More unedited cat photos

 My Dad has a cat closet. It was created for the last set of cats, but has been closed up while these guys were still too little.

They're not too little now. And they're more than happy to prove it.

The carpetted steps lead up to a shelf that Dad cut a cat hole in. They can sit up there if they want to get out of the way for a bit, or (as is more the favourite at the moment) they can bat the crap out of the mouse toy that's dangling from a higher shelf.

It's pretty perfect for the climbers.

Anyway, that's it for today. I'm too busy being angry at my body (long story) to really want to post, so I'll leave it here for now.

Later, all.

Ah, new. And some Turkey Brothers.

 Today's pointless photos are completely unedited, because I have other things to do. You'll hear what in a bit.

The first pointless photo is, admittedly, boring. It's a bridge, obviously, and if you click on it you'll see that it's a little fuzzy because my hand was getting tired at that point.

The cool thing about the picture, though, is that the bridge is way down the hill and across the river valley from my Dad's place, and I took the shot from his driveway.

Yep, someone got a new zoom lens. 55-200 mm, which will nicely extend my range since the kit lens (the one that came with the camera) is an 18-55 mm. And the new lens was on sale.

No, really, that's a good thing. Maybe my family's weird, but we're always happy when we can a) get things on sale, and b) tell the person we give them to that the things were on sale. I know that some people would think it's lessening the value of the gift or something like that, but it's more like being proud of finding a neat thing AND managing to get a deal on it.

Anyway, happy birthday to me, and thanks, Dad.

The other new thing is the computer that I'm currently using. My brother and sister-in-law decided to get Dad a new system for his birthday (yeah, she'd had to use Dad's old one when they were out here. I'm not the only one who was hearing the hamster wheel). Now I just have to figure the thing out. You see, the person who does our IT at work has decided that she doesn't like Windows 8, so all of our stuff is on Windows 7 whether it's new or not. Right now I'm using the Desktop on this computer rather than the Start page for anything that I want to actually get done, but don't worry. I'll figure things out eventually. Erm, not that you'd know one way or the other anyway since it'll all look the same to you, but... You know, I'm not sure what the but is. But I'm not a dinosaur? But it isn't giving me the jitters? But even though I'm now officially smack dab in my mid-forties (yes, dammit) I still know how to computer?

Whatever. Fill in your own but.

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And now for a quick Turkey Brothers update. The boys have lost their kitten coats in a big way. Tom has become very shiny and sleek, and Bob is still a fair bit coarser. They're both pretty handsome cats. You can see from the photo above that Bob is very much the speckled kind of tabby rather than the stripey kind. They're both still shits climbers and are on everything. The only way to keep them off the piano, for instance, is to make sure that they never get anywhere near the piano. Yep, these little boys see a lot of closed doors. I'll have a few more pictures of them in the coming posts, so more later.

For now, though, I'm off to explore the wonderful world of Windows 8.



I'll leave a trail of breadcrumbs in case I get lost.

Totally not recent photo of the day:

Alpine Veronica flowers in the spring, generally. It's not spring now.

I don't know if you've heard, but it's winter here.



Bah.

Now, don't get me wrong. It's not unusual for it to be wintery in mid-November in Alberta. What is unusual, though, is for it to happen in a day. That's right, one day. One day it was something like 9C for a high, and the next, if I'm remembering right, the high was -12C.

Yes, that's a minus.

This week I decided to take Monday off because the fall of the Remembrance Day stat on Tuesday (and I seriously didn't realise that Remembrance Day isn't yet a national stat. Really, Canada?) made for an easy long weekend for a part-timer like me. The weather hit on the weekend, though, and decided that I was staying home anyway because it was too cold for me to be able to clear the 10 cm of snow from my car.

I am not making this up.

I had to get out Wednesday, unfortunately, because some stupid person delayed getting her driver's licence renewed until just a couple of days before her birthday. So, rather than face -- at best -- a fine or -- at worst -- redoing my driver's test after all of these years, I sucked it up, cleared the car, went to the registry, got a really bad toque-head photo taken... and then went right back home because the headache from the cold had set in and I couldn't face doing anything else.

I did manage to make it to work yesterday afternoon. On my own, even. Made me feel like garbage, but I did it. Today? Early program, expected morning temperature of -28C. Yes, seriously. Wheat took pity on me and said that he'd pick me up (thank you, and did I mention thank you?). It didn't get quite as cold as all that (only -21C, I think, when we left), but I'd've still had to scrape the windshield and that would have done it for my hands for a while.

Just so you know, being allergic to the cold isn't the best life choice in Alberta. Not that it was a choice or anything, but still.

Aaanyway, there's how things stand. They're saying that it's supposed to start warming up tomorrow, so hopefully that will give me a chance to get into Dad's and give him his birthday present (happy birthday today, Dad). Which is... ummm... probably peanuts for his bird feeder. Yeah, the crap weather meant that I didn't get my last-minute shopping done, so he'll be getting something from our bookstore. He's ok with that, though. It's not the first time.



Later, then. Assuming that I survive until the next time I'm at a computer and don't get lost in a snowbank somewhere.

Your weekend cat:

I'm actually telling you that I won't be around for a few days instead of just disappearing. Don't die of shock, ok?

See you next week sometime. And until then, do please enjoy this picture of a naked cat bathing.

Quick pointless bad cat of the day:

No time for anything else today. Maybe tomorrow, but don't get your hopes up.

Too bad, because I did have one or two things to say about politics and stupidity. Or I could have just said stupidity to avoid being redundant...



Bet everyone's sorry they missed that particular post.

Ah, technology

Today, Bad Cat is not scratching no really not scratching honestly not scratching...

Seriously, though, it's ok if he scratches there. If you look closely you'll see that it's an extra carpet square put over the actual carpet. I can't remember why it was put there originally, but our old cats used it as a scratching pad and if these cats choose to do it as well it saves the real carpet.

Tom's actually decent at using scratching pads, I'll admit. It's Bob that you catch trying to decorate every scratchable item in the house.

He just acts innocent, you know.

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As I generally say, this'll be short because I have to do work etc. etc. I just wanted to mention that today and Thursday some of us are sitting in on an online interpretation conference. It's been interesting so far and has led to some good staff discussion, but it... well, it just seems a little weird to me. These things always do, really. Let's get everyone into the staff room, throw the computer feed up onto the big screen, and spend a while listening to someone talk while we stare at a powerpoint slideshow. This particular one also has a chat box so that you can ask questions or comment as things go, but still. Everyone walking past the room is hearing a voice and seeing us staring at the screen and apparently not doing anything. Doesn't that strike anyone else as weird?

Probably just me.

I have to admit, though, that it makes me almost miss the days of actually going to conferences. Yeah, there was always the hassle of getting there and the hassle of accommodations and (for me, at least) the hassle of not sleeping... wait, what did I miss, again? Oh, socialisation, I suppose. I'm not exactly a social butterfly, but even a person like me got a chance to make connections when conferences were physical rather than virtual.

Ah well. At least I'll get to sleep (or not sleep) in my own bed tonight.



I guess that's something.

Later, all.

Pointless turkey brothers of the day:

Otherwise known as Bad Cats.

I could have a whole series of these two up on things they're not supposed to be on, you know.

Probably will, in fact.

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Ok, this will be quick because I have a lot of things to catch up on. I wasn't exactly intending to be away from work for a week, you know. I was expecting not to work early in the week because I only work part-time and that's not unusual. I wasn't, however, expecting to be knocked off my ass by some bug or other and end up missing the rest of the week.

When you're home and not really feeling like doing/able to do much, you end up watching a lot of television, you know. Well, you do if you're me and have no computer or wifi, at least. Sometimes you end up seeing things that you really wish you hadn't seen. The other day, for example, I was watching some show on giant food makers. You know, things like competitive pumpkin growers or people who make huge wheels of cheese. I know it was all supposed to be just a bit of light fun, but really all I could think of was the first-world cliché that this is why the rest of the world hates us. I mean, think of it. All of those wasted resources and time, just to grow a huge onion. And then, all that wasted food so that you can have the world's biggest vat of macaroni and cheese. If you were having trouble feeding your family at all and knew that things like that exist in other countries, would you see it as a bit of fun?

I certainly wouldn't. In fact, I guess I didn't see it as fun even now. Food is just one of the things that we really, absolutely need to start taking more seriously, folks.

And don't get me started on those shows where they go to greasy diners or county fairs and eat the biggest, fattest plates of food that can be made. Oh, I watch them all right. But I hate myself for doing it.

Anyway, back to work now. There should actually be blogging this week, fingers crossed, and I'll try to find something lighter to blather about. And if you need something lighter now, go to the other blog and look at Socky. I hadn't looked at it since I posted it until today, and if I do say so myself, boys and girls, that's one fine sock puppet.

And my two fans know how rarely I say that about my own doodles, so you know it must be true.