davejenbarnes » cats

Friday and Saturday

Jennifer — Sun, 09 Jan 2011 06:18:06 +0000

True. I missed posting a day (or two, it’s now after midnight) but a big editing job landed in my lap (2500+ from a wedding to edit for another photog) and I’ve been busy with other photos in a different catalog in Lightroom from my personal shots. Alas. Friday. Hectic. Blurry. Loud. and Saturday, showing off my new chair. No, the cat didn’t destroy it; it came like that for cheaps. I’ll probably spend some time later this year recovering it.

1/200th sec • f/1.8 • ISO 100 • EF 50mm f/1.4 USM

32″ shoot-through on a light stand, cybersyncs • 1/125th sec • f/8.0 • ISO 100 • 28mm

Samba in the Sunshine

Jennifer — Mon, 06 Aug 2007 12:48:11 +0000

Well, or Samba in the Partly Cloudy.

Last night I asked David if he’d locked the front door (like I do every night in bed before we drift off to sleep) and he grunted an affirmative reply. I didn’t think anything of it until Lowell woke me up at 6:30 this morning and the front door was ajar with Samba on the front step.

I knew she’d run from me (as she and I do not and really never did get along with one another) so I zipped back to the bedroom and told Dave, “Get dressed. Door open. Cats outside.” Samba loves David and usually wouldn’t run from him. Plus Lowell was, at this point, screaming and needed some kind of attention so I went into his room to nurse him.

Well, so Samba is now outside somewhere. She ran. FAST. Mambo was caught by David and brought back inside, but Samba ran. We’ll keep our eyes out for her, and David is already making multiple trips outside to try to spot her.

Oh, and for those SPCA police (spies? workers?) This was truly an accident.

Happy Birthday!

Dave — Sat, 16 Apr 2005 04:20:54 +0000

oh the humiliation, uploaded by davejenbarnes.

Today is Mambo’s 3rd birthday. He’s the man!

these are the busy days

Jennifer — Sun, 31 Oct 2004 21:34:47 +0000

David and I have both been extremely busy lately… with band stuff. Saturday was the middle school district competition and next Saturday is the region competition. I like judging because I judge my lesson kiddos and get to take comments on their performances. Plus, since I’m not a band director, I get paid. Also in the band world is marching, and we will be travelling to the state marching band competition this coming week. I bought some 800 ISO film to try and capture some good zoom pictures of the event. Not professional quality pictures, but just from my viewpoint pictures.

Today we discovered that our kitty tower was infested with ants. We have fed them from up there for a couple of years now and the ants finally found all the kitty food. So now the cats are fed in the kitchen. It doesn’t help that both cats are constantly leaving half-digested-food-hair-balls around every other day. We are trying to ween them over to the Science Diet Hairball catfood. We hope it works with our two hairy hairball hocking kittys.

That’s about all we’re up to these days. The bedroom smells like ant killer spray, the laundry needs to be done, and the groceries need to be put away so we’ll catch y’all later.

A Funny Idea

Jennifer — Fri, 06 Aug 2004 04:30:11 +0000

Courtesy the teenagers who play bass clarinet at Cedar Park High School who I had the honor of spending my afternoon with:

I was scrounging through the folder of “stand tunes” — tunes a high school marching band plays whilst standing in the stands — and I came across Speak Up Mambo, which I mentioned last night on this blog for being the inspiration for the name of our large, formally dressed, floppy butler, Mambo. Of course, some of the students had already heard this story because every time I see that song, I tell whoever I am around that THAT is the song my CAT was named after! So when I hold up the score to it and start to say, “Hey! Speak Up Mambo! This is the song my cat…” they ended my sentence, “yeah, was named after, WE KNOW ALREADY!!!” This got them started and one of them, (Chris, for Manuel, who I know is reading this) says, “Hey, Mrs. Barnes, when you have kids, you should name your first born Speak Up.” They then proceeded as a group to come up with some crazy classroom situations in which that name would be funny. I couldn’t control myself and I did end up laughing. I hate laughing in front of students when you’re trying to keep them quiet! Especially when something strikes you as being totally hilarious. But Speak Up Barnes is simply a funny name… Reminds me of the man named Spider Web that we met in Virginia!

I guess typing about it now… I can’t capture the funniness of it all, but I tried.

What's In A Name?

Jennifer — Thu, 05 Aug 2004 01:54:08 +0000

I am sitting here tonight with one hot kitty on my lap. That would be Samba. Funny how one is a lap cat when you’re not busy and the other is a lap cat when you are. Mambo’s the busy cat and Samba is the not busy cat, and since typing on a weblog generally means that you are indeed not busy, Samba is the one here now. She’s my little Purr-Purr.

Nicknames for cats are funny. Take Mambo, for instance. We originally came up with the name driving back from the rest of the world on highway 755, around Santa Elena on our way back to Rio Grande City, where we were living. We were all talked out, as a couple can get on an 8-10 hour drive, so we discussed the possiblity of pets. Cats were decidedly better for apartment living. We wanted a male and female cat, so we talked about names, naturally… much as an expecting couple (or even one who wants to be expecting) will discuss names for their future children. Well, the Roma band played a song during football season called Speak Up Mambo. It was an addictive song, especially since all the kids sang. With gusto. Con amor de la musica. This song always found its way into our minds when we least expected it. Like on a long drive. Anyhow, we decided that the boy cat would be named Mambo… naturally that led to a latin-dance-influenced name for the girl cat, so we settled on Samba. Hence the names of our cats: Mambo y Samba.

Once you have a cat, you quickly learn to mutate their name. I mean, the animals don’t respond to it anyhow… so why not have some fun and see what you can come up with? So one day I came home, walked in the door, and called out to Mambo (who is without a doubt our favorite), “Mambodilie-odilie!” which stuck for about two days before being truncated to just “Bodilie” (three syllables: BO-dill-ie” with the emphasis on the BO, of course)… From there we have only digressed… next was Mambo-jo… and the latest encarnation is Mambo-Tom-Bodilie-Jo-Barnes (which has a melody to it, but I won’t sing it here)… so it’s gotten longer for sure.

Samba has had the mis-fortune of getting stuck with the name Bidi or Bidilie as in Beady or Beadily… (work with me here, Bodilie… Bidilie). We don’t bestow the honor of messing with her name much because she is.. not the favorite cat.. I mean, she did bite me pretty bad (on the left pointer finger which EVERYBODY KNOWS is one of the most critical fingers for playing the clarinet since it is at the top of the instrument and seals THE MOST IMPORTANT KEY on the entire instrument!) which cost over $200 in bills for a visit to the clinic (for my finger) and antibiotics (also for my finger). The doctor was worried that the bite had gotten to the joint on my finger which would have been more expensive and more drugs. Alas, I hold no grudges (NO NOT ME–how could I EVER hold a grudge against a CAT?! <–note the use of sarcasm) well, I try not to anyhow. She’s also the more-annoying-shedding-all-over-the-world cat and sometimes it’s just hard to like something which produces all the nice-clothes-consuming never-again-will-we-ever-be-able-to-wear-black fuzz. sheesh.

(Mambo gets brushed (begs to be brushed) several times a day, so his hairs aren’t much of a problem.)

I am going to get the hotter-than-a-heating-pad cat off my lap and do something worthwhile — like sticky-roll all the fuzz off my black clothes.

my weekend

Jennifer — Mon, 24 May 2004 19:13:27 +0000

I started off the weekend pretty much alone. David had to go to the Region XVIII TMEA meeting at Pflugerville High School and then to lunch with the CPMS and GMS staffs and I had fun with Mambo and a camera. Who knew we have the MOST PHOTOGENIC CAT on Earth?!

On Sunday, we hung out with the Millers. We saw a turtle and Shrek 2 and Mark, Becky, and I (in the Nissan Maxim — it’s missing the “a” for Maxima) met Dave back at our place for Dave’s excellent pizza. (Dave headed home early to get a head start on the crust)

Collared attention

Jennifer — Fri, 19 Mar 2004 22:36:49 +0000

Mambo, our first and favorite fur-ball, has become a very affectionate and loving tuxedo-man. For the first year and a half we’ve had him, he’s been very tolerant and patient with us but never seeked any physical attention. Sure, he’d pretend to rub around your legs, but he never touched you. He would trot over when somebody was using the bathroom, but he would never ask to be on a lap. Now he’s the leg-rubbing-lap-sitting-purring-est cat! I owe it all to the strap around his throat! Yep, his collar! I simply do not feel safe with a screen door and cats especially all on the first floor in Austin, Texas, where the March weather is too nice not to invite inside. So, the cats began wearing their collars faithfully about two weeks ago and now ask us faithfully every chance they get to remove those itchy, noisy, blasted collars by rubbing, purring, and generally “begging” us with those eyes that are so cute.

a scaredy cat

Jennifer — Wed, 17 Mar 2004 18:07:48 +0000

Samba got out today… she ran through the screen door, but didn’t hurt it; she just knocked it off its tracks. Samba is a real ‘fraidy cat, in the truest sense of the phrase. The slightest thing causes her to go nuts… today it was David blowing his nose in a Puffs Plus tissue and she happened to be sitting in front of the screen door. Once outside, she didn’t go very far and David was able to “scare” her back onto the patio (when afraid, she will go where she knows it is safe and in this case, it was back towards the apartment) where he was then able to get her to eat a treat out of his hand and grab her. There’s nothing like seeing your pet in an environment they’ve never been in before. It was scary!

Jennifer — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:50:46 +0000

It’s a little later in the day, and I found the smartcard cable so I uploaded a picture of Mambo amongst the packing whirlwind:

enjoy!