The Burmese are finally introduced

I have an interesting approach to filing, there is no logical dependable system. Oh at the time it seems rational enough, I'll file my cellphone account under Telephones for example. Yesterday I received a text message from my cellphone service provider saying they had duplicated charges during November and December. I remember thinking that it seemed high at the time and assumed it was the new applications I'd installed to download email and do a few other online things. I immediately uninstalled the applications and filed a mental note to trawl the technology sites to see if they had uncovered some devious new billing systems. The text message urges subscribers to audit their accounts to establish if they have been overcharged. I dutifully started the search for the account. No, not under T for Telephone, C for Cellphone, M for Mobile or T for Tax. It shall have to wait until the rationale of the filing moment returns. What I did find, however, was the file with the cat pictures - which reminded me that the Burmese had not yet been introduced. That, plus a midnight message from the border collie explaining why the video upload function was not working on the blog posts.

Burmese cats are perfect for people who aren't essentially cat people. They are generally warm and affectionate without the neediness of dogs. These two follow us around the garden and "call" us when they can't find us. If we are upstairs and they wake up from a nap they will come and find us, their voices becoming more strident as they move through the house. They sorted out our rat problem in a couple of days, even getting the wily old rat who regularly sacrificed young rats to the rat trap (I tell you what, you get that piece of food off that thing for grandpa and I'll share it with you, there's a good boy)

So meet the other kitties, the sisters Storm and Milkshake

This is when they first came to live with us, 8 years ago. It was quite a procedure to get them - involving personal interviews and a lot of money. We only wanted one, but when I caught Storm lapping up the introductory glass of wine I had to have her too.
Their papers show them to be of the highest pedigree, Milkshake (at the back) is a Chocolate Tortie-point Burmese and Storm is a Blue Tortie-Point Burmese. They come from a long, distinguished line of Best of Breed winners, a fact that doesn't impress Ming-Li in the least.
They are sisters (no, I don't know how that's possible - I shall check with the Scientist, perhaps it like eye colour?) and almost always cuddle like this. Useless fact of the day? All Tortoiseshell cats are females. Like common sense it is a gene exclusive to females.
We were only allowed to take them home when they reached six months, the breeder believed they needed some basic maturity before they left her safe environment. At the time I remember thinking that hospitals should consider this for human babies too.
Milkshake is never really called by that name unless she's in trouble - much like using all the given names of a child who hasn't picked up their clothes. We prefer Mongoose, Goose, Mongs or Meeslet. Given that she's a cat she is quite comfortable with this - not something you could do with a dog, obviously.

When we don't want her to know that we are talking about her we refer to her as the Ethiopian Hunting Cat. She is also an undercover cat. By that I mean that she sleeps under the duvet, tucked in next to me with her little chin on my arm. If I move she simply unsheathes a claw or two into the soft flesh there - works like a charm for her.

Storm, on the other hand, is not an undercover cat, scrabbling frantically to get out if we try and put her under the duvet. For the first couple of months when she came to live with us she slept on a pillow between us but now she and Ming-Li have an agreement about the real estate at the foot of the bed.

Storm is not this svelte anymore, her strategy is world-domination which requires her to eat all the food in the house in an attempt to get the other cats to leave.

Here she is with Ming-Li in her best position...totally relaxed

Upstairs
Storm is adventurous, she once disappeared for 10 days - causing us huge distress and returning in the middle of the night much slimmer than she was when she left. She may have been at a spa to lose weight, but we were all immensely grateful that she came back. Personally, I blame the dogs, they have issues with Storm. She has been known to bat them with a paw if they venture inside, and she loves to sit on the windowsill swearing at them, all cats believe dogs are beneath them.
The Burmese don't do tricks, there will be no videos of them rolling over, unfortunately. Storm does, however, have an invisible friend who she sometimes breakdances with. She also lurks in doorways so that she can leap out at Ming-Li and chase her down the passage. The Burmese are not elegant either, and if they try and walk across the dressing table in the dark I know it's them because they knock everything off.
We love them all, each with their own individual personality. Ming-Li, Storm and Milkshake have also taught Walter and I how to sleep in the "pretzel" position so that they can stretch out comfortably on the bed at night.

Walter

We have a great fondness for Jeff Dunham in our house, there has been a motion to re-name Brian after the cranky character Walter. Don't tell Brian

Walter

Meet the cats - in which I forget passwords.

I've been feeling bad about the cats, having written quite extensively about the dogs. I am a cat person after all, so it seems only fair that they should have some of the attention.

I should also say that Brian was not a cat person when I first met him. Oh, he had a cat alright, he had taken in a stray he felt sorry for. Her name was Squinty, she was the saddest cat you ever saw, quite shy and with no attitude at all. She also peed all over the hotplate - and eventually ran away to live with the vet (have you ever?)

Anyway, now that I have that out of my system.

I am a firm believer in having cats in odd numbers, you should have at least 3. As anyone who has seen Cats The Musical knows, you are fully entitled to change a cat's name. I have 3 girl cats - all very different in nature

I am also a bit of a sexist in cat ownership, having learned the hard way that boy cats tend to get into fights and pee everywhere to mark their territory (Squinty was a girl, but she was clearly traumatised, so it doesn't count)

Ming-Li is the "firstborn" of the family, she's dignified and aloof and has a king-sized bed in the master bedroom which she very kindly shares with us at night.Ming-Li's kitten name was Shenzi after my mother's Seal-Point Siamese and long before the Lion King. When she reached cathood I re-named her, which caused some confusion in the house ("Who's Ming-Li?")

Clearly Ming-Li is of royal descent; as such it is beneath her dignity to chase vermin or appear to do anything else reserved for peasants. She's extremely elegant, and I'm pretty sure she holds her breath when she jumps onto the bed - we don't feel a thing. She is a cat who can walk across the dressing-table at night without knocking things over (unlike Storm - more on that later)

She doesn't like the children much, having been around when they were little and I think the Scientist may have either dragged her around by the tail or perhaps dressed her in some doll's clothes. All denied, of course, but mothers know.

I once managed to catch her rolling over on command on video

Ming Li rolls over

I have to say I would have embedded the video - the how to section is quite breezy about this, "select the film strip icon on your edit toolbar and upload your video".  It would appear I don't have a filmstrip icon. I consulted the help forum, no answer. I checked all the settings. Nothing about filmstrips.

Not to be put off I explored other options. This required uploading the video to YouTube so that I could provide a link. That required a YouTube account. I followed all the instructions and then was horrified to see my name in lights on YouTube. I immediately deleted the video and deleted the account. Take 2. Only it wouldn't let me in, it appears I committed a cardinal sin by uploading and then deleting. YOUR ACCOUNT HAS BEEN PERMANENTLY DISABLED (BAD PERSON) No problem, create a new account. Oh, you silly silly naive person - OH NO YOU DON'T. YOUR ACCOUNT HAS BEEN PERMANENTLY DISABLED. Nothing I did could change its mind - and there seems to be no way to erase its memory. Aha - try from another computer! This seemed to work until I forgot my spam email password (you know, the email account you set up to avoid giving your real address to marketers or the gym?) which required me requesting a new password. It has taken me 9 days to get around all the security questions and Captcha codes (what's with that anyway?) and involved 4 computers, deleting cookies and email addresses I had forgotten about. I'm probably on a watch list by now. SO WATCH THE VIDEO!

*calms self down*

Ming-Li is getting on a bit, she is 15 years old now and she mostly spends her days lying in the sun. Once I'm over the trauma of uploading video via YouTube, and if I can remember the wretched password I will introduce the Burmese cats - Milkshake and Storm

Elvis, Kip, Tiger, Jess and Jazz

As a cat person I have always found it easy to just say no to dogs. I have consistently been outvoted by the rest of the family on this matter - "but they're so easy, no trouble at all"  This is true - for them - since I am inevitably the one who walks them, takes them to the vet, makes sure their shots are up to date and generally has to mother them.

The only dog I ever agreed to was Kip, a retriever cross border collie with a great nature. Kip was a fielder of note and spent many Sunday afternoons playing garden cricket with us. Kip thought he was Jonty Rhodes and probably had a serious shot at a Proteas jacket. He was the whole family's dog and had lots of friends around the neighbourhood. Our favourite friends were the Andrews sisters (Dobermans up the road who howled in perfect harmony when they saw us coming). Kip taught me that it's better to aim the stone at the car when you're walking and idiots leave their gates open for their salivating snappy-toothed attack dogs to race out while you're walking past. These idiots will run to see what's happening when the stone hits the car, but not when you're screaming blue murder in the street trying to stop a dog fight.

When the scientist was 12 she spent an entire winter holiday working for the vet so when I spied Kip lying very still indeed on the verandah one morning I didn't hesitate to obtain her professional opinion on what the problem was. She examined him gently while I waited inside for the news, then very gravely told me "I'm sorry mom, he seems to have died in the night. I don't think he suffered at all". Brian buried him in my best mohair blanket under the lemon tree at the bottom of the garden - and probably in violation of at least 5 municipal by-laws. I simply decided there would be no more dogs.

Elvis was the 18 year-old's dog, the having of which I specifically forbade before leaving on a trip to Australia when he (the 18 year-old, not Elvis) was around 11 years old. I had seen the threat during a visit to friends with puppies a few days before I left

Elvis died on Easter Sunday 2007. He was poisoned by a Chinese additive to the expensive food you can only buy from the vet or specialist shops. There is a strange justice in this since he had what the vet delicately put as "a lack of genetic diversity" and if we'd elected to buy him the cheap supermarket food he would probably still be here.

Elvis - you know you're a redneck when you only have one set of grandparents


I should have known it wouldn't end well, the first trip to Australia saw the introduction of the bantams, donated by a kindly neighbour, but killed within a 24-hour period by Tiger, the dog who was asthmatic. The 18 year-old (who was very little when the first trip took place) had to have stitches in his chin while I was away caused by a slip in the bath.

Actually, Tiger wasn't asthmatic at all, but insisted on catching bees which he subsequently swallowed causing him to sound asthmatic. Tiger was donated to us by my mother, who took him on knowing full well she wasn't allowed pets in the complex where she lived. "If you don't take him they'll put him down"  We thought Tiger was a black/grey maltese poodle cross for years until we discovered miniature schnausers. Tiger, being a small dog, lived for around 14 years and one day got ahead of himself, taking on a wasp instead of the bees he could manage. Tiger, too is beneath the lemon tree, although mercifully not in a mohair blanket.

Jess, a labrador cross, was donated by the scientist's boyfriend of the day a little while after Tiger died (but mom they'll put her down if we don't take her. She'll be no trouble, you'll see) and is getting on a bit, she was a puppy while Elvis was around and ostensibly would keep him company

Elvis and Jess, BFF


Which brings us to Jazz (yes, it's confusing with Jess and Jazz) who we got from the SPCA to keep Jess company when Elvis died. Before we could take her home they inspected our premises and required us to cover the pool so she wouldn't drown. I put my foot down, seeing this as a step too far, so they relented and Jazz came to live with us.

Our new year's eve dinner guests patiently await their dinner

Jazz is also a cross labrador/something and is the only dog we've ever had who chooses to swim. She could also probably take part in the Iditarod race given how hard she pulls on the lead when I walk her. She takes it personally that we have a porcupine living in the stormwater drain at the end of the road and has made it her mission to catch it. I have a collection of porcupine quills in testament to this war and hopefully won't have to make an emergency trip to the vet (with either the porcupine or Jazz)

Jess and Jazz provided the entertainment at the 18 year-old's birthday party with the fight of the night - requiring an emergency room trip (for Jess, not the 18 year-olds who didn't fight at all)

I'm pretty sure no-one will listen to me when I say "no more dogs" and that I'll be teaching new dogs to walk on a lead in time to come. As an avowed non-fitness freak it provides an excuse to get out early and walk through the neighbourhood with pretend-protection.

I'm still primarily a cat person, but we've had some great dog characters over the years.

Geography 101

Many people (well, at least two) have expressed confusion about the whole Lake Tanganyika / Zambia statement. Strangely enough those who know me have never questioned the "free range" or "child bride" statements; they choose to focus on the where rather than the who. From a South African perspective, I guess, it is in that part of the continent where maps are marked "Here be dragons" since the education system ignored anything between southern Europe and the Limpopo river for so very long.

Lake Tanganyika from space, courtesy Wikipedia. The bit on the far right of the picture is in Zambia


Lake Tanganyika is an African Great Lake (3° 20' to 8° 48' South and from 29° 5' to 31° 15' East). It is estimated to be the second or third largest freshwater lake in the world by volume, and the second deepest, after Lake Baikal in Siberia. The lake is divided between four countries – Burundi, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Tanzania and Zambia (Wikipedia again) 

The African Great Lakes. Lake Tanganyika is bottom left, looks a little like Italy I've always thought


The problem with Wikipedia, of course, is that it's factual and dry and cannot possibly hope to do justice to the lake, which is the size of the United Kingdom. That's a fair bit of water (apparently one sixth of the world's freshwater) and when I was living there nobody knew how deep it was. 


My dad ran a small game lodge called Kasaba Bay (http://africanadrenalin.co.za/Kasaba/) before the president of the day decided he'd quite like it as his personal holiday home. 

The main lodge with the giant winterthorn tree


Can't fault his taste, and since it was a national lodge in a national park it wasn't as if it was ours to begin with. Sumbu National Park covers around 2,000 square kilometres - it's one of the smallest in Zambia and not well known at all.


My time at the lake was filled with fishing, exploring, adventures and trying to avoid radio school. To this day I have fond memories of Zambia (the sweet-tempered elephant who lived at the lodge) and I still wake up nights in a sweat having dreamt that Jack (the elephant who didn't like women) is sneaking up silently behind me to charge. Jack taught me that an elephant can hide behind a single blade of grass. I remember how my brother and I would scatter chicken bones outside the guests' chalets to attract hyenas and then giggle the next morning when they arrived - puffy-eyed and near hysterical - at breakfast to relate stories of man-eaters and werewolves. 


 I remain firmly convinced that there's no better way to grow up. Free-range indeed.

The Vaal adventure

Bob's outing to the Vaal

"Come to the Vaal for Christmas" said my sister cheerily, "it's only an hour and we're terribly easy to find"

The most important thing to remember is that you should never rely on one device to get you safely there AND back. Bob 2.0 (Nokia GPS system, updated in preparation for the trek following an unfortunate mis-direction through Kempton Park of all places) requires a trailer-load full of batteries to operate. This small design flaw seems to have slipped past the various testers surely employed by Nokia to prevent this sort of thing. Or maybe you can't drive for 4 hours in Sweden.

Getting there was simple enough, if a tad far for a day trip - taking us around 2 hours. I had used the search function to find the address and saved the route so as to be prepared. Bob was calm and confident, full of "Follow the course of the road" and "Turn left now" advice, with only a brief moment of understandable confusion when we joined the highway from Malibongwe road. He became more adventurous as we went, with "turn left now" instructions taking us on seldom-used back roads through sleepy dorps and lush fields in a general southerly direction.

We arrived at exactly the right house in exactly the right town and had high praise for Bob before letting him take a well-earned rest so as to be refreshed for the return trip in the late afternoon. I should point out that I had suggested a sleep over to avoid travelling after dark. There's more than enough room and even though we had appointed the newly-licensed 18 year-old the designated driver we do not have a good track record of uneventful trips back from the Vaal in the dark. The last return trip involved a pot hole the size of a tank trap, a broken wheel rim and changing a tyre in the dark in a spot with no emergency lane just outside Sebokeng.  I was outvoted on this, however, even though it later emerged that the vote was rigged, Mugabe-style (Brian's vote counts more than the others)

The 18 year-old in full Christmas regalia

After lunch everyone went sailing (excluding my sister and me, of course, since I am fully aware that all boats have but one purpose: to take you to the bottom when you're least expecting it) We spent our afternoon in the pool at the yacht club with a glass or two of wine and waited for the family's return.

At six we climbed back into the luxury sedan and instructed Bob to take us home. Looking back, the first sign of trouble might have been the 15 minutes it took for him to find us and give us our first instructions. He seemed sluggish and didn't sound quite as confident as he had earlier. We foolishly ignored this, mistaking it for confirmation of our innate navigation skills. There was lots of cheer and singing, slightly sunburned well-fed happiness and a beautiful sunset to distract us so it's understandable that it took a while for us to realise that Bob had been silent for some time. It slowly dawned on us that we were alone in an unknown place with no landmarks or directions home.

It was dark and Bob had deserted us on a rural road in the middle of nowhere. The few signs we saw were of no help at all - and we hadn't packed a map, obviously, since we had Bob. There was an unusual silence in the car and the music was switched off to allow us all to concentrate.

After a while we spotted a sign to a town and decided our best bet was to head straight there and throw ourselves on the mercy of a garage attendant. This took some negotiation, since Brian is obviously a boy and obviously doesn't believe in asking for directions. He confidently predicted we would cross a highway shortly. After 30 minutes he agreed we should stop and ask. Fortunately we found both a garage and a kindly attendant who told us which street lead out of town to the nearest highway.

At this stage the 18 year-old took control, ignored the parents and directed the scientist to download Google maps, enter the name of the town and our destination and ask for directions. The scientist is, strangely enough, not tech-savvy so it took a while, but eventually we had a clear set of directions without any aid from satellites. I am fascinated that this is possible, albeit a little disturbed that an American search engine knows how to get me home from Meyerton.

The problem with directions, rather than voice guidance, is how non-specific they can be. Take the N12 offramp, then the N3. YES, BUT WHICH WAY? The intricate design of the interchange doesn't allow for hesitation - you need to be decisive and move quickly to avoid the thundering taxis and luxury 4x4's doing 140 in the 80 zone. All 3 of us were yelling conflicting instructions at once - and, apart from one or two near-death experiences involving unsafe lane changes, he managed to get onto a road we knew without panicking, shouting or throwing things at us. (Proud mother moment - that's my boy, keeping a cool head in a crisis)

We circumnavigated Johannesburg and arrived home 3 hours after leaving the Vaal to a dark house - the power had failed (or perhaps a cable was stolen) only to be restored 24 hours later. Bob had a long rest

Perhaps an analogue back-up system (a fold-out map comes to mind) is not a bad thing in this digital age.