We’re less than a month away from our official launch! We have so many articles, stories, poems, and pictures to share with all of you fellow cat lovers. Julius will be contributing monthly reports from his empire, and there will be plenty of other content for everyone to enjoy. Stay tuned!
Cats & Language
I bet this isn’t a well known fact. Or at least it’s not thought of much. Those of us cats who live with or even near humans are bilingual. We have our own language that we use with each other. When that fails, we just get into fights. But when we need to talk to humans, we have to learn another language—the one the humans use.
So, those of us living near or even with humans know two languages. If we hear another human language, we don’t always understand it right away. We need time just as humans do to learn the new language.
I know my girl can understand we cats have our own language that we speak. She is a good one to stand back and let us talk to each other without interruption. She can’t understand what we are saying per se. I know because she didn’t always understand me whenever I talk to her. So, to compensate, I tended to repeat the same one syllable word until she understand.
I know she’s not stupid. She just has a hard time learning a language from just listening to it. My girl reads a lot. I’ll let her tell you about the sorts of things she has read in her life. Besides, she did learn to understand me. I just had to make it a little easier on her.
Oh, I did learn to say her name correctly, but usually I just call her “Al,” because it’s easier for me. We cats just don’t have the same vocal organs as you humans do. She knows when I’m calling her for something and that’s all that matters.
In Light of the GoFundMe Scam…
I’m not surprised we didn’t get more donations than we have. We’ve had none this month at all. I do know why. It’s because there aren’t enough people who know the staff and they aren’t sure if they can trust us. In this day and age, it’s perfectly understandable.
Recently, there were three people who used GoFundMe to raise money for a story they had made up. They are now in serious trouble. It’s not uncommon for people to scam others. I won’t go into the reasons why people scam others for money. But I will say when these things happen more frequently, it hurts all of us.
So, I’m not upset. There is another option that we already do to help raise money for cat charities. We have the book Cat Tales of the Frisky9 Scarf Army, which raises money for Dingo Venezia, a charity that helps cats in Venice, Italy and the surrounding islands. The book came about because I was interacting with the Cats of Twitter. They were behind the book every step of the way and I helped bring all their stories together. The ebook is still widely available. No money was spent on that project and it has raised US$435.04 and sold 62 copies. All that money has been sent to Dingo Venezia.
We are in the planning stages of another book about the Ambassacats of Twitter. They are led by Gladstone, a cat who came from a local shelter where he still lives, and now works in the treasury department in London, United Kingdom.
I know I’m looking forward to this project. There will be pictures and bios for each cat as there were in the other book. I’m sure Gladstone will want to talk about the Ambassacats and his life story as Frisky Le Rouge did in the book he was featured in.
So, if the only way we can raise money is by selling books, then we can do that. If this site cannot pay for itself before we have to renew the domain name, then we have another domain name we can use that is free. We will let you know if and when we need to make those changes.
Summary for November 2018:
no money in or out
over 400 hits on the blog
88 people get the posts emailed to them
13 people follow via WordPress
62 copies sold; US$435.04 raised for Dingo Venezia from Cat Tales of the Frisky9 Scarf Army
Memoirs Update
I never realized how hard it would be to write my own memoirs. I’m glad my girl is helping. She has experience as a writer and knows how to put this book into ebook form once it’s ready. I am very lucky to have met her.
Otherwise, I think I would be complaining how nothing is working out and have no idea of how to get this project done. As it is, she has been helping me with the structure. We have eliminated several pictures from the lot we started with. She has stressed to me that we can’t use them all because it would make the ebook too large to upload.
Very well, I don’t see why we need to use all the photos she’s taken of me over the years. But I’m still worried I won’t get my memoirs finished soon. I will do my best to be ready to start sharing episodes of my life’s adventures in January 2019. I do hope I have enough time to have at least one ready by then…
My girl tells me it’s alright. We have lots of material to work with now. It just needs to be edited. She even says we have time to do just that and finish working with the pictures.
Blizzard
What do you do when there are 8 inches of snow outside? Sit by the heating vent and let the humans shovel the driveway!
What Is This?
Hey, my girl, where did this picture come from?
My Boys’ Exercise Program
poem from Honoring the Cats in My Life
Yeah, I know my boys
sleep about 16 hours a day,
but they’re in great shape.
It’s simply because of their
exercise program.
I didn’t come up with it–
they created all themselves.
The Program:
daily yoga exercises
(after each and every nap)
cardiovascular workouts
(run around the house like mad for an hour)
climbing and jumping
(and knocking things down)
wrestling
(great way to relief tensions between themselves)
I tell you this program works.
They’re both in great health
and not overweight.
It’s safe to leave their food out
all the time.
I can’t say it’s dull to watch, either.
Mama’s Boy
poem from Honoring the Cats in My Life
Little Spot
came into our lives
as a little fur ball—
he could fit in one of
my hands.
He took to Sir Socks
immediately.
Looking up with
total adoration.
I had to give him
a bottle of milk
three times a day.
He’s no longer
a kitten,
no longer
an adolescent,
but an adult,
who’s still
as rambunctious
as a playful child.
Sometimes
waking me up
in the middle
of the night
knocking things
onto the floor.
Even when he
bolts outside
to play,
as other cats do,
he still loves
Sir Socks
and his mama.
He’s Growing on Me…
Without me, this kitten wouldn’t understand the first thing about being a cat.
Sir Socks Le Chat 