I almost said “new leash on life” because when you’re using the “new lease on life” cliche with pets, it’s practically manditory to turn the cliche into a cliche with a bad pun. But I did not. Because I love you guys.
Anyway, the tiny cat has decided to be affectionate. Not just her annual trip out of whatever dark corner she’s been hiding in, but every morning, when I get up, she gets up, comes to the bathroom with me, has a little breakfast while I’m getting my breakfast ready and then sits on the arm of the couch while I eat and read my morning blogs. Today she insisted that I rub her head. And she purred.
This is one difference between cats and dogs. When you get a dog, you know what you’re getting. It’s a slow narrative arc from birth through puppy across a long adulthood of predictable behavior into old age and death. But a cat? Sometimes I think that when they talk about a cat having nine lives, this is what they really mean. To think that this is the same cat who once spent a whole summer living in the back of my closet or another spring wedged in between the bookshelf and the window seems strange, to put it mildly. That was another life, I think.
I bored the Butcher on Wednesday night with all my talk of the various kinds of moonflower and discovering that Beth had given us datura and what should be a minor plot point on CSI last night? Datura. “See?” I told him. “My useless knowledge is useful.”
He went out yesterday and tried to turn the garden by hand. I haven’t been back there to see how it went. But since he said “tried” I’m going to imagine “not well.”
The creek that runs through the yard is, in parts, lined with bricks and concrete. In other parts, it has a natural slope. We’ve decided to plant the natural slopes with something other than grass and I hope to be busy with such a task on Saturday. Since Jim Voorhies sent me to that site where I learned not to mix corn and sunflowers, I haven’t really had a good spot for the sunflowers, but I’m kind of thinking that sunflowers and moonflowers along the creek might be kind of cool and whimsical.
Tiny Cat Pants 
AuntB, did y’all weather the storm alright? I was thinking about that creek behind your house and hope for the best.
That poor little creek has been trying all week to pretend like it’s going to get something going. But it never does. The stream that has popped up in the driveway is another story. Often I look at our crappy driveway and wonder if we wouldn’t be better off with gravel.
Anyway, all is well at our house. We were in much more danger from the storms last week.
Have any of the Donelson folks weighed in?
I am trying to imagine the Butcher turning your garden by hand, and, having done this myself before, I can envision how it went.
How about creeping phlox for the creek banks? I adore it… it’s such a lovely plant that masses beautifully and provides great ground cover, particularly on slopes. Provided that the soil is reasonably well-drained and they get at least partial sun, I think it’s be quite lovely to have a stream lined with creeping-phlox-covered banks, undulating in color…
Sigh. I wish I could take off today and go buy a ton of plants.
Tales of the Tiny Cat never fail to crack me up.
The tiny cat cracks me up, too. She’s just so weird! But I never don’t enjoy her.
Jonathan, I just don’t see how this is a better solution than the tiller, but he asked me to leave it up to him, so I’m leaving it up to him.
And creeping phlox? Beth had the most beautiful creeping phlox. That would be really nice. But then where will I put the moonflowers and the sunflowers? Which I already have and which need planting?
I concur on the phlox – I would put it on the slopes. Yeah, sure, mine is beautiful now — and you caught it at just the right time –but the rest of the year, it’s just a mass of green looking astroturf. However, when it;s blooming it almost makes up for the dull life it leads the majority of the year.
I’ve figured out what I’m doing with my red sunflowers now. But I have to wait until the mudpit that is my yard dries out a bit.
But that still doesn’t fix my moonflower/sunflower problem! People, concentrate! But phlox… yes… phlox would be nice.
Do you think the “new” tiny cat is the result of wet cat food? Might she have been sulking all these years because she wanted wet food?
I don’t know. It makes you wonder. I can’t think about it too much, though, or it starts to upset me. Years we thought she had some skin allergy and years she suffered and was unfriendly and weird and we thought that was just her way. And it turns out that we weren’t providing her something that she needed.
I mean, it’s not like she was losing her hair out of spite. She had real problems that were easily solved and it took us years to do so.
I really feel bad about that.
Oh gosh, you were following the advice of your vet. In no way is any of it your fault.
Her diet change could definitely cause personality changes, but to me it sounds like just plain kitty middle age. A lot of them suddenly become more gregarious and mellow for no apparent reason.
Our cats become friendlier right before the weather gets cool. It’s like they suddenly realize they need to suck up or else they might be fending for themselves in the cold and wet.
‘salright, we take it where we can get it!
If you’ve got a trellis or something where the moonflowers can climb, they’ll like that. I would put the sunflowers in a nice sunny corner of your yard (if you’ve got a place for them). I keep intending to use sunflowers as garden row markers (like one of my coworkers) but haven’t managed to do it, yet.