Claus von Stauffenberg - Part II

Now that I had plucked the kitty out of the graveyard, my conscience wouldn't let me rest until I got him a vet check-up (in Bangkok, I had nearly killed my adult cat from bringing sick kittens into the house). The vet basically said, "This cat is in good shape; he's been eating somehow. He's about five months old." His right eye was in a near-constant squint, so she gave me some cream for it and sent me home.

Hoping the cat had been sneaking into the SPCA next door, but realizing he could still be somebody's cat, I put him back into the carrier and set off back to the cemetery. I crossed the street to the first house.

Nope, never seen the cat before. "Keep him! Take him home!" she exclaimed.

The next house had a woman and what I believe was her son. He was of the age that he might still be in school, or he might just be a "challenged" adult. I didn't inquire. They eyed the cat, and shook their heads. "Take him home! That's how we got our dog! He just showed up on our doorstep!"

Geez, I guess this "They choose you" thing is for real in the country.

I crossed to the other side of the street, and approached another woman. Nope, never seen him. "Keep him!" she said. Seems there's a theme....

Lastly, I stopped at the corner house, one of these interesting houses you see in New Zealand where people have a big yard and just make it their own. There are usually such a hodge podge of trees (fruit, ornamental, native), various vegetables and flowers growing in random places, a path cut out that might lead to nowhere. I just love them. The place we're staying at now has the same kind of set-up.

It was an old woman, bent over her garden toward the back. Not wanting to enter her yard and spook her, I called from the gate. "Hello, hello, ma'am?" Nothing. I raised my voice. Nothing. I opened her gate and walked slowly toward her, calling out. I was really afraid of scaring what few years she had left out of her. Finally, she looked up and I asked her about the cat.

A half hour went by where she talked a little bit about everything else, including her house which she was selling. She even went into the house and brought out the assessor's letter on her house -- a 3 bedroom with a big yard for only $180,000 (about $95,000 USD). Not bad!

She was such a sweet, old lady, I didn't mind. But eventually, I did need to know if she knew Grey Matter.

She knew him. She had seen him walking around the cemetery for quite some time. "Sometimes he crosses the road and sits on my fence. I talk to him."

Awww.

But he wasn't "hers." She didn't think he was anyone's cat. Okay, I'd had enough, he was coming home with me. Now we just needed a name -- something I approach with great seriousness. I considered Loki, from the naughty Norse god, and a couple other cutsie names. In the meantime, I was calling him things like "Grey Matter" and "Little Man."

Finally, we settled on the name I had picked from the beginning: Claus von Stauffenberg. For those not familiar, he was the German Nazi during WWII who was part of the German resistance, and one of the main players in one of a billion failed assassination attempts on Hitler. And like my kitty, he had only one workable eye.

Also, we had just seen Valkyrie in Auckland about a week before and had been surprised by how much we liked it, especially since we didn't think it had done all that well at the box office. I guess all the press around Tom Cruise's ridiculous antics over the past few years really did hurt him (as they did for Mel Gibson's Apocalypto, which was also a pretty good movie).

AND Valkyrie has a great cast (Bill Nighy! Kenneth Branagh! Tom Wilkinson!). Deliciously tense and occassionally tender, it's a good film, despite the fact you know the ending.

About a week later, after many forced squirts of eye goop into the kitty's eye, he no longer resembled his namesake. But it's just fun to call out "Claus von Stauffenberg" and to see a little grey furball barreling toward you.

I'm sure the real Claus would be deeply honored.

And now he's officially ours. Two SPCA adoptions and one stray, ALL under 2 years old. I feel a little guilty about that, since I believe in trying to get adults, but as they say, "You don't pick them, they pick you."

Argh!

Last night as it got chilly, I slid open the front door and called into the night for Fern, the cat. She's the stereotypically-aloof outside cat. I've given up trying to make her my lap cat. But at least she spends a lot of her unconscious hours inside.

Anyway, I could hear the *jingle jingle* of her collar from the darkness. She leapt up on the deck and trotted into the house. As I greeted her and turned, I noticed something.

"Umm, Beau, has she got something in her mouth?"

Beau looked down since she had reached him in the kitchen. "Yeah," He stood up and walked toward her. "She's got..."

A mouse! OMG.

*plech* she spit it out at Beau's feet. It was teeny and grey. Cute, even. Beau picked it up gingerly by its tail. Two globs of blood remained on the floor where the mouse had been. He walked to the door and chucked it into the night.

I spent the next 10 minutes both laughing and feeling like shit. OMG, she actually brought a mouse into the HOUSE! Hahahaha. OMG, that poor poor mousie! *sniff sniff*

I've started to see rats around the property in the last week, too, since it's starting to get cold. And now with a second cat, and a dufusy "attack it if it moves" dog, this should be an interesting winter.

Animals on Parade - Kingfisher

Big pro on living out in the middle of nowhere: Lots of wildlife

Big con on living out in the middle of nowhere: Lots of wildlife

Okay, this was a big PRO moment. Not an icky "protected" bug or yucky "introduced by Europeans" vermin moment.

Beau came home from work the other day, and Tonks and I went out to greet him as we often do. Through the windshield, he was motioning to me, but the glare made it hard to see. Something was in his hand.....

A birdie!

It was this beautiful little kingfisher. Beau was coming up our driveway, which is impossibly long and improbably steep and had to slam on his breaks and pull the emergency break all the way out to his chin. (It's an old truck, you pull this lever toward your face).

He picked up the birdie, and in some way I still can't quite comprehend, got the truck back up the driveway and up to the house, one hand on the wheel, one hand holding the bird.

We ooh'd and ahh'd it for awhile, but finally decided that it didn't seem to be dying or hurt after all and that maybe we should return it to the bush. So, we walked back down the driveway slowly, looking for an appropriate place of deposit. Problem, our kitty Fern also decided this was a good time to follow us. And since I've already picked up the poor, dead body of a starling she nabbed, I wasn't keen on her getting this one. We shooed her off several times before she finally... shooed.

And just to be cute, as the bird held its mouth open for a bit, Beau stuck his finger gently in the middle and made this face. Just so you don't think we pried its beak open or whatever...
So, the little kingfisher went back into the forest and we went back up the hill. We checked the next day to see if either there was a dead bird or a pile of colorful feathers but it looked like it went on happily with its life.

Our theory is that it must have clonked itself kooky temporarily. The way a kingfisher makes its nest is to fly, full speed, at a log and stab into it with its sharp beak. After doing that a few times, it begins to make a hole to make its nest in. I can't imagine that doesn't occasionally knock the senses right out of a kingfisher or two.

Hopefully, it's out and about and living up to its name.

You Don't Choose Them - They Choose You

I (almost) always enjoy the the country boy-city girl differences between Beau and I. It can be so intriguing how these two kinds of upbringings, which I see as not just about location, but also a general cultural outlook, can differ.

One area they are almost always different in is animals. Country people tend to have a more utilitarian view of animals, and are more pragmatic in how to treat them. Killing them is just a fact of life. City people tend to be focused on animals as not just pets, but as integral members of the family. City people, like me, usually let their pets sleep in bed with them. The greatest dog Beau ever had, the one he keeps talking about to this day (though it died like 20 years ago) slept in the garage.

Recently, another difference came up, and it's one that I've always been rather touched by, even though I still don't totally buy it.

Beau strongly believes that you don't go out and buy a pet. As he's said many times, "A pet chooses you, you don't choose the pet." This is all well and good in the country where strays and dumped puppies can literally show up on your doorstep, but in the city, this just really doesn't happen, at least, rarely, save for the occasional outside cat that will gladly take any tuna you wanna leave out on a dish.

Thus, I truly believe that I choose the animal. I got to the local SPCA, maybe I visit it several times over several weeks. I go from cage to cage. I touch them, pet them, talk to them. And I wait...until I feel a connection. If it doesn't feel right, feel really powerful, I don't adopt.

A couple weeks ago we drove to the SPCA where we had adopted Tonks. She's at 8 months now and STILL hasn't gone into heat. This was a problem because when you adopt from them, they give you a certificate to get the dog fixed for free and ours was just about to expire. Well, the thing is, because Tonks is such an enormous, SPAZ of a puppy, the vet told us to make sure she goes into heat BEFORE we get her fixed, since those mommy hormones will chill her out and mature her a little.

So, we rolled into the SPCA to get our certificate time extended, but it seems we had shown up about an hour early (they have crazy public hours). We had already been driving around and doing errands in the other city for hours, and were eager to get home. Sitting around for an hour was not something Beau was willing to do.

The SPCA is on a piece of land it shares only with a large and ominous cemetary. I'm a big fan of these places, Beau is not.

Then we started to hear it - loud, long cries of a cat. Beau heard it first and started walking toward it, a short distance away from the SPCA and closer to the graveyard.

Then we saw it -- small and grey and a complete fuzzball -- an older kitten. How weird that he was out there. The second we made contact, he superglued himself to us, notably me. Every step I took, he was there, meowing and crying. I began to pet him and he cuddled and nuzzled. Awww man.

Right there was an old wooden loading chute, standing abandoned in the thick grass between the SPCA and the cemetary. Looking through the slats, you could see that three small little "beds" that the cat had made. Awww.

That cat desperately clawed his way up the chute until he reached the top slat which was at the level of my face. He tried to rub and cuddle my face, his purr about the loudest I'd heart. Oh man.

Beau, standing back a few feet said, "We're taking that cat home, aren't we?"

I looked up at him. "I don't know..."

"I don't see how we're getting out of here without that cat," he said.

The truth was, at this moment, I felt enormously conflicted. Beau is CONSTANTLY fighting me about getting more (any) animals. Even if I mention it in jest his face scrunches up like a lemon. "Noooooo," he growls, "NO animals."

But at this moment, Beau's country philosophy kicked in. "J., the animals pick you, you don't pick them. And look at...it..." He paused.

I grabbed the kitten's tail and pulled it upwards. "Oh boy, that's definitely a boy," I said.

"Yeah, he's picked you."

So, I stood there, conflicted. "But, what if he's someone's cat? He looks well-fed. And here we are, right next to the SPCA, maybe he escaped? And his eye..." His right eye was held in a permanent squint. Definitely an issue there.

You see, one of my (small) problems about living out in the country, is that it (allows) makes our cat an outside cat. Now, Fern would be one ANYWAY, that's clear, but it's absolutely necessary for us to have doors and windows open here during the day to allow the breeze to flow in from the sea. The only thing that has kept me from getting a second cat, is knowing it'd be an outside cat. And I want an inside cat. I want a lap cat, a sleep-with-me cat, a watch-TV-with-me cat. I spend a LOT of time alone up here on my beautiful remote paradise (with Beau at work), and I could use another heartbeat in the house.

But a free kitty!

So, five minutes later we were back on the road toward home, the kitten in my arms, doing that annoying cat-squalling-in-car thing. *sigh*

Over the weekend I introduced "Grey Matter" to the house. Tonks was thrilled -- another playmate! The other cat, Fern, was horrified and became nearly feral, only showing her face to grab 3 minutes worth of food before jumping out a window and back into the bush again.

Monday I drove the kitty back to town and went to the SPCA. I decided -- either he belonged with them, and if he didn't, maybe I'd just give him to them. I was still feeling...weird about the whole "choice" process. I was shocked that they didn't even recognize him, considering he lived right outside their gates. I put the cat carrier down and asked if I could look at the other animals. I walked up to the big cat cage, and put my hand against the metal mesh. Instantly, a mewing cat appeared. Seconds later, another and another. In less than a minute, I could make out about 20 cats. And this is a small, small town. Oh, man.

I couldn't possibly give him up when they had all these cats to adopt out. I turned around, thanked the lady, and drove across the street to the vet.

"He's about 5 months old, and someone's probably been feeding him, or he's been sneaking into the SPCA at night. He's hardly feral."

Racked with guilt, I set out on a small quest.

To be continued...

This Gnome Used to Have Some Dignity

It wasn't that long ago that I was walking across our carpark and Tonks starting barking her head off at some of the ground cover along the house. This groundcover is a plant with long, thick green blades...like grass gone B-movie.

She was still going at it, her hackles up, and I peered into the plants and saw something. My heart leapt into my throat. An animal? There are only so many four-legged critters in New Zealand, most of them introduced pests of some sort. This was something little and orange.

Taking a closer look, I saw that it was one of a few gnomes that the owners had decorated their gardens with. It had hair, a cute little straw hat, some sort outerwear, and feet the size of a hobbit. Somehow it had spooked Tonks into believing it was an animate object. Who knows? Maybe it comes alive when your back is turned. I calmed her down and went back inside.

A few days later, the gnome had mysteriously disappeared.

A day after that...I found the straw hat laying in the front yard, on the other side of the house. Bits of his hair were strewn here and there.

*sigh*

I had to assume foul play. I only have one suspect.

I finally found his body....far from his original post or his hat or hair. And here he stands today. Poor thing. It's going to take a lot of therapy to get over this shit.