Another long year is about to wrap up. Although we've had the regular ups and downs of life, this year hasn't been too bad at all. Sure, I had some minor surgery. Sure, Cheryl had horrible sciatica. And, sure this year, our bodies have really made the point that we're getting old... old and creaky.
But now I am aware more than ever that I have been so lucky to find kind, sweet wife. My mom has had more time to travel with her good friends. My neice is growing up to be a fun, zany, smart little girl. Both my mom and brother have been able to come and visit me at my home, where I can play host to them (albeit briefly). A lot of fun times this year and, if anything, there's been more laughter than normal
I know that I am blessed... but not everybody has had a great year. I mean, this year hasn't been momentous... but nothing really bad happened, no tears had been shed. For those who have struggled a bit too long this year, who have felt the overwhelming pressure of life, who have had their heart broken one too many times... I can only say to be strong. And hope. Hope that the new year will bring new chances. Hope that the new year will bring new friendships, and strengthen old ones. Hope that the light at the end of the tunnel will glow just a bit brighter.
To all my friends, Merry Christmas and have a freakin' awesome New Year!
We were on the train just shy of 7am.Everything went pretty normally and we
got to see some of the sights (despite being on the side of the train facing
inland…. as opposed to the scenic view Westward of the Salish Sea and Puget
Sound).Mainly trees, houses, industrial
buildings and the occasional scenic shots follow our route southward.
The extra 2 and half hour wait in
Vancouver, WA (just 30 minutes from our destination) was unfortunate.The heat and intermittent air conditioning
didn’t make a great combination… but I guess it was all part of the “experience
of travel”.
We stayed at a hotel downtown,
conveniently close to a lot of the shopping we did(FYI… check out Powell’s Books and Cargo…
both are a must-see)…. But our room was a nice restful get-away.Simple, clean, and a nice view …. It was a
chance to put our aching feet up after all the walking and touring.It gave us a chance to read and recharge.
The early morning walks usually was a
chance to see the local sights (sometimes pre-dawn) without all the trouble of
people and traffic.Downtown is littered
with interesting architecture, great public art and sculptures… and statues
including the famous Portlandia… not too far from one of the Food Cart pods is a
convenient farmer’s market, with great local produce, flowers, and baked goods.
The morning started with a breakfast
at Kenny & Zukes… a cool little delicatessen.Eggs, bacon, fresh fruit and good cup of
coffee... and of course Voodoo Doughnuts.
I’m a little more accustomed to quiet,
subdued, inner national pride
displayed in Canada… so with this being my first American travel spot, I was
surprised by all the flags.
The peaceful retreat of the Japanese
Garden in Washington Park was an unexpected highlight.there was enough shade and cool breezes
throughout the garden to make up for the heat.
The Portland Art Museum was surprising
both in scope and for content.4 floors
in the main building featuring historical and cultural archaeological pieces,
seasonal artists (here was Ellsworth Kelly),and the permanent installations by contemporary artists… as well as the
great European masters.Despite the
super squeaky floors… this another peaceful respite room after room.Another unexpected highlight.
But time came to pack up our bags, add
up the pounds of books we’re lugging back… and get onto our train ride home.
A nice ride home, though.We had to sneak a couple of clear scenic
shots… ‘cause, well, our seating wasn’t so great and we sat between windows.But the ride along the coast and following a
slowly descending sunset was a great end to trip.We sleepily pulled into Vancouver and it’s
time to starting planning next year’s trip.
Finally snow has fallen on Vancouver and area.It’s about 3 weeks too late to be considered
“magical” in my opinion (as I've already mentioned on facebook)… but I’m still
grateful for every snowflake.I’ve been
waiting for what seems like months for an actual feeling of winter to finally
arrive.The extended fall weather was
just making everything wet and brown, despite that this has been a pretty dry
winter for the lower mainland (very little rain at all in the month of
December).
Maybe it’s just nostalgia for the snow heavy winter
months of my youth in the prairies that’s making me want to see more, maybe it’s
a desire to run out and make snow angels and have a snow ball fight, maybe it’s
just nice to see the fresh clean blanket of snow instead of the wet, brown
gardens… this first snowfall is very
welcome in my life.
I made a quick video of a stroll in the area this
morning.Not my best work, but I played
with some sepia tones, tried to give it an old-timey feel (so I apologize for
unintentional blurriness… but some of it was intentional nonetheless).And of course I set it to Carnival of the
Animals’ “The Swan” by Saint-Saens.Enjoy
I woke up early again that following Sunday,
letting Cheryl sleep in since I wasn’t as confident as I was the day
before.Maybe we’d catcher her, maybe
the trap would work, maybe we wouldn’t have interference from other
neighbourhood cats… or maybe I’d be standing at the doorway watching shadows for
4 hours again.As per the routine, I
filled the food bowl (adding some wet cat food on top for irresistible
yumminess), put the food in the trap, set the trap outside my door and called to
the Little Ninja.And I waited.She never did eat the day before so she must
have been starving.I was hoping this
wouldn’t be a long wait
After ten minutes I finally saw her run right by…
like she didn’t even see the food, like she had better things to do than to
finally eat.And again I waited.Impatiently, I called “Pretty Girl” again
thinking she’d try to come to the food once more.No luck.After 30 minutes, I decided to take a walk around the block to see if I
could find her.No sign.I then decided to go for drive.I had caught her a couple times eating from
the dish as I drove up after work at the end of the day.I figured, maybe she wanted to be sure I was
away before she came close enough to the house to feed.Still nothing(Note: Leaving an active trap unattended for
20 minutes was not the best decision.I
don’t recommend trying that one.I
could’ve caught another cat, a squirrel, a raccoon or even a small
child).
After an hour, the sun was starting to rise and I
was pretty sure I had missed my chance.I looked for her again and saw her in the neighbour’s yard; she stared
right back at me.I would always try to
not look her in the eyes, apparently that’s a sign of aggression or
dominance.I didn’t need that mind game,
whenever I saw her I would look away immediately.I did the same here and quietly stepped away
from the fence.I was relieved to know
she was nearby, though.Instead of
leaving the trap by my door, I figured maybe she would prefer to eat someplace
more secluded and away from my prying eyes.I moved the trap just around the corner, right near the fence where she
would often perch.
Another 10 minutes passed with nothing happening at
all.I cranked up the laptop and was
just about to google again “how to attract a feral cat’ when the loudest,
metallic ‘ching-clang’ made me jump
up from the couch.I opened the door,
with a thick blanket in hand.And there
she was!In the trap!Of course she was freaked out and very vocal
and backing to the rear, away from me.I
put the thick blanket over the cage, hoping that might relax her a bit, might
make her more comfortable being confined.I quickly ran into the wake Cheryl up.She jumped out of bed and quickly got ready.I called the vet to give them a heads up we
were coming.Coats on.My heart pounding.Car started.Cat in the back seat, in the cage.And so by 7:20am on November 6th, we rescued the Little
Ninja.
It was hard to listen to her sad little mews from
the back seat, she was obviously stressed, and we hated doing that to her.As people, we could rationalize that is was
all for her sake, that it will be better, that we rescued her from a likely
death as winter approached and food wasn’t readily available.It’s really hard to explain all that to a
cat.
Nevertheless we went to the vet and had her checked
out.She seemed fine, if only a little
thin and weighing just 7 lbs.The blood
results that came back the following week were fine as well.A relatively healthy cat.As the vet gave her the once over, I was
surprised to see that she immediately tried to crawl into Cheryl’s arms and curl
up.She didn’t freak out or squirm like
I had imagined.She wasn’t as fearful or
people as I had first thought, she was just a little timid and perhaps just wary
of strangers.
We brought her home in the cat carrier that
Laura let us borrow (there was no way we’d get her into the trap for
transport).We put the carrier in the
room and left the door open, facing the food and facing a little nook Cheryl
whipped up (just in case she need a private place to hide).We knew it’d be a while before she’d come out
and interact and know that we weren’t there to hurt her… so she stayed in that
carrier for the first day.Cheryl was
the first the reach her hand in to pet the cat… and the Little Ninja seemed
perfectly happy with a rubdown from a disembodied hand.Eventually, she came out of the cage to eat.
And praise the heavens above, she was even
litter trained!!
Cheryl was actually quite a bit ill the following
two days and stayed home from work.I’m sure this was a blessing to both Cheryl
and the kitty.It provided some much
need bonding time and a chance for the kitty to explore her new home, to be
comfortable at home, and to not feel alone.The kitty spent a lot of it curled up with Cheryl on the bed, easily the
first time the kitty was warm in over a month.She seemed quite happy to have a new home.
At first we were going to call for Violet…
personally I like the name and liked the reference to the Series of Unfortunate
Events (which is what led this little kitty to end up in our home).Violet didn’t seem right though.It’s kinda hard to call out and it just
didn’t flow.
After some time, we settled on Charlie.Maybe as a shortened version of
Charlotte.We could even call her Chuck
if we so pleased (like Anna Friel in Pushing Daisies).I’ve always been a fan of boys names for
girls, like Charlie, Sidney, Frankie, or even Fred (a la Winifred).So it was decided, this little cat named
Charlie would become a newly adopted member of our family.
If you are ever wanting to help your own cat
settle down and become more at ease when at home,I wholly recommend Feliway (see photo
below).It comes in both a spray and a
plug-in diffuser, as over-precaution we got both.I’m pretty sure this is what helped Charlie
easily transition into becoming an indoor cat in a stranger’s home.It synthetically mimics the ‘scent’ or
pheromone that cats release when they rub their faces on things.It calms the kitty into believing that ‘this
is home’ and ‘this is safe’.Essentially
it’s an airborne anti-anxiety medication.Effects are noticeably with hours, but sometimes may take a week.After 3 months of the plug-in, your kitty
should be right as rain.If you are
having issues with spraying or peeing on things or anxiety, this stuff seems to
really work.There, that’s it for the
commercial ad (fyi, I wasn't paid to say this or anything... I just think this
stuff is a godsend for our situation).
As I soon discovered, getting your hands on a live
trap free of charge is a little more difficult that you would imagine.The trick was that we would need it for about
a week and this was also going to be a single-use endeavour.I mean, I’m hoping to not have to trap
another live animal in the near future... or ever.For best results, we needed a thoroughly
clean or uncontaminated trap.When an
animal gets caught, there’s usually a bit of pee or more importantly some type
of pheromone related to fear or stress.It’ll mark the cage as being unsafe.If little miss scaredy cat could ‘smell’ that something had been trapped
before, she would never go into it and of course we would never catch
her.
I called around to some of the local animal
shelters (specifically BCSPCA and the Vancouver Orphan Kitten Rescue
Association) assuming that they would have a plethora of traps…. and would be
gracious enough to lend them out.Nope.They had a limited supply
and needed to use them for their own means. That’s fair enough.I
also called around to some pest control agencies (knowing that the size of trap
I was looking for is intended for raccoons).I thought maybe they would let us borrow one (or rent for cheap)… just to
use their equipment instead of using their services.Annnd nope.Some would rent them out on a weekly basis for $200, which was a bit
steep for us at the time.Home Depot had
them for purchase (at $100) but they too did not “rent” them out like they do
with some of their other equipment.
Luckily, Cheryl made contact with a gentleman from
a local small pest control company, Green Valley Pest Control, I think.The guy she spoke with had an extra raccoon
trap that we could just simply borrow... for the week… no charge… in fact he’d
deliver it.Too good to be true?Nope, just an awesome helpful guy.The next Wednesday after work, voilà! a live trap was waiting by our
door.
As I mentioned previously, consistency was
the key to trapping anything, especially this little kitty.Once it knew when and where the food was
going to be, it would start to wait for it.At this point, the kitty would come in the morning to feed usually within
2 minutes after placing the dish outdoors and calling her (well, just calling
“pretty girl” since we didn’t know her name).Now that we had the trap, we had to starting by leaving it outdoors, with
the trap unset, door locked open (very important here), and the food
inside.I would need her to start going
into the cage to eat.She knew what the
food was, but now we had to present it within something new… but still make her
safe.I understood, we would need at
least three days for her to feel comfortable to eat from this cage… we were
going to try it in two (yeah, rebels, I know, huh?). Once we gave her this false sense of security
after a few days, we would obviously crush her spirits with this giant metal
trap…like a teenager after a breakup, she may never trust again.It was the only
way.
So right outside our door, the cage was left in the
morning with food inside Thursday and Friday.After calling her name and placed the dish, she came quite quickly the
first day.I stood in my usual position,
behind my kitchen table eating cereal and drinking coffee in the dark… with
barely a view of the cage where I was hoping the kitty would not see me.It
took her about 10 minutes of walking around the cage and smelling it, ten
minutes of waiting, ten minutes of determining if this cage was safe.Fortunately, hunger won and she eventually
went in.Friday morning, she did it in 2
minutes.
Note: We brought the trap back inside just before I
went to work, just in case the trap was stolen during the
day.
In the meantime, we had converted our second
bedroom into a kitty oasis where we can place the Little Ninja in order to help
acclimate to a life indoors.What used
to be (and had been for the last 3 years) a storage room wanting to be an
office, that room was totally cleaned out.Stuff went to second hand stores, other stuff was “dealt with”, even more
was shoved and configured to fit into our closets.Finally after 3 years, clean floor space was
exposed, closet doors could close, and our desk and bookshelves were accessible
again.But then we filled it up with
kitty litter, kitty food bowls, a climbing tower, and seating for us when we
wanted to try to bond with the Little Ninja.Cheryl even devised a little hidey-hole under the desk, where Ninja could
escape and feel comfortably hidden… just in case she needed more time to adjust
on her own.
Saturday was the big Kitty Trap Day we had
planned.We figured it would be an easy
start to the weekend just to continue the consistent pattern… I would get up at
5:30am, as usual, get the trap set and get the food ready.Cheryl would wake up and get ready (difficult
to do on a Saturday morning).We would
be fully dressed, jackets on, shoes on, wallet and keys in hand.By 6:10, kitty would try to eat.By 6:10:01, kitty would be caught.By 6:30am we would be at Atlas Animal
Hospital, the only 24hour vet clinic we knew about.Within hours, we would be home and warm again
with a kitty in our laps.Seemed simple
enough… but “best laid plans” and all that, I guess.
Yes, the food was in the cage.Yes, the cage was set.Yes, the house was dark and I sat watching
the cage with eerie suspense.But no,
the Little Ninja did not take the bait.Maybe she sensed my anxiety, my tension… like how dogs seem to feel that
‘energy’ kinda.After 10 minutes, I did
spot a black shadow walk by the cage… but she did not go in.After 30 minutes, I was a bit hopeful, so I
was going to the back room to check online for the Atlas clinic’s phone
number.While I was in the back, Cheryl
called to me.The kitty had gone to the
cage entrance, she had stepped inside, may have touched the food (hard to tell
in the dark), but did not set off the
trap… and she ran away very quickly.Maybe she knew it was a trap, maybe not… either way, this was going
through my head for the next 3 hours:
For the next hour, I stood by the kitchen table
watching the cage outside.Cheryl laid
down on the couch a few feet away, wearing her jacket and shoes.Our lights were still off, it was dark
outside, and I couldn’t tell the difference anymore between shadows, leaves
flying about, or an actual pure black kitty.My eyes were playing tricks on me.
After an hour, Cheryl went back to bed to wait (she
never did fall back to sleep, though).Out of sheer persistence and bull-headedness, I couldn’t move.I stood guard for 3 hours, barely moving,
watching the cage, drinking coffee after coffee, seeing no further signs … but
eventually seeing the sun rise.At one
point, I went for a walk around the block to find the kitty.I spotted her down the block, sitting under a
tree next to the school.Odd place since
I have never seen her beyond our yard and the yard of our
neighbours.
By 10 o’clock, Cheryl came back out of the
bedroom.As if on cue, Ani, the cat from
upstairs, came scratching at out back door… like she has every weekend for
years.I jumped outside and grabbed the
trap… hoping Ani wouldn’t set it off accidentally.She was never really food-oriented anyhow, so
there shouldn’t have been such a fear.Ani came in and we played a bit before she went back out to explore.With Ani loose and defending her territory,
with no new sign of the Ninja, and with the cage back indoors… the Trap Day was
aborted.Discouraged and a bit defeated,
we were uncertain if this would even work.
~~ ~~
The next chance would be to catch her at her
evening feeding time.We witnessed her
eating a couple times after I came home from work, so we figured we’d try again
at 5:00pm… just hoping it’d work.We
went about our usual Saturday, with shopping and groceries and a little drive
around town to collect everything else we needed for our second room/kitty
oasis.By 2pm, we were home again.I took a peak ‘round the corner and saw the
Little Ninja on the fence between the 2 houses.This was her usual perch where she could be “safe”, but was commonly
harassed by Ani and Saffi from the deck upstairs (and just a few feet
away).Those upstairs cats were pretty
good about defining their territory, and this poor little black kitty rightfully
didn’t belong.
Knowing the cat was out, I thought that this’d be
good chance to try to feed her (and trap her).So out came the cage and the food.I called her name…. and would see if nature would take its course.But within a minute, freakin’ Wex shows up
instead!Out of nowhere!This hungry, food driven, white cat would
definitely set off the trap and ruin to whole deal.I quickly jumped out again and chased Wex
away (see previous post about the Wex story)
After a couple more minutes, I tried the trap
again.Called the kitty.And now Ani walks by again!So again, I brought the cage back in and
tried to chase Ani away.
Another 15 minutes later, I walk around to house
and I don’t see the kitty… and better yet, no sign of any cat.Hopefully Wex had gone home, hopefully Ani
was having adventures further down the road… hopefully the Little Ninja was
hungry.So out comes the cage…
again.I could see the black kitty
sitting on the fence now… but what I didn’t see was Ani on the deck above giving
her the ol’ staredown.Obviously the
Little Ninja wasn’t going anywhere.I
brought the cage closer…,and freakin’ Wex shows up again!Seriously, it was like the Benny Hill theme
should have been played.With these 2
other guys hanging around, with me jumping in and out of the house, with the
cage rattling it’s way in & out of our yard, the Little Ninja wasn’t going
to try anything at all.
I gave up.
I would have to wait until the next morning and try
this all again.
