Catnip Crafts

As you may have guessed, I'm borderline obsessed with my two cats, Chandler and Whitey Ford. They're such an active part of our little family! I send their "grandmaggie" (my mom) pictures of them every day, doing things that I'm sure signal their obvious genius, but to others probably just look like cats being cats. I think they're brilliant (it's true, they are.).

Anywho, when they were babies, Miles and I bought them little catnip toys shaped like fruit. Whitey adopted the bananas and Chandler, the strawberry. There's also a cherry-at-large, which gets passed around. They can entertain themselves for HOURS with this fruit. It's adorable. Unfortunately, one day tragedy struck.

I sucked up the strawberry in the vacuum cleaner.

I spent a half an hour rooting through the very full bag looking for Chandler's baby with him by my side. Short of dumping the dirt out in the kitchen, I realized I would not find the toy, and even if I did, it would be so dusty that it would probably choke him. I felt like my mom must have felt when she left my sister's blanket, Fuzzy B, at McDonald's and it got thrown away. I searched high and low across three states for replacement catnip strawberries, but they had been discontinued (damn you, Petco!). Chandler adopted the cherries, but you could tell he just didn't feel the same about them. Then, to top it all off, when we moved the cats across the country two weeks ago, I LEFT THE STUPID CHERRIES IN CALIFORNIA. Poor Chan just can't catch a break! So, to make up for my shortcomings, I decided to make him his very own strawberry. Plus, this one would be made in South Carolina, not China, so I wouldn't have to worry that it was dipped in formaldehyde, which isn't so good for cats. Or people.

Whitey was pretty jealous of the strawberry, so I made him a jalapeno.

Chan playing with the jalapeno...

Whitey, molesting the strawberry (Whitey has a tongue to match 70 grit sandpaper, so the strawberry is in rough shape right now. I'm investigating ways to make it sturdier, because at this rate, the strawberry will be demolished in about 18 hours...)

Not bad, right?? Maybe I could have a cat toy side business. I'd call it "Fuzzy Drumsticks and the Chan Chan Man"! (that's also the name of the children's book I'm planning on writing, but that's another post).

On the Road

Greetings from somewhere in Arizona... For those of you who don't know, we are undergoing a de-feathering of the nest. In fact, the nest is moving to Brooklyn! It's quite exciting. Not quite as exciting as a road trip with two cats, but exciting nonetheless. Speaking of road trips, you haven't lived until you've driven across the desert with two cats. Whitey Ford was brave enough to use the kitty litter pan while in motion. Out of respect for his privacy, I'll refrain from posting the picture of it. You'll have to take my word for it that it was priceless.

Instead of devasting my cat's dignity, I'll leave you with a photo of a very cool Dairy Queen we stopped at in Holbrook, AZ. Very retro- take a look:



Taken with the hipstamatic iPhone app- another find!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:Holbrook,United States

Finally! Eastern Columbia follow-up.

My posts have been long-delayed, dear readers, and for that, I am sorry. I'm actually in the process of un-feathering my nest-- more on that later. In the meantime, please feast your eyes on the interiors of the ECB in downtown Los Angeles. Kelly Wearstler did the interior design.

These elevator doors are original to the building; the motif on them is exactly the same as the design on the elevator doors in the Chrysler Building in New York, except the Chrysler doors are inlaid wood instead of mirror. I was very excited to realize that as I was doing research for my historical analysis paper. I felt like an intrepid discoverer.