Monday, November 21, 2011

Cats

I've lived with a lot of cats over the years, but I don't think I've ever known a cat as demanding as Mabel. Perhaps that's because most cats demand to go out, or to eat. What Mabel demands is to sit on you. And if you don't sit down and let her sit on you, she gets rather snippy. Literally snippy. We've learned to read the signals about a second before she swats or snaps and tell her "no." We also move out of reach.

Tonight she became increasingly huffy as I sat through an hour-long video with Zoe, her arch rival, on my lap. When the video was over and I attempted to leave the room, Mabel, who'd been sitting, glaring, in the cat tree for the duration of the show, somehow herded me back to the couch and then sat on me.

I find myself wondering: What is she thinking when she does this?

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

This is an odd fall

Almost Thanksgiving, but all the leaves are still on the wisteria, the climbing hydrangea, and one of my odd vines — although most of the maple trees are bare.

There are still blueberries ripening on the blueberry bushes, and a few confused plants are flowering because they thought it was spring already.

Tuesday was the first true cold.

Even if the plants were confused, I was ready for it. I went out to a meeting wearing a long wool coat with a furry collar that buttons up around my ears. And gloves. And insulated boots. And it was STILL too cold.

Every day, I check the temperatures in Santa Cruz — where it's inevitably 20 degrees warmer.

Sigh.