The Glowing Edge

Category: Henry, Olive & Rocky

  • The Further Adventures of Olive and Henry

    The Further Adventures of Olive and Henry

  • Olive (again)

    Olive (again)

    I know I just posted about her, but I got a chuckle out of this picture of Olive in her accustomed seat at the counter.

    The main reason she sits here is not, in fact, because she might secure a tasty tidbit. She has been known to hook things off the counter with her sneaky little paw, but she’s doesn’t necessarily go for something you would consider a kitty treat (a giant hock of ham, etc.). Instead, she likes anything shiny (fork!), and sometimes she swipes things off just because they are within her reach.

    But what she really loves is when someone wipes down the counter. Her ears get all swiveled forward and every hair is on high alert. Her eyes are glued to the slow-moving hand and water-slopping washcloth. Oh, now that is heaven to one little messed-up Olive kitteh.

    So she’ll sit there through an entire session of food prep in hopes of getting to watch the clean-up. What a weirdo, huh?

    PS: That’s the rarely-seen First in the background, glancing up from his texting to take in the scene. His feet are huge, aren’t they?

  • Olive’s Summer Vacation

    Olive’s Summer Vacation

  • Olive Cheating Natural Selection

    Olive Cheating Natural Selection

    It’s okay with me that Olive isn’t the sharpest tool in the shed. Really.

    But I DO wish our newest kitteh would show at least a little sense around cars.

    However, if she’s outside and I get in my car to leave, she tends to choose and do one of the following.

    1. Wander out from her spot under the bushes and flop down just behind the rear wheel of the car (her favorite).
    2. Scamper from one side of the driveway to the other by going underneath the car. This is while I’m backing down the driveway by slow inches. This actually happened. She’s not even a year old, and I’m not sure how many of her nine lives she has left.
    3. Stroll out to sit smack in the middle of the driveway (where she watches me gesticulate madly inside the car). She doesn’t appear to be offended when I honk.
    4. Come skipping up — as I open the car door to holler at her — to leap into the car.

    This, ladies and gentlemen, is natural selection being thwarted. In the age of the dinosaurs Olive would simply be paste on the bottom of a slow-moving dino’s foot. Instead, our clan works night and day to keep her alive and on the planet.

    The Maker created this helpful sign  (he didn’t know “Olive” had an “e” at the end) and taped it up in our garage to remind us all to check thoroughly around the garage and driveway area before putting the key in the ignition. She’s so troublesome about this that we’ve taken to putting her in the house every time before we leave, or else someone stands Olive-guard while the other person backs down the driveway.

    I’ve told our next door neighbor about our wretched cat, and I only hope they check before they move their car, or else natural selection may win.

  • The Difference Between a Hug and a Smack

    The Difference Between a Hug and a Smack

    I found this photo on my camera recently, and I know what the boys thought when they took it. They thought, “Awww, isn’t that sweet, Henry is sharing his perch with Olive, and he’s patting her on the shoulder! He’s giving her a widdle hug! Awww.” You know how boys are.

    And they are totally wrong.

    Henry is saying, “Kid, it’s bad enough that you came here and robbed me of all peace and quiet. You eat all the white bread (see picture), get in my personal space, and generally piss me off. Now be still or I’m gonna smack you.” And he has his claws poised to sink into her neck.

    But the thing is, Henry is a pushover. Well, at 17 pounds “pushover” may not be exactly the right term. Shove over? Anyway, he’ll never sink his claws into her scrawny little neck or rip out a satisfyingly healthy hank of her fur, or bite her perky little ear off, or even raise his voice to her. He’s the grouchiest old bastard but he’s essentially soft inside. Henry is like an igloo filled with Eskimos. Crusty on the outside, warm and soft on the inside. (I think I saw that in a Far Side cartoon once.)

    Olive can be annoying. You cannot neglect to shut the pantry door, ever: she can drag herself up four shelves high where she stalks, kills, and devours white bread in all it’s forms and leaves the guts everywhere. She is forever pouncing on Henry just as he settles into a nap, and she demands to be picked up in order to watch what’s happening on the stove when you’re cooking. Sweeping is a favorite activity; she pounces on your pile of filth and scatters it in every direction. She waits until two am to locate and bat along the hardwoods the ping pong ball you forgot to put away, and she is particularly fond of launching herself without warning to attack sock feet. Sometimes we humans don’t know whether we want to hug her or smack her, either.

    But we adore her the same way we adore crusty old Henry. Because sometimes love just feels that way.

  • Olive & Henry

    Olive & Henry

    Henry, from the day we brought him home from the shelter, was 17 pounds of orange-striped irritable. He’s not cuddly, playful, or even nonchalant. He bites. And he prefers that you just leave him alone, permanently.

    Henry grew on us like a mild but contagious virus. We actually like him, for reasons that only therapy would help us fully grasp.

    And Olive, from the day we brought her home from the shelter, has absolutely adored Henry.

    Olive eats from Henry’s plate (we finally quit putting one out for her because she utterly refused to eat unless he was eating, and she had to eat with her little nose touching his), she pounces on Henry’s head, and as you can see from the photo above, she lounges on Henry’s perch.

    Henry swears like a sailor whenever Olive’s around. He refuses to use her name, and only refers to her scathingly as “Junior.” He bats at her, chases her, and lets her jump on his head. He spouts invective and scowls at her.

    I’ve decided Olive is Italian, because she’s utterly oblivious to Henry’s frequent rants.

    She only speaks the language of amore.

  • Introducing Olive

    Introducing Olive

    This is Olive.

    She’s deeply interested in the dangle-y wrist strap on my camera. She would like to inspect it more carefully, with her tiny sharp teeth.

    Olive came home with me a couple of days ago, much to the irritation of Henry, our giant orange tabby. Henry weighs 17 pounds, is not fat, and he is emphatically not a lap kitty. He owns Garner, and dispenses cranky remarks from his overburdened cat perch in the windowsill. Olive is 4 months old, weighs as much as a cheezburger, and thinks Henry loves her.

    Don’t worry; we’re watching out for Olive.

    Olive Editing my Photos

    Olive is entirely a lap kitty, in addition to being a laptop kitty, as you see demonstrated above. Helpful is a word she applies to herself, although that isn’t precisely the word I used when I returned from the kitchen to find she had deleted my last photo import with her butt.

    We think she’s going to fit in just fine.

    Top photo credit: The Maker (edited by me)

  • Cat Fight

    And this, my friends, is why boxers wear gloves. That one dude’s arm is soooo gonna be sore. I also don’t recommend fighting on the stairs.

    (Special thanks to @brauhze for finding this and thinking of me.)

  • Cat butt on my table

    funny pictures of cats with captions
    see more Lolcats and funny pictures

    I try to allow Lolcats to post their own funniez, but this one… sigh. This one is just so true. I blame it entirely on the four guys I live with, who don’t seem to mind cat butt in the same place where they calmly lay their PB&J’s. I also tell the four guys with whom I live to use a plate, but they ignore me. Frankly, my cat ignores me, too, but at least I can still wrestle him into submission. Now you know where all those scratches on my arms and face come from.

    I never should have told him he was adopted.

    PS: I apologize, for those of you with delicate sensibilities, for posting this in such close proximity to “Eating Nevada.” Welcome to my world.

  • Sleep Fort

    Seth in the fort Isaac slept in last night

    Sunday night the Maker had a friend over to spend the night. The Ice decided to strike out on his own, and built this fort in his Dad’s office in order to have his own space. In the forground you can see a DVD player (he watched “Enchanted” and the husband and I listened to him laughing and giggling late into the night as he replayed his favorite parts), and an empty Smarties wrapper. The Ice was SET, man. The cat liked it, and so did the Maker, who asked to pose for the camera.