes are. And the neighbor will leave the large garage door cracked just the slightest amount to ventilate the garage. 

This past weekend Dad was checking in on all three cats. He hadn't seen Zach, which isn't anything out of the norm because he usually hides from Dad, but he had seen Moochie and Gracie. Everything was going fine. Then Sunday night Dad was driving home after a late quick trip to the grocery store and he sees this brownish cat-shaped blur run toward the neighbor's house. "That can't be Gracie," he thought, "but I'm going to go and check anyway." 

Dad walks down and looks and the garage door looks to be opened about an inch higher than normal -- apparently just enough for the cats to slip under. Dad looks and sees Moochie under one of their trucks. He's usually a pretty amiable cat so Dad figures he'll just squeeze under the truck and scruff him and bring him in. Well Moochie is having none of it. He hissed and swatted at Dad. 

Dad figures Moochie is set where he is, so he goes in to do a head count. He can't find any of the cats! So he calls the neighbor who talks him through setting the cat door to only allow them to come in but not go back out. Then Dad went out and opened the garage door more to allow the cats to get in easier. He figures he'll prod Moochie with a broom. Moochie thought he'd wander around the house. It is dark out and Dad was having none of this, and was able to herd Moochie into the garage. As Moochie came in Dad heard the cat door flap and thunk closed. (Gracie is in!). Then Dad shut the door completely and saw Moochie under the car in the garage (vintage Mustang). He was set and not budging and made sure Dad knew it. 

But Zach was out, and there was no sign of him. He's played this game before. Dad opened the door the the screened in porch to give Zach some shelter. But other than that there was little Dad could do. The neighbors weren't too worried about it. Sure enough, the stinker came home the next night, hungry and eager for affection. But Mom and Dad were super stressed out.

Happy Gotcha Day to us!

Today was our Gotcha Day! It's been three years since we came to our forever home with Mom and Dad. We are so happy and still very closely bonded. And we love to hang out with Mom and Dad. 

Happy belated birthday to us!

Our third birthday was back on April 30 but life got hectic and we neglected to post our birthday pictures. Dad fixed us a 3 "cake" of stinky goodness. Aslan was quick to taste it. I let him have the first taste, then Dad gave me some in my own bowl (and some Shrimpy Shrimp treats). 

We can't believe we're three years old already! We both still have our kitten moments, especially when we chase our ping pong balls. But we're getting to be real mancats now. 

Next Level Napping

Aslan has taken his napping to the next level. Here he is, napping on the cat tree while using the warm windowsill as a pillow. He was up all night telling Dad he needed Shrimpy Shrimp treats, so Aslan has earned his late-morning nap.

(Also, check out his amazing toe floof!)

 

 

 

Life with Aslan

This right here … this is life with Aslan in a nut shell. 

Aslan up top

Yeah, it took Aslan about a week, but he finally decided to get up on the cat tree by himself without being bribed with treats. This makes Mom so happy. She was feeling really guilty about getting rid of his favorite taco truck scratcher and replacing it with this cat tree. It was just a matter of time. (I've already been on it a lot.)

New cat tower

After years of saying they were going to get a proper cat tower Mom finally broke down and bought us one. We traded in our Taco Truck and Halloween Haunted House cardboard box scratchers from Target and replaced them with this wonderful tower. It has a scratching post and four levels (including a little cubby on the bottom where Dad may put the heated cat bed). I took to it pretty quickly (ok, some treats helped) but Aslan has been a little more cautious. We still have our Stranger Things arcades  game scratcher so he's been on that. He'll figure it out in his own time. But I'm loving being able to get up high. I like a good perch. 

—Loki 

Helping Dad

Dad was watching an online continuing education seminar and he was looking a little bored with the current speaker so I decided he needed a little support. It's a full time job being an emotional support cat but I'm very intuitive that way and up for the challenge. 

The snuggle is real

Aslan and I are both good snugglers. We approach things a little differently. I am an aggressive snuggler. I will climb on top of you and get up under your chin. Aslan like to lay against your body and let you pet his chest and his belly.

Aslan loves to have his belly rubbed.

 

He will knead dough in the air when getting his pets.

 

I want to be on you. I like to lay across your lap or on your chest. The more upset you are or the worse your day is, the more I am going to climb on you. It's the empath in me.   

--Loki

The (Not So) Great Poop Incident of 2022

It could happen to you. It could happen to anyone. But it happened to me. And as embarrassing as it is, I feel it is a story that must be told. 

Mom and Dad had a very late night last night. Mom runs a community theatre and they are in the final rehearsals of The Color Purple, which opens on Friday. So they didn't get home until close to 1 a.m. Mom has a super sniffer nose, and the second she walked in the house she knew something was amiss. 

She followed the smell and noted poop residue in the dining room on the rug and on the window sill. Then she saw a small spot on my favorite chair to sit on (the white one, of course). That made Mom check my bottom, and I had poop on my furs around my bottom. She was quick to scoop me up. Dad shed his jacket and sweatshirt, and rushed me upstairs for the horror of all horrors -- a washcloth bath!

Dad cleaned my bottom, and my furs, and the base of my tail, and my bottom some more, until he was satisfied that he had gotten as much as he could. Then he dried me off as much as I would let him. I was unhappy, and very un-Loki-like. I even tried to bite him when Dad was trying to soothe me. He understood. 

After I got out, I got one lonely treat. We love treats, and Mom and Dad suspect that with the bad weather and stress of them being gone, maybe I've had too many treats.

In the upstairs hall, Mom realized something was wrong there, too. The hallway stratcher was moved. Aslan and I are both very good about covering our messes -- a hairball, some puke -- we'll put something over it. And sure enough, there was a wayward poop in the hall carefully covered by the scratcher. They suspect that I either had some urgency and didn't make it to the box, or I had an incident and this cling-on was the primary problem. 

So the scratcher got trashed, the upstairs hall, my favorite chair, the dining room rug and window sill, and a pair of brand new jeans that were on the guest bed waiting until they fit a little better all got spot cleaned or washed thoroughly -- at 1 a.m., because that's how Tech Week goes in the theatre. 

Then Dad sprayed some waterless shampoo on my butt, because I hadn't had enough trauma that night. But he wanted to make sure I didn't smell like poop, even though I was clean. 

After all the cleaning, Dad sat down to eat dinner (yes, dinner at 1:30 a.m.) while he made some corrections on the show t-shirt. And for some reason he refused to share his food with us. Something about upsetting our tummies. 

 I did forgive Mom and Dad for the bath, and snuggled with Mom in bed last night and this morning. 

(On a side note, I mentioned Mom's new jeans. She's been kicking butt doing a fitness program called E2M for the last year, and she has shrunk to about the size she was early in college. We are super proud of her. And she's still out there kicking butt and getting healthier every day.)

(Also, the picture is not of the incident, because who wants to see any of that, but this is me being cute from the other day when I wasn't covered in poop.)

Four years gone

It has been four years since Jasper (our older brother who we never met) crossed the Rainbow Bridge. He was the original blogger over here -- the cat who started it all. He was a wonderful big orange boy, from what we've been told.

Jasper loved to share Mom's pillow and rest his head against hers, or place his paw on her cheek just so she knew who she belonged to.

Mom and Dad say that Aslan resembles Jasper in several ways. I have a little more Huggy Bear in me, apparently. We hope to live up to the standard set by the cats who came before us. They set that bar pretty high.

Mom and Dad miss him so much...

Napping boys

When you find your good napping spot you must nap! Aslan loves to nap with the sun on his belly. I enjoy curling up in a bed or inside my clock tower scratcher. I hope you have a good nap today too. 

—Loki

Sharing a plate

Cupcake crumbs are amazing! Mom and Dad won't share the entire cupcake no matter how persistent we are, but they do share the crumbs. And don't you worry, we cleaned the entire plate!