Tuesday 28 December 2010

Highlights and Lowlights

Christmas Eve Highlight

The Housekeeper spent the afternoon on the sofa wrapped up in a throw watching the film "Cars" with Dino curled up on her lap purring loudly.

Christmas Day Highlights

The contented look on Crystal's face as the kittens and Amber had worn themselves out in the morning with their new toys and were asleep by the time the turkey was served up.

The Housekeeper spent the afternoon on the sofa wrapped up in a throw asleep and woke up to find CRYSTAL?! asleep on her lap. She stayed there for two hours. Truly a happy Christmas afternoon!

Boxing Day Highlight

The Housekeeper and Mr Housekeeper left Crystal in charge for the day to go to The Housekeeper's Mother's 80th Birthday do. They returned 13 hours later to find the house and all occupants in one piece.


Boxing day Night Lowlight
Everyone must have spent the entire day asleep whilst The Housekeepers were out, because they certainly didn't sleep that night. The Housekeeper doesn't think that she got more that 30 minutes sleep at any one time before the Jasper scarf wrapped itself around her neck AGAIN and AGAIN, licking her eyelids and ears and telling her how much he loved her.

By 4am The Housekeeper wasn't loving Jasper very much.

Saturday 25 December 2010

Merry Christmas


Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year

From

Crystal, Amber, Jasper and Dino
(and The Housekeepers)


to all our followers around the world

Thursday 23 December 2010

Lesson of the Day - Dino

Key Strokes

CAT: If I sit on this nice warm rectangular object covered in small square things, a funny buzzing alarm sound goes off continuously and the humans rush to remove me from wherever they are in the house.

There's also this funny little arrow which I can chase across the screen.

What really confuses me is that the humans are allowed to touch the little square things called "keys" with their paws, but if I walk across them, I get told off.

HUMAN: Always shut the lid of a laptop before walking away from it, into a different room. Kittens have goldfish brains when it comes to a) computers and b) the word NO.

The N is confusing, as is the O. The bit in the middle is a tad difficult and the general meaning of the word as a whole, leaves even an Abyssinian a little foxed. That or they are just ignoring the humans on purpose.

Monday 20 December 2010

Hofstadter's Law

Just when you think that nothing else can possibly happen, the peace is shattered at 11pm at night by a side plate smashing into pieces on the kitchen floor.

It had been covering Crystal and Amber's dinner, which was in a bowl on the kitchen work surface to keep it vaguely appetising and save it from being eaten by the kittens who had already eaten their own tea AND the girl's crunchies.

The noise frightened both the girls who darted from the lounge upstairs. Crystal is now back downstairs, sitting in front of me whilst I type this entry with that "NOW WHAT" expression on her face, whilst The Housekeeper can hear repeated attempts from a kitten to scale the kitchen cupboards onto the work surface again and being removed and told off by Mr Housekeeper.

We assume it was Dino, but we don't know for certain. He was found tucking into the dinner, whilst Jasper sat to one side, also on the work surface, watching what was going on.

Hoover mobilised.

The Housekeeper reckons that on the basis that we've had them living with us for a whole month today, that we should give them back to the breeders for the next month...... Somehow think after reading this, that might be a NO!

Sunday 19 December 2010

Whodunnit? 2


The Housekeeper ventured out in the snow at lunchtime and walked into the village for provisions for lunch with Mr Housekeeper. When they arrived back home they got the camera and car keys and cleared the snow off The Housekeeper's car (snowball fight ensued!) and took some pictures of the snow at the same time.

On return to the house with said supplies, it became apparent that someone in the household had decided to have a take away for lunch and to eat out of the bag to save on the washing up.



No one is owning up, although Jasper does have a tiny paper type cut on one of his front pads........

Whodunnit?

We have been burgled.

Mystery surrounds the sudden disappearance of a number of tails belonging to the resident toy rodents in the household.

A spokesperson for the property confirmed in a statement this morning that no less than 7 small white and grey fur mice, had indeed been spotted without their tails. The crime is suspected to have occured within the last 2-3 weeks but has only just been discovered. The victims also confirmed that a further 5 of their comrades also appear to be missing, assumed lost, under the settee or dining room cabinet.

This is especially upsetting for The Housekeeper who confirmed that the mice were heirlooms which had once belonged to and been played with by the current residents great-uncle Parsnip and had been handed down to the current occupants, having been played with by both Crystal and Amber when they were young.

The victims did agree to be photographed but all wished to remain anonymouse!



Neither small Fawn or Sorrel Abyssinian suspect was available for comment.

Saturday 18 December 2010

Lesson of the Day - Jasper

You gotta roll with it

CAT: In the bathroom there's this really, really tempting cord by the door that swings backwards and forwards. It turns the light on. To reach it you have to jump with all your might and your best back leg bouncy spring onto the towel rail and then reach up - easy.

Unfortunately the towel rail is rather like the loo roll holder and turns round when it has any weight on it. When your front paws are on the top of the rail and your back paws are on the towel, you very rapidly find yourself on the bathroom floor with the bath towel on top of you!!

Then you have a moving towel across the floor.


HUMAN: Worrying about wetting yourself laughing is not an issue when Abyssinian cat antics occur whilst you are sitting on the loo.

Chasing Snowflakes




The Housekeeper thinks that watching Abyssinian's jumping vertically up windows to catch snowflakes is very funny!

Friday 17 December 2010

Home Alone

The Housekeeper left all four Abyssinians on their own yesterday to attend her previous jobs Christmas do.

As she approached the house after leaving all four alone together for a full 12 hours, she wondered what state she would find the house in, however it would appear that it was all intact and had survived better than she had on the mulled wine :-)

As Mr Housekeeper was away for work this was also the first night that The Housekeeper had, home alone with all four charges.

No one went to bed before 1:30am. The Housekeeper was catching up on work and the kittens were RUNNING. When everyone eventually settled down for the night, The Housekeeper had Crystal and Amber at the bottom of the bed, Dino lying under the duvet, length ways against her leg and Jasper sleeping next to her like a human with his head on the pillow and body under the covers.

The tranquility didn't last long. Jasper got a little over excited and started squirming and ensured The Housekeeper got woken up at least once and hour.

Thursday 16 December 2010

Blue Moon

At 6am this morning, The Housekeeper had an Abyssinian standing on her in bed. This isn't an unusual occurrence in itself, other than the Abyssinian in question, was Amber!

Amber isn't the cuddliest of cats. She's affectionate but it's in her way, on her terms. She is happy to curl up at the bottom of the bed at night with the humans and to sit at their feet in the evenings whilst they watch TV but she definitely isn't a lap cat and panics when picked up and struggles to get away.

This morning, The Housekeeper awoke to whiskers in her ears and small delicate car kisses on the nose (so it definitely wasn't a kitten!). Having slowly rolled onto her back, The Housekeeper enjoyed a lovely long "cuddle" with Amber standing on her chest, being stroked and purring quite loudly for her.

This is the first voluntary cuddle which Amber has given anyone since the kittens have arrived and as she had also brought her favourite toy, the Moppy, onto the bed with her as a present, hopefully this means she is a happier Sorrel Abyssinian than she has been recently :-)

Wednesday 15 December 2010

Feed Me!

The Housekeeper is currently feeding the kittens four times a day.

A wet food meal for breakfast, crunchies for lunch, a wet food meal for dinner and a late evning crunchie snack. There's also crunchies left down for all the cats during the day for them to graze on.

However, given the state of one of today's Certificates of Posting from the Post Office run (photographed upside down to keep the customers anonymouse!), I think it's safe to say that she may not be feeding them enough and they are resorting to drastic measures......



Needless to say that after this antic, they were told that if they didn't behave they would be sent to the Cats Protection League for Christmas !!!!!

Sunday 12 December 2010

In a Flap

Having had the kitten's litter tray in our lounge for the first week of their residence, and subsequently moved it to the kitchen so that we could tidy up and reduce the mess, we decided that the time had come to get the boys to use the litter trays in the outhouse attached to the kitchen, which is where the girl's litter tray's are, to reduce the volume of litter being trod around the house by both small paws and human feet.

When both Parsnip and then Crystal arrived, the humans spent hours passing both bowls of food - and the cat!! - backwards and forwards through the cat flap to teach them how to use it. This caused endless hilarity and usually resulted in each cat eventually using the cat flap more often than needed, just because they could, once they had mastered it as it became another cat toy.

We knew that Jasper wouldn't be a problem. He's been using both the litter trays when the kitchen door was open and the cat flap (both as a game and out of necessity) but we both realised that Dino would be more difficult.

The first time that Dino went into the outhouse to explore and had the door shut on him by mistake, he cried pitifully to be let back in. The subsequent times all resulted in much vocal encouragement by the humans, standing in the kitchen and a real struggle for a small Abyssinian kitten to work out how to push the flap with his nose and get back into the house. When we saw him go into the outhouse, we had shut the door on him a couple of time, on purpose so that he had to come back through the cat flap and had called him and encouraged him and praised him each time.

To be honest, we weren't convinced that when he actually needed to go to the loo, that he would remember to use the cat flap and I fully expected to come home one day and find either an accident, or him stuck in the outhouse and not able to get back into the main house.

The intention was to leave the back door to the outhouse open for a day over the weekend with the kitten litter tray next to the two which the girls use, but all good intentions were scuppered when The Housekeeper put the tray outside, hoovered up the spilt litter, changed the bin bag and closed the kitchen door, then went to bed.

At about 3am she woke up and realised that she hadn't moved the tray back into the house - but - to our amazement the next morning, there had been no accidents and both the kittens proceeded to prove at 8am the next morning that they knew exactly how to use the cat flap and where their trays were.

Another kitten milestone. Phew!

Saturday 11 December 2010

Kitten Play Pen Recipe

  • Take one very large, tall cardboard box
  • Add ping pong balls and feathers
  • Leave open in centre of room
  • Kittens will add themselves without being asked


If very lucky, one adult fawn Abyssinian (Crystal) will find this game just too irresistible and join in the fun!


Leave alone in conservatory and put kettle on for peace. Forget the quiet !!!!

Friday 10 December 2010

Pink Negligence

Otherwise titled "Who killed the flamingo in the conservatory?"

The Housekeeper has just returned to the house from the workshop after 2 hours of packing to find shredded cerise pink marabou feather EVERYWHERE.

I should explain ..... The Housekeeper is also a Wardrobe Mistress and the conservatory currently houses the costumes from the entire cast of a pantomime, waiting to be washed, in black bin bags. Amongst the costumes was a bin bag containing a pink dressing gown which was edged in thick marabou boa, referred to in the script by the dame as her "negligence".

Considering the volume of pink feather now strewn across the floor its a wonder that the negligence doesn't look like it has been touched (a good job as it is being borrowed tomorrow!) Also, consider that The Housekeeper sits in the workshop in full view of the conservatory and didn't see any of the above happen.

Now we just have the feathers of a dead animal strewn across the whole of the floor and four Abyssinians, all with different expressions on their faces. The kittens are sat on the settee in the conservatory dozing. Amber is sat on the scratching post in the conservatory with a puzzled look on her face of "what the hell happened here" and Crystal has the innocent, look of a cat who has been in the workshop with The Housekeeper all morning and "didn't do it so you can't blame me".

Thursday 9 December 2010

Lesson of the Day - Jasper

Key Strokes

CAT: "Mee-at Meow" - I'm a bouncy Abyssinian kitten and it's 11:20pm and I'm running. A nice circuit of the dining room after supper and .....oh .....what was that pretty blue light I've just put my paw on? .......

HUMAN: JASPER !!!!!!!! that was the power switch for the "*******" laptop.

Luckily the people that the Housekeeper talks to on MSN at this time of night don't take it personally when they get disconnected mid sentence and are usually still online when the laptop has been rebooted.

- - - - - - - -

11:30pm: Jasper sat in hammock, paws curled in towards his chest, just below his nose with a contented, supper eaten, kitten grin on face and tightly closed eyes but fully alert ears.

"Stood on a laptop power button? Who me? No, can't have been me, far too cute to do that, I am"

Lesson of the Day - Dino

CAT: When I say I am hungry and I squeal at you at the top of my kitten voice, at your feet as you have the cat food tin in one hand and the fork in the other - I mean it - I'M HUNGRY!

HUMAN: A cat food tin being held too low to the ground whilst forking through the dinner in the cat bowl, will have a cat's head IN the tin, eating from it, if you don't get the food in the bowl sorted quickly enough for the said hungry cat.

That or a fork prong in very close promimity to a kitten's nostril!

Wednesday 8 December 2010

Silent Night ....

Or ...in the case of this household, silent evening, as everyone is curently asleep. However any Abyssinian owner will tell you that all this changes at 11pm when the wind gets into an Abyssinian's tail and they feel the need to run around the house at break neck speed, yelling like a banshee.

Crystal is in the lounge on the leopard print throw

Amber is in the radiator hammocks in the bedroom, full stretch across both of them.

Jasper and Dino are in the hammocks behind me in the dining room


You can almost hear the Zzzzzz's!

Tuesday 7 December 2010

Get .....

  • Out of the bin
  • Out of the bag
  • Out of the box that I'm trying to pack costumes in
  • Out of the fridge
  • Off my pile of papers
  • Off my fleece and stop chewing the cord
  • Down from the top of the clothers airer
  • Down from the kitchen work surface
  • Down
  • Down
  • Down (I'm sure I've already told you to get down)
  • Your head out of Crystal and Amber's dinner
  • On my lap and have a cuddle!

Monday 6 December 2010

Self Wrapping Presents

A birthday present which arrived on Friday afternoon from my "bestie" in Somerset was sealed in a cube shaped box and wrapped beautifully in pink cat design wrapping paper. Not being a paper tearing present opener, I carefully removed the sellotape and slid the wrapping paper "box" off the cardboard box, leaving the present to open. After both sitting ON the box, the kittens decided that the wrapping paper would be far more fun to play with.

Having commented that my official birthday present from Mr Housekeeper (Jasper!) hadn't even had a bow on, let alone been giftwrapped, it was very amusing to see both kittens get stuck into wrapping themselves.........



Friday 3 December 2010

Birthdays

It's The Housekeeper's birthday today .... the meaning of life, the universe and everything (if you are a Hitchhikers fan).

As much as The Housekeeper loves her two interactive Abyssinian birthday presents, it is now 1am in the morning and they are both BOUNCING. They are tearing around the house, thundering up the stairs, fighting and chirping at the tops of their voices.

The Housekeeper has picked them both up and looked for the battery compartment to remove the batteries or the "off" switch, but cannot find either.

It could be a LONG night.

Thursday 2 December 2010

Hi Ho, Hi Ho. It's off to Hire we go ....

Six dwarf costumes and a a genie... sitting in the hall in a huge cardboard packing crate with a four way fold top waiting for the 7th dwarf to arrive back from Aberdeenshire, to be added to the box before it can be sealed so that the consignment can then be shipped to Liverpool for this coming weekend.

Unfortunately, four way top folding isn't very strong when something heavy and or live sits on top of it, dips in the middle and creates a gap into which something can fall.

Even more unfortunately, when you push against a four way fold from underneath - the gap closes up and the contents are trapped.

15 minutes last night.........

  • Crystal in box. Jasper tormenting her through carry handles. Crystal headbutting top of box but can't get out as she is closing up gap. Crystal removed from box.
  • Amber on top of box. Crystal with paw on Amber's bum "helping" her into the box. Both removed from top of box
  • Jasper launching himself at top of box from floor and failing to get high enough so starts leaping from the stairs into oblivion in the hopes of landing on top of box.
  • Jasper falls into box. Jasper removed.
  • Bag put on top of box as deterant. Jasper and Dino launch themselves into bag on top of box and all fall into box. Bag containing kittens removed from box.
  • Ten minutes later - noise from box. Dino removed from box AGAIN.
  • Kittens taken into lounge and put on settee and box moved to porch and door closed.
  • Noise coming from box. Amber located in box in porch and removed.

This morning.

7th dwarf arrives and is packed into box. All cats counted and accounted for at least 3 times before and after the box has been sealed !!!!