Eagles Over the Kennebec

As posted on Facebook by Steve Miller:

SCRABBLE (ca September ? 2002 --February 5, 2020)

Scrabble is gone, 18 years after she was born to a mother we never met somewhere in Central Maine. She came to us November of 2003, when we lived in Winslow, adopted from a Waterville Humane Society outplacement in a Fairfield, Maine pet supply store -- and knew nine of our other cats -- details perhaps later -- eventually becoming the respected elder cat in a four cat household, a post she held for almost exactly five years, guiding the other cats through the exciting move to a new home.

Today is Scrabble's 14th birthday (celebrated), and she has suffered to have her picture taken, Just For You.

Today's Birthday Events include napping in the basket, napping with the heffalumps, looking out the window, napping in the rocker, and staring suspiciously at the Silly Fluffs.

Scrabble acknowledges in advance your appropriate felicitations upon the day.

You are dismissed.

Mozart was our first Maine coon cat, and he came to us courtesy of Kathy Robinson of Kennebec Cattery, which is not, as you might suppose, in Maine, but in Pittsburgh.  He was born in March of 1998 and came to live with us in November of 2003, after his first situation proved less than ideal.

Kodi and Nicky had both died earlier in 2003, leaving us with Hypatia -- a grey-and-white "barn cat" -- and Max! -- a cafe au lait masked wonder.  Mozart came to us in early November, and two weeks later, we also brought Scrabble on-board direct from her temp placement at Animal House Pet Supply.

Mozart was the only Maine coon in the house, and he was Rather Shy.  He and Scrabble buddied up for a while, being the new kids, but as Attrition Happened, Scrabble asserted herself, while Mozart remained somewhat reserved, though affectionate and interested in the projects of His People, assisting with the writing, and reading, of numerous books.

In mid-2005, we found ourselves running a household with only two cats.  We thought we'd add a third, and we thought we'd get another Maine coon.

We brought Dulsey on-board, but she couldn't find a place within the Mozart/Scrabble dynamic, and eventually moved on to her forever home.

In 2008, we brought Hexapuma into the team.  He of course immediately fell under Scrabble's spell, agreed that she was, indeed, The Most Qualified to Run Everything, and left her to it.  He would sleep near and with Mozart, and occasionally invited him to play.  Mozart seemed to ignore him, mostly, but obviously missed him terribly, as did we all, when he died.

When Socks came to us, in 2012, Mozart paid more overt attention to him, perhaps at first thinking that he might be Hex.  He would occasionally cuddle up with Socks, and it might have been that they would have become big, sloppy, cat buddies, but Socks was barely with us a year before he succumbed to cancer.

Which brings us to the New Kids in Town.  We adopted Trooper from Kelimcoons in New Hampshire in June, 2013, specifically as a companion to Mozart, who was clearly feeling the loss of Socks.

Predictably, I guess, Mozart ignored Trooper, who wasn't grey, and who very much wasn't Socks.  Trooper, who had come from a house full of cats, and who had been on the show circuit, continued to make overtures, to sleep with the old guy -- by now, Mozart was 15 years old -- and to try to tempt him to play.  We pretty quickly saw the difference between 15 and 4, and in November, 2013, we brought Trooper's daughter, Sprite, up to Maine.

Sprite and Trooper bonded immediately; they shared a common vocabulary (do not laugh; Maine coons TALK, and while Sprite has a lot more to say about stuff than Trooper does, it's perfectly obvious that they have conversations and consult with each other); they shared a common house culture, and an understanding about How We Cats Go On.

Maine coon females are billed as the shyer sex; however, there is a certain Mom Cat Foo that trumps. . .almost everything.  Sprite immediately took Mozart in paw, cleaning his ears, snuggling next to him to nap, cleaning him up, and seeking him out to just check in several times a day.  Mozart gradually came to the point where he'll lick her cheek when they meet, and will occasionally bury his face in her fur, because apparently all that multi-colored fluff smells Really Nice.

He's a little more conflicted regarding Trooper.  I can see this.  Mozart, who will be 17 on March 1, is a shadow of his former self, and even in his prime was a smaller cat then Trooper, who is tall and muscular -- a working athlete.  Trooper, however, puts up with the occasional swat in the face with patience, and insists that a guy needs another guy to snuggle against, and to watch things with, and occasionally to do his ears for him.  And Mozart mostly accepts that.

It's been really interesting, watching the two New Kids maneuver Mozart into their Coon Circle, insisting, gently, but consistently, that, no, we do not sleep on the blanket by ourself; we share the blanket -- and the person reading under the blanket, if any.  We stop and chat with each other when we meet in the hall; we eat together; we sleep on the humans at bedtime, all of us; there's plenty of room.

So, in all, I think we did the right thing, bringing the New Kids in; and that Mozart is having as peaceful an old age as anyone can, surrounded by his grandcats.

So!  Last night I finished "The Wolf's Bride," which, at 10,381 words, is officially  a novelette.  Such a cute word, novelette.  "The Gift of Magic," by contrast, is a shortish short story, weighing in at 4,330 words. This means I wrote a grand total of 14,711 words in August.  Which means I'm a slacker.    It's now September, my obligations to my characters are retired, and that little nip of fall in the air tells me it's time to get to work.

So, in anticipation of getting right to work, we slept in this morning,  had a leisurely breakfast of fresh fruit with other things -- in Steve's case, Cheerios; in mine, yogurt with wheat germ -- and then Did Things.  I have other Things still to Do, notably changing out the  old USB hub for one that (hopefully) works, signing lots and lots of pages, and doing the bookkeeping that sort of accumulated in a paper drift on the corner of my desk while I was playing with Cael.

Some day realsoonnow, I need to get Ox set up properly for the upcoming Road Trip, but I suspect that today is not that day.  However, I did buy him a wireless mouse yesterday, to make up for neglecting him.

I hear via Twitter from the redoubtable Mr. Standlee that Spokane has won the bid to host the 2015 WorldCon.  Here's the link, in case you want to register, or volunteer.

Mr. Standlee also lets the world know that Detroit has won the bid to host the 2014 NASFiC (North American Science Fiction Convention).  Here's that link.

Steve and I intend to be at both DetCon and Sasquan.  Hmmm.  I'm going to have to start seriously saving pennies.

In other, though not lesser, news, today is Scrabble's declared eleventh birthday, the Shelter having supposed her to be one year old when she locked up for being an unsupervised juvenile on the streets.  She celebrated by performing a new dance, which I unfortunately did not photograph.  Let us just say that the choreography was both stunning and unique, which we have, of course, come to expect from an artist of Scrabble's standing.

She has now retired to the hefalumps.  Celebratory ice cream is planned later, for Steve and I, with catnip for the Queen of the Day -- and the silly fluffs, too.

Here, have a birthday picture:

Slow-moving morning, here at the Cat Farm.

Mozart is dozing on the blanket-covered box at the kitchen-end of the hall.  Scrabble has mounted a watch in the window, and she's keeping a Very Close Eye on the bird feeders.  Especially the woodpecker block, which has been the center of a number of antics this morning.

Bird discursion:

I mean, I know woodpeckers aren't terribly bright.  By my observation, this usually works for them, because they don't tend to notice scary stuff.  But this morning, we have a visitor who can't figure out the chain from which the woodpecker feeder is suspended, and it's distracting him something terrible.  He'd come in, start whacking at the seeds, see the chain, and forget to eat, as he looked at This Strange (and Shiny) Device, first from one eye, then from the other.  It was sad, in an amusing sort of way.

He has finally seemed to have figured out that, if he hangs upside down from the bottom of the feeder-cage, he doesn't have to see the chain, and he can eat in peace.  Which is what he's doing now.

In publishing news. . .

For those who do not tweet, last evening it was Revealed that Carousel Sun (the sequel to Carousel Tides) will be published in early-ish 2014.

So!  This is what we now know about the Lee/Miller and Lee publication schedules for the next little while:

Liaden Universe® Constellation Volume I:  July 2013
Dragon Ship mass market: August 2013
Dragonwriter: A Tribute to Anne McCaffrey & Pern: August 2013
Trade Secret: November 2013
Liaden Universe® Constellation Volume II: January 2014
Carousel Sun: Early-ish 2014

From the hey, that's cool pile. . .

We hear from Madame the Agent, who gets her Locus before we get ours, that Necessity's Child has hit the Locus Bestselling Hardcover list at Number Two.  Not too shabby -- and you did it yourselves!  Well done, and thank you.

And! Under the topic Discussions Worth Having:

Kyle Cassidy, photographer extraordinaire, muses on pockets and women's clothes, here

. . .and there's a follow-up, here

This is a useful and thought-provoking discussion about what pockets (or the lack of pockets) says about autonomy.  Really worth a read.

Eye Candy:

Really interesting series of pictures of the remains of plane wrecks (all wrecks depicted are non-fatal) in remote places, right here.

In writing news:

Today! Is the day! That I will break 50K.  I know this because I'm only 172 words short of the goal as I start my work day.  It's nice to occasionally have some certainty in life.

* * *

Progress on Carousel Seas

49,828/100,000 words OR 49.83% complete

"You kill that shark?"

She raised disdainful eyebrows.  "Must you ask?"

"In fact, I don't have to ask.  I'm curious about your motivation."

. . .more accurately, she glares from the heffalumps.

Isn't she beautiful?

. . .use her wisely.

This is Scrabble, who will be holding down the office while I run to Augusta in the rain. As you can see, she’s quite busy, so please don’t call to ask her to do something. By policy, she lets all calls go to the machine.

Scrabble, Office Manager and Cat of all Work

Originally published at Sharon Lee, Writer. You can comment here or there.

Steve and I are returned from The Great New England Steampunk Exhibition. The cats are glad to see us, for values of glad that include Scrabble sitting in the co-pilot’s chair in my office…with her back to me.

Ah, well.

We had fun at the con; met some interesting people; got to catch up a little with Kaja and Phil Foglio; saw lots of very, very well-conceived and well-done costumes, and a sword dancer. The Abney Park concert was super. I did get to shake hands with the band members and thank them for the pleasure their work has given me.

..which is always an odd thing, no matter which side of the transaction you’re on. I think it’s important to thank people — and especially artists — for a job well done. Yet, when people thank me for the pleasure our work has given them, I often find myself with nothing more intelligent to say than, “No, thank you.” And so it was with Abney Park; the band members were puzzled, but kind, and shook hands and the transaction was complete. And as I say, the concert was super, so — well done, all around.

The con. . . suffered from some organizational snafus, as well as some truly horrendous problems with hotel management. There was the all-too-common lack of hotel imagination when it came to the reality of hundreds of people needing to eat NOW and THERE, which put an unreasonable strain on the hotel staff, who nonetheless did their damnedest to provide good service.

In the end, it all got survived, and the majority of con-goers remained cheerful and pleased with the event. I hope that the concom will learn from its errors, and that they will find another venue for the event next year.

Personally, I discover that I need to be more mindful of my own scheduling and eating. Twice now in two cons I’ve managed to bork my blood sugar big-time by deciding that the show must go on, even if that meant lunch was half of a chocolate chip cookie and a glass of water. This apparently will no longer do — or it will, if I don’t mind the consequences, which it happens that I do.

Today’s tasks include finishing the bookkeeping, catching up the email, eating a good lunch and dinner (ahem) and probably taking a nap, so that I’m up and open for bidness tomorrow, which is, just by the way, Scrabble’s Appointed Birth Day, 2011. She will be, so we believe, nine years old.

So!  How was your weekend?

Originally published at Sharon Lee, Writer. You can comment here or there.