Moment of Aargh (Glasgow series, Part 0001) and introducing Odin.

One thing definitely hasn't changed since moving to Glasgow. I am still the queen of WTF Did I Just Do? moments. I've managed to get to the train station in my slippers at least once in the last month.

Stace is on a baking kick, which is so awesome: I come in, and there's cake. And it's good cake, which is even more important.

This means that the butter, eggs, etc get used up pretty fast, so the other day when I went to make some toast, the butter was pretty much done. No problems - we have more in the freezer, one of those lidded little plastic tubs with an inner foil seal under the lid. The plan was to take it out, nuke it for 30 seconds so I could scrape enough off the top for the toast, and leave it out to defrost thoroughly, because in Glasgow you don't need to keep butter in the fridge come November. Hell, you could probably safely leave your milk out for most of the week. Our kitchen is the approximate temperature of a walk-in fridge anyway.

So, I bent down to the freezer, hauled the frozen tub of butter out, turned around to walk away, and promptly tripped over my own two feet. I didn't quite face-plant (Wahey!), but I flung out my hand to catch myself, and of course I used the hand holding the butter. It slammed off of the wall and escaped, sailing across the kitchen like The Little Butter Bar That Learnt How To Fly.

Me: Oh, crap. Not to worry, the lid's still on-

The lid must have been loosened during the bash against the wall. Half a second into the flight, it spun off of the top of the butter and tried to imbed itself in the microwave door.

A half second later, the inner foil fluttered gently down to the floor tiles.

Me: Aw, come on.

The butter, now lidless and foil-less, bounced off of the spare utensil drawer and whirred back at my face. I ducked. It slammed into the wall beside me and sailed back across the room.

Me: Holy sh-

The butter, which by all rights should've been firmly fixed by its own weight inside that bloody tub, separated from the container and dropped. On my foot. Frozen butter hurts, by the way. The container landed completely upright on the kitchen counter, spun twice, and stopped.

Me: Oh, fuck a duck.


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Shortly after we moved into the house, we noticed a gorgeous black cat wandering around. The neighbour told me he's lived in the area for years, and the woman who had him died some time ago. One of her neighbours took him on. Unfortunately, I have no idea who, or if the person is even still in the area.

The cat I saw the first couple of times was desperately stalking pigeons. He caught a couple, and ate most of them. His coat was dull, and watching the way he walks makes me think there's a good touch of arthritis involved. Our bunch aren't allowed out without a harness or going into their outdoor pen, so the old boy spent a lot of summer sitting on the deck looking in at them, with Bast in particular watching him back and chirping. He was extremely skittish around humans, though.

Then he started coming to the front door. We have a couple of spare cat bowls, so I started putting a bowl down for him. (I later found out Stace was doing the same thing. There's a reason my cousin and I get on pretty well most of the time.)
On rainy, cold days, we leave a bowl of food in the front door alcove for him and leave the one door closed so he gets a bit of shelter and a place to sit while he gets his food.

His coat is starting to shine, and he's put on a bit of weight, but he's still pretty jumpy. We've called him Odin because his one eye tends to close slowly while he looks at you. I'm not sure whether it's a medical issue, but there seems to be constant clear discharge, and he won't let me close enough for long enough to get him into a carrier. I'd like to get that looked at, because it's bugging the hell out of me. He also has an overbite, which seems to be a thing with black toms in the UK. It is pretty freaking adorable, though. He'll let us stroke him, briefly, before settling down to eat.
He missed a couple of visits during the big storm we had last week, and we were both very relieved to see him one morning, waiting patiently for the doors to open so that he could get his breakfast.

We can't let him in the house because we have no clue whether his shots are up to date (Sheba got taken to the vet the day after I adopted her and was all up to date by the time the other two met her) and I won't take a chance with my three. Introducing a new cat can also be a tricky business, and it's almost impossible to turn an outdoor cat into an indoor cat and have a happy animal. Three indoor cats with no road-sense and access to a cat door would have the life expectancy of a soft-boiled egg since we live on a very busy road. It's a dilemma I can't see a way around just yet; any ideas that are feasible would be great.

Bast desperately wants to meet him. If he knows Odin is in the alcove, he hurls himself at the door chirping frantically. There's no hissing or growling, and knowing Bast he wants to play with a new friend, but since Odin could probably dismantle him in three seconds flat, that door is staying firmly closed for the meantime.

We're planning on putting a box and blanket down for him so if he wants to snuggle up for most of the day he can. It would be good to know he has a warm place when winter hits.

Scotland, wahey!

We've been in Glasgow just over two weeks. So far, loving it - I'm surrounded by family, which is huge for me, and the neighbours are awesome.

The house is great. There's a standing joke that visitors from London will weep when they see the size of your place and hear the rent price. That's pretty spot on. I have a house with a garden for less than what I was paying for a dingy flat that had crumbling spots on the walls. Lumps would fall off whenever a bus idled outside.

The cats are having a blast. We've had to block off all the fireplaces (there are 4) because last week Hathor vanished. We could hear her crying, but the silly kit kept quiet whenever we were in the lounge.
Whenever Bast or Sheba came into the room and we asked where Hathor was, they went over to the fireplace. We thought there was just no way; there is a metal cap over the chimney. It turns out that cap pushes inwards.
We found her 3 days later, in the lounge chimney. I think she must have been licking condensation off of the bricks; 2 of those days were scorchers. To be honest, I was starting to think we were looking for a dead cat. She was hauled out, black from nose to tail, with Stace receiving a head full of soot herself.

Bast sat on the edge of the bath and watched her get thoroughly soaped and washed, right up until she tapped out with one little paw on Stace's arm. No claws, just three little taps asking for it to be done.

Then he climbed into the cupboard with her, held her down, and washed her all over again while giving her a thorough scolding. We've got her a collar with a bell; but catching her to get it on is a whole different story, since she has decided I'm the Spawn of Hell and am to be avoided unless she thinks I'm sleeping. I think she blames me for the bath.

The floors are mainly wood, and Bast has discovered that he can take a running start and skid through rooms on his bottom. This doesn't always work so well when he hits the carpeted stairs, and I'm waiting for him to get a splinter.

Sheba swops between my bedroom and the lounge, watching me work. Her greatest delight is staring sleepily out of the window, watching the neighbourhood trees move in the wind. At 3a.m. she joins in the nightly cat stampede up and down the stairs.

I'm sure winter is going to hurt, temperature wise. But the people are good, the prices are sooooo cheap - I can't remember the last time I spent £60 on groceries and staggered under the weight of what we bought - and we are happy.

Kitty update

Bast seems to be a bit of a talker. Hathor still hides under my bed, and comes out to stare at me when she thinks I'm sleeping, and makes little chirping noises like a hairy four-legged canary. She also hides food, which I'll get to in a bit.

They got taken for their shots last week. Bast dealt okay.
Hathor went bat-shit insane when the vet took her out of the cage and drew blood from the poor man. As he pointed out, it was an OhgodsIneedtogetaway moment, rather than I'mgoingtoclawyourfaceoffbecauseIcan. It was some small consolation with the vet dripping blood on the floor, but this is also what happens when you have traumatised kittens. It's what happened next that really stunned me.
After getting her shots and weighed, Hathor got put back in the cage. She scooted to the back and Bast stood in front of her, making sure nobody was going to touch her again. She'd been watching the whole process anxiously. I've seen the protective instinct in mother cats and dogs, yes. I've never seen anything like this in litter-mates.

Bast is about three pounds heavier (because she eats every bit of food she can find, including Hathor's) and a bit longer in the legs. When I come in from work she waits in the doorway of my room. She only watched me getting ready for work once; there is something incredibly disconcerting about a kitten looking horrified when you put on make-up. And she likes to talk. Usually this is to tell the world that nobody is paying attention; unfortunately she's not at ease with being touched yet. So at two in the morning, you get this:

Bast, on the staircase: OOOOH, NOOOBODY LOVES ME!!!
Me, stumbling out of my room: WTF?
Bast: YOU LEFT ME ALOOOOONE!
Me, standing on mouse toy and hopping to stair case: Oh, kitty. Hush. (Put hand out to kitten.)
Bast: UNCLEAN!! UNCLEEEAAAN!!! (rockets back up the stairs.)
At this point I remove the mouse toy from between my toes and lurch back to bed.
Some twenty minutes later, the delicate thunder of Bast attempting a landing on the hall cupboard and missing completely will fill the house, and I'll pull the duvet over my head and pretend I didn't hear it.

Hathor, on the other hand, appears to hide her food as well as herself, probably because Bast has the table manners of a starving piranha and will take her food if she isn't fast enough.
Heading off to the shop today, I realised halfway down the road that there was something cold and sticky wedged under my toe. When I sat down on a bench and upended my Ugg, a small piece of chicken fell out. I did the rest of my shop with my toe stuck to my boot from kitty spit.