Meet... Fooney! I mean, Lise

About two months ago, before Rooney died, we'd started looking into getting another cat. From the beginning we'd intended on being a two cat household, but as a person who had never owned even one cat, Turner wanted to have Rooney start us off on solo cat ownership and then we'd work our way up to two. By about February Turner was pretty clear on all the various stuff that goes with owning a cat, and although he really couldn't figure out why the hell the cat would sometimes go rip-tearing around the house for no reason (as someone who grew up with cats I'll tell you that it's because he was a cat, full stop), Turner was willing to let me get another cat. So I started looking into it.

I browsed the various adoption websites and online classifieds for a while. I'm kind of an animal snob, as some of you know. When it comes to dogs, there's a few criteria: 1. no biting, 2. as little barking as possible, and most importantly 3. NO LONG HAIR AROUND THE MOUTH. I'm terrible on the whole idea of dog slobber, so the dogs that have long hair on their faces are right out for me. You know those little puffball-type dogs? The yippy ones? They're white, usually. But around their mouths - brown. BROWN. That hair grows out of their skin white, you know. And then it goes brown because of the slobber and all the ass-licking and what-have-you that dogs do. I really can't think of ANYthing grosser than the brown hair around otherwise-white dogs' mouths. Blech! So I don't like those kinds of dogs, and if they have mouth hair I don't care what colour they are and I don't even really care about their temperment. My cousin Jana has a lovely (though barky) dog named Mulder who is awesome with Sloane and generally a very good-tempered all-around nice animal. But he has slobbery hair around his mouth. I can't touch him and I don't want him anywhere near me and I wouldn't mind if Jana gave him away. (Yes, I realize I am a bad person.)

But I'm also another kind of snob. I like my animals to be beautiful. As in, interesting colour, unusual detail, and good form. Hence the purebred Abyssinian. Hence the purebred English Setter. So when I was browsing these adoption websites and suchlike, I was looking for a Siamese or other purebred-looking cat that would have a lovely personality, not bite, be young enough to adapt to our resident cat and active household, and best of all be beautiful. It's a tall order, especially considering most SPCA-type cats are mangy feral things. It's not surprising that the search would take a few months.

Around the beginning of April I finally found a cat in Lethbridge that seemed to suit us. It was half Bengal and super affectionate. 10 months old. Named Roxy. I conferred with the owner by phone a few times and we agreed that her cat would be a good fit for us, and us a good fit for her cat. We were just finalizing the arrangements to meet in Nanton (halfway between Lethbridge and Calgary) to do the cat hand over, and then suddenly Rooney died.

I can't help but think that if he'd had a friend in the house Rooney might not have been so hell-bent on getting outside. So I sort of blame myself for not getting him a friend sooner, because maybe he would've been running around inside and had more exercise and wouldn't've been lonely or needing to escape and then wouldn't've been killed. ...Something like that. I know it's stupid, but you think these things, you know?

Obviously the whole new-cat-acquisition thing very suddenly went on hold. I wrote this email to my old friend Renee Kerman a few days later:

Ren,

I just lost my cat Rooney to coyotes on Friday night. I know you never met him but he was a super little guy, really a character. He was an indoor cat but managed to get out when we had guests on Friday. We found him early the next morning, about a block from our house, torn in half. It was probably the most surreal thing I've ever seen in my life. I buried him in the yard early Saturday morning. (I think that's illegal, but fuck it.)

I've been thinking a lot of you and the email you sent when Nora died a few years ago. I can't remember if I wrote back anything lengthy or particularly insightful, but your email really conveyed how sad you were and how important she'd been to you. I've been thinking about your loss a lot in the last few days, digesting my own loss.

I've also been thinking a lot about [Renee's old university beau] Denis and how he lost that new puppy (traffic accident?) and he was so devastated, and then got another puppy sort-of-too-quickly afterward. I don't remember how all that turned out but I remember talking with you about it, at the time. I was in the midst of adopting another cat for our household last week and now I'm like, Should I stop and wait? I was going to get another cat anyway, even if Rooney was still alive. I'm not trying to replace him. But suddenly my cat is dead and I'm totally grieving... I don't know. Anyway, I just wanted to write and tell you that I've been thinking of you and Nora, and that I'm in a similar-but-different position these days. Sad times.

How are things with you?
Love Ash

Well, in the end I did the cat show and it was really great (if expensive) and cathartic and all that. And the following week I thought it through, and quietly started back into the adoption process to find another cat for our house. Not to replace Rooney, mind, though he'd left a giant Rooney-shaped hole in our lives when he left us. We wanted another cat (I wanted another cat), and eventually we will be a two-cat household as per the plan. So we'd start back with one again. Eventually I found a lovely cat at the Calgary Humane Society (Sloane called it "the cat store" after a few visits), a tortie-point siamese cross. Very different personality than Rooney: very shy, almost skittish, but super affectionate, loving the head rubs. One year old, and beautiful. I adopted her. And brought her home. We named her Lise.




(The title of this post comes from some very black humour from the weekend of Rooney's death. Turner and I were lying in bed sort of digesting the events of the day on Saturday, and I was upset, but we were kind of smiling about how Rooney finally got his big night out on the town. The topic turned to the whole adoption-of-new-cat I'd been doing and how it would look on the website if I blogged about the events. Turner: "You can't get another cat yet. Just replace Rooney and move on? What's it going to be on the blog? Saturday: Goodbye, Rooney. ...Monday: Meet... Fooney!" I almost choked, laughing so hard.)

Categories: Lise | Rooney

Comments [1]

---

Mr. Vicious Goes To The Cat Show... In Spirit

When Rooney died I was so sad. So so so sad. It's only been a week and a half - I still feel super sad about it. And when we found him on the hill one of the first things that came to mind was, Oh my god, I have to shoot the cat show next weekend.

The Mr. Vicious Goes To The Cat Show feature in Swerve (published December 2006) had gotten amazing reviews. We heard from people all over the country and down into the US. There was something about the story that just struck a chord with anyone who had ever owned a cat, I guess. So here I was, getting set to cash in on the notoriety and fame Rooney and the article earned last year.

Yes folks, I'd been brought in to be the show photographer for the Spring SACCF (Southern Alberta Cat Fanciers) show. I was to have a booth. I was going to do cat photos and pictures of cats and their owners. Document the show hall and ring competitions and generally hang around with the people Rooney and I had first met last October at the fall show. Although I wasn't going to bring him to the show (as mentioned in the article, Rooney HATED the cat show with all his might), I was destined to spend two twelve-hour days answering questions and talking about Rooney. And suddenly, he was dead and I was grieving my dead cat, but scheduled to be surrounded by cats and their owners in only a few days. I didn't know what to do.

So I did a lot of crying and Turner rubbed my back day and night until his hands were going to fall off. By about Tuesday I felt I was almost ready to face the cat show world, if only just to fulfill the promise I'd made to do it. Then I lost my shooting partner (pregnant and feeling first-trimesterish, she wasn't up to the rigour needed for a cat show weekend). I suddenly had to hire someone else. Enter Craigslist and Kijiji and my first-ever advertisements on same. In case you live in a cave (with internet access), these sites are online classifieds communities. Fast, efficient, and best of all FREE, they're kicking the pants of newspaper classifieds sections from coast to coast to coast. I put up little "want to be the second shooter on my weekend gig?" ads and spent the rest of last week interviewing the many many many budding photographers out there in Calgaryland. Hired the gal that, even from the first email, seemed like the one for the job, Erin.

The show was hilarious as always, fascinating, and great fun. I got there at 7am on Saturday morning to get ready, with Erin arriving soon afterward. We set up the studio (a converted hockey dressing room that smelled distinctly like teenage boy armpit) and the booth in the show hall, festooned with little white xmas lights and copies of the Swerve bearing Rooney's fine chop-licky mug. We made signs, we put fliers advertising the photography booth on everyone's "bench". When exhibitors began to fill the show hall, we ran around taking photos of people and their cats and their carriers and cat accoutrements, and reminded them about the photography booth. Rooney's breeder came to the show all the way from Sooke, BC and when I went over to visit her I ended up crying in her arms over my dead cat. I think I snotted on her shoulder by accident but she was very nice about everything.

Now, you should know that I made a capital investment in the cat show. I bought backdrops, I made photocopies, I rented equipment. As mentioned earlier, I hired staff. All tolled I probably made an outlay of about $300. When it came to prices, I'd done a lot of investigation. I'd spoken to a number of cat photographers, mostly in the US, including the famous and very highly regarded Helmi Flick. (Her number is unlisted but with a bit of internet sleuthing I found it and called her direct, reaching her at home.) Taking their prices and then dropping them a little, with Helmi's guidance I decided to charge $50 per session (per cat), which would include six 4x6 prints or two 8x10 prints. For an additional $50 people could have the whole session (20 - 30 shots) on cd. I was told that virtually everyone buys the session AND the cd, and that they'd be happy to pay $100 for the privilege. A bargain at twice the price, said various pet photographers.

So my $300 outlay could be made back in 3 - 6 clients. With 160 cats being shown at this show, there would be at least 40 owners and their partners in attendance. I thought it was completely reasonable to assume that, say, 25% of them would want to have their cats' photos taken. Again, I was basing my numbers on what other photographers said I should expect. I thought I was going to be run off my feet, and expected to book at least twenty cats. Twenty times $50 is a thousand dollars. This was the very least I expected to make.

We don't know what happened. People loved the photos we were taking around the hall (which Erin cleverly rigged up into a slideshow at the booth). Many folks recognized me from the last show and got to chatting. Lots of them thought they'd probably want photos taken, but "not right now". I could understand - it was the first day of the last show of the show season. People were fluffing and primping and trimming and generally manhandling their cats to within an inch of their pedigreed lives. So we were patient, and smiled and were friendly, and took awesome photos around the hall, and generally represented ourselves well.

But by about 2pm it started to become clear: nobody was going to get their pictures taken. Even the executive, the people who'd recruited me and who all had cats in the show, not ONE of them came. Repeated announcements went out over the loudspeakers about the photography. People smiled and waved and yet nobody came. The people who had pre-booked with me over email didn't come. When I chased them down at their benches they said they'd changed their minds. We just didn't get it. By 6pm we were exhausted. I paid Erin a kill fee of $50 and we went home.

That night I talked everything over with Turner and he brought the full weight of his 1.5 years in Commerce to bear on the situation. My reputation? Fine. My service? Proven. My booth? A little out-of-the-way in the show hall perhaps, but it's a hockey rink; nothing's very far from anything. We had to come to the conclusion that the problem was either a) the prices, or b) another x factor about which I had no knowledge and over which I had no control. So it came down to a) the prices. I decided to slash the prices.

So with head held high I strode into the hall early Sunday morning. I wrote a big notice on the booth price sheet: END OF SEASON SALE! PRICES SLASHED! ASK ME ABOUT TODAY'S DISCOUNTS! Turner had counselled me on the power of the x.99. As in, $20 sounds like too much, but $19.99 is a bargain. $19.99 it was. I also conceded that providing prints were cutting into my profit margin (though 25% of $0 on Saturday is exactly as much "zipperoo" as you suspect it is), so the $19.99 would include the images on cd. No prints. Get them made yourself. COME ON DOWN YOU LUCKY PEOPLE!

I think I was also benefitting from it being the last day of the show, but Sunday picked up right around lunchtime. We booked six clients. We sold a bunch of our show hall images on cd to the public visiting the cat show. We did bench photos with some girls who didn't like studio shots. Overall we pulled in $190. At the end of the day I paid Erin another $50, we resolved to work together again soon, and we went our seperate ways.

So let's do the math, shall we? $190 gross profit. Minus $100 for Erin, equals $90. Minus $300 in capital costs, equals -$210. Financially the notion of working the cat show was a big raspberry.

BUT! We loved the shoots we did: tons of fun and awesome clients. The cats were amazingly cooperative, given the dark room plus two giant blinding flashes and teenage-boy-armpit smell. And best of all, it was very cathartic to be around so many cat lovers, and get to meet other Abyssinians that looked just like Rooney did, and receive so many compliments on the Mr. Vicious story, and so many hugs and kind words about losing Rooney last week. I don't think I would have sought out a generic-style such catharsis in the yellow pages if it had a $210 pricetag, but as they say in the business when you've just lost a bunch of money but had a good time, "It was good EXPERIENCE". Yes. Good experience!


There's no place like home... there's no place like home... there's no place like home...

You can see some of the studio shots I did on Sunday, here.

Categories: Rooney | Work work work

Comments [0]

---

Mr. Vicious Goes To The Rainbow Bridge

Rooney died about ten days ago. He got out when there was a film crew at our house weekend before last, interviewing Turner for a climate change movie. We didn't notice that he was missing before we went to bed - usually he comes to sleep with us in the middle of the night, but not when we first retire. I woke up the next morning, early, with the terrible feeling Rooney wasn't in the house. Packed up Sloane and T, and armed with a box of paper clips to shake, we walked the community calling his name.

He'd been caught by coyotes. We found him on the hill near our house.



That's Rooney (what was left of him), the orange thing just up the hill from the stroller.

We buried him in the yard. I have this feeling that you're not allowed to bury animals in your yard. But it felt like the right thing to do, and the only thing to do. So animal control bylaw officers can come and fine me if they like, but I really felt like I had to bring him home, and bury him here.


Rooney's shoe box coffin contained some cat food, litter and a few poos (so he'd know where to go), some ham, a tinfoil ball we'd been throwing for him the day before, some water from the bathroom tap, some leaves of the two plants he liked to eat, and his beloved paper clips. Before we put it in the ground it also contained Rooney. He was torn in half, and all the middle parts were eaten and gone.

Rooney was a great cat. He had friends and fans far and wide. He achieved much in his short 20 months on earth and was dearly loved here at Chez Bristowe Turner. We miss him very much. As Sloaner has said many times since he died, "Rooney was a good cat." He was.

Categories: Rooney

Comments [8]

---

Mr. Vicious Goes To The Cat Show

Well, I was thrilled when Shelley over at Swerve said she'd take my cat show story. I'd been obsessed with the idea of taking Rooney to compete at the Southern Alberta Cat Fancier's fall cat show for a few months, and wanted to find some way to fund it. (Attending a cat show as a participant/competitor/exhibitor is not a cheap pastime!) Initially I thought Rooney, my wee household purebred Abyssinian, might win a ribbon or two that we could hang in the back hallway. But when he hit the first ring it was clear that things were going to go a bit differently than I'd planned. Basically, he went insane and attacked everyone - me, the judges, and the head of the international cat fancier's association. And he earned himself a nickname among the other competitors: Mr. Vicious.

And that's what made the story.

I won't lie to you - I'm floored: a six-page feature, a cover article plus a teaser on the Calgary Herald's front newspaper banner! Sixteen photos total, in the feature and scattered through the rest of the issue, all shot by me. And I daresay that you'll laugh at the story. Yes, I'm predicting that you'll chuckle at my little tale. It's funny.



First page of the article: Rooney looking piiiiiiiiiiissssed off.



One of the photo pages - the cat jewelery and other scenes.

The Swerviettes did an absolutely inspired and spectacular job of this issue - there are dozen tiny details that were carefully handled and finessed. The editing of my piece, done by Executive Editor Jacquie Moore, was marvellous. A nuanced hand, she is a writer's editor, the best kind. My huge thanks for taking a piece I thought was finished and making it even better! Bundle of thanks!

Swerve comes free in the Friday Calgary Herald - and next week marks the start of the Ashley-Turner-Koentges collaboration on the weekly Eats & Drinks columns... more info to follow. But for now: chase down those covers with the orange cat licking his chops!


Full text below:

Okay, I admit it. I thought our cat had a shot at winning the big ribbon at Calgary's fall cat show. I thought he was maybe even a contender for first prize. I wasn't at all prepared for the disqualifications, and I certainly didn't think he'd attach me -- or the head of The International Cat Association. None of it went according to plan, not in the slightest. But let me explain.

A year ago we acquired a purebred Abyssinian kitten, and named him Rooney. He's a friendly little imp who shamelessly helps himslef to my morning granola, and he's a fanaticaly fan of fetch played with tossed paper clips. But most of all, he's gorgeous. Giant amber eyes and huge bat-like ears. Plus, the Abyssinian coat is "ticked", which means that Rooney actually seems to glow from within, as though he's irridescent. The kind of cat you'd see and think to yourself, "I bet he could win first prize in a cat show that handsome devil."

I heard about the fall Southern Alberta Cat Fanciers' Show over the internet and was immediately intrigued. Judges would be coming from across Canada, the US, and Europe; upwards of 125 cats would compete. Certainly Rooney would prove fancier than 124 of them. And wouldn't a nice "Top Cat" laurel look perfect hangin in the back hall above the litter box?

So, at a much-too-early hour on the last Saturday in October, I unceremoniously stuffed a befuddled and half-asleep Rooney face-first into his carrier and zoomed off to the Ogden Legion Hall -- our home for the next two days of competition at the fall championship cat show.

A cat-show neophyte, I arrived with some preconceived notions. Would it be a bunch of eccentric cat-ladies feeding their babies crushed caviar with infant spoons? Or would it be mean and brutally competitive – a hierarchy of bitchy breeders elbowing out the competition with poisoned mouse toys? I just didn’t know. And it didn't matter, for in the days and weeks leading up to the show I had but one simple, lingering fantasy that involved Rooney collecting a bevy of fancy ribbons. How wrong I was.

We arrived at the hall around 7:45am and I found our assigned “bench” in the way-back far corner, next to the fire exit and the kitty litter station. After setting up his cage I put a now hissing and decidedly cranky Rooney inside and taped on the sign I'd printed that morning: “My name is Rooney Roo! I am a red male Abyssinian. This is my first show!” Though ridiculously naïve in retrospect, the sign gave me a strange sense of satisfaction at the time. I’d gotten the idea from a website discussing ‘show hall etiquette’ which suggested preparing a sign because otherwise you’d spend half the time explaining your cat’s breed to the general public attending the show. I also wanted the competition to know Rooney was a newbie, an innocent first-timer, which would, of course, make the pile of ribbons he'd garner that much more enviable.

From our vantage point near the kitty litter we could see the whole exhibitor’s hall laid out before us: rows and rows of tables topped with identical wire cages. Some of the seriously serious breeders buy up whole rows of benching and have photos and new kittens on display in elaborate customized fabric benching ‘condos’ with zip-fronts and fuzzy beds. Circling the outer hall walls are the rings where the actual judging part of the show goes down: tables with raised judging platforms, surrounded by unadorned judging cages and overseen by small teams of earnest young people responsible for the vital clean-up after each round. And at each end of the hall, the vendors: cat toys, cat jewelry, enormous scratching-post-trees, cat carrier bags, cat picture fames, cat blankets, cat mugs, cat pins, cat hats, cat pencil jars, cat slippers, and pretty much anything else you could possibly festoon with the image of a cat. As well, ther ewas a booth advertising cat cremation & funeral services. for planning types. Indeed, at five bucks for a daylong gander at this subculture spectacle, I'd say it was the cheapest wholesome entertainment in town.

By 9:30am the whole hall was a flurry of activity. Judging began in the rings, and the room echoed with cryptic announcements from the PA system. Exhibitors walked their cats back and forth through the rows, or elaborately wiped them down with special gloves and combs designed to eliminate static. I did my best to fit in, pulling out a grooming brush (used not even half a dozen times) and went to work on Rooney’s luxurious ginger coat. The nice lady running the nearby raffle table told me I would have to take off the cat’s collar for the judging, so I did – revealing a bald ring around his neck that wouldn’t brush out.

While we waited for Rooney's turn in the ring, I took a tour of the hall myself, sneaking covetous glances at the giant wall displays of satiny, shiny, riotously coloured ribbons. They numbered for places all the way down to “Tenth Best”. Surely, I figured, Rooney was at least tenth best in some Byzantine category or other. Most of the time, though, I sat there beside the cage, periodically flipping through the workbook-like “show guide”, which seemed to be a collection of pages full of acronyms and other jibberish, incomprehensible aside from the advertisements. I was a bit confused about how to know where and when to take Rooney for judging, though I’d been told that I should just listen to the PA for an announcement. I missed it, of course. The raffle table lady must have been keeping a watchful eye because suddenly she came running down the aisle, waving and pointing at the ceiling. “That’s you! That’s you!” Instantly nervous, I yanked open the cage, pulled out my cat, and went shuffling down toward Ring 4.

Rooney hissed and struggled as I jammed him into the appointed cage at the judging ring – a mild portent, as it turned out, of the storm to come. I wasn’t completely surprised – cats don’t think much of each other when they’re strangers, and now he was under unfriendly flickery fluorescents and within easy earshot of his rivals. As I settled into a chair to watch the judging, Rooney and a cat in a nearby cage faced off with a big round of back-arching, tail-puffing, and yowling. And then suddenly it was Rooney’s turn.

As the judge approached his cage, Rooney spat and moaned, and when she tried to pick him up he swiped at her. Unfazed, the judge asked for his owner to put him on the judging bench. I leapt up and went to his cage, and reached in to get my cat. That’s when the kitty litter hit the fan. It happened so quickly I can’t recall all the details, but I remember that it sounded just like a cartoon cat fight, complete with bouncing-off-the-inside-of-the-cage reverberations and caterwauling screeches.

Welts rising up my forearm and bite marks on my fingers, I scanned the crowd. The people I’d met that morning were politely averting their eyes from our disgrace. To buy time, I pulled down my sweater sleeve and pondered my next move. I was pretty sure that most prize cats don’t attack their owners, in the ring, right in front of the judges. Visions of Rooney winning ‘Best In Show’ were definitely fading… though somewhere north of “Tenth Best” still seemed within reach.

The judge saw through my thin veneer of calm immediately. "You didn’t expect this, did you?" she said in a broad Texas drawl. I shook my head, at a loss for words. Rooney was doing that deep-pitched feline warning growl, tail swishing, eyeing me from a corner of the cage. "It’s his first show?” she asked. I nodded. She leaned in. "Now, don’t you let him win," she warned, voice low, pointing at Rooney. "This is a control game for him. I’ll judge him if you get him to the table. But don’t you let him think he can just have a temper tantrum and that’s it. If you give in, he wins. You’re the boss. You show him."

I turned back to the cage to find Rooney clawing at the ceiling bars, hissing. Where was the lovely cat that follows me around the house, the affectionate little bug who watches over my workday from the windowsill? He’d been replaced by a crazed, judge-hating lunatic. I didn’t know this cat.

I grabbed at Rooney a few more times, trying to get him back in the game. I wanted that ribbon. Even tenth place would be – swipe –  just – bite – fine at this point - screech, backflip out of my grasp. After a minute or two it was clear that we were holding up the competition and that Rooney was definitely not going to allow himself to be judged. "I’m going to withdraw him from this ring," I told the officiants, and our judge nodded.  I made a blind final grab with both hands at once and managed to get Rooney by the face and tail. With that hold I yanked him out of the judging cage, pinned his head under my armpit, and hurried back to our bench with whatever phlegmy furball of dignity he and I had left. I was suddenly very glad to be exiled at the far end of the show hall, beyond the curious gazes of the more experienced exhibitors.

Initially, it seemed to mark the end of our brief cat show career. In the melée Rooney had somehow torn a significant chunk of fur from his own head. He’d also split a nail. And now he was stalking around the cage, hissing disgustedly at fifteen second intervals and clawing at any attempt I made to pet him. I spent about ten minutes wondering what to do with the rest of my weekend, now that my whole flawless plan of winning the big show prize was clearly shot all to hell.

However, to my enormous surprise, however, it soon became clear that I wasn’t expected to leave. Even better, people started coming by the bench to give advice and buck me up. It happens to everyone, they said. Some cats just take time to get used to the overlit pressures of the show hall, they said. Many of them suggested that I walk Rooney through the aisles and past the judges a few times before the next ring, to give him a chance to get used to the smells of the other cats. The next ring? Like I was going to go through all that again? On the other hand, I’d paid the show’s steep entry fee, and there were still two days and fifteen rings to go.

Halfway around the hall on our first "orientation" tour, I started hearing greetings from the crowd: "Hello Mr. Vicious! How are you today, sir?" and "Oooh, lookout! It’s Mr. Vicious! Get ’im, tiger! Grrr!"

People were coming up to greet Rooney directly, not looking at me at all. With just one appearance, Rooney had managed to earn himself a nickname and something of a following among the other competitors. By the time we got back to the bench, I was laughing to myself and willing to give him another shot.

After several hours of constant petting, playing, and other forms of bribery, Rooney chilled out a bit. He was immediately disqualified from four of the next seven rings for hissing and scratching at the adjudicators, but he did win first in his division in every ring that didn’t disqualify him. Granted, he was the only cat in his division (Abyssinian “alters” – which means he’s been ‘fixed’, i.e. doesn’t have his… ‘equipment’ anymore). Unfortunately, it’s just a designation that doesn’t come with any take-home prizes.

Still, Mr. Vicious seemed to be winning an unofficial popularity contest. He was the punk-rock demon of the show, hissing and sputtering while the fêted champions lazed around placidly, gently pawing at feather toys and allowing themselves to be manhandled by the judges. By the time of his final ring show mid-day on Sunday, people were coming to see Rooney the way crowds used to flock to see the Sex Pistols, wondering what stunt he’d pull this time on the judging table. And let it not be said that Mr. Vicious let his fans down.

But Rooney’s last ring started out as one of his best. The calm at the eye of the storm, as it turned out. I’d taken to scruffing him (clutching the neck fur below the cat’s ears) as a control measure, and bringing him to the ring just in time to be put directly on the judging table. As I set him down in front of the benevolent Texan judge for this final contest, she also scruffed him and began telling the assembled gawkers what a long way Rooney had come since his first ring the day before. I allowed myself a moment of what turned out to be hubristic pride in my troubled boy. Things seemed to be going just fine, I thought. Finally.

And that’s when Rooney made his move. I was taking photos like a proud parent as it went down: he flopped on his back, working himself into position for his final volley of spite. The judge managed to maintain her hold on him for a few more seconds as my cat rolled around figuring out the best angle for his finale. But then Rooney exploded, becoming what can only be described as a flying ball of fur, teeth and claws. I learned later that our nice Texan lady judge is the head of TICA, the international cat fancier’s association. When my cat decided it was finally time to go completely batshit insane, he did so by attacking the highest ranking official in the cat fancier’s world, and with his whole fan club looking on.

To my horror, Rooney managed to fight his way out of the judge’s expert grip, and escaped down onto the floor. Immediately, calls went up throughout the crowd: "CAT OUT: SHUT THE DOORS!", from which I took a nanosecond's consolation that it wasn't the first time this sort of thing had happened. As I scrambled around the tables and under the displays in pursuit, I heard the fire doors slamming closed one after another at the other end of the hall. Judging came to a halt in the other rings and the whole show went quiet, hundreds of people now waiting on the recapture of my cat. A nice Singapura breeder from Lethbridge came out of the crowd to offer to hold my camera equipment so I could better throw myself around corners trying to nab Rooney in mid-escape. Others were scurrying around, calling out updates: "He went this way! He’s under there!" - until the PA boomed, "PLEASE LET THE OWNER OF THE CAT CATCH THE CAT." Finally, over near one of the cages belonging to a particularly snobby Russian breeder, I managed to grab hold of Rooney’s hind legs from between some chairs and haul him into my arms. He was not pleased. But by then, neither was I. Not. At. All.

"Thank you, I’ve got him!" I announced to no one in particular. Some cheers went up from his fans back at the ring at the far end of the room, but I knew it was time to thank the crowd, turn out the lights and head home. Owner and pet marched back to our bench, our disgrace now complete.

After retrieving my camera, I went around to the remaining rings, striking Rooney’s name from the rest of the judging rosters. "You’re wise to know when to call it quits," said one judge who’d seen the whole great escape sideshow. I made a special effort to thank the judge from Texas, who’d been exceedingly kind and understanding about everything. "Some cats just hate the cat show,” she said, rubbing a fresh welt on her wrist. "Yours, I’m afraid, is one of them….But he’s a good pet, isn’t he?" I nodded. "Sure he is," she continued. "You take him home and love him, y’hear? He’s a good one, got lots of fight in him." She paused. "But don’t show him anymore." I promised I wouldn’t.

And with that, I packed up our stuff, dumped out the kitty litter, and took Rooney on a final tour to say goodbye to his fans. And then we hightailed it out of there, nary a ribbon on the cat carrier, and never again to darken the door of the competitive cat show world with the ominous shadow of… Mr. Vicious.

Categories: Ash | Calgary | Rooney | Work work work

Comments [8]

---

A Buncha Ruminations About Parenthood, Having A Cat, And My Father's Love Of Animals

I have a lot more love than I can possibly (healthily) give to Sloane. As a mother you basically want to be close to, and touch/be in contact with, your child constantly. But as a mother you also realize that you need to leave your kid the hell alone sometimes so that they can live and grow and make decisions and decide things about the world --- without your constant over-the-shoulder involvement.

It's an amazing and persistent and ever-present dichotomy: I must be with my child, and, I must let my child grow as they will. All kids need a balance of the two. How you maintain that balance is, perhaps, the best indicator of your long-term fitness as a parent. (...Is what I think, at this nearly-ten-month-mark of being a parent - you can take me to task years from now if I am proved wrong.)

In any case, I am appreciating our decision to get a cat, tonight. I've thought about this before: everyone needs to give their excess love to someone, something. As a parent it's excellent to have a cat into which you can pour that overflow of parental love when it's not convenient to do so with your child. Although Rooney is a shameless, terrible, awful beggar and thief of food (we're still trying to get zen about this incredibly annoying and persistent trait, apparently inherent to all Abyssinians and not something the breeder admitted until I called her a few days ago, finally completely exasperated after four weeks of squirting him mercilessly with the water bottle, to no avail), he is a lovely lovely cat. Most importantly, he is good with Sloane. But there's also something very satisfying and heartwarming about having a soft young animal to pet when the baby has gone to sleep or in the daytime while she's working on cruising around the house for the fiftieth time.

You can't just sit there with your kid, petting them over and over and over, like you can with an animal that's looking for love and comfort in the way cats are. Children don't appreciate the nuances of massage and rubs, because, jeez, there's things to do! Kids need to get away and walk along the furniture and pull all the tupperware out of the drawer and poink the plastic piano toy and bang on the television when the Teletubbies come on. But cats, cats basically live for the many complex strokes they can wangle out of their humans. It's a nice reciprocal relationship, especially at this stage of my life.

Cats have different purposes at different times. Rooney provides us with a random X factor in the household to keep things interesting, and to be an animal companion for Sloane - my appreciation of the cat-as-receiver-of-excess-parental-affection is really secondary. And when I left Turner and drove across Canada and crash-landed on my parents, as soon as I was semi-stable and had a job, I got a cat. In the post-traumatic shock of having tanked my relationship and left my whole adult , I really needed to pour my love into something (in the pet-pet-pet "I will love him! and keep him! and call him George" manner), and Pema the siamese kitten of 2002 was it.

I'd grown up with a cat, and had raised one of Mum's kittens for a few months before handing it off as the resident Strawberry Hill breeding stud. But really, I didn't know much about the in-depth selection of cats as pets, so I just looked in the Calgary bargain finder ads for siamese kittens and called the three people who had cats for sale. I found one "breeder" (please regard this term loosely as it applied to this Three Hills farm teenager: in retrospect I realize she had no idea what she was doing) who had 6-week old kittens "ready" for their new homes. Now that I know a bit more about cats, I can tell you without hesitation that 6-weeks-old is TOO YOUNG for adoption. Pema, as the cat was named (a lovely Buddhist name meaning "lotus flower"), was obviously seperated too early from her mother and became a lifelong neck-suckler. Pem is skittish all day, but when the sun sets and everyone gets ready for bed, she's all set to knead your hair on the pillow, and suck on your neck and earlobes for comfort until she falls asleep. She's a bit peevish at times, and sometimes bites a bit. But we loved her all the same and poured the affection onto her like no tomorrow.

In particular, Brucio became very attached to Pema. In many ways she was a good cat: lots of personality. She'd greet you at the door when you came home from work, flopping onto the front mat to have her belly rubbed, and she'd fight with "The Claw" as my dad calls it - a claw-shaped hand, held up for fighting-with. She has a hilarious chitter-chatter-natter sound that she makes when she's stalking a bug or bird (rather counterproductive, as it turns out). She was scared of, yet fascinated by, the predators of Fish Creek Park (out Brucio's back door) and would often get herself stuck up the giant Cottonwood trees after being dive-bombed by great horned owls and chased by coyotes (pronounced "ky-oats" in this part of Canada) - needing to be rescued by a combination of Brucio's concern and Jenna's late-night-ladder-climbing abilities.

Brucio enacts "The Claw" for an enthusiastic kitten Pema-lemma.

In any case, when I bought our current house, I took Pema (and her favourite chair) with me to Ramsay. Of course, having no food or resources, I was often back to Douglasdale for dinner and company, and I'd bring Pema with me for those evenings. Although when I bought/adopted Pema I had had every intention of owning her until she died of extreme old age, it was soon abundantly clear to me that Pem really, really, really preferred it at Dad's. Like, she didn't care about the owls and the long days of nobody home and the old house's decided lack of "Ashley: official owner". Nope, she wanted to live with Brucio in Douglasdale, there was no doubt whatsoever.

I knew Turner and I were planning on getting a dog, but it was with a heavy heart that I made the decision to give Pema to Dad (for some reason, however, the chair remained at our house). Semi-secretly, Brucio was thrilled. But then eight months later when Brother John bought his place here in Ramsay, he and Fiona moved out of the Douglasdale house and took Pema with them. I don't really know the details of how the decision got made, but whatever went on, the final upshot was that my old cat Pema now lives three doors down the block. Sometimes she even comes over to visit. 

Now, it needs to be said that John and Fiona love the frigging hell out of Pema. So she does have a stellar home and tons of attention. John and Fi's house has a zillion cat toys, and treats, and special grooming tools, and there are framed pictures of Pema all around the house. Her water dish has this special plug-in fountain feature that keeps the water aerated, for crying out loud. So she certainly went to a good place when she left Dad's house.

But Dad was sad, really sad, when Pema left. Our father is a fan of animals, cats in particular. I don't think I've seen Brucio laugh harder than when he's play-fighting with a kitten. He goes all silent-screamie-laughing, howling at the ceiling with his fillings showing, slapping his knee, tears in his eyes. It's really fantastic to watch. But for some reason Dad doesn't want to get a new kitten of his own. I think it has something to do with him being away, going overseas so much... possibly also to do with the kitty litter side of things. Besides, now that Jenna's not living there any more, who's going to go up the ladder to rescue the cat from the trees at 1am? Uncle Leo? I don't think so. 

Anyway, when Sloane started getting all gaga over the neighbourhood cats a few months ago and we were thinking about getting a kitten, we went to Dad and proposed a deal: we'd go in together on an Abyssinian kitten for Sloane. The breed was chosen for the hypo-allergenic aspect of its coat, and their good rating as a family cat (less aloof than the siamese, less likely to bite, etc.). When we adopted Rooney he was 14 or 15 weeks old, super-well socialized in his breeder's home and ready to head out into the world (somehow, though, he became an ear-sucker too). We decided that the cat would be Sloane's, but we'd share him between our houses - when Turner and I are away from town (at least eight weeks a year, all tolled), the cat would live in Douglasdale. When we're in Calgary, it lives with us. It was a good balance and Brucio readily agreed.

So when we leave for Asia on Monday, Rooney heads down to the deep south of the city to take up residence in Douglasdale until we return. I know Brucio'll downplay it when we get back and ask how it all went - "Aw, it was o-kay. The cat was fiiiine." But I also know that Rooney will be more than happy to playfight The Claw and snuggle at night. So I think they'll both be more than just fine while we're gone.

 

 

 

Categories: Family | House | Rooney

Comments [0]

---

Sloane (and Rooney)'s Pictoral Week In Review: 37.0

Sloaner and Rooney are pals, especially around mealtime. It didn't take him long to figure out that she's a good source of fumbled dinner morsels, so he sticks pretty close whenever she's in the high chair.

While I was taking this photo we had the squirt gun at the ready - Rooney isn't allowed up on the high chair for obvious reasons. Just after this shot he made a break for the tray, and despite being gunned down with water from all directions, still managed to gobble up two big chunks of chicken before making a break for the back hallway.

Sloane's new pet is, in short, a terrible little beggar-thief, and he'll eat anything. The other morning I saw him dragging off a piece of pineapple that our girl had thrown on the floor, and he got his head stuck in a coffee mug the other day while licking at the dregs.

Our unrepentant Rooster.

Categories: Rooney | Sloane

Comments [11]

---

Welcome, Mr. Rooster

The last two months or so, it became increasingly obvious that Sloane is a fan of animals. She loves to have dogs come lick her face, so the canine population out in Nakusp is a big hit; and we go out to the fence to say hello to our neighbour's keeshond dog, Bear, every day. Sloane giggles and sticks her fingers through the fence.

But when it comes right down to it, cats are what Sloaner truly adores. Like, loves. There are four or five local cats (among them, Brother John's siamese, Pema) that come around our yard on their rounds, and when they saunter into view Sloane goes into high-volume HEH!! HEEEEEHHHHH!! mode, reaching and smiling and squirming. She loves cats, loves them.

Considering her enthusiasm, we decided Sloane's was now a good age to introduce a pet (other than the rotating cast of characters through the fishbowl... our longest-lasting fish to date, Sammy, just died last week after a good 12 week run). Turner and I aren't really ready for another dog, yet. But cats, well, I love cats just fine, and Turner's willing to be nice to them. I went on the internet a while ago and sussed out the whole breed thing using "good with children" and "hypo-allergenic" as the prominent search criteria on the breed selector. And the front runner turned out to be the Abyssinian.

So I rooted around online some more, and found a lovely breeder out on Vancouver Island, Nightmist Abyssinians. Called the folks there, and talked up a storm about their cats for half an hour. It just so happened that Uncle Leo was going out to Victoria last week and gallantly offered to transport our new kitten back to Calgary when he returned. So we armed him with Val's cat carrier, and a bunch of cash money (yikes, purebred cats are not cheap!), and on Monday night we welcomed home Sloane's Christmas present from Mama, Dadada, and Grampa Bruce, a hilarious 12-week-old male Abyssinian kitten.

We've had some difficulty photographing the new kitten. When you haven't had one around in a while, kittens seem ridiculously fast. The autofocus on the camera agreed. 

After a few days of namelessness for the new el gato, we finally chose "Rooney" for him. It shortens to "Roo" or "Roon", and twists to the nickname "Rooster" (one of my favourites for the official name, nixed by T). Rooney is an old Irish gaelic label that means 'red', appropriately enough. ...And of course all you Ferris Bueller's Day Off fans may be starting to notice a pattern here around Chez Bristowe Turner, but only if you were looking for it.

A rare calm moment - Mama, Sloaner and Rooney.

And a few more photos, just for the cat porn angle of it all:

Veiny ear detail

Rooney's fur colour is really complex - the shaft of the fur "hair" goes from light to dark, root to tip; and is darker down the centre of his back and gradually lightens as you head around to his tummy

Categories: House | Rooney | Sloane

Comments [16]

---