Zebedee has settled in and been accepted much more easily than Mojo. Perhaps Mojo paved the way and the rest of the mogs can't be bothered to keep up the hissy-fits. Except for the Queen of Snark. Saffy still gives the random hiss and occasional whack if he wanders too close.

I was coming into my office after lunch when Zebedee raced toward me, an orange streak, and I just barely managed to block him before he got out the door. I'm not sure he was really trying to get out. I think it was more a matter of streaking around the office and being sucked in by the open door.

He was most unhappy about being locked up last night. Given how well things are going, I may not do it for much longer.

He's spent most of the day in my lap and is asleep on my right arm as I type this, utterly content.

May you all find equal contentment in 2007.

I spent a couple of hours on Thurs. and couple hours yesterday at Cause4Cats giving Lolette a hand by feeding and watering cats. Her usual person came down with pneumonia, so she needed the extra help. While I was there, she asked me if I would take in a foster kitten for a couple of weeks. Someone dumped this kitten at Lolette's place and she found him wandering the grounds.

Those of you snickering in the peanut gallery can stop it RIGHT NOW.

I said no at first because I know how I am and I realize the odds of giving up this kitten two weeks from now are dubious. On the one hand, I really don't want another kitten in the Horde. On the other hand, he's a totally adorable love-sponge. He's soaking up the love in my lap right now as I work on teaching him The Rules about not dancing on the keyboard. He has a phenomenal Purr Machine, one of the loudest motors I've heard on a kitten, and he purrs at the slightest touch.

He has been named Zebedee ("the gift of God"), which is a Biblical name. Zebedee (or Zebediah) was a fisherman and the father of two apostles, James and John.

I had already brought home a large cage that Lolette loaned me, one of the kind that had multiple levels of shelves so that a cat can jump around a bit. I set it up with the idea of putting Ariel in it. Once I had it in place, though, I had serious seconds thoughts. It would be difficult to give Ariel enough barriers so that Zoe and other cats aren't able to harrass her at any time. Not to mention the difficulty and stress caused by trying to transfer her from the Cave to the cage. It may yet happen, but not right now.

So instead, I brought back Zebedee yesterday and he went into the cage, which was perfect for a kitten. I figure he's probably about four months old. He certainly bounced around from level to level. He also complained about the situation for hours last night. "I want OUT! OUT!"

Late this morning, after the requisite sniffing around and growling had been done by certain members of the Horde, I let Zeb out. He went into Warp Drive and didn't stop for a good ten minutes, racing around the office, getting into every nook and cranny, exploring every inch of the place, discovering my desk and shelves and wastebaskets and generally wreaking typical kitten havoc.

Mojo has following and romped and chased around with him. He seems to be thinking, "My little brother! And he's orange!" Saffy, Jetta, Simon and Zoe have been having Snark Fests. Saffy is the Queen of Snark, closely followed by Simon and Jetta. Zoe mainly snarked when she had a run-in with the kitten. But the general snarkiness level has dropped off already, though I think I'll keep Zebedee in the cage during the night as a precaution. At least for a little while.

And now, a photo essay entitled Zebedee Arrives for a Visit.

Poor Puckster was pawing at the door this afternoon because I had filled the birdfeeder and he could hear ten thousand birds right outside the door. It was driving him crazy. Never mind that there's snow. There are BIRDS!

They can hear Randy out there now working with the snow shovel. We only have a couple of inches so far, but it could keep snowing all night. You never know. I saw the footprints of the feral cats in the snow as they made their way to the porch for food. My moggies don't know how good they have it.

The Puckmeister in a favorite sleeping spot.

We had a visitor yesterday who insisted on meeting the entire Horde. Theseus and Kate instantly went into Deep Hiding. The rest of the shameless moggies thronged the hapless guest and demanded scritches and adoration. Puck went further and buffed her boots to a fine shine. He has such a shoe fetish, that cat.

The PR people at Iams discovered the Moggyblog and sent me a blurb about a new website. Here's how they describe it:

Recently we've completed what we think to be a fun and entertaining website called The Great American Cat Stare-Off. This highly interactive site lets users meet and challenge 9 real cats to an eye-to-eye stare off and rewards them with a coupon for $3 dollars of Iams Multi-Cat food.

I checked it out and it's a cute site with funny cat bios and lovely cat faces. Here's the link:

http://www.iamscatstareoff.com/start.aspx?bmtn=20000011

The Horde has been going rather bonkers lately. I don't know if it's the weather or what but I had to grab the water-pistol three times yesterday and threaten Dire Consequences. Fortunately, the mere sight of the WMD in my hand is enough to cause second thoughts in furry little moggy brains.

We've been seeing new feral cats showing up for food and water this winter. The old-timer we see every day is Natasha, a black cat. Bowie is still around, but I don't see him as often. Lately, we've been seeing a cat with unusual markings. He's mostly white, with a patch of orange tabby mask on his head, then round splotches toward the rear end which join up like blobs in a lava lamp and give him an orange butt, with an orange tabby tail. We started calling him Orange Butt, which was shortened to O.B., which morphed into Obi. Last week, Obi climbed to the top of the sequoia (which is about, oh, twenty feet tall) in his lust for birds. The sequoia is where I hang the bird feeder. We locked eyes from the second story window and he quickly worked his way down.

And he has a twin! Except that instead of orange coloring, his twin has the same unusual markings in gray and black. We rarely see him, though. We had a long-haired dark tabby show up along with the short-haired tabby that we TNR'd, and yesterday I saw a new one who looks like a big, grown-up version of Mojo. Very skittish, he was, and took off like a flash when he saw me.

Here comes Puck for some lap time. Or so I thought. He walked across my lap and kept going. Now he's perched on the back of my chair. I am but Cat Furniture.

Ariel refused to touch the food all day and barely nibbled at it during the night. She knows that it's POISONED. I have given up and put her back on her regular food. The only way I'll be getting a trank into that girl will be a dart gun or aerosol spray. I don't think that will be happening in the near future. :P

The rest of the Horde has been in a feisty mood, running around taking whacks at one another. Mojo has a long scratch on his nose. Zoe and Saffy are running the Kittyannapolis 500.

I looked down and found a mouse next to my mouse. A gift from Zoe, dropped next to my computer mouse.

Ariel and I are having a battle of wills. She's trying to outstubborn me and I think she may win. I put half a trank in some canned food and gave it to her on Friday. She got a tiny taste of the pill (which is pretty bad tasting) and that was it. Yesterday, I crushed the piece of pill and mixed it into some moist food. She didn't touch it all day. She didn't touch it all night. I threw that out this morning and tried again, crushing another half a pill into a different kind of food that I thought might disguise it better.

So far, she's refusing to have anything to do with it. Sigh...

Mojo got inside the Cave briefly and took some whacks at Ariel. She reacted so defensively, that I know the trank would do her some good, just to give her temporary relief from the stress. But I have this sinking feeling she's going to win this battle. I can hardly let the poor girl starve. I'll give it one more day.

I've decided to start Ariel on a mild dose of tranks to see if I can break the cycle of nervous reaction she's developed due to Zoe. Of course, as long as Zoe is being a snot, that's only going to help so much, but I've had some success helping cats in the past by this method. We'll see.

I had to put the pill into canned food in order to get it into Ariel. Opening any can of food leads to an immediate frenzy in the rest of the Horde, so I had to give them some, too. They got so nuts trying to get to the bowls before I could finish spooning in the food that they knocked over one of the big dry food bowls and scattered dry food everywhere. You'd think they were abandoned, starving waifs or something.

Ariel made a hopeful move which then turned to disaster late yesterday. I looked up to see Ariel sniffing at the edge of the child gate which I'd left propped slightly open. Slowly, cautiously, she came out of the Cave and began to move out into the main part of the room. She hardly got more than a few feet when Zoe spotted her and flew to the attack. She chased Ariel around the office until I nailed Zoe with the WMD (Waterpistol of Moggy Distraction). I chased Zoe and squirted her some more for good measure, then grabbed her and put her into a carrier to think about her transgressions.

I found Ariel cowering on top of the desk that makes up the body of the Cave. I gave her a few minutes to calm down, then I opened the child gate wider and "encouraged" Ariel to go back inside to her safe area, which she quickly did.

Zoe is definitely the problem here and I don't see an easy solution. Maybe Zoe will calm down as she gets older, but that could take a while and meantime poor Ariel is stuck in a confinement she doesn't deserve. Mojo did manage to sneak in there and use Ariel's cat box this morning, but Ariel doesn't have a problem with the other cats, only with Zoe.

It's hard to stay mad at Zoe when she's so blasted cute.

Saffy says "I'm cute,too!" especially when perched on top of my computer.

Mojo strikes a silly pose in my lap.

Yowtch, I made another attempt to pet Ariel and she nailed me through two lawyers of clothing. Only a small hole in my arm, but it leaves me wondering whether I really should abandon any hope of making progress with her. I've continued letting the other cats go in and out of her Cave during the day with no other altercations so far. I also put a cushier cat bed in there for her because it gets rather chilly in my office these days and I want to make sure she's comfy.

Pippin is so cute when he gets to romping. He has a particular gallop he does that sounds like the famous section of the William Tell Overture. Padarum padarum padarumpumpum. Then he stops. Maybe one day when he's excessively frisky he'll do the entire piece.

The moggies were happy to have me home again, as they always are. Saffy brought me the mousie for an enthusiastic bout of fetch until Zoe stole the mousie so that she could play fetch. Then Mojo stole the mousie and Zoe had to chase him around the office until she got it back.

As soon as I got back, I told Ariel she could come out of the Cave any time she wanted. I've been leaving the child gate open just enough for a cat to go in and out, hoping to encourage a gradual level of interaction between Ariel and the other cats again. It was working fairly well. Puck would go in and out without a problem. Mojo has gone in a few times and not reacted to Ariel, though she gave him a low-level growl. I've seen Jetta, Theseus and Saffy go in and out. Saffy harrassed Ariel a little bit, but nothing major. Then yesterday I heard an all-out fight, but by the time I'd jumped out of my chair to see who it was, the culprit had fled. I thought I glimpsed a dark shape and I strongly suspect Zoe, since that is still who Ariel reacts to with the harshest growls. Anyway, I found Ariel huddled in a back cubicle and water spilled all over, which is not a promising step in reintegrating her.

Henh, Simon and Mojo just had a boxing match on my desk. Whapwhapwhappitywhap!

We've lost our friendly visitor, Bob the black cat. Apparently, his people have moved out and taken Bob, Kit and the two dogs with them. We miss petting him.

I didn't have to go without a cat fix while I was visiting family back east. My brother has a lovely, mellow cat named Pucket who kept me company by sleeping on my bed most of the night. In another life, that could have been Ariel.

Pucket the mellow

I'm heading out of town to vist family for several days, so there won't be new Moggyblog posts for close to a week. I'll miss my moggies!

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