wyld_dandelyon | AWOL Cats and a cool idea (Reply)

Well, I didn't yell at my singing partner fast enough--he forgot to use proper cat-lock procedures and now Mamacat is outside again, before we got her spayed. This morning she met me at the door, obviously wanting me to feed her out there. We'll see if she sticks around long enough to be caught anytime soon.

Didn't realize she was gone at first, of course. My Angel, who had stayed up to greet the refrigerator repairman, finally offered the cats their canned food, and Mama was nowhere to be seen. Amitiel, who is a pale fire-point Himalayan, showed up looking black, so after his dinner, he got a bath. He doesn't like it, but puts up with it pretty well, especially when he's gotten into something that tastes bad. And even after that, Mama remained AWOL. So I spent some time looking for her and for Tulku, who has been mostly hiding because he disapproves of adding Mamacat to our household. We weren't really worried then, though it's unlike him not to come for canned cat food.

(Mamacat ended up with the run of the house after the kitten found out she can jump from the porch (the screen on the bedroom window isn't properly attached to its frame) to the window of the room where we were keeping her Mama, and gave us a good scare when she showed up on the windowsill on the wrong side of the screen--two tall stories up! Other doors close, but not securely enough to prevent kitties from opening them; our cats are even strong enough to push the heavy pocket doors open, given a few hours to work at it. And there's (century-old) doors we definitely don't want them clawing up; the one to the media room was badly damaged by the prior owner, so a few cat-claws at the base can't make it significantly more ruined.)

But when I'd gotten home, and timid Tulku was still nowhere to be found, and had skipped another meal, and My Angel had been looking for her on and off all afternoon, that was a concern. Especially in this summer heat. There's only so long any animal will survive without water, and it's shorter when it's hot.

So, I put aside the blog post I'd been planning on the drive home from work and we searched the house. Attic to basement. With nothing to show for it but Amitiel miauing at me as if to say, "that other cat's ignoring you, so pay attention to me!" Twice. And letting me hold him and comb out mats from his too-thick hair both times.

So we rested a bit, and I had some food (an apple and some corn-oil-free potato chips) and waited for it to get dark, since My Angel sometimes sees stuff in the near-dark that she can't see in bright light.

I think what finally made the difference, however, is that it got quieter in the neighborhood, and had all the other cats closed into a room with me; she heard him answering her call and found he'd gotten stuck between a desk and a window, under the ledge made by the desktop and above the ledge made by the windowsill. Either something scared him and he didn't realize what he was getting into, or he finally got fat enough that he couldn't back out of that spot any more.

So, Mama's as safe as she ever was before, outside. Tulku ate twice as much as usual before having a very, very long drink, and is now happily enjoying My Angel's lap.

Thus, I don't have the cool post I'd planned, and I don't have a new bit of flash fiction (or not-so-flash), and I haven't printed out stories to snail-mail to new markets Monday, and it's bedtime.

Oh--yeah--the cool idea. I've got a new Torn World thing I'm developing, which involves the archetypes used by the culture that uses the musical instruments in the story I've written for the next contest, and also extrapolates how having three noun classes (natural, technological, and abstract) might lead people to think less in dualities and more in triads.)

And I anticipate having a Torn World-related Free Stuff Day sometime in mid-August, though I'm not revealing what type of "stuff" yet.