Lily the polydactyl kitten
We brought home our new polydactyl (six-toed) kitten, named Lily, from Portland three weeks ago, on May 25. Lily has 23 claws: 13 in the front (on 12 full toes) and 10 in the back (on 10 toes). Her left front paw has an extra tiny claw/mini-toe in between two toes. And the inner “thumb” […]
Cats and ducklings: Part two
This is a continuation of Cats and ducklings: Part one. Since our cat Smokey died on Sunday, April 6 and was cremated on Thursday, April 10, these became two significant dates in our search of a new companion for lonely Eli. Reincarnation is a comforting idea, especially for grieving mothers. Soon enough, a litter of […]
Cats and ducklings: Part one
Happy Mother’s Day! I was going to hold off posting about all of our recent cat and duckling experiences for a bit longer, but I’ve been inspired by Google’s avian-themed logo doodle for Mother’s Day. It looks like they’ve got a white pekin duck mothering two mallard ducklings. Hooray for adoptive parents. Unless that’s a […]
Queen wasp in a bottle = new cat toy
Today we found a wasp on the kitchen ceiling. Seems odd for Oregon in January. I captured it with an empty juice bottle easily. I originally thought it might be a paper wasp, because we recently had an open-comb wasp nest on the far side of the building. But this wasp was not slender and […]
Smokey the $1000 housecat: A Hemobart story
This 1500-word post is all about our pet cats, Smokey and Eli. Yes, that’s right. 1500 words. About our cats. Welcome to a rare break from posts about popular culture and random Internet nonsense. This story is mostly about Smokey’s near-death experience and, more generally, about the housekitties. I had been waiting to write about […]
New fish and Novak Djokovic
Following the recent death of the last fish (Jezebel the alarmingly aggressive goldfish) from my original 2003 fish tank setup, I cleaned out the aquarium and started over this weekend. But, before I get to my new fish, I want to mention the U.S. Open 2007 men’s final. This was the first match I’ve watched […]
Kitten resolution, Kitty Surprise, Propaganda wallpapers
I have good news about our kitten situation. We have found a home for the white-booted tabby named Peter (AKA Repete). A coworker has graciously agreed to let Repete live on her large property in rural Albany. We dropped him off this evening. There are two other well-fed indoor/outdoor cats that live at her house […]
Feral kittens on Father’s Day (and LOLcats)
There is a large feral cat population around where we live. Even more specifically, there is a feral cat colony underneath our apartment building. Here you can see the entrance to the kitty lair, full of black plastic and yellow insulation. Today two male kittens showed up on our doorstep. They are obviously littermates, approximately […]
Marys Peak crime scene (and College World Series)
Today we went hiking at Marys Peak (yes, I’m refraining from using an apostrophe to show possession). Why isn’t it Mary’s Peak anymore? Why? Anyway, we had a nice hike, literally walking through clouds near the summit at around 4000 feet in elevation. So I don’t bore you too much, here are just a few […]
Airports unleash virtual strip searches
We started to hear about this technology in the mainstream news late last year, but now it has arrived! As of this week, airline passengers in Amsterdam are now being subjected to a new “millimeter wave” full-body scanning system. This body-imaging technology uses non-ionizing electromagnetic waves to generate an image based on the energy reflected […]