The Crystal Caves

just some random pics i've had on my cell phone memory card for a while and decided to post. i guess i'm in a picture mood rather than a writing mood right now.



( pics here )

seriously. i can't even count going to work as productive.
this is day one of thirteen in a row at work. and it was dead. dead. dead. i was really happy i had books with me. i learned a lot about the Granada Sherlock Holmes series staring Jeremy Brett and then started one of Stephen King's books on writing. or on horror, rather, as i'm reading that one first. then i'll read his "On Writing" and see if it lives up to the opinions of my writing group. it's rather the holy grail when i go to the conference every year. so i'm curious.
i also downloaded the Prince of Tennis memorial best CDs (all 8 of them) and i swear it's like listening to an extended 100 song marathon. so far every song has been in the exact same order. to the point that i even know what's coming up next. it's kinda fun. =^.^=
more ideas for where stories are going, but no energy to sit and type. not to mention that there really is such a thing as cat nightmares or a kitty boogieman because Nina came out of her nest very abruptly last night with her tail four times it's normal size and looking like she'd just been shocked. and she only just went back to the nest. she's been insisting on sitting with me since i got home from work. i have no idea what got under her fur, but i'm just going with it.

My little girl turns 12 today. I asked her if she knew what that was in human years. *snickers* And, yeah, her name is pronounced like the weather system. It's Spanish.
This is her the day after she came home from Cabo San Lucas. It's a pic of a pic, so not real great.




We figure she was about three to four weeks old when mum found her in Cabo and brought her home. She bottle fed for 11 weeks and then went to deli shaved roast beef because she wouldn't eat kitten food. I said let her eat the cat food, but my mum said princesses should have the best food.
Here she is today. Not really happy to have her picture taken. And I didn't do my hair yet. ;)




I'm biased, but I think she's the most beautiful cat ever. For her birthday she gets a day with no little punk kitten lurking around the corner. I put Zeri outside.

My kid brother is home and we actually have a tree this year. (I also have a new brace for my wrist that is letting me type a little more normally, so we'll see how it goes)
Nina decided to help us set up the tree.

( pics and other text here )

Draco has now been missing for over 72 hours. Ro called the humane society in Pullman, we went to her vet after the dealer auditions today and checked with the humane society here in Moscow as well. The vet did tell us that any professional group (humane society or vet) will check for a microchip, which he does have, and they'll call if anyone contacts them with that information.
We also went door to door on her street with a picture and asked everyone who was home if they'd seen him recently. She's got some really nice neighbors, which has helped renew my faith in the human race. One gal said she'd put out food for a week or so just in case and another said that he'd watch any time he was out. They could have just been saying it, but I believe them.
The bad news is that a couple of the people Ro talked with said they had seen a couple of coyotes in the area, and on Monday night (the night he went missing) a dark colored cat being chased by a coyote. That alone pretty much killed Ro to hear. She's positive he's dead.
She's going to make up flyers and we'll put them up this weekend and there's a local add service that's free to use so I'm going to press her to put up a note there as well.

She thanks all of you for your replies, kind words and well wishes. Neither of us are doing too good at the moment, and her roommate's attitude is not helping at all. I'll keep you updated. :(

Mr. Jinx and Zeri were out enjoying the sun the other day and I managed to get a couple of pics of them. Jinx is huge and Zeri is so tiny. It's hard to believe the black and white kitty (Zeri) is two years old.




They get along fairly well with each other. Jinx will just lay on her if he doesn't want to play any more. *grins*



Then I came back inside and upstairs to my bathroom to brush my hair, looked in the mirror and actually screamed a little.




I was being watched. That's Nina on my towel shelf. It's the one place she can hide from Zeri in peace.

I have four new chapters each for Miami and NYDC. The new dragons and characters I decided to bring in have really energized both the series and me. If I keep this pace up, I'll be at the next group meeting before I know it. Bet that will make everyone happy, ne? I'd say look for an update announcement around Wednesday or Thursday. I still have to write up Quantico and get some of the new character sections checked over for OC-ness before I post them. Oh yeah, and get the wiki updated so everyone will be able to quick reference the new characters. So little to do and so much time. Wait, strike that. Reverse it. (love that movie)


Okay, so two pics tonight. This is Ro's older cat, Draco Malfoy the Last. He's sitting next to her chair.



I think he was telling me to quit watching Avatar The Last Airbender and get back to writing my novel. *Grins*

And this is La Nina in our living room. She's still finding strange hiding places, although this one was rather obvious.




I just didn't have the heart to tell her that hiding between the sofa and the foot rest is pretty obvious. Cats are weird.

I'd like to just stop the world for a couple of days so I could have a break. Seriously. I know I say this a lot, and I'm happy to actually have a job with how the economy is right now, especially with the fact that I work in a casino and we could totally go out of business if the economy tanks too badly. But having problems at work messes with my writing. When I get upset or depressed I just don't want to write fan fiction, unless I'm working on a sad story of course. ;) And I have no sad stories right now. Or, at least I don't think I do with living plot bunnies. First Time doesn't really count at this point.

The poor cat had surgery for his ear and, while the stitches were in, was fine. The day after Jinx's stitches came out the hematoma came back so now we're trying to figure out what to do next. At least my mum is home - and wasn't upset that I took him to the vet - and can make the decisions. I'm worried that he'll have to have his ear amputated to deal with this, although I think the next step is a drain stitched into his ear. That just sounds messy.

Work is work. The new guy they gave me from poker caused a massive meltdown this weekend. I found dirty dishes and used napkins lying around. How bloody hard is it to clean up after yourself at work?? So I put up a nasty note and have a feeling that my surveillance room will be cleaned by next weekend. That's the punishment for not cleaning up after yourself. Cleaning the whole room. I can't suspend him because James and I are already having to work a weird schedule because of Jeff - which doesn't make either of us happy - so I asked my manager for help with punishments if Jeff doesn't start doing his bloody job. And I'm not just talking about cleaning up after himself.

My parents had a blast in Mexico and I really don't know that mum wanted to come home again. But she's only going to have to work for another two years of so, and I think she can manage that. My father is having good days and bad days - not health wise, but memory wise. He somehow managed to lose his wallet with everything out at the mall so we're having fun trying to cancel accounts and get new cards issued from the credit card companies. The worst part is I think he was old fashioned enough to still carry his social security card in there, and that's one of the worst things in the world to lose. So I don't know what all they're doing there as they haven't asked me for much help on that one. But, then again, I work two days on, one off, three on, one off, so things can get interesting around the house.

I managed to break a major writer's block on the second novel in my series and have actually been working on drafting that out while things are still fresh. I still have some fan fictions pieces to type and upload when I have the chance, but my finger is back to bothering me, so I don't know what's going to happen. All I can say there is just stay alert and I'll put up the usual update notes on here. And I'm working on a couple of Fuma no Kojiro fan fiction pieces. I'll make sure to put up pics of the guys in them when I post. *Grins*

As always, hugs and thanks for your patience with me.

the antibiotics made me sick, so no more of them. i hate being chemical sensative. i've missed three days of work now because of all this. *sighs* at least we're positive the kitten doesn't have rabies. i really don't want to go through the shot routine. ;)

the good news is that we found them all homes!!!!! the two wild things that had been living here are going to be farm/barn cats which is totally perfect as they were the wildest. the little boy out neighbors are fostering is going to be a birthday present - he's fairly tame now - and the boss is keeping the other two. she lives out of town so they can be a little wild at her place. so none of them will be put down, my finger is on the mend - sore as hell but not as bad as it was. happy endings all around. i love happy endings.

long story short because i only have one hand at the moment; my mother just listed a house for sale that the owner buggered off and left five, yes five six month old kittens in the backyard. my mother, her boss and co-worker had been trying for a week to catch the kittens with very limited success; ie, one kitten. the boss decided to keep her and she was the tamest. i caught the second one a couple days ago by leaving the house door open and then chasing him around.
last night i came up with the idea of tuna fish in their crate and twine tied to the door to close it once the other three were inside. i managed to catch two of them that way. then i get the idea to food trail into the house and do a repeat of the other day. fifty percent success. the cat went inside but my mother had opened the furnace room door so now we don't know where it is, yeah, it, we don't even know what sex we're dealing with.
we bring the two i caged back to our house with the idea that i work with them, socialize a little and then we'll find homes for them. i bring the crate inside, open it, reach in and the kittens went crazy. i finally managed to catch one (a boy) as he was flinging himself at the window. that scared, :( the other one was behind our dryer, so i chased it out and just as i went to grab it, it bit me. hard! so i dropped it and it ran back behind the dryer. after bleeding all over everything i finally got a jacket over it, mommy grabbed and checked under the tail. it's a girl, so we have one of each at the moment.

but the end result is that two of my fingers are bandaged together, i'm on codeine for the pain and i'm only just now coming out of shock. i don't know if these two can be tamed. i'm not going to try touching them again any time soon - unless i have really thick gloves on. *rolls eyes* mum's boss just wants to put them all down. it's just not fair that these poor kittens are being made to suffer for a human's mistakes. and, as far as we know, they've never been to the vet so i'm researching how rabies presents in cats. although, honestly, i think i bled enough that any bacteria washed out. i totally don't blame these kittens for any of my injuries. they're just scared to death right now.

i hope a co-worker is right that one of her friends wants mousers for her house. the two little hellions downstairs would be perfect, if the boss does have them put down, i don't want to know about it. i love cats more than any other animal - always have done - and just want to find the bitch-whore who treated these kittens so bad and beat the crap out of her.

so, i'm going to vanish again because i really can't type right now. i'll keep writing though. i think three more chapters - 60 pages - and the novel will be done!!!!!