Monday - no excitements!

Cats are nocturnal – they sleep all day so they can play all night! This morning all kittens were lying next to my bed again – not under the night stand, just in front of it. Both mothers followed me into the kitchen – I’m afraid Shadow is learning some bad habits from Silver! I made my coffee and ignored the two cats around my feet, then went to the nursery and fussed over the kittens and both mothers (who had followed me, again). Shadow was happy, but Silver insisted on going out – so I let her out. Shadow also came investigating the front door – but hasn’t advanced in her human-training quite as far as Silver!

Fortunately Silver returned shortly – apparently she just needed to widdle. I need to include more attention time for the cats; I’m not sure what keeps driving Silver to leave but it could be plain boredom. I still hope that Silver moves out on her own again once the kittens are weaned and gone ... I can’t see her happy with me forever. She’s simply too wild – although the experts don’t agree with me. And yet: she left her kittens for at least 15 hours when they were just over a week old!

On the way to work I find the turn-off I need to take closed. Road works. No alternative route marked! I remember ‘Road Works Ahead’ signs being put up ahead of the road works, informing traffic of what’s out of sight ahead. Now those signs are propped up against the lane closure chevrons! I remember lane closure signs put up depicting the reality of what lies ahead – now they use any ‘lane closure’ sign. As in: the sign indicates the right hand lane will merge with the lane to its left, i.e. ONE lane out of three will close up ahead – in reality ALL three lanes merge into the yellow lane OR in reality the left hand lanes will be closed (again: ALL lanes, where the sign depicts only one-lane closed ahead). And never, ever was a turn-off closed completely without clear signage indicating an alternative route! Sadly, from what I can gather, this decline in civilization is not limited to South Africa.

I just had a chat with a school friend in Pretoria, her dog had gone missing. Turns out that there’s a new scheme of pet-napping: They steal your pets, and then tell you what you’ll pay to the ‘finder’. Unbelievable! But then again, when I read some years ago that criminals had stolen the comfort-toys in the pediatric cancer ward – THAT was the absolute lowest I think it possible to go! Stealing from children with cancer in hospital!

Well, I didn’t go to Builders on Sunday. I though about it, but wasn’t really in the mood. I don’t have any real concept of what I want to do, yet, either. This isn’t the hardware store in East London, where a host of staff who KNOW their products will advise and make suggestions – taking my skill level into account. I’ve never encountered more than lukewarm ‘oh, if I must help customers’ attitude in any Builders anywhere in this country. So I better have a good idea before I go there.

Back at home I was surprised to find our gardener busy in the rockery! It looked like rain most of the morning, so I didn’t expect him – but I suppose the rain most of last week cut into his pocket. He did a great job weeding the path! I’m sure he did more – but I’m afraid I didn’t take the time to look. I went straight up to play with the kittens. My neighbour came up and brought the gardener to see the kittens, then, when he left her and I sat for quite some time playing with all of the cats. The two adults got a lot of attention as well, of course!

Later on, when I popped in to check on them I found Shadow on my pillow! Seems she’s decided to take some time out as well! I planned to prepare a potato salad and steamed potatoes and boiled some eggs. I found a cool recipe the other day which said to take the eggs off the stove as soon as the water boiled, then let them stand in the hot water – great power-saver! I’ve done it half a dozen times before but this time something seems to have gone wrong: The shell wouldn’t come off nicely, sticking to the skin and the whites were too runny. Turns out that five of the six eggs had double-yolks!

Both cats went for a turn outside earlier, they left with my neighbour – we worried whether Shadow may have decided to go ‘back home’ to her, but she also just wanted to water the garden. My neighbour mentioned that Silver seems to have some Siamese in her – now that she said it, I wonder how I could have missed it! Her foxy face, her whitish (hence Silver) fur plus her attitude! Well, Shadow seems to be teaching her some manners – succeeding where a sucker like me stands no chance! Since Shadow has moved in, Silver hasn’t run off – except that first night for three hours. She now also has Silver taking over so Shadow can take a break. When I looked in on them again a few minutes ago, Shadow was again on the bed, leaving Silver to nurse and clean the kittens!

Well, I don’t want to oversleep again tomorrow, so it’s off to bed for me.