A Home for Oscar

Our big news of the week this week is that Oscar, our feral cat, now has a home. I don't know if there is anyone out there that is not familiar with Oscar, but just in case I will remind you that Oscar is our very fussy, demanding and picky feral cat that we've been feeding - to his exacting demands - for about four years. We can't touch him, and we're only allowed within about 5 feet of him. A couple of years ago we did manage to trap Oscar, and we had him "tutored" and vaccinated. I predict that is the last time we ever trap Oscar.

My ongoing concern for Oscar each year is him having appropriate shelter when it is warm. When he's not hanging out on one of our porches we most often see him at our very back barn in the hay. Jason assures me that being squeezed in amongst several semi-loads of hay is a very warm place. We've gone back and forth for three years now about Oscar's cold weather needs. I have campaigned for a heated cat bed for two years. Jason has claimed he isn't burning down our house for a feral cat for two years.

As with most things in life persistence pays off. Jason finally relented, or just got tired of having the same conversation over and over and over and over. We purchased Oscar a heated cat house last week, and it arrived yesterday. Jason assembled Oscar's new home, set it on the front porch, and plugged it in. I have to say it is cozy in there.

Now the big discussion centers around the obvious, will Oscar actually go in the house and use it? It does have both a front and a back entrance to help avoid the trapped feeling as it's designed for feral cats. The entrances do have soft, clear plastic flaps that must be pushed in to enter and exit. We taped up the flap to the front entrance so that Oscar doesn't have to work so hard to enter his house, and to encourage him to actually go in.

At this point, after 24 hours of availability, Oscar has yet to enter his house. Today we have been feeding him his food right in front of the house to encourage him to approach it and be comfortable around it. Jason is positively gloating over the fact that Oscar hasn't gone in the house, and in fact may never go in it.

The betting pool is open, so place your bets.

Oscar's heated cat house ready and waiting for him

Oscar

Timbit was getting his beauty sleep . . . 

. . . until his frenemy Ewen came along and disturbed him

Lily

Norman, Renatta and Cuffie

Norman's latest girlfriend appears to be Renatta; apparently Norman still has all the moves

Dawn and MyLight

Apollo and Thomas

Convey and Trigger

Cisco was a wild man; first he played with Hemi

then Cisco played with Levendi

and then Cisco played with Homer

Tis the Season

I don't know what the correlation is between horse medication and Christmas shopping, but as I texted some refills to our vet at lunchtime today I randomly had the thought that it was December 6th and I had not done any Christmas shipping. Well, that's not entirely accurate, I've done most of Carter's Christmas shopping. However, anyone else that might be on the list to get a Christmas present from me, it's not looking too good right now. Sorry Jason.

On the topic of Christmas and the holidays, I did manage to put up all of our stockings and we do have our tree up and decorated. Our tree looks a little bit like the Charlie Brown Christmas tree since we're down a lot of ornaments after our cat Jingle took down our tree and broke it in half last year. Jason seemed a bit miffed as Carter and I hung up the stockings. We have stockings for me, Carter and Jason, and of course the World's Cutest Fainting Goats, and Oscar the feral cat, and Jingle and Joy the house cats, and Ewen the dog, my horse Bonnie, Timbit the worst pony ever, and Sparky the best donkey ever. That gives us a total of 13 stockings.

Jason: That seems to be an excessive number of stockings

Me:  Why?

Jason:  There's 3 of us and 13 stockings

Me: Well of course the pets have stockings

Jason:  I feel like 10 pets is excessive

Me:  We have more than 10 pets, I never made stockings for the pet cows

Jason:  I feel that 13 pets is extremely excessive

Me:  Why? I don't understand this. My parents, sister and I had way more than 13 pets at Windy Hills Farm

Jason: (getting grumpier by the second) But that's not normal. No one has that many pets. Normal people don't have that many pets! (this last part was spoken with conviction)

Me:  I like being abnormal

Jason:  Oscar doesn't even count as a pet. We can't even touch him!

Me:  Oscar has clearly chosen us as his family. I get that we can't touch him or get closer than about 3 feet away, but he's only been around what, four years now? He just needs more time.

Jason:  Silence (a good choice when you realize the conversation is going nowhere)

And that's what the holiday season is like at the Webb house. Now I need to find some time to make a list of people I need to shop for, figure out gifts, and hope they are all eligible for Prime shipping on Amazon.

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Merlin and Duesy

Cocomo and Asterik

Flyer

Lotus, Gus and Romeo

Gibson and Silver

Lofty and George

Lightning and Havana

I couldn't get Ripley, Walon or Wilson to lift their heads for a picture . . . 

. . . I finally got a couple of annoyed looks

Calimba, MyLight and Maisie

Digby doing his best to convince Paramount to play

Digby says, "fine, I'll just stick my tongue out at you"

Trigger and Revy

Sunday Stills

Toledo and Donovan playing

Roho, Toledo and River

Blu and Johnny playing

the daily afternoon charge to come eat; Walden always leads the pack and here he is followed by Fabrizzio (who is claiming his space in the lin-up, Baner, Hesse, Bruno and Remmy. Havana also makes an appearance in the next picture

Romeo and Lotus

Baby and Apollo

King, Trigger and Cisco

Sabrina being annoyed by Timbit while she eats

the blankets all came out for the first time yesterday; Dawn with Dolly in the background

Renatta and Charlotte

Rip

Sam, Lighty and  Mick . . . 

. . . a closer look at Sam and Lighty . . . 

. . . and a closer look at Mick

Rain

Although rain might not seem like an exciting topic, it is a very thrilling one for us. Our area is in the midst of a terrible drought, and for the last 90 days alone we are at a rain deficit of 11 inches. We had gotten into a pattern where every time we had measurable precipitation in our forecast everyone got very excited, we would watch the system move towards us on the radar, and then ultimately watch all of the rain disappear before it reached our area. Thus we had gotten to the point where we didn't even get excited about rain in the forecast anymore since it never actually materialized. 

We had rain in our forecast for Monday evening and again for Tuesday evening, with the potential for up to three inches of rain. In a strange reversal of roles I was the pessimist, and Jason was convinced that this time it was actually going to rain. Jason was right. Between our two rain events we got about 2.5 inches of rain. Since we've had less than an inch of rain over the last 3.5 months we were ecstatic. I had forgotten how pleasant a steady rain on a metal could sound. 

The horses were equally ecstatic. After a long stretch with no mud, and not even any wet dirt, there was a lot of rolling, splashing in puddles, and general cavorting. The ground was so hard that at first we had a lot of puddles, but 24 hours after it stopped raining the ground is so dry it has absorbed most of the water like a sponge. I was even seeing isolated spots of dust this afternoon.  Hopefully this is the beginning of the end of our drought. 

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Romeo and Gibson having fun

Miel and Mick

Bruno and Merlin

River

Walon

Wilson and Donovan

Trigger and King

Cisco and Moe

Duesy, Baner, Remmy and Merlin