Tag Archives: Pickles

A bit of a scare

Cats,

We had a bit of a scare yesterday. I was at work and a contractor was at the house cleaning our bedroom bathtub and sealing cracks in the tile and grout. The bathroom has its own door that opens into the bedroom. He was going to use high strength pool chlorine to clean the tub and tile. I had insisted that the Mrs take all precautions to safeguard Hillary and Pickles.

The contractor moved the cat bowls and water fountain (that are usually in the bathroom) into the living room while the Mrs checked to see that Hillary was in his bed in the kitchen and then rounded up Pickles from his usual place at the head of our bed on the Mrs’ side and moved him to the living room. The contractor closed the bathroom door and Pam closed the bedroom door.

When he finished he came out of the bathroom and yelled THERES A CAT IN HERE. The Mrs ran into the bedroom to find Hillary crouched near the litter box (one of our automatic LitterMaid litter boxes under a table in the bedroom) with drool streaming out of both sides of his mouth. Must have been the chlorine fumes. He apparently had run in as the Mrs was leaving with Pickles and she did not notice. She went into immediate “nurse mode” (the Mrs was an ICU nurse in a former life) called vet and was told to wash his face off with a wet cloth.

Hillary is fine. Here he is snuggling in my lap as I write this

(Hard to hold iPhone to take pix with one hand while scritching with the other)

The night before I had forwarded the Mrs a link from Weggieboy’s blog about how cats view us a their parents (https://phainopepla95.com/2019/09/25/study-cats-really-do-view-us-as-parents-pain-in-the-bud/). When I called home and the Mrs explained all of this to me she told me that Hillary was expressed all of symptoms of “Mommy it was horrible please love me and make it better”. Needless to say it was a stressful day.

Sunday – Lap Day

Blogging, Cats, News, ,

I haven’t been posting much lately. Too much “life” going on … in a good way.

I have been working in my profession since April after a difficult two years. So, yeah things are going OK. Turned the big 65 last Sunday. The “pride” is still going strong.

Bottom left clockwise: Sir Edmund Hillary, Pickles, and the grant old lady … Patches. Not a very photogenic picture, but you get the point.

Oh the humanity …

Cats, ,

Sir Edmund Hillary, or just Hillary for short, is one of my cats. He and his brother Pickles were litter mates that we rescued.

They are both long haired cats that suffer from extreme matting. Fortunately they are both tolerant and long suffering, allowing me to both trim their nails and shave their mats. I used to take them to the vet for this, but the vet wanted $300 apiece to anesthetize them and shave them. Since I have been underemployed since 2016, the task has fallen to me.

Earlier this week I couldn’t stand it any longer and decided that Hillary had to be trimmed. His mats had to be making him miserable.

Mission accomplished – I had him mostly trimmed – with the worst of the mats removed. Then yesterday I noticed it. I must have “zigged” when I should have “zagged” while trimming his neck.

I trimmed off one side of his whiskers. Oh the humanity! Or is that catity?

Hillary is VERY forgiving … and lying in my lap as I type this.

Upload UPDATE | Brothers HD

Cats, Internet, Rant, Technology, Video, , , , , ,

So … today I decided to run speed tests on my Internet again …


There are two sets of numbers for December 10 (alternating) … 150+ / 11+ and 70+ / 1+

The faster numbers on December 10 are for the 5 Ghz Wi-Fi channel and the slower for the 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi channel. The 5 Ghz Wi-Fi channel is fast enough to keep up with the native cable modem speed, the 2.4 GHz channel … not so much. I think I knew that, but had not paid attention as I always connect via the 5 GHz channel.

My son confirms that direct wired connection is running at full speed as well.

I am definitely getting a “performance discrepancy” with Comcast that varies throughout the day. Does this reflect bandwidth congestion from other users? Probably.

Will retry the upload now.

SUCCESS

Brothers HD

Cat Butt

Cats, Photography

Pickles gives Mommy her daily ration of “cat butt”.

Note: Pickles is back from a two-week solitary confinement at the vet while we had the interior of the house painted. He and his brother Sir Edmund Hillary got shaved while there to remove matting. Pickles is particularly needy now. Lest you think me heartless, I did visit them once a day at the vet.

Pickles discovers Arlo

Cats, Technology, Video,

15 seconds at a time…

The Arlo camera was set on motion detection and a 15 second recording window. I merged them with iMovie.

Depending on the amount of light received it is either color or infrared black and white. When Pickles blocks enough light the IR LEDs turn on and the camera goes black and white. Pickles is fascinated by the infrared LEDs. Mmmm … tasty.

  

See previous post for more Arlo videos.

Care Package

Blogging, Cats, News, Relationships, , , , , ,

Doug loves his citrus   http://phainopepla95.com/2015/10/25/post-924-loving-my-citrus/

I have a mutant orange-tangerine tree    https://contrafactual.com/2015/10/26/oranges-pickles-tangerines/

Doug needs a care package

   
 
Doesn’t look like much in the basket, but I individually wrapped most of the oranges and tangerines and left space for additional padding to be added at the shipping facility.

   
   
 With padding … felt, bubble wrap, paper … it filled out a good sized box.

It is supposed to arrive Monday by 10 AM.