Archive for the 'Fiji' Category



Overstretched

March 8th, 2009

I have managed to overstretch myself a little. This week I have at least one “extra” thing scheduled four days out of five on top of my normal schedule. I think the only way to get it all done is to go on autopilot. Much as I would like to blog I don’t have the time. I must write something, though, or else my Mom will worry (hello Mum!). So here is a picture of my cat:

fiji2

Fiji. The Daddy calls him my Familiar because he follows me everywhere like a very quiet slinky little dog.

Oh, OK then, like a cat.

At night he sleeps on my pillow and purrs in my face. Strangely for a cat, his breath doesn’t smell.

In other news, we haven’t abandoned the T-Bot’s beloved science experiments. Here’s a fun one we did last week with yeast, sugar and water in a glass bottle. It blew the balloon up almost immediately.

yeast

I have been avoiding the project the T-Bot really wants to work on. Before you judge me, listen to why. He wants to build a rocket to fly into outer space. And I am scared of heights.



Not Named After a Budget Vacation Destination*

February 19th, 2009

My life has been mysteriously following the same path as Marinka’s recently.

Well, actually … NO.

But I did get a cat!

Fiji

It was all planned for a few weeks ago, and then there were complications. But finally, last week, the T-Bot, Wictor and I went in to pick up Fiji.

I happen to love black cats and did you know they are eight times more likely to be euthanized than other cats? I picked him up and that afternoon the shelter replaced his picture on their website with three more black cats.

So, he is settling in surprisingly well, especially considering the fact that for the first two days, whenever he ventured out from his hidey-hole under our bed he was greeted with toddler and pre-schooler squeals of delight, which of course sent him scuttling right back under there.

And, although he had hardly been out of his 4 ft square cage since October, he is playful, cuddly and curious. He is sitting purring under my desk right now.

And his name? Well, he came from the shelter called Fuji. And for want of further inspiration we called him that until -duh- it occurred to us that Fuji sounds exactly like Fugee. Lightbulb moment! He hadn’t been named after an apple after all! By then we couldn’t think of anything else to call him that wasn’t obvious, pretentious or difficult to pronounce. So we just changed a vowel. That way when the kids get confused we can just pretend it was a slip of the tongue. Or many slips of the tongue. Or that they all have terrible diction. Oh, wait a minute, they do.

Kind of in the same way Baby Sister will present some elaborate and fanciful excuse for a wrongdoing after the fact,  we’ll just forget that we have never even been to Fiji, and it that doesn’t actually look like this, and pretend that this is why we named him:

We’ll also try and forget that I don’t even really like this painting.


(*Yes, Fiji is a budget vacation destination - if you live in New Zealand. )