The Adventures of Charlie and Mochi

Don't forget! Charlie and Mochi now have their own Facebook page! If you haven't already 'liked' it, click here for all the mustachioed cat and underbite-faced dog action you could possibly desire!

Bay Area Renaissance Festival 2014

Yesterday I went, with my father and brother, to the Bay Area Renaissance Festival in Tampa. We went together last year, although apparently I didn't blog about it. Last year, I discovered (and rather fell in love with) Sirena, the best act of the faire in my opinion. They put on a performance within five minutes of our arrival at the faire, and it was excellent. Seriously, they were the main reason I wanted to attend and their performance alone was worth the price of admission. I took a bunch of photos of them, as well as a few short video clips (below) - if you like that sort of thing, I definitely recommend buying their albums.

Sirena might have been my favorite performance, but they weren't the only one I enjoyed. Below are a few photos and videos from other acts that I enjoyed:
Crannog
Crannog
Crannog
The Bawdy Boys
The Bawdy Boys
Demzarah Gypsies
Demzarah Gypsies
Of course, one of the best things about any renfaire is the opportunity for people watching:



My brother and I
My brother in the stocks.
I like posing with trees.
Lastly, remember Molly, the Christmas Puppy that my dad adopted? She's gotten a lot bigger! She's full of energy and incredibly sweet.
Watch Molly playing :-)

Cat Lady Spring Break

The first week of March was Spring Break at the university where I both study and teach. It's a bit early for Spring Break, in my opinion, although perhaps The Powers That Be felt that we Floridians should be given our Spring Break before the college-aged masses from across the country descend on our state later in the month. Who knows. It had been t-shirt weather here in Orlando for the last two weeks of February, so when I started packing for my trip to southeast Georgia, I initially only threw t-shirts into my suitcase. I added a couple of sweaters as an afterthought, and it's a good thing I did as it was pretty cold the entire time I was there - and rainy most of the time I was there. As such, I spent a lot of my Spring Break huddling under the covers with my animals, keeping warm and dry. I didn't really do a damn thing blog-worthy, although I did take a good number of animal photos, especially on the dry days. Let's start with the dogs:

Wolfie is a little obsessed with his food bowl. He continually prances around with the damn thing, all the while looking incredibly proud of himself. Below is a video of Wolfie showing off his bowl-carrying skills.


I was going to take a cute photo of Viktor... then he did this.
Nadya now must be kept on a running tether at all times, because otherwise she gets loose and runs around the neighborhood. As she's one of the three cat-killers, we really cannot have her getting loose. She doesn't seem to mind the tether, though. It's pretty long, and she's still in the yard with Viktor and Kali.
Kali: Fat, lazy, adorable, shy, sweet, and occasionally kills cats. Sigh.
I swear Brin gets greyer every time I see him.
This is not our dog. She has apparently been running free through mom's neighborhood for the past couple of weeks - although she's not thin at all (and turned up her nose at a bowl of food), so she must have a home somewhere. Unfortunately, mom's dogs go nuts when she shows up. Brin even attacked her on Friday... perhaps after that she'll stay closer to her home.
Mochi being his adorable self, with Bagira in the background
My mom really didn't want me to post this, but is is seriously one of the most adorable photos ever, in my opinion. And it works well for a transition from dogs to cats.
This is Stranger. He showed up out at mom's land back in January. And by "showed up" I suspect I actually mean "was dumped" - he's a full grown male, but young. Super friendly.
He loves to roll over.
Watch Stranger in action:

This is Buddy. He was trapped as an adult feral cat in 2009. He didn't start allowing humans to pet him until January of this year.... and he has discovered that he loves it! Although if you watch the video below, you'll see his feralness rear its head (or its claws!) a few times. You can also clearly hear him purring :-)


Charlie, being all ladylike.

Bagira, who is always ladylike.

Echo, our oldest cat. We found her as a kitten in 2002.
And now for some rainy photos to show you what most of my Spring Break was like:
Merlin

In the distance you can see one of the kitties (Solly, I think)
Honey, Merlin, and Solly

State of the Charlie/Mochi Union

Charlie and Mochi now have their own Facebook page! For those of you who enjoy seeing pictures and videos of these ridiculous looking lovable beasts, click here or on the image below to check it out - and don't forget to like the page :-)

PLEASE HELP! Dogs need adoption in southeast GA!

I’ve written at length (numerous times) about the problems of being one of the fairly small number of folks in Southeastern Georgia willing to take responsibility for animals no one else wants. My mother and I like dogs (I have Mochi; she has eight – and you may remember that we picked up six puppies in December), but we are cat people. Cat rescue is our thing. My mom has roughly 25 cats (all rescues, all spayed/neutered and vaccinated).

Cats and dogs do not always get along. Luckily Mochi is great with cats (I’m fairly certain he thinks he is a cat), and mom’s three indoor dogs (two little ones and one pit bull) are also great with cats. The dogs in mom’s backyard, however, are cat-killers. Specifically Kali, Viktor, and Nadya. It’s not their fault. They were all full grown when we found them. Kali and Nadya (found separately) were starving, and probably hunted whatever they could to survive. Viktor was most likely a lost/dumped hog-hunting dog, whom we found injured and on the side of the road in the absolute middle of nowhere. Whatever hunting instincts they had when we rescued them were already fixed into their brains. Mom has had Kali since 2009 and Viktor since 2012. During that time we have lost several cats to the backyard dogs. Most of the cats know not to venture near them. I picked up Nadya last New Year’s eve. We’ve lost two kittens in little more than a year, once they’ve gotten big enough to venture out the cat window. Kittens who didn’t know that the backyard dogs were not friendly like the indoor dogs. We lost little Sunshine today. It was probably Kali that got her (apparently she had a scratch to the face), although we don’t know for sure.

Rest in peace, poor, sweet Sunshine.

WOULD ANYONE BE INTERESTED IN ADOPTING A DOG? (Or if you're a dog rescuer with some cats that don't fit in at your place, would you be interested in trading?)

Perhaps this isn’t the best way to introduce the question of adopting these dogs… But we really need to find homes for them. We’ve wanted to find homes for them ever since we found them, but they’re not the easiest to place (especially Kali and Viktor). Viktor and Kali couldn’t go to anyone with cats or small dogs. Viktor can’t go to anyone with male dogs (he’s viciously aggressive against male dogs), and Kali has in the past been aggressive towards female dogs. However, they get along great with each other. I wouldn’t want them to go to someone with little kids. They’re not aggressive towards humans at all (they’re quite friendly), but they might view a small child in the same way they view cats and small dogs and I wouldn’t want to take that chance. What they need is someone with a fenced in yard, no small children, and no other animals that might wander into said yard. They are both very sweet and love attention. Kali is actually passive aggressive; when you try to put her in her kennel, she will often roll over on her back and refuse to budge until her belly is rubbed to her satisfaction. Nadya is incredibly sweet, and could go to anyone with a good fenced in yard and no cats. (She's great with small dogs.) I’m sure she’d also LOVE to be a house dog.

Viktor

Viktor

Kali

Kali

Nadya

I’ve mentioned before that my mom is 69 years old and lives alone. She has about 25 cats, in addition to the eight dogs. If I get offered a job in the US, I will take Viktor and Kali off her hands, but my future is (as I mentioned in my previous post) rather up in the air. I might be living in the US after I finish my Master’s program, but I just as easily might be living somewhere like Kyrgyzstan. (This also, of course, depends on me being able to live somewhere where I could have large dogs. For example, I would not be allowed to have them in the place that I am currently renting.) Additionally, right now half of my mom’s cats live out at her land (where there are no dogs). When she moves out to her land (once the house is finished; probably in June) she will be bringing the eight dogs out to the land. While she plans to have dog ‘yards’ out there as she does at her current location, there are about 15 cats out at her land who have only ever met Brin, the cat-friendly pit bull, and who are used to having free reign across all her of her land. She is terrified of what might happen to her cats if she brings Viktor, Kali, and Nadya out there, and so am I.

These dogs are cat-killers, through no fault of their own. We took these dogs in because they were abandoned and mistreated, although since we are cat people, it is proving quite a heartbreaking hardship. If anyone is interested in adopting them (or knows someone who might be), please leave me a comment and let me know. All three are fixed, have had their shots, and are on heartworm preventative. Please share this post and help me get the word out. 

Showing my Floridian roots.

I took Mochi for a walk down along the Little Econ Greenway yesterday. The high was 52F. I wore a couple of sweaters, and this is how Mochi was decked out:

Honestly, Mochi probably would have been just fine without the coat (having a built-in one and all), but here in Florida, I rarely get the chance to bust out my own winter wear, let alone the dog's. That's not to say that I'm feeling overly nostalgic for cold weather. I mean, I was excited when the polar vortex made it cold enough to actually wear my lovely little dark green riding hood coat a few times... but I am already ready for this Florida "winter" to be over and done with.

It really is a rich dark green and I am really not a funky shade of orange; the lighting in my bathroom is terrible. Also, I need to clean my mirror.
I'll be graduating with my MA in a few months, and as such have started looking for jobs. Given that I am looking for teaching positions, this isn't really the best time of year for job postings as most fall-starts aren't going to be listed for a few more months yet. Or at least that's what I tell myself. Last fall I submitted my application for a really good 1-2 year position overseas. There are a large number of positions available, so even though it's competitive, chances are good. Still, as I selected the former Soviet Union as the region to which I would like to be sent, I just keep thinking how cold it will be. So I've started applying for jobs in the southeastern US. (I figure I'll go with whichever good job offer contacts me first and let fate deal with the should-I-stay-or-should-I-go problem). There aren't many full-time positions in the ESL field if you're looking to stay out of the public school system, and I really am hoping that there will be more openings posted in a couple of months. Still, in the past couple of weeks I've applied for four jobs (three in Florida, one in Georgia), all of which would be good jobs (although two would be most excellent). I've found myself browsing real estate in the areas where these jobs are located. Real estate! Looking for jobs stateside? Browsing real estate ads? Longing for warmth? I seem to have gotten old overnight. Not that a job in the US would stop me from vacationing in places like, say, North Korea...

Doggie Deliveries

After the catastrophe with little Loki breaking his leg last Friday, I didn't think he would be going to his new home that weekend. I knew he would need a lot of follow-up care, but as I didn't know the people who had been planning to adopt him, I didn't know if they would be willing to provide all the necessary follow-up care. In fact, after my experiences in Georgia during December, I was fairly convinced that they wouldn't even want him.

My dad drove over to Orlando from Tampa last Saturday to collect Molly. Initially, she was terrified of him. As in she totally freaked out and pissed herself, then ran and hid, shaking, under the bed. She'd never shown any signs of being in the least frightened of me, my mother, or of Lois (the president of BARC who had administered their first vaccines), so this was quite a surprise. I suspect that she was mistreated by a man sometime before we found them. Luckily, she got over her initial fright very quickly.

That evening, I heard from the woman who had agreed to adopt Loki - she definitely still wanted him, despite his injury and the follow up care that he would need. Additionally, it turned out that her other dog only had three legs, so even if he never fully regained all use of his leg, he would fit right in. This was such a relief, and such an unexpected surprise. It's always reassuring to discover that there are folks out there who are willing to care as much for animals as I am. On Sunday, I drove Loki over to Clearwater, where I met his new family - human, canine, and feline. I miss the little guy, but he will have a blast over there, and I know they will take excellent care of him.

Since I was in the area, I stopped by my dad's to see how Molly was getting along. She was definitely racing around the house like she owned the place, snuggling with her new humans, and trying really hard to get the cats to play with her (they weren't so into it).

Molly and my brother

Here Molly's playing with Harley, a cat my dad adopted from me when I lived in GA in 2009.