Stairway to .... huh???

What the??? Seriously, I mean, I'm ... Sorry, guys, but I'm still a bit confused about what I saw today.
We have had the contractor in house for weeks now, and finally even I got annoyed and didn't try to play with him anymore. At first he fixed up Buster's room, then he kept disappearing behind the door to the dining room, the room with the stairs going up.
Today the door finally opened again, and it didn't take long before I went to check out what had happened. I'm not sure what I had expected, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't that!!

The first check

"Mom, something is very wrong here, there used to be a hole to walk through!"

"Ok, Ponder, let me explain to you what happened ...."

"I think it's still a little dusty up here, I'll need to clean myself."

"You know, it is kind of weird for a big cat like me, but I guess I could get used to it."

"Esme, Greebo, Meffi!!! You'll have to see this!!!"

"Oh come on, you cowards, that'll be a great hiding spot, come and check it out!"

"It's still weird, though."

The other three haven't checked it out yet and I still like to sit up there and yell hoping the hole will open back up again. Mom says that won't happen, but that we'll try to get creative soon and add some fun stuff like a spider web for the Steiff spiders, maybe a curtain - I vote for beaded, that would be sooo much fun to play with! - and who knows what.
Maybe it'll become the stairway to cat heaven after all? ;-)

First floor - Cat art, flower magnets and private booths

First of all, my dear friends, I want to wish you a Happy New Year. I can't believe it has already been three weeks that I talked to you. Time flies by ... and things change.

Mom says we cats change all the time. She means she can't keep up with us. She hasn't even found out about my new favorite spot for example which is a good thing. I like to be able to disturb her, but there's no need for her to disturb me.
Meffi is different. Gee, the little lady talks up a storm these days. And of course Mom has not the slightest clue what she's talking about. Just one thing is clear. After Meffi hasn't been interested in one spot for a long time, she has suddenly changed her mind about that.
Just look at her. Doesn't she deserve to get anything she wishes for?

Now look at this. I think it was designed to be a shopping basket. Mom hates baskets for shopping, she'd rather run around with a million totes hanging from her hands, shoulder and neck if necessary than with one basket.
Nowadays this basket is
- a cat car
- a cat plane
- a private cat booth
- a cat lift

So if you wondered about today's post title, let me tell you the whole story from the beginning.
One fine day Meffi decided to use the fridge as her headquarters. She had her cat bed up there and whenever I tried to come by for a harmless little visit, she could see me from far and alert Mom by hissing, spitting and growling.
Then, after months, she moved back under the stairs where she had had her favorite hideout before. Mom didn't like that at all because Meffi liked to throw fits if she was in the mood, even if we just, ehem, walked by her with no intentions at all. It didn't do much for the peace in this house.
Meffi moved back into the kitchen, but not on the fridge. She had her spot with her cat bed and the Queen took her meals alone, not like us other three who were left to fight about each crumb we were lucky to get ("Ponder!!!! Enough now!!!! You don't want me to take a picture of your lucky little fat belly, do you?? ~ Mom).

Ignore the lady behind the curtain. The point is that a few days ago Meffi started dancing around, chattering and making pretty clear she wanted to get up on the fridge. She seemed not to be sure about that last jump - unfortunately my lady isn't as great a jumper as she used to be and sometimes she stops in the last second - so Mom put her up there.
Since then it has been an up and down and the easiest way for both of them since Mom is short and Meffi never really liked to be held is the cat lift ... which then turns into a private booth as soon as it's on the fridge. Smart, huh?
The Queen gets everything she wants in this house, so I wouldn't surprised if the kitchen would soon get furnished with an armchair, a TV and possibly a snack machine!!

The new meds

So Esme got a new prescription, and it's not a pill this time.
"It used to be capsules, but now it's a kind of oily liquid. Cats really like it. It smells like vanilla, and probably tastes like it, too. See? She's licking her lips."

Yeah, she's licking her lips, but don't ask what she's doing before the stuff finally hits her mouth. She tosses her head like a horse and Mom has to put the death grip on her. For a cat who is so easy going about a pill that tastes disgusting (Mom speaks from own experience), she's amazingly NOT easy going about that other stuff (that Mom says is not so bad, again from own experience - it's the new IN to share meds with your cats, didn't you know ... nah, no worries, they don't actually share, but they actually do take the same kinds of meds).

The funny thing is that every self-respecting cat would try to avoid taking that stuff at all by hiding underneath the bed, in a corner that is hard to get to, or run, run, run until the weakly human is worn out (it doesn't take long).
Not Esme. She runs a few steps and then turns around and lets Mom grab her. She stays on the bed when Mom comes into the room pretending to let the shades down.
Mom says she's cute, lovely and her sweet girly. I say my sister needs some serious cat training.

Take today for example. Mom came in and wasn't fast enough. Esme looked at her and there she was underneath the bed. Well done, sis! The old lady went down on the floor looking for her. Smart little Esme was on the other side of the bed. It takes hours until the old lady is up again and ready to go to the other side, no problem for a cat to run.
What did Esme do, however? Sit down, you won't believe this. When Mom said "Oh sweetie, you know we have to do it. I don't like it any more than you do", sweetie came crawling towards her!!! Until Mom could grab her and put her on the bed. What the ... I was shocked. Three tosses of the head and twenty seconds later Esme was free to go ... licking her lips.
And thirty seconds later she was snuggling up to Mom. And five minutes later they were at the desk together, actually Esme was on the desk, and they were sitting there, Mom's cheek against Esme's forehead, in silence. They are an odd couple.

Ok, so I might be a bit jealous. I just got to hear "Oh Pon, stop that now!!!" Mom's pushing it while it's still the old year and she doesn't have to pay each time she says it ...

Kitty cats

My my, aren't we a handsome lot?
This is the collage Mom and her sister are using for a card to send to one of their vets who moved away. They didn't get the chance to say goodbye themselves, so they let us do it.
Much better than using pictures of themselves, don't you think?

P.S. Mom said she'd make one resolution for the new year, by the way. She wants to ban the words "Stop that now" from her vocabulary. I wonder if we can make a deal that each time she says it she has to give me a treat or something. I'm quite I'd be rich!

The many tasks of a feline supervisor

I watch the house.
I watch Mom.
I clean up after one of us felines puking, at least I try. Mom says more than once it was me leading her to the right spot because she heard me cleaning.
I keep Meffi fit (Mom told me to say that she thinks me attacking Meffi to catch her attention is NOT fitness training, but what does she know?).
I keep Greebo fit, we are on the same wrestling team.
I provide uniform wear for all the furniture in the house by changing sleeping spots a lot.
I'm the official opera singer.
I keep Mom company at the computer and help her typing ("And deleting!!" Oh, shut up, Mom, go write your own blog post.).
I officially greet all visitors to the house.

I'm just adorable.

There is so much more of course, but today I got a new task.
I'm supposed to keep Mom fit now, it seems. I just wonder what she'll look like after a while if her left arm is all muscular because I prefer her left shoulder to hang onto and her left arm to lie on. As of today I'm the offical weight. Yup, you read that right.
We started our first weight lifting training today. She didn't really expect to leave her arm alone just because it was going up and down, did she??

The bunny room

Mom says people have always asked or laughed about the bunny room. She told me about the first bunnies they had, Wurstel (which means something like "little sausage", but she says it was just because he was such a little baby when they took him home from the zoo to raise him) and Krümel (which means "crumb"). It's a pity that she hasn't scanned any pictures of them yet.
Well, even back then the room was called the bunny room. There have always been bunnies around, some were shy, some were a bit mean, some older, some younger ... and then as you know there is my pal Buster.

It's sad, but I have to tell you that Buster is in jail. An innocent victim. First he has been evicted this morning from his nice big room where he was allowed to roam free and even had access to the rest of the place if he only was ready to cross the step. His home was rudely taken away, his food and water bowls, his toys, his bag of hay ... and then even the ground.
So when he was still wondering what had happened to his world, he was picked up and taken away to jail.
She didn't even give him a little metal cup to bang the bars with. She didn't give him his hut because she thought he would climb it and jump out - back into FREEDOM!
Ok, it's not all that bad. Mom didn't put the roof on, that's why she left the hut out, and he got apple and carrot today and his two favorite toys and a brandnew wood carrot to gnaw on. He could look a lot less happy, then again I have visiting rights whenever I want to jump in and I took advantage of that about two minutes after he had moved.
As you can tell, he has already settled in quite good (droppings on the floor, wood shavings in his hair) ....

Now you may want to know why Mr Buster has been locked up (no lock, Mom actually wired the door to the cage because she didn't want to screw it on - in a turquoise green wire from her stash!).
His room is getting a makeover. When I asked Mom why I didn't get my own room, she not only told me that I was using all the rooms anyway, but that the bunny room had been neglected makeoverwise (quite sure that's not a word) for too long.

I'll be sure to show you a picture of the new digs once it's finished.

My little sister

Mom keeps telling me that Esme is adorable. You know something?
She is.