Cat Appreciation Post

It's time for a cat appreciation post! One of my favorite internet cats, Colonel Meow, is sick right now, and that's just reminded me how blessed I am that my kitties are happy and healthy today. So here are some pictures of my fluffs!

 It's Leo! His full name is Leonardo da Vinci. He's a Maine Coon mix and is full of fluff. That's me holding him. He was not impressed with the Halloween tie.

 Memo and Leo were having a pre-wrestling discussion here. I believe the issue was who was going to get to sit on the catnip mat.

 Then they noticed that I was paying attention to them, so they looked at me and acted like nothing was going on. I caught Memo mid-wink, while Leo is giving me his wide-eyed kitten face.

Memo was much better about wearing the Halloween tie. He always shuts his eyes whenever I take a picture though! But he still looks pretty dapper. I'm just so happy that they are healthy. It makes me so happy to come home to them every day. They really do make my life better.

June 2

Last week the weather was pretty crappy. Lots of rain and thunderstorms. The rivers got really high here in Ames, and for a while it looked like it might flood. Luckily it didn't and the rivers are starting to come back down. Dan and I went hiking around Ames and saw the Skunk river at a bunch of different places, and it was pretty crazy. There were some spots that were supposed to be hiking trails that were completely covered in water. Hopefully it stays dry for a while and the rivers get back to normal. I'd also like it to be dry and warmer for my plants. I don't want their roots to rot.
I can't believe it's already June! I feel like the year is going by really quickly. At the end of this month I'll be going home for a week to visit my family. That will be really awesome because I haven't seen them since Christmas. I'll get to see the new puppy that my parents got in April too! He's so cute from the pictures I've seen and I'm looking forward to actually meeting him.
Lab work is going well so far. I think I'm making some good progress. We're going to start up a little collaboration too with another lab so there will be more work to do. That's good though so I have more data for my thesis. Hopefully in the next year I'll be writing my thesis and graduating. I really hope that's how it works out. I don't want to stay in school too much longer than that. I really do want to get going and get a real job soon. After all, my next goal is to buy a house of my own with a yard. Then I can have more room for gardening, and the kitties will have their own house to live in too. Then I could put up some permanent kitty perches for them in a couple of windows!

Last week of February

Memo is sitting here helping me write this post. Actually he's just staring at the screen. Maybe he's proofreading for me. Anyway, not much has happened since my last entry where I busted my elbow. That was the most exciting part of the week. We had a load of snow Tuesday night and I was sick and stayed home Wednesday. We're supposed to get more snow starting tonight. I'm really hoping that's the end of it, because I am so sick of winter.
Yesterday, Dan and I went to visit Furry Friends, where I adopted Leo. We like going and petting all the cats. They had three hairless cats there! So we got to pet them. I'd never touched a hairless cat before. They were very sweet cats, although they looked like gremlins. They were kind of weird to pet because there was no fur at all, but they were really warm. There were lots of people interested in them and at least one went home while we were there, so I think they'll get adopted pretty fast.
I'm still babying my stupid elbow and hoping it'll get better soon. It's bruised pretty badly so I don't know how long this will take to heal completely. I've accidentally bumped it a couple of times and it feels like someone's setting my arm on fire when I do that. It sucks massively. I should count my blessings though and be happy that it isn't broken, because that would have meant surgery with pins in my arm and a sling and all that crap.

Memo and Leo being friends

First Week of February

It was a lot warmer this week, above freezing the whole time. The snow and ice are starting to melt! I hope it stays that way. I'm ready for spring. I'm getting a little stir-crazy having to be inside all the time. I want to go out and walk through the parks again, and I really want to start my patio garden. It's like I'm just trying to make it through every day until spring comes.
Since it's still too cold for me to start my patio garden, and I don't have the equipment to start seeds inside yet, I bought two more houseplants today. I ordered them from Pernell Gerver online. It's a store in Massachusetts and they look like they have a pretty big inventory. I ordered a Marble Queen Pothos in a 6" hanging basket and an Old Man Cactus. Pothos are supposed to be pretty easy to care for and the hanging hook in one of my rooms should be a great place for it. I got the Old Man Cactus because I haven't had a cactus in a while, and they're really cool-looking. They grow these big silver hairs and look like an old man's beard, hence the name. I'm looking forward to them arriving! I also moved my Hoya carnosa upstairs to my room. It suffered some damage last summer when I moved, but this week I noticed that it grew its first new leaf! So I moved it upstairs where there's more light every day and hopefully it'll start growing again like crazy. Hoya are pretty resilient so I'm optimistic.
Memo and Leo are going stir-crazy too. They've spent a lot of time at the doorwall watching birds and rabbits. They've been playing all kinds of weird kitty games and running through the house like crazy. It's pretty funny to watch.
I still haven't made a whole lot of progress on my problem at work. It's very frustrating. I've talked to my lab mates and they're pretty much as confused as I am. So I guess I just have to keep banging away at it and hopefully it works eventually. I'm waiting on some other stuff to come back from the DNA sequencing so hopefully that stuff is good and at least I could make progress on something. This is so frustrating because I have the deadline of wanting to graduate next year hanging over me and I get really worried about that.
As of next Monday, Dan and I will have been dating for a year! That seemed to go by really quickly. I'm glad he's in my life, he's really made it better. I don't know how we'll celebrate yet since Valentine's Day is the same week and of course it's his last week of working at Walmart so he's stuck with one more week of shift work. But I'm happy that we're together and I'm looking forward to the next year.

Second week of January

Sorry about the lame post titles, but I'm not feeling particularly creative and I hate leaving something untitled. Anyway, this week was about the same as last week except that I was at work all week. I still haven't gotten any good results from either of my projects and it's getting frustrating, but there are a few things my PI suggested that I'm working on. Hopefully I get some data soon, because it's really obnoxious to have nothing work. It definitely makes it harder to be motivated to want to do anything.
I still haven't unpacked everything from my vacation, although it's mostly done. Oops. I guess I need to make that a priority for the upcoming week. I also want to buy another bookcase-I'll probably do it tomorrow-and put all my DVDs and games there since they are overflowing the two tiny ones I have in my living room right now. The two little ones will go upstairs and become Lego display cases. I've put all my Christmas Lego together and my Black Pearl one, and I want to get a bunch of them rebuilt. I just have to have somewhere to display them where the cats won't knock them over or steal pieces from them! I really enjoy building Lego; it's very zen and calming for some reason. Plus I have a bunch of Harry Potter ones that I want to put back together.
Other than that, I've been playing lots of Harvest Moon: A New Beginning. Harvest Moon is one of my favorite game franchises. I've almost beaten the newest Paper Mario game too, but Bowser kicked my ass the last time I tried to beat him so I'll have to change my strategy.
I actually caught the cats cuddling last  night! They stopped as soon as I noticed them, but it actually happened. I knew they were friends but just didn't want to admit it. Right now they're sleeping on the bed, not touching, but almost!

Bits n' Bobs

There isn't a whole lot of news since I last wrote. Leo has assimilated well into the family. He and Memo are getting along well. I haven't caught them snuggling yet, but they will sit next to each other and watch 'cat TV' out the window. They like to tussle with each other but it's friendly and pretty cute actually. I'm really glad I brought Leo home. He and Memo make my house all happy and fluffy.
Work is going. I'm feeling ambivalent about school again. I really want to get my degree and then start working again. I think I'm just wanting to move on with my life and being in school makes me feel stuck, like I have to wait to do things like make money, buy a house, and all that. I'm sure I'll feel better in a little while, but right now I definitely wish that a genie would show up, hand me my degree, and leave. Too bad that thesis genies don't exist!
My running has been slow. A couple weeks ago I wore nice shoes to work and had the nastiest blisters. Then it got hot. But today I went out for a run and I feel really good. I'm still fat and I still can't run more than half a mile without stopping, but I feel good and I'm going to use that feeling to keep going. I'm hoping in a couple weeks I'll be able to make the whole mile without slowing down to a walk. I don't care about how slowly I run right now, it's all about being able to do it at all.
In other news, I just ordered some Lithops plants. They are really cool succulents and I'm hoping that I can get them to grow inside. I really like plants! I need to go to Lowe's and get a bunch of pots and herb seeds or plants so I can start an herb garden too. I might wait until spring to do that so I can grow them outside, so for now I'm getting more houseplants. Houseplants are freaking awesome. If anyone has suggestions on what plants would be good to grow, tell me!

New Addition to the Family

Last Friday I brought home a new cat from Furry Friends Animal Refuge in West Des Moines. His name is Leonardo da Vinci, Leo for short. He's a 4 year old, part Maine Coon, male cat. He's very chill and laid back. So far he and Memo have been interacting pretty well, with only a little bit of hissing and growling. I'm hoping that they'll get used to each other soon and get friendly.

Here's Leo! It's the best picture I have of his face so far. He's still pretty excited and exploring a lot, so he doesn't stay still for long!

Omaha Zoo Big Cats

 The tigers were mostly very sleepy while we were there. It's weird to see big cats stretching and doing the same things that my cat Memo does.

 This tiger had an attitude! He reminded me a lot of Wisp-he was giving us some angry eyebrows and looks.

 This lioness reminded me of Miss Demeanor. She looked like a long-suffering matriarch over the other lions.

 They had white tigers! I love white tigers. This one was stretching and looking all cute.

 It's Memo's bigger cousin, the black panther! He was very very sleepy.

Memo actually sleeps like this on the arms of my sofa sometimes. It's hilarious.

Carbon!

I had a pretty boring week so I don't have a lot to talk about. Therefore, here is a picture of my family's new kitten, Carbon. She is little and crazy and adorable. She likes polar fleece and will sit on you for hours if you have a polar fleece blanket.

Bunny!

This big fat bunny lives in our yard. I think it's the mom because there's at least one little tiny baby bunny hopping around too. Memo tries to talk to the bunnies, but they never talk back. I think he's confused by them.

Memo's Birthday Present

I got Memo a window perch for his third birthday. He loves looking out the window but the sill is too small for him to fit on when they're closed. He loves the perch and hasn't done anything except sit on it since I gave it to him.

Kitty Bed

I got Memo a kitty bed for Christmas. He likes to sit in it.

Cats

For some reason Memo thought that my collapsible file thing was good to sit in. He loves it. I don't know why.
Wisp was all wedged in between my pillows and looked ultra-sleepy and cute, so I took her picture before she woke up and got all grumpy.

Kitties being friends?!?!

Finally, the long-sought for photographic proof that all three cats can coexist peacefully. I like Miss Demeanor's laser eyes.

Kitties and Catnip

This thing is a mat that you can put catnip inside and then the cats get all silly. They were bored so I got it out and put fresh catnip in it. Miss Demeanor and Wisp got very silly.
But eventually grumpy ol' Miss D. won and got the whole thing to herself.