Tami~shredding machine

Paper Shredder Poppy!

I did a little shopping today, nothing too exciting, new track bottoms for the gym and so on, and when I got home I went through the same routine as usual with Poppy! As soon as I enter the door and she hears the rustle of a paper bag she's all over it like a rash!! She can't wait to jump on it. And not just to hide in it like a normal cat, no she has to shred the bag to pieces! Which means every time I bring a paper bag home I have to wrestle it away from here before she's done too much damage and try and get it in the bin without her noticing!

Paper bags are her favourite, but she's not that fussy, she'll shred receipts, paperwork, bills, you name it she's tried it :D I've got so many notes for work that have little cat teeth puncture marks in them, it's mad! I'm always worried she'll find something to shred/chew/bite when I'm not there and ingest some of it, I don't want her to get ill. I'm only waiting for the day she eats a €50 note and then I'll be ill..hehehe! Not that i have €50 notes left scattered around willynilly ;p

Yesterday I heard someone talking about their cat making bits of the toilet roll! So at least I know Poppy's not the only mental moggy around! I've been researching this paper obsession a bit on the net and came across this reply to a question from someone whose cat was a paper shredder like Poppy..

Many times cats like the noise of the paper--they will play with it when it is crumbled and when batting it around, bite it. When my cats were kittens they loved to eat toilet paper and to this day, they will chew on tissue paper if it is laying around or the newspaper when I am trying to read it. My one cat also has a tendency to lick plastic...I chalk it up to a bit of obsessive compulsive disorder. Your cat may be bored and if has the need to nosh, you could try planting some cat grass. You can also try spraying bitter apple on the paper and boxes to discourage her. Also try getting her some cloth sacks of catnip to play and chew on and actively play with her for at least 15 minutes a day using pole toys or a laser pointer. But if it is only paper, I would not worry. If she takes a liking to ribbon, string, twist-ties or rubber bands, these things can cause intestinal blockages if ingested.

So I guess it's just a case of making sure she doesn't develop a taste for anything more exotic like elastic bands and keeping all the cash in the Piggy Bank..hehehe I found a video of another paper eating cat on You Tube. Very similar technique to Poppy, but not as enthusiastic, the rate she rips the paper to bits she could get a job working for a confetti making company ;p!!

Cats in Art

First of all my apologise for not posting all week. I've been very busy at work and just didn't get the time :( But I'm back now and rearing to go :)

A good friend of mine gave me a really lovely book recently. It's called 'Cat...Wild cats and Pampered Pets' by Andrew Edney. It was a perfect gift as it combines two of my great loves, cats and art. The book contains beautiful images of cats represented in art works down through the ages, mixed with quotes from literature.

I thought it would be nice to include excerpts from the book from time to time. A sort of 'Cats in Arts' section! The funny thing is, despite the fact I am a painter I have never painted our two lovelies! I've painted cats but never ours, something I plan to remedy soon. When I do I'll post the finished product here :)

Anyway, the first painting I've selected from the book is 'The New Arrival' by Horatio Henry Couldery

The New Arrival

I like this painting because it shows the little ginger kitten bristling and facing off against the much larger tabby. It reminds me of Poppy when she gets a fright from Oliver, puffed up to twice her size and hopping along sideways!! Always makes me laugh.

Couldrey was one of the best known Victorian painters of animals and especially for his very detailed paintings of cats. You can check out more about the artist here http://www.burlington.co.uk/picture/cm/content/1516.

This is another painting by Couldrey, not in the book, but it's so sweet I had to include it.

The Unexpected Guest

Photographing Cats

'I'm ready for my close-up'!

I love taking photos of our two cats. They have to be two of the most photographed felines in existence! I always have the digital camera handy and ready to go in case a photo opportunity presents itself :)

I'm not showing favouritism here, but Poppy happens to be particularly photogenic! She loves the camera and it loves her!! She enjoys posing I think. Oliver on the other hand, has been there done that and has the t-shirt with his photo printed on it!! So he is not as enthusiastic a model. More often than not he tends to glare at me when I try to photograph him.

I recently bought a new digital camera with loads of nice little settings to play with so I've been having fun with that. The two photos in my previous post were taken with the new camera.
I am sure every other cat owner out there also loves to take kitty pics, so I've compiled a list of tips and tricks to capture the purrfect pose!

*When taking a photo of your cat, always do so in good light. Try and avoid using a flash if possible. If you have to use a flash take the photo from a slight angle, to avoid the flash going off directly in the cats eye.
Also taking photos in bright light means the cats irises will contract and you will capture more of the cats eye colour.

*Take the photo while holding the camera at the cats eye level, being careful not to cut off ears, legs or tail.

*Having some kind of back drop makes the photo look more professional. Throwing a piece of coloured fabric over the sofa works well, pick a colour that contrasts with your cats colouring.

*Clear clutter out of shot. If indoors, a nice photo could be spoiled by the sight of mugs and plates on the dinner table in the background! Same goes for photos taken outside. Try and take from an angle that does not include anything too distracting.

*Use something like a toy to get the cats attention. I usually dangle one of their toy mice neat the camera to make them look my way. Taking photos of the cat looking away is nice too.

*Get in close and fill as much of the frame as you can with the cat. This can make for great photos.

*Take lots and lots of photographs! Professional photographers often take a hundred shots to get one great photo.

*Always have the camera nearby. It's often when you are not planning to photograph your cat that they pose best! Be ready to capture the moment!

Here are some lovely photos I found online to inspire you :)

Duvet Day !

Poppy Undercover!

The Look of Love!

Sleeping Beauties!

I don't want to get overly excited here, but last night was an historic night in our household! Poppy slept the whole night (well the whole night except for the 40mins she got locked out for hopping around on my legs non stop) in our bed :)

That's a breakthrough! As I've mentioned in the past, she is a wild one at night. Hopping, walking across your head, scratching at toes under the duvet! Not last night. Last night I headed to bed and read for a little bit. Oliver curled up on the end of the bed as usual and Poppy joined us, snuggling in a little further up.

After about 30mins she decided under the covers would be cosier and so she wriggled her way from the top down to my feet! There she stayed for most of the night (except for aforementioned hopping relapse). I woke up with aches everywhere though as all night I was afraid to move around too much lest I disturb the two sleeping beauties (Oliver spent most of the night in the crook behind my knees!)

After this momentous occasion I was browsing some articles this morning on sharing ones bed with your pet and I came across this great article on a website. It made me laugh out loud several times, which is just what I needed to sooth my sleep deprived aching body, hehehe!

Sleeping With the Enemy

Written by Stacy Mantle

The Mayo Clinic just released a new statement that states sleeping with your pets could, and I quote, "Make You Dog Tired."
My initial question is: "How long did it take these geniuses to come up with this theory”, and “How much did it cost us, as consumers, for them to complete a study that really could have been accomplished by just contacting me?" As the owner of fourteen cats, three dogs (one of which is half-coyote) and a plethora of other little creatures that may or may not be visiting at any certain time, I can attest to the fact that, of course sleeping with your pets will make you tired.

For instance, just last night in the hot deserts of Arizona, we had a huge lightening storm. Actually, it was the first of its kind since we (we meaning "desert dwellers who are actually forced to reside in Arizona due to lack of finances, and pay extraordinary electric bills as a reward") officially entered the "monsoon season" in early July. Under normal circumstances, the most catastrophic event that occurred for most people during said storm was a temporary loss of power. Not true for our household. In our household, the most catastrophic event that occurred was being bombarded by fourteen half-wild cats as they scrambled under the bed covers, three paranoid dogs as they struggled to climb up on the (thankfully) large bed, and a slightly irate husband. Obviously, this proved to be a serious disruption to an otherwise restful night of sleep.

The study continued on to say that, "...when a dog was permitted to sleep in the bedroom, it has only a 57% chance of being allowed to sleep on the bed." I find this interesting mainly because they neglected to mention the number of cats who shared their bed. This is primarily due to the humiliation of cat owners in admitting that they have no choice in the matter. If these cat owners' homes are anything like mine, they don't have, nor will they ever have, a choice on where the cat sleeps. Cats are notorious for simply sleeping where they choose, and God help the person who tries to move them. Therefore, I'm assuming that roughly 100% of the cats slept on the bed in contrast to the 57% of dogs.

But that's not all! In addition to this already disturbing trend, was reported in 21% of dogs and 7% of cats." (Again, this is more than likely due to the cat owners' reluctance to admit that they have no control over their snoring felines and where they choose to do the aforementioned snoring).

This Mayo clinic study was not complete, however, and it went on to state that, "...nearly 60 percent of their patients with pets, slept with their pets in the bedroom."
I've done the numbers, my friends, and that is a lot of pets who are disrupting the sleep of otherwise normal human beings. The Census bureau claims that there are currently 106,566,000 households in the U.S. (a figure that I can't help but think is seriously understated. But, we'll give them the benefit of the doubt). In addition to this large number of people, there are 60 million dogs, and 70 million cats that currently claim "pet" status. Now, if every household in the US has one cat and one dog who own them, then that, in essence, means that 82% of the residents in our beautiful country are being deprived of sleep each and every night. I find this interesting, as the article goes on to say that more deaths occur from falling asleep while driving than from drinking and driving.

While this study does in actuality, exist, it is obvious that they have forgotten several important points.
First, there is little hope of successfully sharing a bed with your pets, unless of course, you are like my husband, who could sleep through a nuclear attack, without any of the following events occurring:
Heat exhaustion from the body heat of all the animals accompanied by the average 110-degree desert heat.
Noise pollution from the hissing, barking, growling, and general irritation resulting from cats and dogs sharing a bed together, not to mention the snoring.
Bodily injury from the occasional night stalker cat that chooses to use your naked back as a scratching post.

But there is good news among these disturbing figures. First, the Mayo Clinic also did a study some time ago discussing the positive effects that pets have on people. These consist of lowered heart rates, a sense of calmness resulting from petting your animal, and an overall decrease in disease amongst pet owners.

So, while we may run the risk of dying in a car accident from sleep exhaustion, the good news is that you will have a much lower level of stress during the accident.
Ultimately, the risk falls to you. And I, for one, am willing to accept the potentially deadly car accident over not sleeping with my sleep depriving pets. In all, it is just a part of learning to live amongst animals without becoming one – a task unto itself.

Plants, Flowers & Other Pretty (Dangerous) Things...

Cats are like children in so many ways, both cats and children bring joy to their parents, both make you smile at their antics and both eat things they shouldn't!


I received a lovely bunch of flowers today and my first though after how lovely they were was 'I hope they aren't poisonous to cats!' Call this paranoia on my part, I accept that I am an over anxious cat parent. But prevention is better that cure :) I am also aware of how nosey my two are and knew the second they were placed in a vase they'd be over for a sniff and a nibble! It's the nibble I worry about and sure enough I've spent most of the day moving the flowers from one out-of-cats-reach spot to another another!


By now though the novelty has worn off and said flowers are pride of place on our dining table :D Oliver and Poppy have moved on to more exciting things, like the spider dangling outside our window!!


For those of you as paranoid as me here's a link to a site with a very comprehensive list of plants that are harmful to cats :) It also give images which is very handy for those of us not well up on our gardening!


http://www.russianblue.us/plants.html

Readers Cats - Part 2

Kirsty sent these lovely photos of her cat Jaina...

Readers Cats -Part 1

I'd like to invite readers of the blog to send me photos of there cats and a little bit of their story, for me to post on the page under 'Readers Cats'.

Our first feature is on Turtle and Mojo, two gorgeous cats belonging to Jenn. Jenn is Canadian but now lives in Holland.

Mojo & Turtle

My first cat is Mojo. She is about 11 now. We got her from the pound. We didn't even have to go in to the area of where all the cats were to know we wanted her. We saw her sitting in the window shaking so badly from being scared. We have had her for 2 years now. She is a big sookie cat. She loves to be patted. She loves watching TV with you. If you lay on the couch with your legs up she is right there all stretched out on them. Man she is a bit heavy too once she is asleep. She hates change. She likes things to stay the way they are. She gets very scared if you go away then come back. At night she likes to sleep on the bed. She has her own spot up by my pillow with her head on it, my arm around her and the blanket a little over her lol. Her favorite food is chicken. When ever we eat that she will be over meowing her head off and acting silly for some. She also likes the cat food that has the blocks and the juice. She will like all the juice from her bowl then move on to turtles. If you don't feed her right away she will harass you for hours lol. She does like to play a little bit but only if she is the only cat in the room. She doesn't really like turtle. They fight quit a bit.

OK on to Turtle...

Turtle likes to hunt bugs. She will meow at them and jump at them and eat them. Turtle always has to be doing some thing. She is always looking at some thing or playing with some thing. She barley sleeps. She has a spot on the top of the third floor where she sleeps and hides out. When you are on your way to bed she will be looking down at you. When she is playing she will run in and out of the room howling this long weird howl. She gets scared of the weirdest things. When it hails she will hide under the keyboard of the computer desk and stays there. When the window washer comes she will look at him and get all bushy and run.She doesn't like the door bell. She doesn't really like to cuddle yet. She is about 2 and a half now. We got her from the pound. When we first got her she had a stomach problem and was sick for a few weeks. She caught some bacteria or some thing from her surgery of getting fixed. She is a sweet cat though. If you aren't paying attention to her she will come over and tap at you till you pat her on the head. She doesn't like it when people come to the door she gets all wild looking and runs and hide. She is the type of cat who likes to explore things so she would love to go outside. However we are afraid she wouldn't come back. When we are eating dinner she will like to sit at one end of the table and watch. At the end of course. She is always wanting to see what we are doing. She doesn't really sit down and cuddle. and if she does decide to come over to you and lay with you it is only for a short period of time.

Cat Alarm

Now I realise that cats are naturally nocturnal animals, but being pounced on at 4am is something I'll never get used to! Oliver has settled into a respectable routine over the years. He likes to curl up at the end of the bed and snooze until the morn. He doesn't believe in sleep ins though, they're are no Saturdays in his book! When its 8am it's 'get up and feed me' time and thats it.

Poppy at 9 months has yet to fall into a routine that doesn't involve jumping on my head or scratching at my toes under the duvet at some un-Godly hour. She's also much more vocal than Oliver. When she gets thrown out of the bedroom (which she nearly always does!) she gives it about an hour to make sure I've fallen back in to my beauty sleep and then she starts Meowing and Meowing and Meowing!! Hopefully in another couple of months she'll grow out of this and then we can all sllep through the night again :)

I found this article that gives some tips on how to help get cats out of the middle of the night/early morning thing. I might try the hoover thing! Poppy hates the hoover..hehehe

Early AM Wakeups

Cats are notorious for waking their owners up at oh-dark-thirty. If you wish to stop this, there are several steps to take.
The cat may simply be hungry and demanding its food. By feeding it when it wakes you up at an ungodly hour, you are simply reinforcing its behavior. If this is why it's waking you up, you can handle this either by filling the bowl just before you go to sleep so it will not be empty in the morning, or by ignoring the cat's wakeups and feeding it at the exact same time convenient to you every morning. The cat will adjust fairly quickly to the second.
If it is trying to play, there are again several tactics you can try. If you make a practice of tiring it out with play just before bedtime, you can reduce its calls for play at dawn. What works in some cases is to hiss gently at the cat. You can also try shutting it out of the bedroom. If it pounds on the door, put it in a bathroom until you wake up.
In persistent cases, try the vacuum cleaner, eater of noisy kitties. Go to bed, leaving him out in the hall. Position the vacuum cleaner next to the door, inside it. Plug the vacuum in, and arrange things so you can switch the vacuum on from your bed (eg, wire a switch into an extension cord). Wait for the scratching and wailing at the door. Turn the vacuum cleaner on. If cat comes back, turn it on again. The cat will eventually decide to stop bothering you in the morning.

Poppy Goes to the Vet (again!)

Poppy

Well Poppy had her trip to the vet yesterday for her booster. She really knows by now that the cat carrier = VET! In the beginning when the carrier came out she happily ran in to it, thinking it was some new hiding place. Now you have to practically shove her in to it and when she arrives at the surgery she refuses to come out!

Is she sticking out her tongue at me!

As well as getting her jab, it was noted that she's putting on a bit of weight. She's always been very small and skinny but since her 'operation' she's filled out a bit which I think really suits her. However we'll have to start watching her figure from now on, as she is quite small she can't really afford to gain too much or she'll go from skinny cat to fat cat!


I bought one of those ribbon type toys today for the two of them to put them through their paces :) I'm hoping to get them running around chasing it, so far they're content to sit in the sun and watch me running around waving it like a looney! Cats have a great knack of making you feel ridiculous!!

Italian Loving Cat!

I'm not exactly sure why, maybe it goes back to his kittenhood (!) but Oliver seems to have a love of Italian food :) Now it's not that I feed him Italian food on a daily basis or anything like that, I am a responsible cat parent..oops, I meant to say cat owner ;p However whenever we are having anything remotely Italian for dinner, he turns in to such a beggar!

He's particular favourite is Pasta Frills & Chicken served with Olive & Tomatoe Sauce. He'll not only eat the chicken, but will also happily munch down some pasta if he gets it! This evening we had he's second favourite..pizza. Again he'll beg for bits of chicken, ham & cheese, all the better if there is a little tomatoe sauce on them!

Poppy on the other hand..not that interested in anything that doesn't come out of a tin with Whiskas written on it! She'll stretch to eating some tinned tuna, but chicken fillet etc, no thanks. Not that I'm complaining, one beggar is plenty...hehehe!!

Cool Clock

Under Construction

I'm going to be messing around with the page layout, template etc today. So apologise for any weird things that happen to the blog while I'm working on it :)

Oliver & Poppy's first taste of Catnip!

Spot the difference! Oliver with his Precious - Super Catnip Ball!

I've been meaning to try out Catnip on the two fur babies for a while. Today when I was in the pet shop picking up some fish food for our goldfish Mr. Jaws I spotted the ideal thing. The Super Catnip Ball! It's basically a little wooden ball, hollow, with a removable top. You open it up, pop in the catnip and watch the effect on your moggies! Oliver and Poppy LOVE it! Check out the video below of them enjoying it :) I think they are hooked!

Excerpts from "A CAT'S GUIDE TO HUMAN BEINGS"

1. Introduction: Why Do We Need Humans?

So you've decided to get yourself a human being. In doing so, you've joined the millions of other cats who have acquired these strange and frustrating creatures. There will be any number of times, during the course of your association with humans, when you will wonder why you have bothered to grace them with your presence.What's so great about humans, anyway? Why not just hang around with other cats? Our greatest philosophers have struggled with this question for centuries, but the answer is actually rather simple: THEY HAVE OPPOSABLE THUMBS.This makes them the perfect tools for such tasks as opening doors, getting the lids off of cat food cans, changing television stations and other activities that we, despite our other obvious advantages, find difficult to do ourselves. True, chimps, orangutans and lemurs also have opposable thumbs, but they are nowhere as easy to train.

2. How And When to Get Your Human's Attention.

Humans often erroneously assume that there are other, more important activities than taking care of your immediate needs, such as conducting business, spending time with their families or even sleeping. Though this is dreadfully inconvenient, you can make this work to your advantage by pestering your human at the moment it is the busiest. It is usually so flustered that it will do whatever you want it to do, just to get you out of its hair. Not coincidentally, human teenagers follow this same practice. Here are some tried and true methods of getting your human to do what you want:Sitting on paper: An oldie but a goodie. If a human has paper in front of it, chances are good it's something they assume is more important than you. They will often offer you a snack to lure you away. Establish your supremacy over this wood pulp product at every opportunity. This practice also works well with computer keyboards, remote controls, car keys andsmall children.Waking your human at odd hours: A cat's "golden time" is between 3:30 and 4:30 in the morning. If you paw at your human's sleeping face during this time, you have a better than even chance that it will get up and, in an incoherent haze, do exactly what you want. You may actually have to scratch deep sleepers to get their attention; remember to vary the scratch site to keep the human from getting suspicious.

3. Punishing Your Human Being
Sometimes, despite your best training efforts, your human will stubbornly resist bending to your whim. In these extremecircumstances, you may have to punish your human. Obvious punishments, such as scratching furniture or eating household plants, are likely to backfire: the unsophisticated humans are likely to misinterpret the activities and then try to discipline YOU. Instead, we offer these subtle but nonetheless effective alternatives:* Use the cat box during an important formal dinner.* Stare impassively at your human while it is attempting a romantic interlude.* Stand over an important piece of electronic equipment and feign a hairball attack.* After your human has watched a particularly disturbing horror film, stand by the hall closet and then slowly back away, hissing and yowling.* While your human is sleeping, lie on its face.

4. Rewarding Your Human:Should Your Gift Still Be Alive? The cat world is divided over the etiquette of presenting humans with the thoughtful gift of a recently disemboweled animal. Some believe that humans prefer these gifts already dead, while others maintain that humans enjoy a slowly expiring cricket or rodent just as much as we do, given their jumpy and playful movements in picking the creatures up after they've been presented. After much consideration of the human psyche, we recommend the following: Cold blooded animals (large insects, frogs, lizards, garden snakes and the occasional earthworm) should be presented dead, while warm blooded animals (birds,rodents, your neighbor's Pomeranian) are better still living. When you see the expression on your human's face, you'll know it's worth it.

5. How Long Should You Keep Your Human?You are only obligated to your human for one of your lives. The other eight are up to you. We recommend mixing and matching, though in the end, most humans (at least the ones that are worth living with) are pretty much the same. But what do you expect? They're humans, after all. Opposable thumbs will only take you so far.

Hehehe....I love it!

New Cat Loo! (with door!!)

New Cat Loo

As I have two indoor cats the one thing I am always concerned about is odour from their litter tray. I would hate if any guests to our home could tell we had cats by the smell! As a result I am very particular about keeping their tray clean.

Through trial and error I have now settled on a litter I am extremely happy with called 'Worlds Best Cat Litter - All Natural'. It is excellent for odour control and clumps really well, so it's dead easy to remove the undesirable bits with a scoop. Also because it is natural it's flushable.

I've also invested in a new hooded cat loo with door! We've always had a hooded loo, but when Oliver was a kitten he was too little to push in the door, so we removed it and left it off. With the addition of Poppy (they share the litter tray happily) I felt a loo with a door would be more effective, both for odour control and discretion! So on Monday I made my purchase straight from the new Argos catalogue (see pic above) and I'm thrilled.

The new loo is much more stylish looking with rounded edges and a cool little snap in thingy for the litter scoop, which came with it, built in on top. Also as the litter tray itself is curved inside it's much easier to clean. It also has a filter on top to help with the odour control, these can be replaced. It took Poppy all of five minutes to get used of pushing in the door to use the loo! After that she was popping in and out for the sheer fun of it! Oliver was a bit more wary and it took him a little while watching Poppy to get the idea. Two days latter, they are both using it happily, which I'm delighted with.

Speaking of cats and toilets, I came across this video on You Tube and had to share it !