Spunk waiting in ambush, napping, and waiting for story time with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.
A kitten adopted our friend Vanessa, but she couldn’t keep it. Since we are down a couple of cats we decided to take him. So far the other cats are nominally accepting him. Rosencrantz has been the most welcoming so far, but none of our kitties have out right attacked him. In the first few hours after arriving, he ambushed Rosencrantz, Guildenstern and Diné and they hardly reacted. He very slowly and timidly crept by Mama Manx while she growled at him, but she only growled. At the moment we are calling him Spunky, as he is working very hard to get into trouble, but he may end up with another name as we get to know him better.

The garden got about 3/4 inch of rain over the past few days, and with a good soaking from the irrigation, the grapes have gone wild (along with most of the plants on the property), and climbed into the apple tree, where they are dangling among the apples. I’m sure most self respecting winers would not allow their grapes to mix with their apples, but when we get a little water in our dry climate, grapes (and a whole lot of other stuff) happen!




I got a flat tire on the truck, put on the spare and drove the flat tire to Discount Tires to see if they could repair it. Even though the tire didn’t have much wear, it was over 10 years old, so he said by law he couldn’t touch it. A guy from the Midas shop next door walked by and said, I think I have some used tires that will fit. He didn’t have any 225/15s, but he had a pair 235/15s, which are a bit bigger. For $30 he mounted and balanced the two 235/15 tires, and put them on the back of the truck, and then he out the two better tires of the 3 remaining originals on the front. That was quite a deal, since the lowest price set of four new tires for the truck would run about $400, and since I don’t drive the truck very often, I didn’t want to put a new set of tires on it right now.
After a morning run and repairing one of the drip systems this morning, to getting tires replaced, loading and unloading my other large snake cage and a bunch of stuff out of Tristan’s garage, I’m all tired out. While making my evening rounds with the camera, I noticed that the white lilies, Rosencrantz and a hummingbird where tired out as well.



Note: Leo is mistaken. It was a leaf hopper katydid exploring my computer. Insect identification has never been one of Leo’s (or my) strengths.
After getting “logged in” the other day, Mama Max got stumped today. Guildenstern is feeling better as you can see by his kingly pose, and Diné was looking at him like “Who do you think you are?” Rosencrantz was hacking up a hairball a few yards to the east of Diné when I did these shots. Rosencrantz is quite a hacker when it comes to producing projectile hairballs, but I figured I’d spare you the action.
I took Guildenstern in for a checkup last week because he had become anxious, clingy, talkative and seemed to continuously move from one spot to another. It turns out he has hyperthyroid, so now I have to give him medicine twice a day. We just started the medicine on Friday, but he seems calmer already. When I give him his medicine, I open his mouth and quickly stick the tiny pill down his throat. It happens so fast, that he purrs and looks confused because he’s not sure about what happened. Guildenstern is only 13 years old, but that makes him an old man in kitty age. He was enjoying the afternoon sun from under the garden table, that made a nice grid pattern on him.