Author: catsynth

WCB100: TeaCup

A serious note to accompany Weekend Cat Blogging #100. TeaCup at “Bad Kitty Cats”, has been very ill. He suffered an unknown injury to his leg that became infected, and he has had several operations to remove the infected tissue. He has been very tired and weak, and is currently back in the hospital. We learned about TeaCup through Weekend Cat Blogging and we've been sending our thoughts to him and Megan, and hope other readers will do the same. Fellow WCB'ers Pet's Garden Blog are holding an art auction for TeaCup and Megan, and he is among the animals supported this week at the pet prayers and praise blog.

We at CatSynth hope that TeaCup gets well soon.






Weekend Cat Blogging #100: The Big One Hundred

Well, it's Weekend Cat Blogging #100. The honor of hosting this milestone goes to Puddy and Kate at A Byootiful Life.

Once again, we turn our attention to he world outside of Luna's window. Remember this photo of Luna staring at an outside cat?

Well, the cat is a frequent visitor to the yard. He's been living here longer than I have, and was roaming the neighborhood long before Luna was born. He's actually quite friendly, and handsome as well:

We don't know his name because he doesn't have a tag, but he seems very healthy and sociable, so he probably has a home. He enjoys cruising the tops of fences and finding comfy spots to chill out:

He almost looks like a wild cat in that photo.

Although I don't have a photo of this, I have caught him staring in at Luna a couple of times, with that same frozen slack-jawed look that all the tom cats in the neighborhood, seem to get. Remember this tuxedo visitor?

Luna has all the neighborhood boys looking. It's kinda fun getting to play the role of proud but protective dad for her…





Cat is out of the bag on Saint John Airport security

With apologies to Harry Shearer, we present this “tale of airport security” from the CBC News:

Mary Martell discovered Ginger, the family pet, in her luggage after a two-hour plane ride to Toronto and an hour's drive to Niagara-on-the-Lake. The cat apparently snuck into a bag while Martell was packing.

Martell said her bag was scanned at the airport, but she was not stopped.

“They had asked me, when they put ? the luggage through the X-ray, whether I had a turkey,” Martell said…
…The bag was sent on and loaded into the cargo bay of the airplane. Ginger, 3, was discovered when Martell opened her suitcase in her hotel room.

Fortunately, Ginger is doing well after her adventure. But don't you think that airport security could have detected a live animal in a suitcase? From a follow-up article:

When the cat went through screening, the X-ray machine would have shown just a faint image of some bones,” [Canadian Air Transport Security Authority spokesperson said,] “That, in itself is not a threat object to civil aviation. That would have passed through, no problem.”

But of course my toothpaste is a threat to civil aviation, and my musical instruments (including the acoustic folk instruments) get passed through the X-ray machine several times before being allowed to pass. And a bottle of water (purchased outside the terminal) cannot be carried, but an animal that is 75% water is OK…

Well, since it appears to be OK security-wise to carry live animals in suitcases, can people check in their crying babies, please?




Seriousness with Highways: MacArthur Maze

I had planned to do a “fun with highways post” on the MacArthur maze, which connects highways I-80, I-580 and I-880 to the Bay Bridge in Oakland:

Well, it turns out not to be so “fun” at this time. A major tanker truck crash and explosion in the southest corner of the maze. The resulting conflagration on the elevated southbound I-880 melted the steel of the even more elevated eastboard connector from I-80 to I-580, which eventually collapsed onto the lower highway.

Please visit this article to view images. You can see a video taken by an eyewitness at the time of the fire. Watch it here instead of at the YouTube site in order to avoid the boorish and in some cases quite inappropriate comments.

This looks like it was rather intense, and scary. Indeed it was rather freaky to see the charred freeway photos last night when first logged on last night. I know that section of freeway quite well from my time in Berkeley and frequent trips to San Francisco and the East Bay since then. That section of southbound 880 had only re-opened a few years ago, having been closed and then rebuild after the infamous collapse of the 880 double-decker freeway in the 1989 earthquake.

Fortunately, the driver of the truck escaped with only moderate burns, and nobody else was hurt in either the fire or the collapse of the freeway. Presumably when you see something like that ahead of you, you opt not to keep heading into it. The area is also fairly spare industrial land, so no homes in West Oakland were threatened. Could have been a lot worse, I suppose…







Weekend Cat Blogging #99: May Flowers

First time WCB hosts Spot, Mel, Shishi and Sirius have decided upon a floral theme for Weekend Cat Blogging #99. We at CatSynth are of course happy to oblige with this lovely photo of Luna posing with a California poppy:

As we saw last October, the color orange really brings out something in Luna. I thought this living-room photo of orange with black and grays was quite striking:

While the California poppy is aesthetically and geographically “purrfect” for Luna, it is not safe for cats. These photos were taken under very close supervision and the flower was immediately removed from the house afterwards. We at CatSynth want to remind our feline friends to enjoy May flowers responsibly. The Cat Fanciers Association has a list of plants considered non toxic for cats. Another list of resources on plant safety can be found here.