On location with cats #amrevising #amtiredofwinter

April 8, 2023 by Julie Holmes, author 12 Comments

Finally! Finally the sun has made an appearance, after almost a whole week of gray, clouds, wind, and even some snowflakes. Oh, don’t forget rain. Maybe, just maybe, the weather wonks will be right, and we’ll be seeing 60 degrees by the middle of next week!

Oh, please, please let it happen!

I’m spending one more night at my son’s apartment, mostly so I don’t have to do anything but write; I’ll pack up my stuff and head home in the morning. It’s been interesting working remotely from here. I don’t usually have four miscreants hanging around while I’m working. Or rather, wandering directly through my workspace. All of them. And cats don’t care what you’re doing, they’re gonna do whatever they want. And they’re not going to turn down their curiosity for anyone.

Juniper–cat in the bag

The first day of work was okay. I think some of the cats were still getting used to me being there, and my time in front of a computer in the spare bedroom/slash office threw them for a bit. I’d already spent two and a half days with them, but not working. I was definitely a novelty for about 5 minutes, then they figured I wasn’t going to play with them. No worries, plenty of stuff in the office to jump on, climb on, nap on, sit on, climb on some more.

Sheesh.

Of the four cats, the two littlest/youngest are cool with new or seldom-seen visitors. Nyx and Juniper considered me just another piece of human furniture to climb and rub against. It took Stella another day or so before she was begging for attention.

Stella and Juniper

Tibbers is the shyest of all of them. I barely saw him for the first few days, and when I did he looked at me like “what are you doing here? You’re not supposed to be here.” He’s like the little kid who peeks out from around the corner to see if the visitors left yet.

During my second or third day of work, he decided I was worthy of his presence, I guess.

Yep, you can stay. As long as you pet me.

This is my good side!

It wasn’t too bad, until the day I was in a meeting with my team, and Juniper decided the TV mounted up on the wall was a perfect place to explore. And darn it, no amount of human discouragement was going to keep her from climbing behind that TV.

I did end up kicking all the cats out of the bedroom/office so I could finish my meeting. Oh, fun fact: Tibbers is tall enough to open the door. You know, the handles are all those lever-type handles now, so he’s able to pull the handle down to open the door. I ended up locking the door so they wouldn’t get back in. Uff-da!

Juniper and Nyx. Reminds me of Light Fury and Night Fury 🙂

Most of the time they were fine, albeit with the occasional–and expected–walking across the desk in front of the monitors, just because they could. And can’t forget the random games of cat parkour, where they spontaneously chase for the sake of chasing. The Zoomies!

They have a bunch of toys, and of course the rods with various lures dangling from the end are the favorites. I had to replace one because the one that was on the rod started shedding pieces. Juniper is the most enthusiastic about chasing the lures. She’ll start growling as soon as she snags it. That brand new feather lure is looking pretty sad after a few days of Juniper.

Juniper in the bag! (yes, her eyes are different colors)

As for my revisions, I managed to get through maybe three-quarters of the book. My daughter stayed Saturday night and most of Sunday, so I didn’t get any writing done during that time. I’m heading home early; I have a webinar I want to sit in on about writing short stories, and my son and his gf will be back in another day. Hoping to get the rest of my revisions done by the end of the weekend so I can move on to finding another beta reader or two before sending it back to my agent.

Take-aways from this week of cat-sitting? Four cats in a three-bedroom apartment are too many. Way too much cat hair everywhere! I’m going to have to wash everything when I get home. Each cat has its own personality, and it is really interesting to watch them interact. The youngest (Juniper) gets a pass on lots of stuff, and is allowed to play with stuff even if the others want to (they wanted to play with the lures, but Juniper was like the Tasmanian Devil in her enthusiasm of chasing them, so they let her). My son needs a better brush to collect cat hair (I used his, and of the three, only one seemed to be effective at all). Cats LOVE to be high, and the cat shelves they have that mount to the windows with super-strength suction cups are genius!

I do have a favorite, though. Tibbers is the best. Once he’s comfortable with you, he’s super chill. Nyx is awesome, and she’d be the first I steal so I could let her roam outside at our house in the middle of nowhere. Man, she’d love it! I’d even take Stella. Juniper? She’s a little terror–for three days she tried to climb up behind that TV! She’s not quite a year old, so a lot of that is kitten that she’ll outgrow. Nyx was like that, too, when she was younger. Now Nyx has settled down a bit, but she still loves climbing.

Anyway, it’s been fun. Even though cats don’t need the everyday sort of maintenance like dogs do, it was nice to be away from home distractions (hours of news, anyone?). I do have a personal writing retreat at the Shire scheduled for mid-May, so I am looking forward to that. No cats, but also no cat hair, and no TV. And a good place to walk.

To all those who observe Passover or Easter–Happy Holiday of choice! May Spring finally grace your doorstep, and may your writing flow!

Nap time!

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