Kitty Stuff

A few days ago while petting my cat Lynxie I found a small lump under his skin. I've heard such lumps can be serious, so I took him to the vet. He had the lump removed today, and it is being sent to a lab to analyze it to determine if it is malignant in a way that could threaten his health.

He is doing quite well after all this. The kitty already drank a ton of water and some food, and is becoming more coordinated by the minute. :)

Lynxie has to take antibiotics twice a day for a week; the first dose is tonight. Hopefully he won't mind being dosed. Knowing felines, though, he probably will mind, quite a bit.

Here's the damage:

Those are mean looking stitches, but they will eventually dissolve and fall out.

I'm a bit more relaxed now; anything that involved putting my cat under is going to make me nervous. I'm sure by tomorrow he'll be running and jumping and being his lovable brat self once again. :)

UPDATE 4/24/2008:

Stitches fell out only a few days after the above photos were taken, and now his scar is almost completely gone:

The biopsy came out benign as well. Isn't nature amazing?

There was an *opossum* eating out of the food bowl I leave for the neighborhood cats on the patio.

I shit you not. I didn't even know there were opossums around here. I also didn't know they like cat food. And I realize "pics or it didn't happen", but of course it was gone by the time I got my camera.

I guess leaving the food out overnight is going to be out of the question. I don't mind feeding the few neighborhood cats that come along, but I'd like to keep my charity confined to a single species.

This is the Disney Tails T-shirt that everyone always seems to love at cons.

Kitties!

It's gotten more attention than any T-shirt I've ever worn! At Anthrocon 2006 I was stopped about 20 times walking around by folks wanting to identify all the cats, and to a lesser extent the same at AC 2007 and MFF 2007.

I thought it was awesome when I got it but never expected that. :)

You need a fast computer to play this. A G5 or Intel-based Macintosh or a Pentium 4 3GHz or faster Windows (running Quicktime 7) or Linux (running mplayer) PC should be able to handle it.

It's more or less a test video as I play with the format, so no critiquing my cinematography. I borrowed a Canon HV20 camcorder from work and have been messing with it. It has a 24p mode, but iMovie HD can't work with 24p, so I shot this in 30i and deinterlaced it prior to compression.

I hope they add a 24p mode to iMovie HD soon; I hate interlacing. It's a damn evil concept and always makes video look odd on progressive displays.

Here it is. (71MB) Not bad for a sub-$1000 camera, hmm?

I finally got off my ass and moved Lynxie's picture archive to this machine. It no longer wastes nearly a gig of space on my employer's innocent disks.

Took two new photos yesterday with a borrowed Speedlite 430EX from work. I love this flash, and will proably be acquiring one for myself at some point. Being able to tilt the head backwards at a 45 degree angle for easy bounce-flash rocks.

So I'm late for work, but for an unconventional reason.

I start the car this morning, getting ready to leave and hear what sounds like thumping under the hood. Grumbling that something may be going wrong with my car, I pop the hood and check.

Sitting there mere inches from swirling belts is a gold tabby cat, staring at me terrified. I run full speed back into the car to cut ignition, then when I return the cat is no longer there.

I spend about 10 minutes peeking around every possible crevice and spot where a cat could hide in the engine compartment, and see nothing, then start the car and head to work.

A mere inch or two in a different direction and the poor kitty would have been shredded by spinning pulleys. The thumping sound was probably the cat trying to get out of there in desperation but unable to in the panic. Hopefully he learned his lesson (he's a youngster, looked a bit under 1yr old) and won't hide in engines anymore.

Sigh, at least I'm awake now.

Lynxie really doesn't like 9V batteries.

This is "rascal mode". All he wants is play play play. No petting, no affection, just pawpawbatbatnipbunnykickmewmew. Silly kitty.

Okay, I haven't annoyed everyone with talk about my cat in a while. So, for your enjoyment, here's videos of Lynxie doing what he does best: Uber-cuteness.

• Playing with my foot
• Grooming himself
• Sleepy-eyes! Awwww!
• Playing with a crumpled ball of paper pulled out of my new shoes

Who says cats aren't a riot? :)

This loveable kitten is up for adoption. If you're in South Florida (or are willing to drive there), consider bringing this bundle of cuteness into your life. She's incredibly playful and sweet, and is quite adorable too!

If you're interested, comment my journal; the owner of the kitten (who is not me; I just took the photos) will be reading.

Update 5/12/2006: We found someone to adopt her! I'm leaving this post up so you can awwww at the pictures some more, though. }:)