Caturday Sunbeams

And I'm spent. Also very, very behind in this week's blog reading, so if you lot want a nice, fat Los Links come Monday, I'm going to have to pawn you off with a little light (ah-ha-ha) entertainment.

The sun has forsaken us now, but last week, Seattle attempted to apologize for not giving us an actual summer. Lovely 80+ degree days with wonderfully cool nights, my favorite. I usually don't open the curtains in the bedroom, because keeping the place a dark cave prevents it from getting warm, but over the last several sunny days, I took to letting the sunshine is for the poor kitteh, who wasn't getting enough quality porch time.

This met with some approval.

About the second or third day (I know, consecutive sunny days in Seattle, unheard of!), she figured out the routine. She appeared at the window before I'd even gone to it and stood there, little nose poked out and eyes half-closed, awaiting that magical moment when Mommy would let Mr. Sunbeam in. And this continued to be her routine most days thereafter. I wish I'd had the camera handy, but the one time I did, she broke her streak. On purpose, I'm sure.

But she did allow me to catch this moment of bliss:

Doesn't she just look smugly self-satisfied? You'd think she was responsible for the fine weather.

You may be wondering about the blue thingy. That's her hair tie. She won't play with cat toys, but for some reason, adores chasing hair ties. She'll even play fetch with them sometimes. And when she's not chewing on Mommy, she likes chewing on them:

Funniest moment ever was when she started dry-coughing due to a developing hairball, but wouldn't let the hair tie go, so it was dangling from a tooth as she wheezed. She's ridiculously cute sometimes. I try to explain this to friends who wonder why I've kept an animal with homicidal tendencies. They just do not understand the power of her Massive Cute.

During the day, her sunbeam would move, but she'd sleep through it. So when I was home, I'd go back to the bedroom every hour or so and drag her a few inches over. I probably shouldn't have done - this just taught her she didn't have to do a damned thing for herself. No matter. Once the sunbeams had well and truly moved on, she'd amble out through the living room and onto the porch for a nice lie-down in the sunshine with her favorite rocks. So she did get exercise. Of a sort.

I'm looking forward to the winter writing season, but I'll miss these times.

Caturday Geocat: Hand Sample Analysis

My poor beautiful hand samples from our Oregon trip are just sitting forlorn on the porch, waiting for me to come up with a permanent home for them. I'm afraid I may never get to properly house them, however. My cat has taken a definite interest.

We have this little ritual when I come home for lunch. She usually spends the time outside on the porch, hanging out on her carpet square whilst I scarf some food and catch up on Twitter. Then she greets me at the door as I head outside for a smoke. She follows me over to the lounge chair, where I sit and enjoy the last moments of freedom before heading back for another four hours of soul-sucking drudgery agonizing boredom work. She consents to a scratch behind the ears, and then ambles over and starts inspecting the rocks.

Here she's analyzing one of the platy volcanic bits (which may or may not be basalt or basaltic andesite, but that's a story for another day). It's one of the ones with dendrites on it. Once she gets done with those, she'll establish ownership over the rhyolite by rubbing her cheeks all over every piece she can reach. I have to watch her on that - they've got some glassy textures and sharp edges.

She'll look up occasionally, stare off into the distance like she's considering what she's just learned from her latest inspection.

Then she'll go back to her favorite sample, a frothy bit of basalt or basaltic andesite with quartz in.

She loves that rock the best. She curls up with it every time we're out there together. I'm surprised it's not coated in cat hair, considering how much she snuggles with it.

It'll be winter soon, and both rocks and kitteh will have to come in from the cold and rain. But for now, I think I'll leave her hand samples just as they are. This time we have together, me and her and the rocks, is precious.

I'm lucky to live with a cat who shares my love of geology and Doctor Who. I can forgive the occasional homicidal rages. We all have our little quirks, after all.

You've had your Caturday dose of cute. Time for something of substance. Both Lockwood and Cujo have written up bits of our recent trip. Cujo explains why geology is important, and Lockwood's done a more in-depth look at his teaser tweeting, a sexy take on the Pinnacles, and a dedication to the teacher who introduced him to many of the wonders we saw. Enjoy!

GeoKitteh Contemplates Hand Samples

All of my lovely rocks from our El Norte adventure are still on a towel in the living room, awaiting their final home. This is normally where teh kitteh's paper and cardboard are. I thought she might be angry, but she found Mommy washing rocks to be fascinating. Then she decided they'd been placed there for her own entertainment.

Looks like a queen with her court, doesn't she just?

She's been busy inspecting the bounty.

And then she thinks about them for a moment.

If she makes some sort of profound discovery no one's ever made before with your basic subduction zone rocks, I hope she learns English and shares her wisdom.

Serpentinite and Cat

Sorry, folks.  The week got away from me, and I haven't got a Dojo post ready. Besides, Karen wants pics of that delightful chunk of probable serpentinite.

Alas, I missed my chance Sunday. It was baking hot on the porch, I had Aunty Flow's typical "hi, I'm here!" agony going on, and the weather folks assured me that all would be sweetness and light aside from scattered thunderstorms on Monday. "No problem," thought I. "Scattered t-storms we can live with. Plenty o' sunbreaks, I'm sure!"

What the weather folks apparently meant but didn't state explicitly was, "Thunderstorms scattered through solid gray clouds that will not allow so much as a single stray sunbeam to alight upon your porch. No, not even for a second."

Argh.

So we're going to have to go on with two pics I shot that include the cat, and that do not in any way do justice to the glory that is my chunk of serpentinite, but can be seen as a teaser.

There she is, lying on top of the bits of the glacial erratic I picked off the ground so that I could take them home and break them open and attempt to identify what it's made of. The rocks from Carkeek are laid out neatly drying. I suppose she believes she's helping. The serpentinite is that chunk o' yum right behind her head.

Here she is lying beside my great and glorious chunk of serpentinite, out on the porch. Could've gotten a much better shot if I'd been in any condition to crouch, but at this time of the month, movement is severely restricted. Still, you can tell it is beautiful.

The light today is so severely filtered by clouds that the truly magnificent greens and blues of this thing aren't properly displayed, but I can't just leave you with mere glimpses. Here's one taken near the window, with what little light we've got:

How amazing is that? Just imagine what actual sunlight does to it!

A macro:

Really, as much as I love my schist, I almost think I love this more. Once the sun comes back at a time when I can take full advantage, we'll have some truly good pics and a proper write-up on what serpentinite's all about. As long as this is serpentinite. If anybody suspects it's not, now would be an excellent time to say so.

And, because I can't resist:

How happy does she look, eh? Shot that with the zoom from inside the house, so as not to wake her up. In the summer, she spends a fair amount of her time out on the porch, basking in the sun. At least she's lazy and doesn't try to climb up on the roof like the neighbor's cat. I can leave the door open and leave her to do whatever without worrying I'll have to call in a ladder truck later. True, we get flies, but it's a small price to pay for such a happy kitteh.

No Lounge Chair Shall Prevail

We've had occasional moments of summer, which means I'm forced to leave the sliding glass door open so that my felid can play Queen o' the Porch.  So last weekend, there I was, trying to concentrate on me work, and I hears this clunk.

I looked outside in alarm, and in the next moment dove for the camera, because hilarity was about to ensue.

The important thing about leverage is, when you're on one end of a very long lounge chair, and there's nothing anchoring the other end, the end you're on goes clunk.

I waited for the freakout.

My Cat the Geology Fan

A few of us on Twitter were recently discussing the feasibility of sticking cats in washes in order to create some geology lolcats.  This is the closest my cat will ever come to a dry wash.  She's not what you might call a fan of the great outdoors.  But, apparently, she likes pop geo books just fine:

If you're inspired to caption, knock yourselves out.  I'd love to see the result!

I wish I could believe she really was interested in geology, but I think she was just trying to impress the neighbor, who was visiting us for the first time.  She's more of a Doctor Who fan at heart.  Here's yet another bit of evidence:

Note how she's shifted them so they form a nice, comfy arc along her back.  And she's dragged her green tissue paper closer so she can have all of her great loves in one place.  This is why I will never be able to clear my living room floor of Doctor Who DVDs, a tattered old piece of cardboard from an Amazon shipment, and that stupid piece of tissue paper: she'd kill me if I tried.  All right, granted, she attempts to kill me anyway, but only as an afterthought.  She'd be motivated to murder if I ever put things away.

If blogging ever suddenly ceases, at least you'll know what happened to me.

My Cat Is Also a Doctor Who Fan

Fangirl

She's added hanging about with the Doctor Who DVDs to her usual rounds of sleeping on me, her paper, and the back of the couch.  Looks very smug about it, doesn't she?

Overdose of Cute, Plus Snow!

Some of you like cute kitteh photos.  Well, this post is for you.

My cat, who is spawn of Satan at the best of times and something Satan would flee from at the worst, has been overplaying the cute card over the past few weeks.  I believe she's plotting something.  Or perhaps she's just saying thanks for giving her a big ol' sheet o' paper for Xmas:

Nah.  Plot.

More disgusting cute after the fold, plus a rare glimpse of Seattle snow.

So Much for Substance

I got the other half of Connie Willis's two-part book today.  I'm about to go devour it, much like egg-eating snakes devour their dinner.  Alas, my darlings, this means you should expect no posts of substance from me for at least 24 hours.

Instead, you're being subjected to a grab-bag of kitteh stuff.  Why?  Because I can, and because it's funny.  And at times heartwarming, such as this rescue reported by Jerry Coyne.  Moral: do not let your toddlers get their hands on kittens small enough to flush.  And Aussie firemen are awesome.

Lockwood found two items aptly demonstrating a writer's life with a cat:

Lotsa other funny stuff there both having and not having to do with cats, so if you haven't read his Sunday Funnies yet, what the hell are you waiting for?

Callan Bentley demonstrates that cats have no appreciation for the artist's workspace, either:

Well, actually, they appreciate it quite a lot, I suppose.  Just not in the way we might wish.

Bora tweeted a helpful guide to petting a cat.  Here's a taste:

Click for the rest.  Even if you're not a feline aficionado, you may still require these skills someday.  Think of the rich, cat crazy relative you may need to placate, who knows you're not allergic.

There.  Something fun for ye.  Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to WWII London.  Laters!

Jerry Coyne's Traveling Cats

Love cats, love science, really love a scientist who loves cats!  Jerry Coyne's had a felid road show this week.  We're talking about a man who carries a box of cat food around with him for teh kittehs.  He's got lots of travel photos with kittehs!

U can see dem in Greece:

And Istanbul:

And on teh way to a glacier:

Dey r in Guatemala:

And dere are kittehs in teh biology lab doin science:

Dere r moar kittehs at teh linkz!

Scenes From the Cat-Servant Life

I had ambition today.  I promise, I did.  Aaalll sorts of things planned.  Wasn't gonna be like the cat, doing nothing but lazing round in sunbeams:

Yeah, well.  Long day o' work later, Rocko on me teevee, cat on me arm...

And yes, it's really damned hard to snap photos of the cat with only one arm free.  I asked her to move, and this is all the movement I got:

My cat is my inspiration... to crawl into bed with a good book, stretch out my toeses, and be all the lazy I can be.

Substantive content tomorrow, my darlings.  Promise.  Unless the cat suggests otherwise...

Bookstore Kittehs!

We haven't had enough of the cute and furry round here lately.  Happily, thanks to Brian Switek and Brian Romans, that sad situation is remedied:

When they aren't trashing the occasional pricey manuscript with their teeth and claws, cats - in all their blissful sloth - serve as wonderfully calming (if sometimes haughty) hosts: Have a seat, take it easy, get lost in a book. A bookstore cat is a shop's mascot and keeper, equally adept at charming customers and, when the lights go out, chasing away rodents.

I do not believe it to be a coincidence that as I was squealing over the slideshow of adorable bookstore kittehs, my very own little hell beast went and posed prettily against our own bookshelves.  Alas, the camera was out of reach, and I made the mistake of mentioning that if she really was a bookstore kitteh, she'd have to put up with children wanting to pet her, so she stopped playing bookstore kitteh before the camera could be retrieved.  There's only one thing she hates more than humans, and that's small humans.

So no, she'd never make it in a bookstore, but the other kittehs profiled love their job.  So do go enjoy their company.

Cunning Kittehs

My cat will sometimes sit somewhere just out of view and howl and yowl like she's trapped, mortally wounded, or otherwise in dire straits.  She does it to see how fast she can make me get up.  She especially loves doing it just as I'm drifting off to sleep.  Apparently, the sight of a frantic, half-asleep human tumbling out of bed amuses her.

Now I see where she gets it from:

Many people see dogs as open, loving, and honest, and cats as duplicitous, cunning, and sly (Fig. 1).  This gross misconception will be reinforced by a paper in the new (but dated July 2009) issue of Neotropical Primates, which you can download for free. The authors, Fabiano de Olivera Calleia, Fabio Rohe, and Marcelo Gordo, show that a wild cat imitates the sounds of baby monkeys  to lure its prey within reach.

And I think she may be related to the cat Jerry Coyne encountered:

Margay babies are sometimes tamed by the locals. I once got to hold a (relatively) tame margay that belonged to a bar in Costa Rica; it let me pet it but then sank its teeth into my silver ring, leaving a sizeable dent. 

That's her favorite trick, too: sucker in the human by being all cute and cuddly so that the flesh is made more vulnerable.  When visiting my house, body armor is a good idea if you plan on getting acquainted with the cat.

The next time she attempts to lure me out of bed by pretending injury, I'll think of a margay somewhere deep in the rainforest luring dinner with baby monkey cries, and go back to sleep.

The Fruits of Mah Labor

For those of you wondering why I spent one of my days off hauling bricks up the stairs, here it is:

Mah rocks now have a happy home.  Well, some of my rocks.  The rest of them dwell in the house.  It's a wonder the floor doesn't collapse, between the rocks and the books.  I should probably ask the complex to add reinforcement.

And what thanks do I get for all this artsy-craftsy hard work ensuring these buggers no longer dwell on the kitchen counter or the floor?  My cat became so discombobulated by this change in her porch environment that she refused to go out for many hours, and every time she did, she'd flee back inside almost immediately.

Maybe it was because I threw out the enormous box o' boxes that had been living there since we moved in.  I believe she has the same obsession with boxes that I do with rocks.  Take Exhibit A:

When I went on my mad cleaning spree, I moved her Amazon box so I could vacuum.  The instant I put it down again, plunk!  Kitteh heaven.  So I have a lovely, well-organized and super-clean house with a ratty old broken-down box lying in the middle of it, because she loves it so. 

She's also apparently bored by all this organization stuff, because while we were gone, she dug out one of her toys.  She hasn't done that in months.  Considering she once chased my mother out of the house for the offense of a little light cleaning, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised.  My cat likes clutter almost as much as she likes boxes.

So we have a book/rock hound and a box/clutter hound in this household.  It's a good thing I don't have a mate, because there's no more room for hounds here.

Silleh Kitteh

I haven't been doing much adventuring lately, aside from a trip out to the Bellevue Farmer's Market for research purposes today.  But my cat's been having a rich life of her own.  Apparently, getting singed has had no lasting effects.

Or did it?  After all, she's never made herself a fortress o' paper, until now:

Those papers were flat until she rearranged them.  She's made good friends with my In Search of Ancient Oregon book, too - I haven't been able to shelve it because she's been enjoying cuddling it so much lately.

When she's not hanging out with geology, she's using the couch as a bunker:

Don't ask me why it's so amusing to look up from your political reading and see nothing but a cat head poking around the sofa, but it is.

Later in the day, she decided she felt oh-so-pretty:

And yes, that is her shoebox.  There are actually a few boxes around the house I haven't discarded because she's not done playing with them.  There's her Amazon box:

Amazon wants us to rate their packaging.  Kitteh gives it five stars.

Then there's her lamp box:

Which is so deep she has trouble getting out of it, but that hasn't stopped her from jumping in (and eventually jumping out):

Both of us will regret the day this box ends up being filled with books and hauled down to Powell's.

It's hard to believe this feline is fifteen.  She's still as adept at getting into trouble now as she was at age two.

Catblogging Time!

It's been awhile since I've given you poor souls anything other than pollyticks, and poor fare at that.  Have some kitteh!

Here's kitteh sleeping uncompromisingly on the Bible:

She still refuses to stand uncompromisingly on it, silly beast.

Her appreciation for the pillow-like qualities of religious texts does not end with the Bible.  Indeed, she can be a proper Zen kitty when she likes:

Apparently, she'll lounge unashamedly and uncompromisingly on any book I set within her reach, because she was at geology this morning.  Alas, I didn't have the camera.

As you can see, she has no problem lounging uncompromisingly on the book I'm writing as well, but only when I'm actually trying to scribble something.

As you can see, this leads to writing as a performance art, because I have to become a contortionist to accomplish it.

And then there's times when I just have to give up altogether, because when you have a purring bundle of fur stretched out right across what you're trying to work with, well, all you can do is pat it until it gets sick of the attention and goes away.

At least I finally found an actual cat toy she'll play with.  Sometimes, I'll see the little string on its pole bob like a fish has just taken the line, and I know that at long last, I have fulfilled my duties as a cat owner.  At least until the next belly rub is required.

Ode to My Insane Cat

So, I'm writing from Ray's viewpoint right now, which means I'm listening to oddball (for me) things like Red Hot Chili Peppers and Sublime.  Hey, there's that song, "Peaches."  Look that up.  And find out that Presidents of the United States of America have this song called "Kitty."

Of course I listened.  And it is my cat to a T, except for the spending all night outside part.  The going from love to hate with no discernible transition period, however, is dead-on accurate.

So, here ye go: an ode to insane kitties everywhere.



I promise a return to pollyticks tomorrow. But in the meantime, I'm finishing off another pen. Will Aunty Flow arrive in time to save the next one? Mwah-ha-ha!

The Way to My Cat's Heart

Definitely through her tummy.

I awoke this morning to pitiful little meows, and then she jumped into bed and cuddled very close, purring as loudly as she could manage.  She usually wants nothing do to with me until I'm trying to do something else.  "Bet her food bowl's empty," thought I as I drifted back to sleep with my face buried in fur.

I was so right.

The affection she shows her mommy directly correlates to her needs at the time.  If she's hungry or cold, I'm the most awesomest hooman and she loves me to bits.  If all of her needs have already been met, I'm furniture.  Or a particularly entertaining chew toy.

Cats are amazing creatures.

I Just Got Bitten in the Ankle Because My Cat is a Klutz

I don't really want to try to explain the mechanics of it.  But she misjudged the gap between one of the bits that supports the recliner and the open space between it and the seat, tripped, and caught herself on my ankle.  With her teeth.  It was one of the goofiest things I've ever seen her do.  She looked like a total dork.

Once she got her legs extracted from the gap they'd fallen through, she changed her mind about climbing into my lap and is now busy over on the loveseat pretending absolutely nothing ever happened.  It was that other cat.

So much for legendary feline grace, eh?

Weekend Plans

Working hard:

Or possibly hardly working:

Either way, you won't see much from us this weekend.  Especially not if the cat keeps choosing the keyboard as her pillow.

In the meantime, maybe you'd like to amuse yourselves with McCain's POW Tourettes.  Yup.  It's an election year, all right.

And in the realm of news too important to wait, here's Ezra Klein on why Tim Johnson shouldn't be allowed near Chris Dodd's gavel, seniority be damned.  Prepare to apply some pressure.

Right, then.  We're off.  See ye when I can get at my keyboard.  Have a good weekend, one and all.