Caturday Is Odd

We never know what to do fer Caturday sometimes.   Its just an odd day of the week fer us.

But we found something...

We love the little leopard that sits on the top of our 'puter monitor.  Its been broke an repaired several times.  Well, the sticky-tape fails eventually an it falls off sometimes, ya know?  TBT allus fixes it best he can.

TBT says there is at least room fer THAT cat...  An WE dont feel threatened since it is really quite small.  And it never takes our food...

An BTW, TBT was playin Risk again.  His avatar is the cool one on the far right.  Ya might have ta biggify it.

Images

The Big Thing: Ayla often sits in front of the TV and watches some of the things moving.  She particularly likes batting at golf balls in flight, but I don't watch much golf since Dad moved out.  So she mostly watches critters on nature shows now.

I was watching a DVD on prehistoric mammals, and got a good picture of her batting at the young one of this pair.  I remember these creatures from childhood as Baluchitherium, but the name is now different (or maybe it was a close cousin), and I don't recall the name from the show.  I wonder what she would think if she realized that even that young one weighed several tons in reality?

I was surprised to get a good picture.  Usually, the autoflash goes off and shows a bright reflection or the picture is blurry (maybe DVDs photograph better than cable signals).

Iza seldom pays any attention to the TV pictures, and Marley never does.  Interestingly, none of the Mews have ever paid any attention to themselves or the others in the mirror.

Garden Tour Thursday

IZA:  

Welcome to the garden tour!  Since most of the flowers look the same as the last tour, I am showing the section Ive avoided fer a few weeks.  From back here, ya can see the 2 sections of Black Eyed Susans (the 2nd is in the far back right) with the ornge Zinnia in the middle.  Its the cheerfulest part of the garden right now.

I had a reason ta kind of not show the Zinnias recently.  Ya can see in this old picture from June that they looked nice when first planted.  Not very full, but nice an orderly an clean...

But look at THIS picture from last week!  They are all full of WEEDS.  I hadda bug TBT fer 3 WEEKS ta get in there an get those weeds OUT!

So he finally did, and see how they look today?  MUCH nicer.  That empty spot in front is where he planted a Wave Petunia that he saved indoors from last Fall and it finally died.  Well, it was an annual flower, so I guess it figured it had done its best and was too old ta keep blooming.

Come an look at the Zinnias close up.  They are very pretty an lush an we had never grown them before.  We looked inna catalog an saw there are other colors, so we are gonna try several different ones next year.

It is nice an sunny an dry today, so lets have some snacks out on the lawn!  We have chopped-up chick-hen breast sprinkled with bacon bits ta nom on, along with Niptinis made with leafs we picked just today.

Thank you all for coming!

A Flutterby

IZA:  I caught a nice yellow flutterby today.

It dint last very long though.  They are kinna fragile...

The Evening Kibble Toss

Ayla:  TBT tosses kibbles around while he eats his own dinner.  We've mentioned that before.  But what ya havent seen is Iza and Marley anxious ta get at them. 

They are shameless in begging...

I regret having to show this, but honesty demands it.  *sigh* (heh-heh-heh)

Notice Im not in the picture.  I have control of myself!

The bowl of kibbles is up on the counter.  See how frustrated Marley is?  He's been known to jump the counter an its about the only time he gets shoved off annything by TBT.  We are NOT allowed up on the counters.

But as soon as TBT sits down in the chair to eat his own dinner, the kibble bowl is on his tray.  He starts tossin them around and we are all happy about that.  Hey, I DO like the kibbles too.

We all chase them all around the rooms and sometimes into boxes set around.  Its great fun.   Marley is obsessive about it though.  For Iza or me to get one, TBT has to toss three to Marley way across the whole room.  Its almost like tryin to catch fishies around a crocidile!

Do you have a brofur or sisfur like that?

Mancat Monday

MARLEY:  I'm Monorail  Marley on the computer chair again!  I do that a lot, but TBT can't usually get a picture of me that way.  I hear the camera "bing" and I run.  But he got me this time (he turned on the camera OUTSIDE and brought it in in his pocket).

And Oh Boy, have I torn up the tracks...  The vinyl at my paws looks like "Goth Lace with some mini Freddie Krueger attacks"!

Also, thanks to all our friends who came over yesserday for the Blogiversary Mousie Hunt.   TBT says he figures at least 4 paws of toesies worth of the little critters went to that Big Mousie Hole in the Sky an he is thrilled!

7th Blogiversary Mousie Hunt

AYLA:  Well, as the eldest cat here, I will be coordinatin our Blogiversary Mousie Hunt!  Marley an Iza will be outside helpin our guests find the best mousie holes.  They brought TBT around earlier today ta have him take some pictures of some of them.

Some of you esperienced mousers will note that there are other good places around the yard (a pile of stones, a compost bin, some overgrown area near the back fence, etc).  Feel free to hunt those places too.  There are also several Nip plants around too.  Those are available fer nibblin on, but try not ta roll on them too much.  There are froggies in the pond.  Yer welcome to catch them too...

TBT hopes we will catch and eat as many as possible.  But dont ferget ta drop a few live ones in the bucket near the deck door, cuz TBT is gonna dump some in the bath tub for the inside-only cats to grab an play with too.

We dont espect anny cat will go hungry with all the mousies we have around, but there will be bowls of Stinky Goodness and some kibble in the kitchen.  I will be inside to make sure our teleport tunnel stays werkin properly, to keep order around the bath tub, and to let TBT know when we need more from the bucket.

Dont ferget that there is a big tall fence completely around the back yard, so ya dont hafta worry about anny wanderin woofies (no offense to your friendly ones).

Also, I will post a few updates ta let those who cant visit during the Hunt read about it later.

Its 6 pm here, so LET THE HUNT BEGIN!

UPDATE:  The outside cats have caught a BUNCH of mousies, and after many were played with and ate, there were enough in the bucket to bring to the tub inside.  TBT dumped them in and I formed a line of the inside-only cats to take turns gettin a mousie.

But the line dint last long an everyone piled in.  It was FANTASTICAL!

UPDATE:  Well, its midnight here, all the mousies left outside are hiding deep.  There are no mousies left in the bath tub an evry inside-only cat that wanted one got one.  If anny outside-allowed cat didnt get one, they licked their lips an pretended they did, MOL!

The last guest ported out through the tunnel a few minnits ago, so we are all goin to bed now.  Thanks fer coming to our Mousie Hunt! 

7th Blogiversary

We have made it to 7 years of bloggin!  Well, not US ezactly.  We werent here at the start.  It was Skeeter and LC back then.  But we overlapped (its never been less than 2 of us), so we figure it counts.

TBT has routinely done a post about the blog beginnings, and that IS HERE.  But we wanna do somthin differnt this year.

Ayla arrived here almost a year before Skeeter hadda go over the Bridge.  Iza arrived about a year before LC decided she hadda join Skeeter cuz she missed him so much (an saw there were two to take care of TBT when she left).

An the blog title DID change from "Skeeter and LC" to "Mark's Mews" when he had to realize that things were gonna be a-changin about who of us kitties were around.  But its been the same blog all the time, with TBT takin pictures and us kitties writin as best we could (slightly edited by TBT when absolutely required).

We have made 2416 posts, gotten about 148,000 visitors (not much by some blog standards, but WE are AMAZED), and made SO MANY friends along the way.  Some of those friends have gone over the Bridge themselfs, some have just stopped bloggin, some have gone off into media TBT doesnt want to get involved with, and some have refocussed their blogs so that there is hardly anny cat presence.  Well, things change an we unnerstand that.  We (including Skeeter and LC) have loved evry kitty we have ever visited or who has visited us.

Since we just hadda big Birfday Pawty fer Marley, we dont really wanna have another big one.  But we (Ayla, Iza, an Marley) still wanna celebrate in some way.  So we had this idea we got from when Skeeter an LC were here.

WE ARE GONNA HAVE A MOUSIE HUNT IN THE BIG FENCED-IN BACK YARD!

It will start at 6pm EDT (cuz the mousies just WONT come out before then).  No kitty has to worry about bein outside, cuz the fence stops woofies an evil deer and such.  We will note where the active mousie holes are the day before.  We have TOO MANY mousies in the big back yard, so there will be plenty fer all.  You can dead and eat only half of all the mousies ya catch.  Thats cuz we need to bring in some mousies fer the kitties what are just not used ta the outside, and they need some fun too.

So every 2nd mousie we catch outside, we bring (alive) to the deck door where TBT has a plastic bucket.  We drop them in, an TBT will take them to the dry baftub wif the closed plug an dump them in a few atta time so those who cant go out can have the WUNNERFUL esperience at grabbin some ta see what it is like. 

EVRY kitty should discover the thrill of grabbin a real mousie.

Plus we will sing our "Mousie Come Out And Play Song" so you can use it too back home.  It works great.

"Mousie mousie, come out an play,
We have cheddar cheese today.
Old chees fer new,
New chees fer old,
An all we want ta do is play.

We're just little things like you.
The only thing we want to do
Is sing our song,
You sing your song
And we will dance around wif you.

Joyful meeting you our friend,
We wish this time could never end.
But we we have other mice to meet 
And we have other mice to EAT
BWA-HA-HA more mice to eat! "

After dark, we will sit around and discuss our esperiences catchin mousies an we can get as technical as we want about claws in furs, neck-bites, and flippin them up to grab them comin down. etc.  An we will respect the newby esperiences of those who just grabbed a mousie in the inside bathtub fer the first time.

We know that seems a bit structured, so after that we will just all run around all crazy-pants inside an burn off all those mousie-calories as we go up an down the cat trees and jump around in the boxes and then even nap.  We figure there are twenty-eleven good nappin placin NOT countin the big watery-bed what could could 30 kittehs without touchin each other (more of course if you like touching).!

And we have the newly crabilated calibrated tunnel to get you all home safely no matter how tired or stuffed you are.

Tomorrow is our 7th Blogiversary

And tomorrow we are having an evening mousie hunt in the big back yard (which is surrounded by the big fence so its all safe).  And there will be mousies in the baftub fer the indoors-only kitties who visit.  So all come by.

We will teach you our "Mousies Come Out" song too...

Laptime

MARLEY:  TBT was all busy away from the house most of today, so when he finally got home an put away his foods and other stuff he bought an sat in the chair, I was sure glad to get up an get some laptime!

Iza was all jealous cuz I got up there first, but ya snooze ya lose...

She even tried pawin at the deck door ta try ta get him up, but he knows her tricks.  He said "Sorry Iza, you are just going to have to wait"...

I got 2 HOURS!

Garden Tour Thursday

IZA: 

I thought I was gonna have ta cancel the Garden Tour today cuz it started ta rain, but the clouds went away an it is all sunny now.  But the grass is still wet, so iffen ya wanna keep yer paws dry, stay on the flat stones that go along the edge of the flowers.

But first, I have these weerd Caladiums ta show you. Arent they colorful?

Look closer though.  Guess how many plants are in that planter?  Just 4!  Theres the plain white/green, the solid red center, the almost all pink, and the white/green with bright red veins.  So even on the same plant, some leafs can look a bit differnt than the others.

Now lets go look and the lawn level flowers...  Theres this bush with small blue flowers.  I ferget what its called and quite frankly I dont wanna go crawl inta that wet stuff ta look at the label.  TBT says he is gonna dig it up an move it someplace by itself cuz it gets sorta lost in the back there.

The orinj Marigolds  are finally bloomin nicely.  They were a bit slow this year.

The Black-Eyed Susans are thriving.  They were originally in a shadier place, but have been movin toward sunnier places ever since.  So this year TBT dug most of them up an put them in a better spot an they are happier.

A lot of them came from one of the paths here.  Yet even after he dug up all the little plants he found, look at all the ones that grew in their place!  They must have been seeds that grew later.  We are gonna enlarge the new spot this Fall an move these guys too cuz its hard ta walk on the path when the bees are busy.

Now lets have some treats back up on the deck.  TBT says it is too close to dinnertime for real food, so we will just have Pounce treats an Catmopolitans today...

Oh Yay, Breakfast!

Ayla:  It's dawn an TBT is up ta give us our favrit foods.  Its Wellness chicken! We think it doesnt get better than that.  We did the food dance aroun his legs.  He is good at dodging us, but we really werk at gettin in there ta show him how happy we are.  We are PRETTY sure he likes that cuz he uses our names a lot when we do...

First, the can is opened.  Then we can smell it.  After that, he puts it into our 3 bowls.  Iza an Marley get their small bowls in larger bowls cuz they shove them unner the cabinets iffen not the large heavy bowls.  I dont of course.

I get mine up on the top of the shoe rack.  I like it up there.  Even dear Marley will eat my food iffen I dont have it all high.  An even then I have to try to eat fast.  Marley has learned to jump up on the shoe rack.  But I'm safe to eat for an hour.  Marley doesn't come lookin fer foods fer a while after he has his own bowl.

Its hard bein the smallest cat in the house sometimes.  But TBT watches over me eatin an strokes me while I eat up there, so I do eat an get my fill.  That even helps me wanna eat.  I even gained 2 pounds the past 2 years.  Really, I went from 5.5 pounds to 7.5 pounds, so I guess its werks. 

I've gotten kinna fussy about even the other good Stinky Goodnesses.  I just want the Wellness.  Well, who wouldnt?

Mancat Monday On Tuesday

MARLEY:  I have discovered - FROGS!!!  The little pond is FULL of them.

I had been noticing some things jumping into the pond while I walked around the plants near the pond searchin fer mousies, but I could never quite figure out what they were, and when I did stop to sniff one, they werent warm like little critters OUGHT to be.

But the other day, finding no mousies, I decided to investigate the cold jumpy things more carefully.  After all, they DO move (even if a bit oddly), so there might be something to them.  After I studied their jumping patterns, I grabbed a couple and carried them away from the pond to see iffen they were good ta play with.

There ARE!  Ya gotta poke them in the butt a few times ta get them ta hop, but they are good fer chasin and grabbin again fer a few minnits.  After that, they just scrunch themselfs up tight and lay there all grumpy-like.

The legs are a bit tasty, but thats about all there is ta eat on them.  Still, they are fun ta catch.

TBT told me what they were when he saw I caught a couple, an he said they were LC's favrit toys.  That was neat ta learn!  Mebbe I'll get TBT ta take some pictures so you all can see what ta look for around ponds.

BTW, when ya pick them up in yer mouf, get them by the head.  They pee when grabbed!  I discovered that the hard way...

Nellie, The Cat From Hell, Visits!

Well, first of all, we wanna say that Nellie is nicer than her title suggests.  HERE, as a visitor, annyway.

We knew she was coming, but not exactly where or when but that she would arrive in our tunnel.  So we were a BIT surprised when we were lookin out the deck door an she suddenly appeared there.  Its a good thing we look outside there often.  Marley isnt in the picture cuz he ran to tell TBT she was out there, and HE of course ran (dodging Marley in between his feet) to open the door an let her in.

We made sure she was OK from the tunnel trip (she was), an we made sure she had some of the best foods left over from the Birfday Pawty (Bast, she scarfs down foods like Iza does).  Well, it was a long trip an she was hungry.

So we had a great night an day with Nellie here!  After all sittin down in the cat tree, she told us a lot about her travelin adventures.  As we are not much into travelin ourselfs, we were VERY impressed.  Nellie has been EVERYWHERE we ever heard of and plans to go to OTHER places soon!

We all slept on the waterybed (an naturlly Nellie slept closest to Marley).

In the morning, we all went out to hunt mousies.  Nellie was concerned, but we showed her the BIG FENCE around the back yard and she was OK about that and as long as we were there and TBT was standing by the deck door watchin carefully.  We showed her the best mousie holes.  She loved our "Come Out And Play" mousie song and watched quietly.  Iza got one out an showed Nellie how to hold it down while it sang its last song with us.   Mousies sing so nicely...

But Nellie was still a little nervous about bein outside so long, so we all went in.  We had a nother great nap-session on the waterybed and then TBT did the kibble-tossin game.  Nellie was amazed but she caught on quick.  She has fast paws!

So we showed her our Turbotrak ball game, and she loved that.  She really got that ball movin FAST!

Then we had TBT sit down on the chair (after putting our "cat-sitter" DVD on the TV.)  Nellie was a bit cautious about TBT but evrycat falls for his magic finger-scritchies and she had a great half-nap with the scritchies and the mousies on the TV.

But all visits must end and Nellie had to move on.  She went into our tunnel and Marley an Ayla watched from both ends to make sure evrythin was aligned properly.

She ran to the other end of the tunnel, an then it was just like she wasn't there.  We've always wondered about that.  No noise, no air movement, just "gone".   Not even a "poof" sound.

We really loved her visit.  Mebbe one of US will try that sometime.  But not yet.  We need more esperience with tunnels first.  They are kinna tricksy.  We mean, even a sperienced kitty like Nellie ended up on our deck!  So we think we will practice in the house a while...

Thank you Nellie fer the wunnerful visit!

Easy Like Sunday

Well, we had our routine for Easy Like Sunday all practiced (90 degree rotation nap-curls), but SOMEONE suddenly stood up when the camera "binged" on.

And THEN decided she needed to look out a window an would be back "later".  Seriously, shes the eldest in the house, so you would THINK she would know the routine.  I'm not identifyin myself cuz I might get in trubble with her and she is sneaky in pay-backs.  But really, we practiced the picture ALL day Saturday!  She did it to spite me, I'm sure.  ~ Iza

MARLEY UPDATE:  I wanna thank ALL of you who attended my Birfday Pawty Friday (and those who showed up early Saturday - We were still up and enjoyed your company too).  You all made it the BEST birfday pawty I've ever had (all 3 of them).  I had 128 unique visitors and 205 total (so a lot of you visited more than once).  That was the MOST visitors we have EVER had!

I especially want to thank Miles Meezer fer visitin, who had himself delivered in a box by the Bloo Shorts guy on an amazing tour he is doing.  After his visit, we got him back in his box and TBT attached the next label on the box to send him along to the Hotties.