Cats are easy to grow, even in a reasonably exposed north-facing garden like ours - but benefit from early propagation in a greenhouse (see left).

When the cat is ready to be planted on, pick a large pot to give the cat sufficient room to root/curl up (see right top).

Cats are reasonably hardy but can be infected with the “evil virus”. If that occurs, remove the cat from the pot (to avoid cross-contamination) and leave it to “dry out” on an old doormat (see right bottom - tell tale evil signs can be seen, namely the staring eyes, the fact her head is on backwards and the slightly manic “I’m going to eat your soul” expression). The evil is usually eradicated/forgotten about within a few minutes and the cat’s growth will continue as normal again.

Cats will raise from the curled/lying position as they grow until they reach their final height (typically around 40cm). Cats who have been infected with evil early in the growth stage may retain a rather hunched appearance and maintain the soul-eating gaze. In actual fact, they don’t eat souls, they prefer Go Cat. And tuna.

STEP 1
Take an old pillowcase, or in my case an new-to-me-but-old pillowcase, purchased for a very cheap price from a local charity shop. Get a cat (in this case Sili) to inspect it for quality and cleanliness.

STEP 2
See this picture of a pillowcase shopping bag on the internetz.

STEP 3
Find the instructions the red bag lady used to make hers.

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STEP 4
As directed, fold in half along the diagonal, pin and cut. Do a better job than I did then have a cat expect your handy work. If you didn’t do a better job than I did, expect the cat to stalk off in disgust (a la Carbon).

STEP 5
Turn the pieces inside out (everything is pretty much done on the wrong side from here on in) then ask the nearest cat (still Carbon) to help fold and pin all the diagonals for hemming. You may think the cat is in the way but you are wrong: they’re making sure you don’t get too over-eager with the folding and that you listen to Martha and fold it in twice, about 5mm a time. Cats are stickler for detail and have claws to make sure you follow their instructions, even when they’re so disgusted with your efforts that they can barely look at you.

STEP 5a
Brief pause for a quick tickle with Carbon because, let’s face it, you’re not going to get any more work done while he’s in this mood.

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Carla came and went:

While Sili sat and Boron rubbed against my legs:

And Carbon? Carbon was too relaxed and light absorbing for such energetic pursuits…

I don’t usually just pimp random websites but this made me laugh a lot this morning: http://www.stuffonmycat.com/

Some on the front page are a bit hit and miss but the “Best of 2005″ are pretty awesome: Loki is the best though. In fact, nearly all the food pictures rate highly on the amusement-o-meter. Eric wins the cute prize though.

And if all that wasn’t strange enough, the actual Stuff on My Cat ‘my cat’ is an absolutely clone of my mum and dad’s cat Holly in terms of markings. Awww.

(The picture here is Sili, by the way - probably the only of our cats that would let us get away with such tomfoolery)

Quick post pointing to two things that live elsewhere:

1) Katherine has started a lifestyle management company so if you need your lifestyle managing, let The Blue Gnu do it for you.

2) Carla met a squirrel on Wednesday and John photographed it. So cute.

I saw a very cute thing this morning that I had not really seen before: I saw Carbon fall asleep.

I’m ill at the moment (Fresher’s-Flu-come-early) so spent most of yesterday and this morning in bed. Carbon and Sili (and later Carla) volunteered for nursing duty. I was nursing Carbon too: along with his little sister, he’s having a skin allergy problem at the moment and his response to the itching is to lick and nibble constantly which damages his skin. While he sat with me, I tried my best to break his licking obsession. When he started licking, I put my hand between his head and the itchy body part; sometimes he’d lick my hand then stop licking, other times he would stop straight away and seemingly forget about the urge. I tended to leave my arm gently wrapped around him afterwards to stop him starting up again and this time, I had my arm over his shoulders with his upright head in the crook of my elbow and my hand under his chin.
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