Grandcats

Our grandcats, Katie and Bella, are doing well as the time for their return to home in San Antonio, and to their Mom, approaches.   Katie's chemo has gone remarkably well and without complications until recently after a dose of Vincristine.  It's been normal for Katie to have a day on which her appetite is off a few days after chemo administration so we thought little of it when she wouldn't eat the Thursday evening after Tuesday's chemo.  When she didn't eat Friday evening we became a little worried but Saturday evening she did eat a bit and we thought that all would be well.  Being a little anxious, nonetheless, we bought some designer cat hors d'oeuvres and fancy foods to tempt her but she ate nothing Sunday evening.  We could further tell she wasn't eating normally by the kibbles still left in the dish each morning despite Bella's best efforts.  In addition, my early morning pearl diving in the litter boxes wasn't as productive as it normally is.

Now we were worried.  Monday I called the vet who was concerned enough to have me bring her in that day.  This was about 11:15 and she said she could see Katie at Noon.  I was in my sweats and hadn't shaved yet (I'm retired, OK?) but had no time for anything but to collect Katie, throw on a jacket and head out for the vet.  It's about 25 miles from our house and takes about 40 minutes to get there.  Katie and I arrived just on time and the vet tech took her right in.  Turns out she was a little dehydrated and had an ileus (which I think is a blockage due to loss of normal bowel motility), a known side effect of Vincristine, which can cause nausea and loss of appetite.  The vet gave her some sub-q fluids (poor Katie looked like a camel with the hump on the wrong side), an anti-emetic, some prednisone, and a drug called Cisapride to relieve the ileus.

Happily, and a great relief to Janet and me, she perked right up and ate like she was ravenous that evening. We've continued to give the Cisapride twice per day through tonight but her appetite is back and she's eating again with gusto.  She had also begun rejecting the prednisone oral suspension we'd been giving her but we've found that at least for now, she'll take it in her soft food.  The animal druggist we go to for the meds, The Pet Apothecary, said that the prednisone has an awful taste and even flavored it can be a problem to get inside a cat.  Hopefully she'll continue to take it in her food but if not we'll have to pill her for as long as she needs it.

Although we'll miss both Katie and Bella - Bella is the nosiest most curious cat we've seen, ever - we'll be happy to get their Mom back in the USA and I'm sure they'll be glad to get back to Texas and a home without a large black dog.  I think they'll also be glad to get back to a warmer climate.  In the wee hours, as the house cools off, Katie now heads for the little dog bed and Bella for the heat register.

Froehliche Geburtstag, Jannie

My lovely wife turned 39 on Friday.  She took it very well, I think.  Women are really most attractive as they mature and Janet is no exception.  In any event, I love her more as each year passes.  Happy birthday, love.

The water of life

Friday night, our good friends Steve and Ellen came over from Middleton to help us celebrate and we went out to dinner at Il Mito on about 70th and North Avenue in Milwaukee.  We met them at the bar and had a glass of wine and some catch-up conversation before we went to our table for dinner.  The food was good and sharing it with such good friends made the occasion even better.  We came back to our house (Steve and Ellen stayed over that night) for some desert, but not before we savored a couple of drams of Aberlour 12 year old single malt whisky.  The 12 is double cask matured and an excellent value as well as a very pleasing dram to enjoy.  I believe at this point that Aberlour is my favorite Speyside whisky although more research is in order.  Steve and I each had two drams (!), in honor of Janet's birthday, of course.  I find that good whisky never tastes so good as when you're enjoying it with friends and family.  I've purchased a bottle of Aberlour's excellent A'bunadh to open and enjoy with Stephanie, Adam and Ruth, and Keith and Sarah when they are here at Christmas time.  Of the Speyside whiskys, this is my all time favorite although a small splash of water is mandatory because of the high alcohol content (59.7% abv) of this non chill-filtered cask strength magnificent whisky.  What a treat this would be with a wee bit o' haggis!

Saturday night we went downtown to see David Sedaris at the Riverside Theater courtesy of son Adam. We left home early so we could have a bite to eat before the show and stopped in at Mo's Irish Pub on Wisconsin Avenue just across the street from the Riverside. We caught the last of the Wisconsin-Iowa game (Badgers 31-30, YES!) as we waited for our  burgers and found ourselves with about an hour to kill before the show by the time we'd eaten.  We walked around by the river (it was very balmy and pleasant that evening) and eventually found our seats in the theater in time to relax a bit before Sedaris did his thing.  He's a very funny guy and the entire show was a continuum of chuckles, giggles, and belly laughs.  We had a very good time and Janet had a great birthday weekend.  If the Republicans had bombed the building during the show, they'd probably have cinched the election for sure.

Girls in bathroom linen closet

Katie and Bella are perking along and, although they don't know it yet, they'll soon be reunited with their Mom down in San Antonio.  Katie's chemo continues to go well although she doesn't care for the tuna flavored prednisone we have to squirt into her unwilling mouth every evening.  It would probably be correct to say that she doesn't care for the chemo admin itself but she is a good sport about it and doesn't seem to hold the weekly visit to the vet against Janet and me.  We try to keep food available during the day so that Katie can eat if she's hungry.  We want to put some weight on her and she's gradually adding pounds a fraction at a time.  Bella is the inadvertent beneficiary of this and has blossomed into a cat of substance.  Nevertheless, she will play with her fishing pole cat toy for extended periods and she's both energetic and agile.  Both cats are real buddies and wherever we see Katie we can be sure that Bella is close behind.  I've included a couple of pics illustrating this as they nap together in the bedroom closet and the bathroom linen closet.

Girls in bedroom closet

The leaves are virtually all off the trees at this point and as we look out the family room window through the now bare tree line, across the farm field bare and harvested, to Elmwood Road we remember Janet's Mom who always commented on being able to see the road at this time each year as if it was the first time she'd noticed it.  We miss her as the holidays draw near.

Today is a rainy, grey day and dismal day.  The good news is that Stephanie is now days away from leaving Iraq and returning to the States.  That's the sunshine through the clouds and a real cause for celebration.

Keith, Loch Ness

Our youngest son, Keith, is only days away from leaving for Argentina as he begins the next phase of his life and career.   Keith is working toward a career in travel writing and/or related endeavors and will spend a month in Salta, Argentina and surrounds as the first stage in a 2-year long odyssey.  He's been writing a travel blog for over a year now and has received substantial recognition for his writing and insights. We're looking forward to reading more as his odyssey unfolds.  Wife Sarah is fully in support of this career change but we know that she and Keith will miss each other greatly during his month-long absences.  But those reunions will be sweet!  We wish him (and Sarah) the best in this exciting new phase of their lives, and much success.

Beautiful Wisconsin

Fall is the time of anticipation and change.  Maybe that's why we love it so.  You can sense it as you see woolly worms hurrying hither and yon to places and appointments known only to them in an invertebrate sort of cognition.  The geese know it, too, as they fly about in random-seeming groups, practicing for their big event and you hear them calling to one another when you go outside in the morning.   It's also one of the most beautiful times of the year when the heat and humidity of summer give way to balmy days and cool nights with an occasional frigid day or frosty night to remind us of what awaits in the dark time to come.  For me, I think, Fall's poignancy lies in its similarity to life itself to the changing of the seasons (hardly and original thought) and to the religious mythologies that have guided our ancestors and still, in varying degrees, ourselves.

Fall is an especially beautiful time in Wisconsin where we enjoy a year with four distinct seasons.  Vivaldi captures the beauty of each season so well in his The Four Seasons (Il Quattro Stagioni, I believe, for those studying Italian).  I'm listening to it now as I write this post and realize that it has probably been a couple of years since I last heard it. How does the composer capture a part of the natural world in something as otherworldly as music?  The only other composer that has done it as well to my mind is Claude Debussy in his La Mer which is, perhaps, even more remarkable.  Enough. This is getting a little flatulent and I surely cannot claim to be a musicologist.  In any case, I've included some snapshots of the Fall foliage here in the Kettle Moraine area of southeast WIsconsin.  I regret that my skills as a photographer don't do the beauty of the countryside here justice.  My (lame) excuse is that it was difficult to safely stop and take pictures because there were so many other people out doing the same thing and so composition and exposure suffered under the pressure of time and fear of injury.

Yesterday, Janet and I went to Empty Bowls with Dave and Dale DeTrempe.  Empty Bowls is an annual charitable event that works to secure funds with which to provide food for the hungry in the Milwaukee area.  We know from our occasional work at a food pantry that there are more people in this predicament now than in many years.  For a $20 donation, one gets to try a variety of soups made by restaurants and pubs around the area in your own personal bowl, which you pick out from tables laden with handmade clay bowls.  It's an exercise in decision management for some people as they pick up a bowl here and put it down there when they find one yet more fetching than the last.  In the past, a few generous philanthropists bought so many bowls that they've had to limit it to 4 bowls per person!

Today, it has become more than balmy reaching 88F on the weather station in the kitchen.  The sensor is proximate to the deck so there may be some extra heating going on there.  Nevertheless, a very warm and beautiful day with no noticeable humidity.  We've begun the annual Fall trimming of the shrubs and cleaning out of the vegetable garden so we're a bit pooped at this point.  My red potatoes from the garden are very good and I think they do have somewhat more flavor than the store bought potatoes.  Having discovered and become enamored of Chana Saag, an Indian dish of pureed spinach (chard in my case) with garlic, chickpeas, the usual Indian spices including red chile powder, and plain yogurt I'm leaving my monstrously productive chard plants to continue doing their thing in the garden so I can put it up in the freezer for future use in the various iterations of Saag.  Hopefully, we won't get a killing frost soon.

Katie in the closet

Bella taking a break

The girls are still doing well and we're enjoying them immensely.  Katie likes to sleep in the closet of the back bedroom until the sun hits the cat tree.  Then, you'll find her there working on her tan.  Bella is pushing the envelope so far as zaftig is concerned but is remarkably athletic none the less.  Sophie, as I've mentioned in the past, is gradually disappearing as she becomes thinner and thinner.  Duncan is still remarkably well aside from being a little stiff in the hips at times and being largely deaf.  He continues to refine his "walk & drop" technique of defecation, which makes picking up after him a real Easter egg hunt.  But, we love the old guy and he's still spry enough to sneak upstairs and eat the girls' kibble if we leave the gate sufficiently open at the foot of the stairs.  Sadly, our friends with a dog about the same age as Duncan aren't as lucky.  Their dog springs a leak at odd times seemingly unaware of doing so and periodically cocks his head to one side and stares off into space for minutes at a time.  Probably should have done more crossword puzzles when he was younger (grim humor).

Until next time,  arrivederci!

The holidays? It's about family, eh?

The bed

Katie and Bella continue to thrive with their grandparents, although I'm sure they miss their Mom and will be happy to see her in November - as she will be happy to see them.  They bring us so much fun and affection that we look forward to what each day brings with them both.  No dullards they, when Sophie starts complaining that she's hungry, Bella shows up soon after and Katie isn't far behind.  Katie has taken a liking to the cheaper food that we feed Sophie and cleans her plate (or dish) each night.  It's probably the McDonalds of cat food and she's becoming a junk food junkie.  Bella, like her grandfather, eats whatever doesn't eat her first.  Sophie pays them little attention and still hasn't uttered the slightest negative sound when she sees them.  Bella, on the other hand, hisses at Sophie and makes even more hostile noises when she comes into close proximity with Duncan.  Duncan can't hear her, of course, so isn't offended by the unfriendly greetings.

Ahhh...Aberlour

Sophie continues gradually to disappear.  She eats twice what we fed her years ago but cannot gain weight.  I'm sure that she has the irritable bowel problem that cats often develop as they get older.  Thank God we have a basement to keep the litter boxes in.  Duncan is doing well although some days his joints are pretty stiff in the morning.  He can still do the doggie dance at dinner time if I don't move fast enough, however.  I took him for a ride in the Mazda SUV the other day and had to help him get up into it.  It's much higher than my Subaru Forester and he's just not as spry as he used to be.  I feel his pain, to paraphrase 42.  We'll both be glad after our first hard frost because it will kill the the goldenrod and allow our allergies to tone down a bit.

Piper, Glen Garry

The approach of the holidays always seems to bring family to mind and it should since family is all that's important in the end.  It's what I'm most thankful for and I know that others feel the same.  We won't have Stephanie, Adam or Keith with us this Thanksgiving but we will have Sarah and her parents and brother as well as our niece Cheryl, and brother (in-law) Ron.  I'm looking forward to having them all here for the holiday and expect a warm and happy celebration.  Part of that warmth ( a small part, to be sure) will come from a new furnace.  I'm having a great time getting quotes from a number of contractors and learning about furnaces and furnace salesmanship.  Our existing furnace is original equipment and is 20-22 years old.  It hasn't failed yet but when is does it will surely be on the coldest Sunday of the year so we're going to do a preemptive strike on it.

Speaking of hard freezes, we're supposed to get one tonight so I picked the basil, the eggplant, and the cucumbers and we'll see what happens. I'm hoping my chard will survive - it can take some frost - but if it gets well down into the 20s, it may be toast. My parsley, oregano, sage, thyme, and rosemary are along the south side of the garage and will be OK...I think. The coming of the dark time here in Wisconsin brought to mind the need to store away some pulled pork for the long, cold winter months when BBQ is pretty much infeasible. We found some large pork shoulders on sale and I smoked two of them for 6 hours and then put them in the oven for another 4 or so at 230F and they came out tender and sweet.  A couple of squirts of Fergie's mustard& vinegar sauce and you're in heaven!  We had some for dinner then bagged and froze the rest. We're well prepared for pulled pork sandwiches for the remainder of the dark time.  I did a couple of polish sausages at the same time and they'll be ready to go when the gumbo bug strikes.

Family (-1), Stirling Castle

Most of all, we look forward to the return of the last trauma czar in November.  She has only a few months left in the Air Force and that's a good thing.  Even though she's gone out of her way to stay in touch with her old gits, we've missed her and we will be much happier to have her back in the USA.  We'll have to haul out the Springsteen to welcome her home, ainna?

Oh, dem Packers, eh!?

We've eaten the last of the tomatoes from the garden.  Beets, chard, zucchini, and potatoes are still available and the fresh herbs remain.  Fall is definitely here, however, and we've had our first patchy frost of the season.  This being Wisconsin, more is definitely on the way.

We went over to Uncle Bob and Aunt Jeannie's house last night for pizza and the Packers v Bears game.  Once again, the Packers snatched defeat from the jaws of victory by managing to incur more penalties in the first half than they had so far in the season.  Nevertheless, the pizza and company were good and we had an enjoyable evening.  We didn't watch the second half but it's possible that by game's end, they'd gotten more penalties than the entire NFL so far this season.  I hope "da Bears" enjoy their early Christmas present.  Diz-gusting.

Retirement is going well for me and I feel especially fulfilled as I apply primer to the porch railings in front.  We're going to paint over the red paint now on them and give them a coat of white.  As the snow begins to fly this winter, they will become invisible.  We may have to put flags on them as a safety measure.  Since the weather has begin to cool my thoughts have turned to gumbo and I believe I'll make up a batch this afternoon.

The girls, Katie and Bella, our grandcats, have won our hearts and we'll be loath to give them up when their Mom comes home in November.  Still, I'm not sure we'll miss the coarse sand beach that is our bathroom floor.  I feed them and clean out their litter boxes each morning when I get up, and scratch a couple of tummies before I go downstairs to feed Sophie and have my morning coffee.  Bella has taken a cue from Sophie and now comes downstairs at around 4:30 p.m. to let us know that she and Katie are ready for their evening repast.  In preparation for their return to San Antonio and the continuation of Katie's chemotherapy there, I've been in contact with South Texas Veterinary Specialists in San Antonio conveniently situated on Sonterra Blvd.  This will be nice since it isn't far from their home.  They've said that they'll work Katie in when we get down there and the contact person for us, Delilah, seems very nice.

Last night uncle Bob gave me an article he'd cut from the Shepherd Express about Wisconsin's three micro distilleries.  Two, Death's Door Spirits and Yahara Bay Distillers are in Madison while Great Lakes Distillery, makers of Rehorst Vodka and Gin, is in Milwaukee.  Great Lakes also makes whiskey and Yahara Bay makes vodka, gin, whiskey, rum and a couple of other spirits.  Great Lakes and Yahara Bay have tours so we'll have to add them to the brewery tours we so enjoy.  Mayhap we can do something during the holidays.  Could be fun.

Hope everyone is doing well as the holiday season hurtles toward us.  That reminds me.  I need to check out the snow blower but it should be fine since I just got it last year.  Off to the store for some okra and turkey thighs.  Mmmm.  Gumbo!

Brave New World

It's another cool and rainy day in Wisconsin and Fall is definitely in the air even though it's technically still summer.  Katie has now had three weekly treatment sessions of the UW Protocol for lymphoma chemotherapy in cats.  She's handling the chemo remarkably well with just a little anemia and a bad food day a few days after the treatment.  Nevertheless, she is gaining back weight and her kidney tumor was not palpable on exam at her treatment last Tuesday.  Most days seem to be good food days for Katie and great food days for her sister Bella.

I love Duncan's bed

I know they're up there

As I mentioned in an earlier post, we gave the girls the run of the upper level of the house, with the child gate to keep them apart from Sophie our aging female cat who has been savage with other female cats brought into her home.  It wasn't long, however, before Bella discovered that she could easily jump the barrier and have access to the whole house.  Katie followed shortly after.  We were quite concerned that Sophie would go nuclear and we'd have frightened or even possibly injured cats on our hands but it seems we worried for naught.  Sophie has been entirely passive, never once showing hostility despite close encounters of the feline kind on a daily basis.  The girls have now been everywhere in the house and have discovered the joy of an other cat's food and the earthy pleasure in using someone else's cat box.

Sophie sees you...

I must be putting on weight

Janet decided that if Katie loved Duncan's bed so much, she should have one of her own.  It happened that a friend at work had a little dog bed that had been used by her tiny toy poodle before it died so she gave it to Janet for Katie to use.  Predictably, Katie has no interest in that bed being perfectly satisfied with the larger bed with it's homey doggie ambiance.  Bella, however, seems to have taken possession.  We had put it in our bedroom, of course, and when Duncan saw it, he immediately tried it out.  He went round and round trying to find the perfect position.  See picture.  Somehow, he did manage to get himself into the bed.  He looked trussed up like a chicken for the oven or a scoop of ice cream on top of a cone.

Today Janet's cousin Char and husband Phil are coming up from Illinois for a brewery tour and dinner at a German restaurant.  Uncle Bob and Aunt Jeannie are going to be here for dinner (they're in Madison for most of the day) but we'll be taking Char and Phil to Sprecher for the tour.  Brewery tours are always fun and Sprecher does  make good beer (also good root beer and other sodas).  Fortunately, brewery tours and German food are not affected by the weather so I'm sure a good time will be had by all.  While I'm not a huge fan of hog knuckles and red cabbage, I do like a good Wiener schnitzel and I'm also partial to sauerbraten the way Grandma used to make it mit knadeln und ginger snap gravy.

Finally, the vegetable garden is on it's last legs as summer comes to a close.  I've had some fun with eggplant making a chinese eggplant dish that got a thumbs up from Janet (no such luck for Dal Curry).  I've laid in some coconut milk and will use another for a Thai red curry.  I absolutely love Thai curried eggplant so I'm probably going to go for it next week.  I still have to dig the red potatoes I planted in Spring but I'm looking forward to trying them.  People say that home grown is much better then store bought potatoes. We'll see.

Auf wiedersehen.

The Hat People

Katie and Bella are doing well, just for the record.  I have been advised by my muse, however, to talk about other things besides the cats on this blog.  Therefore...

My inner anthropologist was piqued recently to find that my wife and brothers-in-law had all, (almost) independently purchased the same type of hat.  This may be the beginning of a social movement or the founding of a tribe of hat people.  Anthropologists, of course, are inevitably excited by the discovery of a new group of indigenous people with a strange, heretofore unknown culture since it is not only intellectually stimulating but potentially provides the grist for journal articles, professional advancement, etc.  Fame and fortune also often come with such discoveries.

I've often had second thoughts about my decision to abandon anthropology as a profession and so I wondered if this might be a door just opened that would allow my re-entry to the field.  A social or cultural anthropologist will, of course, immediately see the hat people as a cultural and social phenomenon.  This is a variant on the old saw (!) that says when your only tool is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.  However, since all of the members are blood relatives, one must not dismiss the potential biological ramifications of this discovery out of hand.  Fortunately, I have immediate access to experts in genetics with whom I can explore these possibilities.

At the same time, this nascent culture has interesting linguistic components including a variant of the English language that includes a number words that are similar to English and yet different in fundamental ways.   There are also curious phonetic and syntactic elements that, aside from physical appearance and mode of dress, identify the speaker as a member of a different tribe to those not from the Hat People's geographic area.  This is similar in many ways to the relation of Scots English to standard English.  Here too, fortunately, I know a trained linguist who will be able to address the linguistic aspects of the tribe in more detail.

As the ethnographer for this group, I will be watching closely and will, in fact, live with one of the tribal members in her hogan.  It will be important to remain aware of the "observer effect" so as not to influence the behavior of this subject.  I will report back at a later date after I've had time to become better acquainted with the culture of this interesting new group of native peoples of the north.  ;>)

Hope for those in a parched land

If you see hot and brown and dry every day (and I don't mean California), try these pics.  There's a big T-storm that has been moving through our area for a couple of hours with a great deal of rain, and donner und blitzen.  The girls don't care and Duncan is so deaf he doesn't know it's happening.  It's been a warm and wet summer and the grass and vegetation generally have remained green and growing.

We're having a Labor Day party for our local relations and the forecast is for the storm to have moved on by this afternoon when people start showing up.  It could be tricky, though, because the yellow jackets get pretty feisty this time of year and will bring all their friends to the party once they smell the food and beer.

I'll try to get some pics of the folks that I can post so all can see how youthful and vigorous we are.

Second Thoughts

So after thinking about it, we decided that the child gate in the stairway wasn't a sure enough means of segregating our cat from the girls.  When we're away, we'll close the girls up in our bedroom and just give them the run of the upper level when we're there to supervise.  As the doctor said, "an once of prevention is worth a pound of cure."

On the left you'll see pictures of the TDY girls relaxing in their Wisconsin quarters.  Katie, the calico, is from Korea and sustained a serious injury as a kitten on one of the runways at the air base where her Mom was stationed.  She's a bit shy but deigns to let me pet her and scratch her behind the ears at the times and places of her choosing.  She has a really sweet face and disposition and, unfortunately, feline lymphoma.

Bella is the sleek but zaftig black cat who flops on the floor whenever I enter the room, rolling onto her back so I can scratch her tummy while she kneads the air. I've known Bella since her Mom picked her out of a score of kittens at a humane society in San Antonio, Texas.  Bella has a sunny disposition but sometimes bugs her sister Katie who will, if sufficiently provoked, apply corrective action to Ms. Bella.  Bella is also notorious for stealing the covers when she sneaks up on the bed at night after I've nodded off.

By way of orientation, the girls had been staying in Illinois with two very good friends of their Mom while she is over seas.  They took Katie to see a vet when they became concerned that she might be losing weight.  Long story short, Katie was found to have a mass on her right kidney that turned out to be lymphoma.  Lymphoma is a very aggressive disease in cats and could have been fatal in a matter of weeks if not discovered and treated.  Since the two cats are inseparable, they both came to live with us in Wisconsin so that Katie can receive weekly chemotherapy treatments from a veterinary oncologist practicing here.

So far, Katie seems to be doing well and has gained back about 0.5 pounds of weight, a significant amount given her size.  Everyone who knows her is hoping for a good outcome from her treatment and at her last visit to the oncologist we were told that her tumor has decreased in size - a cause for some optimism.  Statistically, the odds of a successful remission with the treatment regimen she's on are very good.  We're all rooting for her.

The Wide Open Spaces

As mentioned in my first blog, we've been keeping Katie and Bella in our master bedroom.  Janet and I have been taking turns sleeping in the front bedroom (the other sleeping in the master bedroom with the girls) so that our elderly Duncan Dog and Sophie Cat would have someone in whose room they could sleep as has been their custom.  Duncan would be happy to sleep with the girls (!) in the master bedroom  but Sophie has historically been opposed to having other females in her house to say the least.  It's not much of an inconvenience to us to have the girls in our bedroom but we wanted to let them have a bit more area to explore and enjoy so we barricaded the stairway up from the first floor with an expandable child safety gate.

Having installed the gate half-way up the stairway, we opened the bedroom door and gave the ladies the run of the second floor.  Bella was exploring instantly and quickly found the cat tree we'd put in front of the window in the back bedroom.  In fact, the gate isn't high enough to prevent the 3 cats from going up or down the stairway if they want to climb or leap over it but we decided to pretend that they aren't smart enough to figure that out or else would not care to do so.  We'd really like them to have more area in which to chase each other around.  It would also allow us to put their litter boxes in the guest bathroom, reducing the zoo-like ambiance now extant in our bathroom as well as the coarse sand beach we walk in when using it.

This evening not so long ago, Janet asked me if I knew where Katie was. Beads of sweat appeared on my upper lip as I envisioned a major disaster involving Sophie and Katie but I realized that I'd heard none of the screeching that usually accompanies a cat assault.  A few minutes later, Katie was found peacefully sleeping in Duncan's bed in the front bedroom.  To my way of thinking, that's a very good sign!

In the beginning...

The Mewlings will attempt to chronicle the lives and travails of Katie S and Bella S, two cats TDY to Wisconsin while their Mom serves her country in a galaxy far, far away.  I'm not an experienced blogger so I have much to learn but it is my intention to post to the blog at least weekly (if I can figure out how to get back to it).  I'll do it more often if I find it cathartic or if I just have so much to share with the blogosphere (does a blogger use words like blogosphere?).

Please feel free to offer suggestions on how I can improve the blog.  I may be an old git but I can still learn and will try to make improvements as best I'm able.  Do keep it constructive, though.  Perhaps given time I'll become addicted to blogging.  A gene for it just may run in the family.

I'll be back with news on Katie and Bella who are, as we speak, enjoying the comforts of the master bedroom in our house.  There are a couple more things I need to figure out before I swing into high gear as a blogger but hopefully that won't take long.