So This Is Christmas 2012

Their  traditions: homemade gingerbread and roasted chestnuts.

 

My traditions: Christmas tree decorations composed entirely of angels

Our traditions: peace on earth and good will toward man. Sleep in heavenly peace.

The New Baby

I didn't take the loss of Simon Says lightly. It was only a matter of days before I began hunting for his replacement. I won't lie: I knew it was a replacement I was looking for. My maximum allowable cat limit was three, and being back down to two was odd. 

I was introduced to "Petal" on my first trip to the SPCA mid-December. She was a stunningly soft long-haired calico, about 6 months old, and... already spoken for. I asked what that meant, and essentially a family had claimed my ideal third cat already but gone home to get supplies and prepare the house. They had 24 hours to come back for her. What were the chances of them not coming back? I asked. "I've never had someone not come back for a kitten," the girl behind the counter told me.

There was a tiny black furball and a year-old white beauty with calico spots that I found myself debating between. I did have the thought of taking them both, but four cats was a little too much to care for properly, even for me. So I decided in the end to sleep on it and went home empty handed.

Imagine my delight when I returned the next day, and that girl behind the counter almost came over the desk after me as I came through the door. "Oh my God, I'm so glad you came back! They didn't come to claim her!"
I was stunned. I recall having to apologize for using the f-bomb in my moment of sheer glee. "She's mine. I want her," I said, and then I dashed into the cat room to Petal's cage and took her incredible softness into my arms. "You're coming home with me," I informed her. "But that name has got to go."

Meet Chloe, aka BabyCat, or BellaBean. 

 

She has a swiffer tail, feels like silk to the touch, and is a hell of a charmer, to both the other cats and humans alike. She loves to tease Fat Monty and she and Pickles chase each other playfully from one end of the house to the other. Then, she sleeps. Most often with me, on my legs or on my keyboard, but generally any lap will do. 

On the occasion when she's allowed outside, she goes no farther than the next door neighbour's, and the one night she was accidentally left outside, she sat by the basement door and meowed until she was found.

She replaced Simon physically, but definitely  has carved her own little niche in the family.

That Fat Cat

Just a little camera shy, Montgomery takes more offense at having to open his eyes than he does to sleeping in a doggy bed.

The Australian Pink Floyd Show 2012

Every year, the Australian Pink Floyd Show comes to Halifax and, being a fan by association and a sucker for a fantastic photo opportunity, every year I find myself in the audience, camera in hand. 2008 found four of us with floor seats, 2012 was courtesy of skybox tickets won by my friend in a draw. I'm not going to say anything other than that the music was, as always, incredibly spot-on. As for the spectacle, well, if a picture's worth a thousand words...

 

Hallowe'en 2012

 Another Hallowe'en, another excuse to go getting all creative. :)

Claire

I've posted about Claire before, but you've never seen her until now.

I love taking pictures of children. They're so natural. Innocent. Not self-conscious in the least. In the fall of 2012, Claire was 18 months old, and I was looking for someone new to shoot. With her dad away with the navy, and her mom more than willing to share some of her mother-daughter time with me, I found my match... and what a match it was!

 I was taught a lot by this child. How to look stunning when you're not trying, for example.

How to behave when you find yourself in a large pile of ... well, whatever.

 That quality time with Mommy is important.

and to take joy in the simplest things.

I followed Claire around the yard for hours that day, and though that's usually long past my usual tolerance threshold, I actually enjoyed the time spent just watching her enjoy life. It was a great day with a friend and her adorable daughter, and I'm hoping that maybe someday soon we can do it again... bring on the snow????

The Epic Saga of Simon Says

There is a Facebook group called Lost and Found Cats in HRM and Nova Scotia.  As the name would imply, it assists in returning missing cats to their owners by networking people in the various communities and supplying a central focal point to post pictures and descriptions of troubled animals.

When my friend Andrea (recently spotted here) shared a post about a purebred Siamese needing a home in late October 2012, I couldn't believe someone would want to give away such a beautiful and exotic animal. It turns out, his owner had a new boyfriend who was moving in with this new dog, and this stunning feline had essentially been locked out and was taking shelter in a neighbour's backyard.

We named him Simon and quickly fell in love with his quirky personality and crooked eyes. He was loud and obnoxious, as Siamese tend to be, so he quickly earned the title Simon Says. He joined Pickles and Montgomery in the tiny little house and staked his claim with the other two: a little forcefully at first, but then everyone just became content with ignoring each other.

Less than a week into Simon's adoption, disaster struck. The back door opened, and Simon bolted. The other cats never left the backyard, but Simon was used to running free on his own terms. He high-tailed it up our street, under a neighbour's deck, out the other side and under a fence. By the time we got around the fence, he was gone.

We were heartbroken. We searched for hours. We resorted back to the Lost and Found Facebook page, we accepted tips and ideas for finding Simon, and we drove and walked endlessly around the neighbourhood, putting up posters and calling out for our beautiful boy. We had helped locate the owners of a cat that had been missing for three months just weeks earlier, so I dared not give up hope. It was late October, though, it was getting cold, and Simon didn't know the neighbourhood or our voices

Then, five days later, I got a call from a lady two blocks away. She said she had been out for a cigarette late the night before and had seen a small Siamese cat trotting up her road. She hadn't wanted to call because it was late, but I assured her that we would come talk to her after work. I met and spoke with her and she showed me where she had seen the cat. She promised to call if she saw him again, no matter what time of day, and I spent the evening searching... to no avail.

That night, about 11:3o, she called again.

I'm not going to lie: I thought she was a bit wacky. What were the chances this was my cat? Halifax has a stray cat problem in the first place, and there were a ton of them in the area. In the dark, Simon looked white, and relatively unidentifiable. I had to go look, though, just in case. We piled in the car and headed back to the area.

We had actually given up and were driving back to the main road to go home when I saw him. I didn't know it was him: he was sitting on the railing of someone's step and I saw him there and took the flashlight to get closer. When he turned and looked at me, I freaked out: I couldn't even speak. I just waved my arms like a mad woman until the others realized what had happened and came over with the cat carrier.

Simon apparently had enjoyed his freedom. He bolted again, but this time we were able to follow until he cornered himself by slipping through a crack in the wall of someone's shed. While I guarded the hole, the shed's owner was woken up and brought outside to unlock the door. The key didn't work. The door got ripped off its hinges.

I broke down crying when Simon was placed back in the cat carrier and handed to me. 

All this for a cat we had known for 3 days.

 Simon came home with a scratch on his nose and an exaggerated attitude. While Montgomery put him right back in his place, Pickles was not willing to be so aggressive. Simon bullied her to the point where she would not come out of the bedroom, and even used the bathtub because she was scared to go to the litterbox. Once he realized he had this power over her, it only got worse, and nothing we tried would snap him out of it.
On November 17, two weeks after he returned home, I called the adoption agent to come take him back. It was incredibly hard. I had fallen head over heels for the little guy with the annoying voice and the big personality. But it was unfair to Pickles, who had lived there first and not caused a problem in her life.
Simon was fostered out to a lady who owned no other cats. He got along with her dog and she ended up keeping him permanently. I am happy to know that he has found a loving and stress-free environment, and I am still able to contact the adoption agent any time I want for updates on his well-being.

Simon Says: Have a happy ending.

Apple Picking and GPS 2012

This year's annual apple picking excursion saw pit stops at all the usual places: Willowbank UPick, Hennigar's Farm Market, and Kenny's Farm Market. There were apples galore, of course...

...and the stunning country scenery that is the Kentville/Wolfville area.

 

 

This year's mission also included a special guest: a hand puppet that I had debated buying, but which had sold out of the store we found it in in April. Then, when I found in Wolfville, I got permission to buy for myself as a late birthday present.  A hand puppet you say? For a woman in her thirties? Really?

I know.

But it was Lambchop!
Still... really?
I know.
But I grew up with sheep and they hold a special place in my heart. To make sure my point is clear, here's a picture of me feeding a baby lamb from a bottle circa 1991:

Besides, we ended up having a lot of fun with it and getting some good laughs...

,,,and all the way home, we enjoyed the peace of mind of knowing we'd make it safe, thanks to our new Global Positioning Sheep!