Lumpen Cat and Punk Kitten

I came home yesterday to Bartleby lying in the middle of the driveway just taking in the sun. She's decided that living outside again is preferable to sharing a house with other cats and, especially, kittens. She can be found parked under my car or my brother's truck depending on which of us is home.

Usually, if neither of us is around she'll lie off to the side of the driveway and lift her head the least possible amount to see who is arriving when we return. Yesterday, she lay right in the middle of my side blocking the way. I pulled up slowly until I couldn't see her in front anymore hoping she would walk away. She didn't move. I honked the horn. She didn't blink. I got out and went round to the front where she lay nearly under the bumper and told her that, while I appreciated the trust she put in me not to run her over, she really needed to shift her butt. True to her namesake, she preferred not to.

So I physically picked her up and carried her to the top of the driveway and deposited her, limp but unprotesting, by the walkway and proceeded to finish parking.

Speaking of the walkway, I have spent the last week cleaning out weeds between pavers and along the edges. It's really a one day job but I restricted myself to the hour or so each day after the sun sinks behind the house putting the walkway in shadow and before the mosquitoes and other bitey critters come out to feed. And each day Bartleby would stroll over, look at what I was doing and plop herself down right in front of me. So I'd work around her until, having moved sufficiently beyond, she'd get up and park in front of me again thus allowing me to go back and clean up the Bartleby-shaped patch I'd left behind. It's kind of a system we've worked out.

Meanwhile, in the house, it seems Mittens is developing something of a black stripe on her back similar to Paribanour's chipmunk markings. Mittens' stripe is much narrower, however, and since the black stripey fur is longer than the background gray fur (as it is on Paribanour, as well) it tends to get pushed up giving Mittens something of a Mohawk. Which makes her even more bad-ass when she's picking fights with her bigger sister. She needs an earring.