Apologies for the lack of cameras for a few weeks – we needed to wait till the Tribe had found their favourite places before we installed the photographic equipment.
Two catcams are now online, and the other two will follow real soon.
He seems to be settling in reasonably well now :)
On 21st November, we moved house from North Somerset to Kingston-upon-Hull, in East Yorkshire. This involved someone – me, in fact – drawing the short straw and driving the five cats 230 miles.
We put the older two in a cattery – I felt that if they were around while the removal was going on, they’d leg it. I bought a big dog cage for the younger three, but in the event, they were quite happy, and had to be fished out of the lorry on a regular basis. So when we were packed up, I looked for Henry, Ron and Lilith to enbox.
No Lilith. She was, inevitably, in her second home, a house which backed on to ours. I went round with a basket and knocked on the door, and the mother opened it. ”Can I have my cat back, please?” I said. ”We’re moving to Yorkshire and I need to take her with me”.
She was aghast – “my daughter loves that cat”. I knew that, but Lilith is actually *our* cat. ”Why not get her one of her own?”, I asked and was told that she worked irregular hours. No idea what that has to do with it.
Then she asked me not to tell the daughter that we were taking Lilith away for good. In my haste, and against my better judgement, I went along with it, but oh – how I wish I hadn’t. When she asked why Lily was going in a basket, I said we were going away for a few days, to friends, and that they wanted Lily to come with us. I can’t begin to imagine how that girl must feel now, and I feel I betrayed her.
Anyway, EnRon went in a box together and were as good as gold. Lilith went in the small box, and I went off to the cattery (which was in the wrong direction) to collect the spotty boys. I couldn’t get anybody to answer the phone, or the doorbell, and stood in the rain for 25 minutes in an increasing panic until the woman who was looking after the place for her son finally realised there was someone there when she looked through the window …
She yattered and yattered, gave me a bill for the wrong amount, and I just wanted to get the boys, and get going, as I had a 4.5 hour journey ahead of me. Eventually I got them in their separate boxes, and into the car, with Lily between them, and off I went.
It was a *vile* day – sideways rain, and really dark, and Iggy and Mustrum shouted – screamed, at times – the entire way. I’m sorry to say that Iggy was so distressed that he disgraced himself in his basket, and so I had a Smell to content with too. We let them have the run of the house and yard as soon as we arrived, and while they weren’t happy, they seemed to be settling.
And then, the next evening Sunday), Iggy disappeared. We tried not to worry, but we did worry. And as the days went by, we worried more. I went out often calling him, but we now live in a part of the city which is a grid of Victorian terraced streets, and they all look the same. I didn’t see how he could find his way home. I phoned the Identichip people, and reported him as missing.
Since I arrived here, it’s been my habit to come downstairs early – about 6 a.m. – make a cup of tea, feed the cats, and catch up with some stuff on my laptop. And on the Thursday morning, as I was making the early tea, there was a rowl from the living room, and Iggy strolled into the kitchen. He wasn’t thin, he wasn’t hungry, he wasn’t stressed, but he was home. I can only assume that he’d gone to check out the neighbourhood.
He came in through a cat flap that wasn’t even fitted when he left – what a clever cat.
We now have five stay at homes, which suits me fine, but my word – what a lot they’re eating. I knew they dined out and about, but we’re getting through more than twice the amount of food we used to!
- There is, quite literally, a rat in my kitchen. What am I gonna do? #
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Henry and Ron had been showing particular interest in the shelves in the kitchen for a couple of days. We put this down to an unfortunate frog/toad-related incident on Tuesday night which I haven’t had time to tell you about yet.
However, on Friday night, as I sat watching mindless television while stuffed up with flu, I swore I heard Pete say “there’s a rat in the kitchen”. Obviously, I was hallucinating. But no .. he did say it. And when I went to look, I could see its bright beady eyes and little black nose where it was perched behind the spice rack on the worktop. This is marginally better than Pete’s first encounter with it a couple of minutes earlier, which was when he lifted up the big soup mug from the draining board and found the rat (admittedly smallish, but still – a rat ..) underneath it! The rat scuttled off and took refuge behind the spice rack.
We weren’t sure what to do – it wasn’t very big, but they can bite, and we couldn’t have got hold of it anyway without dismantling things, by which time it would be off. By the time we’d discussed it, the rat had taken steps to relocate itself behind the washing machine.
All five cats seem totally disinterested – even Lilith, who is a prodigious ratter. This morning, two days later, I can hear the bloody creature scuttling about under the kitchen cupboards, which is quite creepy. Not quite sure what to do next …
- spotted cats delivered to the vet for second injections with no trauma involved to any party – amazing #
- Another dead shrew last night, outside the kitchen door. Which is odd, as all the cats came in through the patio door last night, shrewless. #
- I have two cats on my desk. #
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I think we can safely say, at last, that the cats are no longer using litter trays. This is the first time in our 12 years of joint cat ownership that we haven’t needed trays, and we’re not about to get rid of them just in case it’s a flash in the pan (as it were).
They haven’t been used in three weeks, though, which is a very good sign. However, as we are moving house shortly, I think we’ll keep them going for a while, until the Tribe find new places to do their business,
- 4rrrrrrrrrr #
- [ that was Ron, keyboard dancing; he opened up my recycle bin too, which may have been a comment. On something. ] #
- home to a small dead shrew, and a puddle in the kitchen. #
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