Hi Again, Everyone,

Sorry I haven't been back to thank you for your kind replies; been dealing with people health issues in my family. All is making its way back to "well" now, however, and so I wanted to post a picture of "My Boys."

I don't currently have pictures of the dogs; they're very much so more my father's lads than they are mine; but the cats... ah, the cats!



This is Jordan... also called "Jord," "Jordy", "LaRue" and "Monster" Think of badly-dubbed Japanese science fiction movies to get an idea of how I pronounce that last. At the moment, he's getting over a tapeworm infestation... but then again, he could afford to lose the weight: when he came to live with us, he weighed almost 17 pounds! Now, he's around 15 pounds, which is much closer to an ideal weight for him.

Jordan is a gentle soul who puts up with the now-40 lb.-"puppy" (that would be Bucky, the Hellaciously-Hyper Australian Cattle Hound) way too often, though that is changing. In typical catly fashion, Jordan loves the highest places in the house he can find: the table and kitchen counters, from which he's always being evicted; my chest-of-drawers, the top of the television cabinet. He hasn't found a way to get to the top of the built-in bookcase, but he still occasionally works on it.





This was my Buzzsaw... also called "Buzz," "Buzzy," "La Boo," and simply "Boy." We lost him to a heart problem this October past, and I my heart is still in pieces over it. Buzz became part of his former owner's household when, at around two months old, he followed Jordan home and refused to leave.

Though his eyes looked normal, Buzzy was essentially blind. All cats are somewhat farsighted, I'm told... but Buzzy would walk into things. Like doors and plant stands. Not surprisingly, he believed profoundly in ambling. He thought the sun and moon rose and set with Jordan; Jordy, in turn, would often let Buzzy eat first, like a mama cat will with a kitty. Buzz was also Jordan's cleaning service: he would literally lick the poor guy until his fur was soaked, given the chance!

When Buzz and Jordan came to us, Buzz was pretty traumatized: after years of being inside-at-night cats, their owner took to being frequently out of town, at which time they became outside-all-the-time cats (I lived 45 minutes away from their home in Sacramento). Jordan could hold his own without any trouble, but with his small size and bad sight, Buzz didn't fare so well. The many other neighborhood cats would push him aside or beat him up before he could get any food, unless Jordan was there to back him up. By the time he came to live with us, Buzzy was little more than skin and bones, and very, very shy. A full year passed before he would let anyone but me touch him.

As much as Jordan and I miss Buzz (he always put up with me picking him up and holding him like a baby, at least for a little bit), I'm proud to say that, by the time he left us, he'd learned to smile. I have a picture where it literally looks like a catly Mona Lisa.

He, in turn, showed us that cats really can sleep anywhere!

Okay. Well. Sorry. I ran a little long. But I did want to share a bit about my boys. We're kind of sort of looking for a new cat; I think Jord really misses not having a buddy to hang out with. But the Hyper-Dog from hell makes me leery of bringing a new, ideally grown, cat into the house, both for the cat's sake and Bucky's.

If, however, Jordan sees fit to bring a new kitty home, I will not object.