Posted by shana on Jan 29, 2009 in
making friends Quote from “Intro Tips,” from the kitty adoption folks:
“When the time comes to let the new cat out out of its room(do not rush–wait a week) and be sure to monitor closely, open the door to see what happens. Most likely your existing cat will hiss and growl, maybe even wail, confirming their worst fears. Unless open fighting breaks out, let them hiss as cats need to establish hierarchy and territorial rights. Even though the growling is upsetting and sounds bad, it’s okay.”
Our excitement, and the cats’, of course, overrode our desire to follow the rules and wait a week before letting them start becoming bff’s. So it’s been less than four hours, but Amarok and Rohn have already met. It went something like this:
Ammy: Meow
Rohn: Hisssss
Ammy: Meow?
Rohn: Hisssss snort
Ammy: Aw, he snorted! That’s so cute!
Rohn: snort hissssss snort snort
Ammy: do you like feathers? I do.
Rohn: hissss growl growl growl snort
Ammy: (to Mac) what’s with this guy?
Rohn: hisssss
Radiator: hissssss
Rohn: snort
Deciding that was progress enough for one day, I returned Rohn to his room where he is now taking a snooze next to me on the bed. Amarok is reportedly laying outside the closed door purring like crazy. Best. Present. Ever.
(Apparently no one told Amarok he was supposed to feel threatened.)
peeking under the door
Tags: cats
Posted by shana on Jan 29, 2009 in
our family This is Amarok:
He is our cat and we love him very, very much. He is sitting in our Ticket to Ride box, which is open because Mac and I are playing.
Amarok likes to watch us play Ticket to Ride… well, he did at first. The little plastic train stations were fun to knock off the table…
… but it got old, and fast. Ticket to Ride is no game for a cat! Amarok wanted us to play with him!
And we do, of course. We don’t play Ticket to Ride with just each other ALL the time. We play with Amarok, with toy mice and dead leaves and bottle caps and anything that slides across the wood floor, and we even made our very own line of “feathers tied to yarn tied to a stick” toys, about which Amarok is simply gaga. But for all our train stations to knock off tables and furry toy mice and feathers on sticks, we’re forever dropping the ball in one area: we’re not cats. What Amarok needs most of all, we’ve decided, is a little buddy of his own.
Enter Julius.
In the past couple weeks, Mac has spent countless hours on the phone making friends with the kitty adoption folks, and the two of us have met several adoptable kitties, discussing with Amarok at length after each visit the various merits of each. After much deliberation and lots of listening to our hearts and guts, we picked one.
Active but cuddly, discerning but friendly, wise for his young age but light-hearted at the same time, Julius seems to be the complete package, the most likely of all we visited to someday achieve a four foot vertical jump, and, in short, the perfect addition to our family.
We’re taking him home today.
We will christen him “Rohn” and begin the process of taking excessive photos/videos and determining his favorite color feather for the new feather toy we will surely be making in his honor.
Amarok is very excited. He’s just not yet sure why…
Tags: cats, ticket to ride
Posted by shana on Jan 27, 2009 in
weather alert The piles of frozen, weeks-old snow chunks on the sidewalk are covered in crusty yellow shooter holes from the little booty-footed doggies of the neighborhood. We need more snow. Or… or maybe we need it to be April. Yeah…
I was at the grocery store yesterday and they had potted flowers: daffodils, crocuses, even tulips. I bought some daffodils in a little yellow pot. It felt great. I’m looking ahead. But tonight I went out without a hat. It did not feel so great. Oh well.
Here are some more winter pictures for you: icicle art in the courtyard and some lake-side shots from the bike path along the lake (I braved the wind on that one “warm” day last week and took the lake path home). The sand mixed with the freezing waves and made frozen upside-down drip castles on the shore. Pretty cool.
Tags: photos, weather
Posted by shana on Jan 23, 2009 in
outings We FINALLY crept above freezing yesterday, for the first time in weeks, weeks during which some days did not even get as warm as zero. To celebrate, Mac and I headed out to the lake for a sunset stroll.
Though the picture may not seem to project the tropical image you’d hope for on a typical sunset walk on the beach, you could’ve fooled us. After wind chills of -40, and after having to enforce the “no biking when it’s below zero” rule multiple days in a row, 34 felt downright balmy. Break out the swim suits and the pina coladas, hey? You don’t even need a deck chair, you can just prop yourself up in the snow…
Here are some more pictures from our evening:
Of course, it’s all a big tease. Today we woke up to 33 degrees (at 5:30 am, no less – I didn’t even wear my heated pants in to work!) but it’s been dropping all day. Tomorrow’s forecasted high is back down in the single digits, which remain fair game for the next two months, no grumbling allowed because you knew that would happen when you moved to Chicago… Better get those heated pants charged up again… deep in the throes of winter, that’s where we are.
It’s not hard to complain. In fact, it’s hard not to complain. The cold makes you feel miserable and trapped in your home and, well, cold. But if we’re being totally honest with ourselves, especially on an evening like this one, I think we’d have to admit that deep, deep down inside, we kind of love winter anyway.
Tags: photos, weather
Posted by shana on Jan 15, 2009 in
weather alert
yeah, there’s a song nobody wrote.
hello, -30 wind chills.
Tags: weather
Posted by mac on Jan 15, 2009 in
blog status The bad news first: our blog got eaten by the Silverstripe content management system. Something went terribly wrong–we don’t know what–and two days ago our blog just up and disappeared. We lost ALL of our previous posts. I cried a little.
Now, the good news: We’re back up and running, but this time using good, old, reliable WordPress. Keep on the look out for new posts including Chicago facts, winter biking tips, fashion advice, product endorsements, new recipes, snazzy photos and more!
Tags: blog status
