Mom insists she did not take these photos – © Colehauscats.com
… which means Viola figured out how to work the camera – © Colehauscats.com
… or maybe Viola has a photographer accomplice – © Colehauscats.com
We guess we’ll never know – © Colehauscats.com
… because Viola ain’t talking – © Colehauscats.com
Welcome to the month of May! If you live in a city very close to our town, welcome to Riot in Downtown Day. Grrr….
Moving along, someone elsewhere was telling someone else how rare ginger girls are, going on and on how only so many are born and how even more rare it was to find one to adopt. Mom’s not one to let such incorrect information pass by without saying something. She sees ginger girls all the time in shelters who need forever homes, and her respect level automatically goes up many more notches for those who adopt, permanently adopt that is, a ginger girl. They can be stubborn, difficult, very opinionated, and from time-to-time, downright cranky.
They can also be extremely loving and exceptionally loyal.
Mom posted a photo collage of our four ginger girls to that someone elsewhere and opened a can of worms at the same time. Our Mom…. can’t let things be, can’t keep her lips zipped.
Our ginger girls – © Colehauscats.com
Our old visiting raccoon, Happy, who is partially blind and mostly deaf, is looking much, much better than she did a couple of weeks ago and we think that’s due to having access to good kibble. Sure, the food is out there for the daytime visiting strays and ferals, but we’re okay with her chowing down if she’s hungry.
Happy at lunchtime – © Colehauscats.com
A couple of weeks ago, we were certain Happy wasn’t going to be around much longer. She was sneezing horribly and looked so ragged and thin. And she walked so slowly, it was painful to watch. Now, she’s no longer sneezing and she may even have gained a pound or two! She still walks slowly, but not as slowly as she did weeks ago. Maybe she has arthritis and if so, the cold, wet weather can’t be doing her much good.
Happy at Dinnertime – © Colehauscats.com
After months of whining about how our area is breaking all kinds of rainfall records (yet another record smashed for the month of April just this week), last week we had one and a half sunny, warmish days, in a row, and half of the flowers in the garden seemingly opened all at once.
Our east side backyard – © Colehauscats.com
In our backyard, on the east side everything tends to bloom at once. About three weeks later, things bloom along the back. Lastly, about three weeks after that, things bloom over on the west side. It’s all about sun exposure, someone once mentioned. Okay… we’re just happy everything doesn’t bloom all at once, even though it might seem like it is.
Bright Tulips – © Colehaus.com
Azalea Crater Lake – © Colehaus.com
White Trillium – © Colehauscats.com
Pink Rhododendron – © Colehaus.com
Soft lavender creeping phlox – © Colehaus.com
Creamy Pink Rhododendron – © Colehaus.com
Though possible, we don’t get too many rainbows during the winter months – not enough sun. But during spring, our weather goes from sunny one minute to a downpour the next and a brilliant rainbow after that. Sometimes, two or even three rainbows are seen.
Double rainbow from a back window – © Colehaus.com
Our squirrel feeder hangs on the fence and if, from inside, you lean over the corner kitchen sink and look though the west side window, you can see whether the feeder is occupied or empty. If a squirrel is just sitting there looking at you through the window, you can bet the feeder is empty. Okay rodent, we’ll get some nuts out there soon.
A curious squirrel – © Colehauscats.com
Oh yeah, this is supposed to be a CAT BLOG. Okay, we’ve had three new visitors this month.
1 – A solid gray tank of a cat, we suspect a true feral by the looks of him(?) and how terrified of people he is. We’ve yet to see his face but could identify him in a lineup by his backside alone.
2 – A gray and black tabby with white socks cutie who we think is less than a year old. It walks our fence occasionally and we’ve yet to get out there in time to call to it.
3 – This black and white fluffy one who sadly, we have only seen once and couldn’t get within twenty feet of.
Someone new – © Colehauscats.com
Someone new close up – © Colehauscats.com
Sweet Teese still visits twice a day, once in the early dawn hour and once later in the afternoon. The thing with Sweet Teese is… she’s a drooler. BIG TIME drooler. Just say her name twice and she gets all lovey-dovey and slobbers all over the place. Could this be why she’s an outside cat and not an inside cat? Could be. If she were our inside cat, we’d have to mop the floors hourly… but we’d take her to the vet first to make sure some condition wasn’t making her drool so much.
Petting Sweet Teese – © Colehauscats.com
Lastly, if you remember, we took down our bird feeder in late January because there are just too many outside cats in our neighborhood now. Cats plus birds at feeders equals bird feasts. Most of our regulars have flown the coup permanently and other than the occasional blue jay fly-by, there’s not many birds out there now. But that’s not to say we don’t notice an odd one every now and then. Like this…. this… thing that we think might have been a turkey vulture. Eeks!
What is that thing? – © Colehauscats.com
What is it? – © Colehauscats.com
It was sitting for over an hour on a skylight at a neighbor’s house and we took these photos from our kitchen window (which was as close as we could get). The good thing is we saw Happy and all the new visitors after we saw this bird-thing so we weren’t worried too much about what or who it might have been eating. Even so, people, keep your pets INSIDE. Turkey vultures are about!
That’s about it. Have a great weekend. See you again in May!
