Cat Help in the Catio

February 3, 2014 Timothy Price16 Comments

Work continues on the catio. We started preparing the old cement slab for resurfacing on Saturday, but then we discovered we needed to rent a high pressure sprayer to clean it before we put on the resurfacing cement, plus the temperatures are supposed to stay above 50º F for 8 hours after the new surface is applied. Since the temperature only got into the 40’s over the weekend we decided to prepare surfaces for painting.

The first photo is Laurie preparing to wire brush the French windows so I could paint them. In the second photo, she is telling Rosencrantz and Guildenstern what they could do to help. The third photo shows Guildenstern supervising Laurie. He had a lot to say about our work, so much so, that it wore him out and he had to take a break (fourth photo). The French windows and door had not been painted in 22 years. The ivy had grown up on them which marked and pulled off paint in various places, so I spent a good part of the day painting the windows and doors with a very good, “stain killer” primer. The last photo shows Laurie standing by the freshly primed windows.

As I have mentioned before, we live in a cold spot — the reason Laurie was dressed in layers of warm clothes to work on the catio. We went to a dinner party last night in Albuquerque. When we left the party at a little after 10:00 PM, the car showed the outside temperature was 47º F. When we got home 20 minutes later, the temperature at our house was 26º F. We live about 10 miles north and west as the crow flies, and about 700 feet lower than the part of Albuquerque we attended the dinner party, yet we were 21degrees colder.

Misty Mountains, Shaggy Dogs & Magic Light

February 2, 2014 Timothy Price14 Comments

On our way to rent a pressure sprayer to prepare the slab in the catio for resurfacing, we got distracted by misty mountains and shaggy dogs, and ended up not getting the pressure sprayer. Such is life and art in New Mexico.

Let a Sleeping Cat Lie?

February 1, 2014 Timothy Price22 Comments

Rosencrantz was so cute sleeping in, that I had to do a photo. I got only one shot of him sleeping before he kitty-sensed my camera, woke up, and looked around a bit disoriented. He was definitely unhappy with me disturbing his bliss by taking a photo of him while he was sleeping.

Waiting on a Waffle/Breakfast with Guildenstern

January 29, 2014January 29, 2014 Timothy Price2 Comments

I had to get out my 17mm, super-wideangle lens to get a photo of Beaker impatiently waiting for the waffle that’s in the toaster oven. You can see the tips of his wings are a little blurry because he is fluttering them in anticipation. Guildenstern got up on the table, flopped himself down and waited to see what Laurie was having for breakfast. He wasn’t too sure about either the granola or the coffee.

WTFB

January 27, 2014 Timothy Price10 Comments

Waffle Time For Beaker (WTFB). While I was heating up a waffle in the toaster oven, Beaker stood on the edge of his shelf impatiently watching the waffle through the glass door on the oven. When the waffle was done, Beaker tore off a piece and ate it on the edge of his shelf not bothering to take it to his food dish like he usually does. Even though he loves waffles, he will not eat them cold. They either need to be straight off the waffle iron, or toasted.

I finished putting up wire around the new roof on the catio, so now it’s reopened for kitty business. The new roof is lower, covers a 12 X 16 feet area, and is translucent, so even in the late afternoon there is plenty of light under the roof. The top of the kitty jungle gym is now almost three feet higher than the end of the roof, so the kitties now have open space all around, and a full 360º view from the top of their jungle gym.

Cold for the Cats

January 23, 2014 Timothy Price7 Comments

I’ve gone out at sunrise the past two mornings (in 10º F temperatures nonetheless) to put the new roof on the catio. While I was out freezing, the kitties were in bed, under the covers, wondering why I was stupid enough to be out in the cold at such ungodly hours. As the first photo shows, I got a nice translucent roof installed that lets plenty of light in through the windows it covers on the north side of the sunroom. The kitties still can’t go out in the catio at night because I have to put wire up between the new roof and the structure over their kitty jungle gym.

Cat Three

January 19, 2014 Timothy Price8 Comments

I had one of those disgustingly productive days — I removed the roof from the “catio” but left the fencing around it intact. The kitties were supervising, and they thought I was a pretty cool cat working up on the roof, balancing on vigas, hopping between cross beams, and making quite a mess at the same time. They didn’t realize what I was doing until we all came it for the night and found the cat door to the catio blocked. Now my being on the roof all day doing dangerous things is like very un-cool among the cats.

The reason I deroofed the catio is that Laurie started reorganizing everything, and that turns into repurposing spaces. The roof over the catio was originally a shade structure to protect our bonsais and other plants from the intense sun we have in New Mexico. I later put a tin roof on it, but there was really no way to seal the edges against the house to make it useful for anything but plants, weights and cats without redoing the roof. So a roof redo is underway so I can seal the sides that are against the house and make it a more useful space. The last photo is the roofless catio taken through a very dirty window.

Cats in Winter

January 16, 2014 Timothy Price18 Comments

What do our cats do in winter? Romeo was not sure about me taking yet another photo of him. Rosencrantz made like a kitty statue, while Guildenstern relaxed on a Viking book to see if he could soak up some Old Norse. Mama Manx dozed on a “cat magnet” blanket, and Diné got warm lying on the heater vent.