We have a very dear friend who lives in Tokyo and is not only a world-famous computer journalist but also a cat lover. She has two cat blogs — one in English and one in Japanese — and she recently sent us a link to a Japanese tuxedo cat video. It’s on the Japanese-language version of YouTube, so there are lots of tuxedo “related videos” on the right side of the page, just like the English version.

Tags: tuxedo cat

OK, not really friends, perhaps. But all the cats loved to watch them.

Today Susan unexpectedly lost one of her beautiful fish, a Gold Nugget Pleco, and Madame Houdini, a White Line Gecko. Dang, they were both fine yesterday.

Here’s a picture of Madame Houdini with two of her little gecko friends in happier days (like when she was alive):

She wasn’t called Madame Houdini for nothing. In her most famous escape (documented in the upcoming book Famous Geckos and Where They Hid, soon to be a major motion picture starring Stickon D. Wall and Leggo Mai Gecko), she not only got out of a completely sealed tank, but eluded six cats for three days by pretending to be a wall decoration, and then resisted capture by numerous experienced reptile wranglers. If you don’t believe me, check out these photos.

Madame Houdini could often be found on the back wall of her tank, where she teased the heck out of all the cats, but especially Jennifur, Auri, and Aurum. Jenni sometimes stood up on her hind legs like a meercat to look at her, while Aurum would come out in the middle of the night and stare at her for hours.

We will all miss them both.

Tags: cats, fish, gecko, lizards, pleco

It was just about three weeks ago when I had an interesting experience with Panther. Unfortunately, while Panther managed to stimulate all kinds of terrific creativity, he also somehow managed to somehow put my leg out of joint, as it were.

Well, that was two weeks ago, and I still don’t like to complain, but since then I’ve been able to sit at the computer productively less and less each day. The pain has been increasing, and I was saving my Vicodin pills for serious episodes (i.e. when I screamed). And walking around with a cane all the time was starting to get old…especially in public, when people saw me and assumed I was old. Anyway, my leg started getting numb at random times and then all the time, so I made an appointment to see the doctor, which was today.

Just a few hours before the appointment, I was suddenly seized by a pain that felt like the mother of all cramps in my calf (as opposed to the mother of all calves, which would be a giant cow…but I was ready to have a cow anyway by this time). Somehow I had the presence of mind to check my leg muscles, and there were no knots, cramps, Charley Horses, or anything similar. It was just pure acute unmitigated pain with no apparent cause.

How bad was it? I called upon God, Panther, Jennifur, Susan, all known spiritual entities and beneficent demons, and used several dozen colorful metaphors. I called Susan’s voicemail to tell her I loved her, just in case. I was in very poor shape indeed.

Suddenly it stopped.

Of course, I expected it to start up again at any moment, but I took the opportunity to take a shower, get dressed, eat, and do all those things people do before going to the doctor. I wanted Steven with me just in case the pain struck again while I was driving, so I left as soon as he got home from school.

I was sure the doctor would tell me I had a blood clot in my leg that was about to break loose and kill me, but she decided my problem had all the symptoms of some sort of nerve damage or displacement (my mother always told me I had a lot of nerve). So tomorrow I’m off to get X-rays of my hip and pelvis, which doesn’t worry me because I’ve already had children.

And the kicker: all that jumping around I did with the non-cramp (or was it an anti-cramp?) must have jiggled something back into place, because virtually all the previous pain has been gone since then. Either that, or Panther and Jennifur really did manage to cure me…which wouldn’t surprise me much at this point.

Tags: agony, cane, cats, healing, leg pain, Vicodin

We have a guest blogger this evening: Steven, our youngest (a precocious 14-year-old) son. As soon as I heard what happened to him, I dragged him over so you could hear it too:

Hello, this is Steven. Just tonight, I fell asleep on our living room couch. I wake up about an hour later with Charger laying next to my chest, Agile under my head (he makes a very furry pillow), Yang in the crook of my leg, Yin on the other side of my legs, and Aurum (mind boggling!) sitting right on top of my side. It was quite a furry blanket as you can imagine :) Then Auri decides to get next to my face so I can taste her fur…

OK, this makes me really mad.

First they invaded Tibet (admittedly, this was a while ago, but we dragons have long memories).

Then they accused the Dalai Lama of being a terrorist.

Now, in one of the most cynical ploys I’ve heard since Hillary Clinton claimed to be a New Yorker, they’ve pre-announced that Tibetans will be making suicide terrorist attacks.

Why is this cynical? Because now the Chinese government can kill as many Tibetans as it likes, and claim they all committed suicide. Or that they were about to commit suicide, so they were forced to shoot them in order to stop them. Or that the peaceful Tibetan Buddhist monks were stirring up the people and goading them to commit suicide, so that’s why China was forced to destroy all the Tibetan holy places.

Think I’m paranoid? Let’s just watch and find out. And while we’re waiting, please remember to boycott Chinese goods to show your displeasure.