chiclet

stormy afternoon sky at our beach

Raining and freakishly warm again here this morning. Last night at 8pm the temperature was 20, incredible and secretly I do love it, it's hard to believe that next week will be November. An unusually warm fall just seems to shorten winter which can't be a bad thing. It's 15 this morning and I have all my big windows wide open.

Had a great day in the city yesterday. We left at 9am and we were back home again by 6pm - perfect. And oh the greeting that I received upon returning home from a full day away, Jake wriggling & wagging and bringing me a huge assortment of stuffed toys from the toy box and Miss Winnie Dixon just beside herself with pure joy. Kisses and kisses and spins and snorts it's like she just cannot believe that I actually did come home.

A day like yesterday, when I know I'm going to be gone all day I put my 2 indoor kittens Gussie & Oliver in the guest room with everything that they'll need. That way I can leave the sun porch door open to the back fenced in dog yard and the 2 outside cats Lulu & Bleet and les chiens Jake & Winnie can go in & out as they please. This time of the year it's a perfect solution. I like to round up the cats every evening just when it begins to get really dark. Lulu's always very content to be in at night but Bleet, my solid black cat, would love to stay out and hang with the alley cats all night (although we have no alleys here in the village). We do have lots of raccoons and many reports of foxes and the odd car driving around in darkness and for these reasons I prefer that Bleet comes in. We go through the same routine every night he comes in around 7:30, happily, and within 15 minutes he's back at the sun porch door mournfully crying & meowing staring up at the doorknob as if it might magically turn & open at any minute. We suffer through this short lived performance and he eventually gives up and goes upstairs to lie on my bed. Every night it's the same drill.

Last night I couldn't find him. It was a strange and creepy kind of night last night. Really warm, almost muggy and really windy the leaves swirling around my feet as I trudged all around my big yard and little back forest calling Bleet. He's one of those cats that generally sticks close to home and usually comes when you call him. He also seems delighted when I come outside to join him in his yard so it's strange to be outside calling and wandering around and still no sign of Bleet. I started to think "where could he be". I peeked in my neighbour Florence's garage, although I couldn't really see anything, cat's are so famously nosy and curious that they often get themselves accidentally closed up in garages or sheds and out buildings. By 9pm I was beginning to think my day was now ruined because of my missing cat. I'd leave the front porch light on for him, I'd go up to bed with my book and I would come down to the kitchen every half hour or so and check to see if he'd come back. He did go missing like this once last week and it was midnight before he finally appeared on the porch.

One last trip outside for les chiens before bed and thankfully Jake barked a few times, in his senior dog deep gravelly woofy bark. I thought to myself that's perfect you call Bleet for me. Bleet adores Jake, that's another whole long story, but when Bleet arrived at 29 Black Street as a teeny tiny stray kitten he fell in love almost instantly with Jake, Jake became Bleet's Mama Cat and Bleet has loved Jake immensely from day one. Sure enough into the sun porch door, along with Winnie & Jake, comes my fat black chiclet of a cat- "brat! where were you?". Sigh. Happiness. Sigh. A great day in the city and now all my family are safe and accounted for and it's bedtime. All is perfect once again.


Jake, Bleet and the bunny