We're back! Yay!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's like the best Christmas present ever!

Mommy finally passed her exams and says we can use the computer again. Yay! I was very sad that we didn't post hardly at all last year 'cause then I didn't have a reason to stand on the keyboard. Even Dante was sad that we didn't get to post. He tried to pretend like he didn't care, but I know better. His ears totally perked up when I told him we were going to blog again. He can't fool me! I'm a smart kitty! Almost as smart as Spanky! :D

So, you're probably wondering what we've been doing all this time. Well, we've been super-busy. The monster started law school so Spanky had to make sure the monster did all his homework. Dante and me helped Mommy with her exams and then helped her grade some essays. Every time she got a pile of essays we'd knock them over and then sleep on top of the best ones. Or maybe it was on top of the worst ones? I forget. Maybe this quarter we should sleep on all the essays just to be safe.

We've also had lots of adventures this year to tell you about! Super-exciting!

First Day of School

Things have been rather quiet around here of late, but that doesn't mean we don't have big news to share. Some of our readers are undoubtedly already aware; however, I thought it best if I made a more formal announcement. Jason is now attending Southwestern Law School!

I was a bit trepedatious when I first learned that Jason was applying to area law schools as I had become accustomed to the amount of time he and I had spent together of late. In addition to bringing an end to our Star Trek marathons, Jason's returning to school would also mean that I would be in Jennifer's care more often. She has recently decided that Edmund needs to go on a diet, and while I agree that my young friend is quiet portly, for some reason his being on a diet also means I'm on a diet. Despite my repeated protests, Jennifer has gone ahead with her plan to restrict access to our food dishes. The other two have accepted this situation but I remain hopeful that Jennifer will eventually see reason.

Where were we? Oh, yes, law school. Despite my concerns, I've come to realize that law school is a big opportunity for Jason. He shall be able to continue assisting others while earning a living that will enable him to buy me all the kibble I can eat and perhaps even one of those robotic vacuums for my two young friends to chase. He also seems quite excited about the prospect of returning to school and I am willing to put up with Jennifer and her "ideas" if it will enable my human companion to pursue his dreams.

And what has Jennifer been up to, you ask? She is in the midst of studying for her Ph.D. exams which are scheduled for this November. As near as I can tell, this process involves checking out a large number of books from the library and then reading them. The stacks of books are quite sizable; I almost feel bad for the poor girl. Almost. Once her exams are completed, she will be able to begin writing her dissertation. A process which I'm sure will involve acquiring even more books.

Once both of them are done with their respective graduate programs, it will raise the number of doctors in the family to three. I, of course, earned my Ph.D. in Feline Studies several years ago.

I am not a mutt!

Jennifer has been spending a lot of time around the house lately. I believe she is reading as the stack of books on her floor keep growing. I have mixed feelings about her seemingly continual presence. One the one hand, I am forced to deal with her unusual ideas more frequently, but on the other, I can ensure that my meals are served promptly at the proper times. Feline meal times is one of Jennifer's recent notions, and a peculiar one at that, but that is a subject for another post.

Recently, I came across an intriguing chart. As the image is quite large, I won't post it here. Instead, this link should allow you to access it. The chart is really quite fascinating and reflects an immense effort on the part of its creators. As many of you may know, my feline housemates and I are not members of any recognized breed. Because of this, Jennifer insists on calling us mutts when asked about our pedigree. Mutts, of course, are dogs and it is terribly improper to refer to the more sophisticated cat by that term. This chart, however, enables us to determine a more suitable designation.

We shall begin with Edmund as he is the easiest to identify:

Under the "Solid" category, the gray is a tempting choice, but my young friend's paws are pink and so that option is out. Instead, he must be a Frost and as he has some white on his chest we have decided that he is a Tuxedo Frost.

Dante's case is more complicated as white fur is generally indicative of albinism, a condition which he most assuredly does not have.

However, it is possible to locate a non-albino white with Dante's eye and paw color on the far left side of the chart. His spot patterns means that he is white with black Harlequin spotting. An excellent pattern for my occasionally uncoordinated housemate.

Identifying my description gave us the most challenges.

My coloring and pattern suggest calico. However, male cats lack the genes necessary for tri-color coats and thus calicos can only be females. Lady cats are all well and good but I am most definitely a gentleman. (Editor's Note: Male calicos do exist but are extremely rare). My coloring, instead, is that of a tabby. Tabbies are located in several places on the chart and it is necessary to look under the "Tipped" section to find mine. I am a Spotted Cameo Tabby.

I can only hope that Jennifer uses the correct terminology in the future although given her stubbornness I suspect she will continue to refer to us as mutts.

Presents from Santy Claws

I wasn't sure about this Santa Clause thing. He sees me when I'm sleeping? He knows when I'm awake?! He knows if I've been bad or good?!? This is supposed to be exciting?! Sounds pretty scary to me. O.o

I was getting all worried, but Dante told me not to because Santa only comes down chimneys and we don't have one. I had to take his word for it 'cause I don't know what a chimney is.

But I LOVE getting presents! I thought you all might like getting presents too. So here's some links to funny pet things and the three of us all dressed for the holidays!

Cat vs. Printer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSK1D3bZhRs

Dogs are silly (not like good kitties)
http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/11/dogs-dont-understand-basic-concepts.html

Spanky


Dante


and Me!

The Trouble with Humans

So I imagine you're all wondering what my person has been up to since we last posted. The answer is "the usual." Big surprise there. She reads. She keeps letting TGWWGA hang around. She scratches my ears. But it wouldn't be "the usual" if she didn't find some way to be incredibly dorky. She may have managed to out do herself this time, too. She found out that the author of "The Trouble with Tribbles" was going to be in town for a talk and a book signing. Yay.

Since you probably have a life, you probably don't know what tribbles are or why they'd be trouble. I know I didn't. I still wish I didn't. Spanky says I have to tell you, though, or the post won't make any sense. Anyway, "The Trouble with Tribbles" is an episode of the show Star Trek. It's about a bunch of humans that travel around the galaxy. This sounded like it could be pretty cool at first. There are aliens! And laser pistol things! And space battles! BUT the show's from the 1960s which was forever ago and even with the laser pistol things it's mostly about peace and harmony and making new friends. Only nerds would want to watch something so old and boring.

Oh, and tribbles are these little alien things that pretty much purr. They don't have eyes or do anything. Just purr. And they don't like Klingons. I'm not explaining Klingons no matter what Spanky says.

Despite the obvious nerdiness, my person was ridiculously excited when she heard that this guy was going to be in town. She was so excited that she dropped what she was doing for the day (scratching my ears) so she could go. She says it was a really interesting and he talked about his writing, and that silly space show, and lots of nerds were there. Some of the nerds even dressed up like characters from the show. ><

The talk was at a museum that had a whole exhibit about the space show. A. Whole. Exhibit. Apparently, there are enough nerds to support this kind of thing. They had props and costumes from the show, too. This was very exciting for my person. She told me all about it when she got home. I tried to pretend to be asleep. It did not work.

After the talk, there was a reception that had food and drink like in the show. Spanky says "Ale" is a type of alcohol but my person says that there wasn't any alcohol in the drinks there. Any potential coolness this event might've had just went out the window. Again, my person thought it was exciting and took a picture of it with her friend's stuffed tribble. That's it at the top of the post. The grey thing is a tribble. I guess it looks okay. It could be fun to play with and gnaw on. Oh, now I'm being told it's not a cat toy (even though it looks like a cat toy) because the author signed it. He signed a toy. >< And this made it not a toy.

Oh, and TGWWGA says to tell you all that the sign next to the blue drink should read "Romulan Ale." I didn't think my opinion of him could get any lower, but it just did.

Mission at San Juan Capistrano

So what do you think of the new look? We decided it was time for a change so we asked Jennifer to show us some options. Edmund wanted one with birds in flight but I thought this one fit more with our blog's theme. Dante pretended not to be interested but I spied him peeking around the corner more than once. The young always think they are so clever!

However, I did not begin this post to tell you that our blog has a new background. I imagine you've already determined that for yourselves. I believe I have mentioned previously that Jennifer has a rather large number of relatives. They are forever getting underfoot. In any event, they all decided to come for a visit and the entire group went on numerous adventurers in the surrounding area. My feline compatriots have already written about a few of these and I shall be adding another one to the list: namely, the Mission at San Juan Capistrano.

The Mission at San Juan Capistrano was founded by a group of Franciscans in the late 1700's. It has been through many changes since then and most, if not all, of the original Mission buildings are no longer visible. The architectural of the remaining structures is quite beautiful, as you can see.

The grounds have been beautifully landscaped as well and feature native and non-native plants.

Although the Mission is now largely a living museum, mass is still held in its Serra Chapel. Jennifer did not wish to use flash photography in a church, so I am afraid there are no usable pictures of it for me to post. However, she did take a lovely shot of a side alter dedicated to Saint Peregrine.

Peregrine, as you may know, is the patron saint of cancer sufferers. Why, exactly, the Mission features a prayer room dedicated to this particular saint was not made clear to me.

I could not post about San Capistrano without mentioning the annual arrival of the swallows every March who build nests under the eves of the Mission buildings. As Jennifer neglected to take a single photograph of either a swallow or its nest, I am forced to post one from an Internet source.

This is the first time in the history of this blog that we have used someone else's photograph. The dear girl really must learn to be more observant.

She did, however, capture some lovely pictures of the fish in the Mission's fountains. There was a sign that forbade putting one's hands in the water as it might harm the fish and aquatic plants. It said nothing about paws, however.

Here fishy, fishy, fishy...

Look it how big that fish is! And that's just it's back! Whoa! I like to eat fishies, especially the kind that comes in a can, but I think maybe this fish could eat me. O.o

Spanky says that it isn't a fish. He says it's a whale and it most definitely does not eat kitties. I don't know, though. It lives in the water and has fins and a tail and last time I checked that's what fishies have. Also, it has to eat something. It's not going to live off of little flakes like the goldfish we had did. Dante just told me that I don't have to worry cause we're too far away from the water to worry about any fish that doesn't come in a can. Yay! Tuna fish! :D

Oh right. I'm supposed to be posting about the not-fish.

So, to see the big not-fish, Mommy and her family had to go on the ocean in a boat. I don't know why they wanted to go near that much water but sometimes humans are strange like that (even my Mommy). They wanted to see a whale but whales don't always tell people where they are going to be. You just have to be lucky enough to catch them.

They saw all sorts of cool stuff! Like dolphins!

Spanky says those are also not fish even if they look like fish. They are different not-fish than whales. So confusing! Why can't I just call them all fish? It would make things easier.

And then they saw a whale. Right by the boat!

Even though it's gray like me, it's called a blue whale. Blue whales are the biggest not-fish of all! Spanky says that they're the biggest mammals, too. When I asked him what a mammal was he told me that I was a mammal and so was Mommy and so was the Monster. Which is just silly. I don't look anything like the Monster! Also, I do not have fins like the not-fish (but I do have a tail).

Mommy also took some video of the whales and the dolphins. Since she was on the water, the camera goes up and down a lot but it's still pretty cool. You might also want to turn off the sound unless you want to hear Mommy and her sister talk about if the camera is on or not.

Dolphins!


Whale!