Learning to Fly

February 21, 2021February 21, 2021Angel Ackerman Leave a comment

This is a post about babies of multiple species.

My dad helped me… no he did it… my dad got a really disgusting clog out of the vacuum cleaner last night. And then we (with my stepmom) went to Tic Toc Diner to harass teenager #1 at her first official job as a waitress. The young man assigned to our table recognized me and asked if we wanted her to serve us, and I said that wasn’t necessary we were happy observing her from afar. But he gave her the table anyway.

That’s my baby, and she was buzzing around looking very focused. There is a strange heartwarming and heartbreaking feeling when you see your baby becoming independent.

Earlier that day, Vesta and Minerva went to the adoption event at Petsmart. But no one inquired about these Roman Pride babies. I brought them home to Hermes.

Teenager #1 is with her dad right now, so I spent some time working with our foster kittens from Feline Urban Rescue and Rehab. I’m going to post some videos from today to show progress.

Hermes is afraid of human hands. And Mars— oh spunky Mars— bit one of our fellow FURR volunteers when she tried to move him from the habitat at the Petco in Easton to the one in the Phillipsburg area.

Video: Manhandling Mars (and Hermes)

Video: The Roman Pride

Meanwhile, I decided I had to let go of my fear of harm coming to the parakeets. I opted to let them free fly for the first time since Boo-Boo’s death (see Farewell Boo for details). And it was the first time for the babies. My room is oddly silent right now because all SIX birds, including Nala the Goffin (who turned five this week), are sleeping. The budgies flew so hard!

Video: Baby birds awkward flight

And here’s a video of Hermes from yesterday: Hermes amid the vacuum

So all the babies are doing well!

The Monday report of challenges, joys & lessons

February 9, 2021Angel Ackerman Leave a comment

It is almost 12:45 am. Tuesday. I’ve been home from work about 2o minutes. I started the dishwasher and poured a beer— that may also include crème de cacao and peanut butter whiskey.

It’s about 15 degrees outside which means my parking pad area was icy and hard for the car to climb, but the Jetta is safely in the garage.

I just sat down on my bed to write this blog entry about the joys, challenges and lessons of my Monday. Let’s go in reverse chronological order— start at the most recent and work to 24 hours ago.

Challenge #1– the Belkin charging cord I got for Christmas appears to have stopped working. Now I have sworn by Belkin cords for years. And they all last years. Why has this one failed? I’m too tired to troubleshoot. I whipped out my new Anker cord I bought as a spare when I saw it on sale. And teenager #1 needed one. Bought one for all of us, including teenager #2.

Challenge #2 and Lesson #1– I still suck at QC at the Bizzy Hizzy. The official goal is 130. I did 89 on Friday and 82 today. I am not accustomed to failing at assignments and it’s compelling exercise to try to improve at something at which you really seem to be bad.

Which brings me to… Joy 1– working in a warehouse with a wide variety of people has shown me how eager people are to help when you appreciate them. As I have mentioned before (see Rip it off fast like a bandaid), the ability to take criticism seems to be unusual at the Bizzy. I had another colleague come up to me today and thank me for being agreeable and willing to listen.

Joy #2 — cherishing the leftovers of last night’s Peruvian chicken with red peppers and Brussel sprouts.

Challenge #3– understanding how this video of my dear cat Fog reached 100 views in less than 24 hours: Fog purring. And now that I go to copy the link it’s up to 453 views a mere 5 hours later. Why?

Joy #3– meeting Barbara at Petco. She is one of the volunteers who helps care for the kittens in the habitats up for adoption through Feline Urban Rescue and Rehab.

Challenge #4– cats are a**holes. I had to very forcefully remove Fog from my room last night because he kept dangling from the parakeet cage. I cried myself to sleep because he’s slept with me for about a month now and I didn’t feel like I could rest without him.

Peaceful Saturday

January 30, 2021January 30, 2021Angel Ackerman Leave a comment

The weekend started on a rowdy note, after a difficult but not insurmountable week of difficulties with my physical body after two weeks of mandatory overtime at the Bizzy Hizzy.

I haven’t written much not because I lacked anything to say, but because my emotional exhaustion matched my physical fatigue.

The teens stayed up last night, and Mama found herself hungry around 11 pm so from my high-jacked-from-inbound-processing work station, I texted them:

You guys want pizza?

I let teen #1 order from Dominos as not much else is open that late at night, and somehow a $43 charge appears on my Amex. They do love their pizza.

I know at work I’m still slow compared to the people that normally work returns, processing and even QC but I felt good last night and my numbers did improve during the week.

I got home at 12:25 am and the pizza arrived at 12:30 am— which tasted amazing and I ate too much. It was perfectly accompanied by a cold Yuengling brought by my separated-from husband.

It was so nice to spend some time laughing and joking with the teens. Even if we were up past 2 am.

We took Minerva of the Roman Pride to the Cat Adoption Day at Petsmart hosted by the organization with whom we foster/volunteer: FURR. Minerva’s profile is here: Adopt Minerva. Her brother Mars and sister Vesta are at Petco.

On the way back, I stopped at Dunkin and we tried the Valentine’s pink velvet macchiato.

Pink Velvet Macchiato (includes Minerva) video review

I spent some time helping Teenager #1 gather sources for her AP English research paper on Anne Rice’s influence on the vampire legend. I can’t wait to see where she takes it. I know where I would.

I also bought some unusual liquor yesterday— so here are some cocktail ideas I put together.

Caramello Russian: 2 parts caramel vodka with 1 part crème de cacao
Reese’s Peanut Butter Shot: 2 parts peanut butter whiskey, 1 part crème de cacao

Fostering scare: “Trapped” kitten

October 28, 2020October 28, 2020Angel Ackerman Leave a comment

Every animal mishap when you have pets— and consider yourself an experienced pet owner— starts with the phrase: “I knew better” or “I should have known better.”

This one is no exception.

Everything I state in this blog entry is based on my 40-somethings years of experience with all sorts of cats and a teen obsession with Cat Fancy magazine circa 1990. Do my knowledge may be wrong, don’t take what I say as gospel. I’m just trying to spare you from making my mistakes.

So, yesterday, the teenager suggested moving two of our foster litter, The Roman Pride, to join Hermes (our final in-house résident from The Greek Pride) now six months old and young, fluffy The Norse Pride.

Now, what we should have done is brought the cat carrier to the mud room, put the kittens in, and transported them to the teenager’s room. What we did instead (and I was dumb to do this) was scoop them up and carry them into the kitchen.

The teenager even warned me that I had a terrible hold of Vesta, the most timid of her litter. Now, my cat friends, do not confuse timid with docile.

As soon as we set foot in the kitchen— Vesta started to wiggle and I lost my hold of her. A timid cat is a scaredy-cat. This poor kitten has been in a house three weeks, and I suddenly try to carry her away from her siblings into a room— a new world— that she has never seen.

Luckily, her cat instinct drove her into the bathroom off the kitchen. Unfortunately she wedged herself between the shower and the wall.

There is a litter box right next to this shower, we gave her a plate of wet food and closed the door. We had to wait her out. She had to regain her sense of safety and trust in her environment. We closed the door.

About four hours later, the teenager tried to disassemble the shower, but it’s so old the fasteners are corroded. So we had to wait.

In the morning, she was screaming. I opened the door and after a few minutes the screaming stopped and she cautiously crawled free.

But then my personal cats scared her. Back she went. I moved my personal cats to another location in the house, have her food, and left the door to the room where her siblings are open. The bathroom door was also open.

After a while, I brought the calmest sibling of her litter into the bathroom and the two of them called to each other and then I put Minerva back with her brother.

All the doors are open.

About ten minutes later, Vesta carefully crept toward her siblings and “home base.” All kittens safe.

Update on the Roman Pride

October 27, 2020October 27, 2020Angel Ackerman Leave a comment

With Apollo and Zeus of the Greek Pride on display (hoping for an adoption) at Chaar, working on brother Hermes’ fear of human hands, integrating 2 new adult cats in our personal household, and the addition of the Fluffy Norse Pride, the world has not heard nearly enough about the tuxedo kittens we dubbed The Roman Pride.

We’ve had them about two weeks and the teenager is nervous that we don’t spend enough time with them.

I spend 30 minutes to an hour with them each time I feed them. They are in the mud room with the garbage and recycling can right off the kitchen — so we see them every time we throw things away and they hear all the kitchen activity.

But the teenager wants to bring them to the bedroom with the others.

Meanwhile… Let me tell you about them.

All four can be handled.

Jupiter — was originally the most docile and willing to be cuddled. Has grown more shy over time, now the last one to the food bowl. Has an adorable white snout with a black blob in the middle. Make.

Mars — the spunky one. Has a white line on his nose and one black nostril. Male. Has started making strides in the playing with and eating with humans. Video: Mars playing with me

Minerva — I thought she was the runt. But it turns out Vesta is smaller. Minerva is the first to investigate the other cats when they visit and the first one to the food bowl every morning. I love to cuddle her.

Vesta— Vesta is very timid and she often comes to the food bowl and then runs back to the corner feeling exposed and unsafe and then comes back. She has a beautiful stripe on her face. Very narrow.

Video: The Romans meet my cats

Video: Jupiter and Mars

Adieu dear Hades, enjoy the freedom

October 11, 2020October 11, 2020Angel Ackerman Leave a comment

Fostering is not for the feint of heart.

The teenager and I applied to be foster parents for feral kittens through Feline Urban Rescue and Rehab at the end of July.

We received our first litter July 31— a little faster than we expected. That litter was about 3 months old (the same age as our newest litter) and consisted of 5 spunky but sickly kittens. By August 2, I was in the hospital for a cat bite.

Trial by fire, I guess.

There was only one all black kitten in that litter of tabbies. Two were lovely silver tigers. Two were brown tabbies with lots of white.

Since we wanted to name them after Greek Gods, we quickly decided the black one, regardless of gender, would be Hades.

Hades had bad eye infections and bit me, piercing me with one tooth, while I was trying to give her meds. It was my first time in nearly a decade scruffing a kitten. I’m used to scruffing my 15 lb adult cats.

Hades never trusted people. She would never let me closer than 2 feet away. Yet, if I sat still she would come up to about 18 inches away from me and cock her head inquisitively.

Sometimes she slept in the top bunk with the other kittens, but most of the time she hid in the corner.

And then she got ringworm. We crated her to try and give her meds. She would not let us. And every day she got more aggressive.

So we talked to our FURR foster godmother. Together the three of us decided it was time to transition Hades to a barn cat.

Today we transferred Hades to godmother’s house where she will have her ringworm treated and continue the process to become a barn cat.

We all hope the open space is what she needs to be happy.

Angel Ackerman

Writer, Editor, Passionate Participant in the World

Tag the Roman Pride