WCB: Kiri's birthday and a special surprise
This weekend's cat blogging is special because it's Kiri's birthday! His beautousness is all dressed up in a jumper and tie (I swear that cat's on nip, check out that last picture) and ready to party, Kiri's got lots of friends hanging around. Complete guest list is at Kiri's slave's place (sometimes known as Eat Stuff).
The furling, who has finally been named—but we'll get to that in a moment—had to rest up before the party and chose one of her favorite spots.
The local food bank was collecting donations today, and since we sometimes donate to the food bank in honor of someone's birthday, it seemed like good timing. The furling checks out the bag to be sure it's a good collection.
Pasta, fruit, no problem, but there's tuna in there! Did I say you could give away tuna?!?
There are treats to share too. The remnants of the roe from the homemade caviar are the furling's offering. Too bad it won't squish through the Internet, it was apparently really yummy.
Any good party has games, and the furling is playing her side of tethermouse. Kiri, smack it back!
Now on to the naming portion of our day.
Cats should pick their own names—or so goes the wisdom around our place—and while this isn't as straightforward as many other methods, it just might be the most accurate. The nameless furling has been with us or just about a month now and until just about a week ago, she's mostly been known as "the little kitten," as in "It's too quiet, have you seen where the little kitten is?" (Believe me, like with a toddler, silence is not golden, it's worrisome. The last silence accompanied a demonstration that a roll of toilet paper could be unrolled onto the floor 30 feet away without any auditory indication.) As we've watched her get used to living here, her personality has begun to express itself a bit more definitively in a number of ways.
She is, by and large, a good-natured furling who can often be seen scurrying around the house burbling to herself in a manner highly reminiscent of R2D2 or the little bots on Farscape. Gurgles and coos waft down the halls in her wake. On other occasions, she sounds like Kenny from South Park—and we can almost decipher what she means. However it's identified, she is a talkative little thing, even if nobody but her knows what shes saying.
There is apparently an on-off switch buried somewhere; she goes from being the sweetest, gentlest, snuggliest kitten to a bundle of terror incarnate—and back—in a flash. With any luck, we'll discover the triggers before our forearms and jeans are reduced to shreds. When she's in kill-mode, she has a special relationship with gravity and serious hang-time.
Another thing: Houdini has nothing on this furling. At least once a day I search the house for her—and the areas that are not protected by closed doors are neither huge nor heavily furnished so this shouldn't be that hard—and, after failing to find her anywhere, blink and she's at my feet. In the middle of a room with nothing to hide under in it. I am thinking she is a half-breed, perhaps elf or pixie, or something that accesses additional dimensions to tesseract around...it's the only explanation.
Like many kittens she is frequently competing with our feet for floor space. Luckily, having had a few cats who did this, we're used to it and step lightly. Plus, the hardwood floors mean she slides easily while escaping from the great crushing human feet. Of course, that also means she slide a lot of other times too, but we have to get our laughs somewhere.
After living with the furling for a few weeks, we started trying out names to see what fit. Poof, in honor of the great appearing act, was a hot contender for a while, but it was a small slice of a multi-faceted kitten so we moved on. Many possibilities were examined and discarded, although an early decision was that she might need more than one name. That didn't make this easier.
Eventually we came to a decision. Once we had done so, we found ourselves saying things that made a lot of sense if you knew who she was named after, which must indicate we chose wisely. Given all that, got any guesses?
Oh, it might help to know that our last two cats were named Wesley and Moufasa, both after movie characters. The first got her name from some kids who were visiting us when the cat—a stray—adopted us. The kids were watching "The Princess Bride" and upon seeing the stray cat lurking around the yard, insisted on feeding her...while giggling, "Eat well Wesley, we'll most likely kill you in the morning." (Okay, so it was Westley in the movie, the kids were 3 and 7 and they said Wesley, so Wesley it was!) Moufie got his name because he this rather hulkingly low-to-the-ground orange and white fluffcat who was an adorably ferocious 6 week old when he killed his first critter; The Lion King was on our radar for some reason, someone said "he wants to be the King" and the name stuck. There was also a tiny grayling stray who briefly adopted us and was dubbed Shadow Underfoot—clearly her elven name.
Last guesses? ...the furling's new name, on the other side of the jump.
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