How to befriend homeless or feral cats!

The past week began with a super Sunday (Mother's Day) at Marilyn's rental. With the common area and pool, we swam, gossiped (!), stuffed ourselves silly on super dogs and salad, loved Beth's carrot cake, and all went home a tad dizzy, but content with our motherhood and life in general! I'm sure we are all very grateful to Marilyn for once more hosting a ladies' luncheon...

This was a week that was...thunderstorms that shook the entire country, I'm sure, with rain to green everything and refresh the world around us. Our grass is already lush once more. It must be frog season here - one morning there were over 40 frogs in the pool - the sound of their croaking in the evening makes it seem like there must be thousands out there! They have a deeper sound than the ones back home in Canada, and these guys although just as small, make the same tremendous noise. We had two bright green lizards on our front path one morning. Cute little fellas with the longest tails, they look like mini iguanas. There are always geckos hanging around with their annoying chirping, but I prefer the lizards. Can they move fast? Can Carl Lewis run! Our cat visitors are here off and on...all so sweet.

Lucy and Spaz

Momcat, Fredi, Lucy, Spaz

Spaz

Fredi

We truly wish the four girls would stay with us...the kittens are a joy to watch, and we can be sure all are well-fed and dry.

Saturday was the FA Cup soccer final from Wembley Stadium in England and there was  no way we could miss our favourite team. Arsenal met Hull City and it was a great match, the score rocketing back and forth, and lo - Arsenal won! There was joy in Pedasi that day. Next up is the World Cup from Brazil...prayers are now heading upward that there will be NO electrical outages for a month. They have been plentiful this year, and are so annoying when it is evening and you are in the middle of a good movie! Speaking of movies, we had both read "Life of Pi' when it won the Booker prize a few years ago, so we were curious to see what Ang Lee made of the movie. There were some changes, yes, but the movie was very well done, and I certainly loved it. Richard Parker was brilliant! Highly recommended, folks.

So, to answer the headline of this post, easy this is not! It takes a lot of time and patience to win the trust of wild cats, and they are so easily spooked, this can be impossible with many. We have not yet touched our outdoor cats, except when they were very small kittens, and now are slowly winning trust. Good food, lots of water, and a quiet environment works best. No sudden movement, loud voices or noises. This needs to be consistent or they will stay away for quite a while and you are back to square one. 

Our own cats, especially Mitzi are very trusting, and totally "humanized". Like all domestic pets, they require daily human contact to stay that way.

As you can see, Mitzi has no fear! If Chris can climb a ladder, so can she. We are presently washing all the drapes, and she wants to help.