Little Cat, Big Bed

My name is Coal.  Long ago I lived on the street.  It was really, really cold one night.  I sat in front of a door and howled.  Patti felt sorry for me and took me inside.  Where I stayed.

I'm old.  I was neutered in 1994; you do the math.

I have extra toes.  It seems to fascinate people.  My paw can double as a spoon, which is handy.  It also allows me to lift the ball out of the track on my favorite toy. 

I have been on an airplane 2 times in my life.   I didn't much like it.

My first trip was from New Jersey to Washington.  I had 2 brothers and a sister with me, but the airline wouldn't take all 4 of us on the same flight, so I had to fly out on the first plane and sit in Washington waiting for the rest to arrive.  It was a long day in a small box.

The new apartment had carpeting.  I liked that.

My second trip was from Washington to Denmark.  I shared a crate with Oscar.  He pee'd on me.  It wasn't a pleasant trip.

The new house is big but it doesn't have carpeting.  Slippery!!  I had to learn how to walk again. 

I'm basically an indoor kind of guy.  I wander outside now and then, but I get confused.  One day I jumped out the bathroom window.  Things outside made me nervous.  I ran up a tree.  Patti eventually convinced me to go back inside.  When I go outside now, I only go to the terrace or the driveway.  I like to roll over and scratch my back on the cement.  If you catch me out there, I will immediately run back inside.  Can't take any chances (see cold night above).

Sometimes I think I'm a dog.  This is why I sleep on the doggy bed.  This is also why I ignore my own water bowl and drink from the big bowl.

Today I was in the kitchen when the tall guy served food for the two big black slobbery ones.  I stuck my head in Lexi's bowl and started to eat her food.  She was confused.

Mission accomplished.  I will go back to sleep now.

Good Morning Denmark!

While the Danish government believes that I can read, write and speak Danish (after all, I did pass the test), I find my skills lacking and it frustrates me. By far, the hardest aspect of the language, for me, is understanding what people are saying. That and actually listening, rather than tuning them out, but that's a separate issue!

I've talked to others attempting to learn the language and to those who are more fluent than myself and the number one suggestion that I get is to turn on the TV. I can't actually watch the TV while I'm working, but everyone suggests that just having it on in the background will somehow penetrate my skull; subliminal learning apparently.

So today was day one of the experiment. I turned on the TV this morning and found Denmark's version of the Today show, "Go' morgen Danmark".

This is what I know, or more accurately, what I think I heard...

1. It's a nice morning in Denmark.
2. Something about a motorway. I don't know if something happened on a motorway or if something is going to happen on a motorway but I know that a motorway is somehow involved in something. Useful, yes?
3. Pia Kjærsgaard had something to say about something. She's the leader of the most conservative party in DK and most of what she says holds no interest for me other than outrage, so I didn't pay much attention to this part.
   
4. I think someone wrote a book about women's backsides through history. When it was popular to have a small butt and when it was popular for baby to 'have back'. And they talked about Pamela Anderson. And church bells were ringing in the background. The same segment was played again later - the church bells gave it away.
5. Tour d'France is coming. I think someone from the Saxo Bank team was interviewed.
6. It is a dark day for England after yesterday's loss in the World Cup. In a related matter, some woman wrote in asking for someone to explain 'off-sides'. I'm not sure if it was explained or not. Then again, I'm not sure I would understand it if someone explained it in English.
7. Someone cooked something involving couscous.
8. Protesters are at the G20 meeting in Canada.
   
9. It's going to be warm later this week.
   

Perhaps Day 2 will go better.

Can you read my mind?

You're probably thinking, "who is this woman in my reader list?" And that would be perfectly understandable as I seem to be as rare as an overstock in a Danish grocery store.

But...
I have been blogging.
I blog all the time.
Daily.
In the shower.
In my head.

The mere absence of actual words on a screen should not discount all the great posts I have written.

In my head.

Perhaps one or two will be coming to a screen near you!