The fact that it's Todd again freaks me out a little, I'm not going to lie.

It's a minute before midnight, December 14. Not December 14 yet, we're not quite there. Sit down, keep your mouths shut, keep your hands inside the ride at all times. We're a thousand years from hearing the end of this shit.

Man, okay.

Okay, seriously.

Where was I?

Deember 14. Now it's finally December 14. The kitten, the Moxley-kitten, is sitting at J-Ro's feet; standing, actually; pacing around, meowing, begging for a pet or one more or perhaps three. I'm going to go oblige.

He's beside me now, trying like hell to eat my guitar. It's not food, Moxley. It's not anything nutritious nor particularly appetizing for your feline instincts to swoon over. It's... you know, it's a far cry from the regal condition of a divine dominion over the African savannah.

Woah, it's Todd.

See, this is the thing about kittens.

When you bring them home, they both fit in a box with a sterile metal mesh on the front, and they wriggle and squirm and do adorable things in their little kitten gulag for the duration of what's no doubt a long, arduous, Homeric quest for their new home. Then you release them into their new wilderness and expect them to change, but they don't. I've been waiting for Mox and Squig to turn into the oft-reviled archetype of the Cat Asshole ever since they settled in on May 14. Probably against my better judgment, too. Yeah, definitely against my better judgment.

It was clear to me that these two will never be anything less than our adorable furkids this afternoon when I unpacked our new coffeemaker. The old one went kaptuski, not to mention the fact that it's hideously inefficient to brew a cup or two at a time if you're anything like me, a compulsive bastard of the caffeine-and-benzedrine world. So I pulled the whole packaging apparatus out of the box and arranged it as an ornate and elaborate kittygym, hoping that Moxley would find greater amusement in its scratchable and tumbly labyrinth than in the business district of my pyjama pants.

When we first got these guys home I was under the assumption that by now they'd be watching me with disdain, questioning my authority as a human, gnawing on my flesh as I sleep. Jessica Rose told me that a dog will lay down beside you and starve itself if you suddenly and unexpectedly expire; a cat will devour your ass. Call me a blind feline devotee, but I just think that's cool. I wouldn't want these two dead along with me. I've got ambitions for these kittens. A self-contained empire, ruled by a brother and sister with absolutely no patience for the treason of cupboard mice, scattering our garbage and making anarchy of the apartment. No, if I die I want these two perched over my bloated, fetal body, taking sustenance from their former master. Regal, in control, divine. This is my body, kittens. This is my blood. Take, eat, drink.

Anyway, that's not going to happen anytime soon. Squiggle's perched on the windowsill, pawing at the cords for the curtains and trying like hell to make it up to the next ledge. Moxley's hanging out on the TV, constantly eyeing my laptop bag, no doubt convicted in the knowledge that if he can just shimmy up the side of the dangling bag, he'd make it to our X-Files collection. And that, in his skewed kitty logic, is the penultimate step to finally getting in the pantry. It's on the other side of the living room, Mox.

I've blathered enough. Here's some pictures. Love them.

just another day

not too much to report on the kitteny end. moxley's currently playing around with a bead by my feet, and squiggle's just noticed and pounced in. except now she's re-discovered her food.


yesterday was fun. we were home with the kittens all day. and we cleaned the house so they have more room to tumble around, and we set up our new little table beside the stove, in which their food is now located. all sheltered from the kicking feet of rompy kittens. yes, that's right. gone are the days when we'd come home to find kitten kibble all over the floor, kittens looking up all innocent and confused as to how their delicious crunchies were no longer edible because they weren't where they were supposed to be. and no, of course they couldn't eat them off the floor. what do we think they are? mere dogs? pathetic floor-scavenging creatures? that was, until we would try to clean it up and suddenly there would be kittens all up ins, eating and dragging and playing with the kibbles, right from our hands back into the middle of the living room floor.

ahh, life with kittens. waking up at 6, 7, 2-minutes-till-the-alarm-at-8, to purring kittens who want petting and attention and to curl up. but mostly to lie down until you're almost asleep, and then to get back up and walk on your face and lick at you with their adorable, scratchy, painful little tongues and purr louder and get all over you and your dreams. and one to curl up, sleepy and purring and adorable and (finally) peaceful, until the other one wants to curl up too, but the first doesn't allow that. no, sir. this is my curl up human, he says, i bite you now. and the other kitten protests and a fight begins and dear-god-can-i-just-get-2-more-minutes.

i swear, if there's a terrible twos for kittens, it's the 3 month mark.

however, they are still the adorables. no doubt. and who wouldn't rather wake up to a purring, loving kitten than a dude on the radio talking about bullshit? i love my kitteny goodness.

oh yeah, happy canada day.

kitten history

today was another special day.

number one, the kittens are 3 months old today... unofficially. the shelter people do not know their exact date of birth due to their background story. which i will share in a moment. but yes. three months and they're already so smart, and still so curious and rompy.

number two, the kittens got to go on the patio again! word to the wise - kittens do not like harnesses as much as one may think. in fact, they tend to walk around like something is pressing heavily on their little backs. we altered the harnesses into collars and it went a lot better. kittens like to walk everywhere, though. including in broken glass and almost to their falling death. and also, everywhere. around every chair leg, table, and crack in the deck did their little strings go.


this is cally and bruce. bruce is to mox as cally is to squig. bruce has been adopted but not poor little cally. they look remarkably like our little furkids. and this is how our dear little friends made their way into our hearts... moxley and squiggle were born with two other little fuzzy guys, in a barn in collingwood. the foster says they were "terrified of people initially. We brought them into the foster program when they were 6 weeks old. At 6 weeks we separated the four and put them in pairs of two putting one confident and one shy kitten together so that they could get lots of personalized attention in the foster homes."

we're not sure which one was "shy." but they're official birthday with the shelter is march 24, so that's what it shall be. and their adoption day was may 14th, so that's another day in the month to celebrate kitteny goodness.

now they're both asleep on the very top steps to the patio. they have had another wonderfully rompy day, and now again are drifting off to dreamland of roaring and exploring on the plains and maybe the patio.

todd's genius

todd's current genius is in making kitty-time videos. here is the first.

opening night

this is officially the first post in this chronicle of the lives of moxley and squiggle.

as you can see, it is a fancy occasion and mox has shown up in a lovely bowtie.

tomorrow is their birthday. and they are three months. and they are a lot bigger than a month ago.

today was special. the fuzzy kids had their first experience on the patio. given their bigger size, they shouldn't have been able to squeeze through any openings to their falling death. squiggle, ever the little explorer, immediately went for the space under the tallest wall, thereby exploring the neighbour's patio. ignoring the "spsss" noises and the "squiggle! get over here now!" from the 'mom' human, she explored fully until something moving under the wall caught her attention. stealthily she approached and pounced and protested in squeaky mews as i put down the stick and picked her up.

the kittens need collars or maybe harnesses. maybe they'll receive some tonight made with hemp by momma.

squiggle has taken to sitting in the windowsill and it is the cutest. and as always, they are sleeping in the oddest positions sometimes.


now they sleep soundly on other side of me, lying in the exact same position as each other. as the kittens drift off to dreams of chasing mice and birds and antelopes in the savannah, this post comes to an end.

the kittens are all cute and asleep..

cutest kittens in the world

are what we have... testing....

kittens!

we have kittens and this shall be their blog.

they are the cutest. right now squiggle is sleeping beside me and moxley's being a curious little monkey, climbing all over me and the computer at mad attempts to catch the cursor.

now he's snuggled in the blanket at my side, and squiggle continues to sleep while sitting, curled up in a pink sweatshirt.