I am sad to write that our beloved kitty cat Bob suddenly died today.  I was sitting on our couch with baby Moses and watched Bob try to jump up on the ottoman to peer out the window.  He fell back to the floor and went into convulsions.  He was unresponsive.  I called Russ to come home from the office to check Bob out. — Nothing — no response. 

I took Bob out to our local vet to have them see if they could tell the cause of death.  Our vet does mostly large animals, but was very sympathetic and told me he would get back to us.  We will probably bury Bob out at the farm where we got him.

Bob had been acting owly towards Hilton at night.  But we didn’t think anything of it.  Bob had just had a check up and shots two weeks ago.  We’re wondering if he got into something with our house construction going on right now.

Hilton is just laying on the bed sleeping – he sniffed at Bob while he was still lying on the floor.

It’s a sad day at the Russ from Winterset household.  Maybe Bob the Cat and Spunky the Dog are up in pet heaven playing together.

Will miss you Bob Cat, Roberto Gato, Bob Kitty, Bobby . . . my kitty cat Bob.

The Lovely Janis

Bob on one of his favorite perches– waiting for his turn in the window above the toilet.

Bob and Hilton’s favorite pastime — drinking out of the bathroom vanity faucet.

Bob as part of our Christmas decorations.

Another favorite perch.

Bob and his best friend and brother – Hilton.

Hi  sorry about the hiatus. . . Lots been going on which we will write about later.  However  we have to pay up on a bet with Bandit.  The care takers got us Christmas Costumes to wear and we had to have pictures too – so here we are.  We hated every second and it did not last more than 10 minutes – but Bandit sure got a laugh out of us…

Bob as Rudolf  . . .

And Hilton as Santa Cat. . .

Notice Bandit in the background smiling…

This is what happens when you don’t live with Loving, Caring, People like the Geezers.

It’s very nice that you got me a license plate for my car.

Now buy me a car.

We know we are a day late, but wanted you to know what we are thankful for this year:

 - Fresh Catnip that the caretaker grows in her garden. 

 - Treats – besides catnip.

- Birdfeeders- to gaze at birds and dream of catching one.

- Open windows on Monday (it was almost 70 degrees here) to enjoy fresh air one last time before next Spring.

- A warm bed or couch or chair to curl up in and snooze.

- Petting on the demad of a meow.

- Be able to escape out the front door once in awhile and roll in the dirt!!! (its too cold to do this now – we have 4 inches of snow!!!)

- We are even thankful for Bandit – even though he is a dog. 

- Great caretakers of our castle that feed and water us, clean our litter box out and just being all around good people.

 - Laser pointer light to play with.

- Turkey scraps.

We probably left something out so we will just say we are thankful for everything!!!

 HAPPY THANKSGIVING –

Bob and Hilton.

The Geezer walked down the road, in his bathrobe, to take a picture of the Sunrise.

I followed,  just to make sure the mice stayed away.

Do my eyes look scary in this picture?

Ain’t this pretty!!!

And How about this . . .

These are from two different days and we had nothing to do with taking the pics– We left that up to the caretakers.  We suppose we will have to thank them since as we mentioned before that we only see houses, trees, grass and an occasional squirrel from the out doors. 

Hope you enjoy the view from rural Iowa.

 And for you added viewing bonus (and LM[our]AO) pictures of the week . . .

What can we say . . . we laughed so hard.  We hear the trick or treaters really thought Bandit was cool.   Earlier this year Bandit got sprayed by a skunk out at the farm.  Even with a bath with special soap it took several days for the smell to go away and he was not allowed in the house.  His previous caretakers sent him the costume and voila. . . We guessed we just got really lucky and did not have to endure the whole costume thing . . . anyway we would have just hid out in the basement (in our double secret hiding space) until the coast was clear.  Hope there are no Thanksgiving or Christmas ideas for costumes or pictures  . . . and don’t get any ideas.

We promise to have some pictures up later today. . . still having problems manipulating the camera and computer . . . without thumbs its a challenge.  We might have to bribe the caretakers of our castle to help us out.

 We think you will like the pics and discussion to follow.  We had to ask the caretakers what are sunrises and sunsets. . . you see we don’t get out much and from our vantage point all you see are trees, houses and the occasional squirrel.  Our nemesis – Bandit– let say we had a good laugh at his expense recently (just think Halloween and Costume).

 More to come — BOB and Hilton

Hillary Clinton wrote a crowd-pleasing book “Dear Socks, Dear Buddy: Kids’ Letters to the First Pets,” in which she claimed that only with the arrival of Socks and his “toy mouse” did the White House “become a home.”.

After they left the White House, they gave the cat away.

Apparently there was not enough room for a cat at the new Mansion.

Hillary’s treatment of Socks might come back to haunt her.

While I was making my coffee before dawn, I could see it was going to be an award winning sunrise. I had a few minutes so I got my tripod and went outside with the camera.

Spudder greeted me as always and then tried to show me where her food is.

“Not now, Spudder, gotta take a picture”.

Notice how the early morning sun turned her coat to gold?

Oh yeah, here was the Sunrise. I didn’t manipulate the color at all.

Can you see the 2 red-tailed hawks on the poles?

(left side of the near pole, right side of the far pole).

When I first went out, they were both on the closest pole, side by side.

Looks like a scene from The 300, doesn’t it?

Here’s one I snapped a few minutes later.

Notice the green artifact at the right, I guess it’s lens flare.