I baked a cake today.

And what is cuter and more hilarious than Oliver discovering the wonderfulness of momma's yellow cake batter, and subsequently ending with it smeared all over her face? Watching her spend forever trying to lick it all off, and then nose the bowl for more, made me giggle very, very much.



Nothing, and that is a fact.

( More Oliver )

This is going to be an Oliver Update, Complete with Pictures, and I apologize for being such a horrible mommy as to not provide regular updates, or even regular pictures. This house has been kind of crazy the past few months and I think only the cats are the only ones who see it all as perfectly normal, or at least acceptable.

PS: By the way, if any of you are Jean's friends (or anyone who knows Oliver, for that matter!), don't be afraid to pop up and inquire about Oliver on here or other posts in my journal. I don't bite. ;3 And I don't mind in the least.

( But it's long so here's a cut. )

So I'm sitting here.

And all of a sudden I hear the toilet flush, and Oliver comes running out of the bathroom like a spooked kitten.

I knew he had a fascination with flushing toilets, but actually FLUSHING ONE YOURSELF DEAR KITTEN IS A LITTLE EXTREME DON'T YOU THINK

Sorry for the lack of updates; I've kind of been waiting so I can just group everything together in one final version. Here is how my life has been thus far:

I have a new job -- I just started Tuesday -- 8:00 am to 4:30 pm Monday through Friday, working for Carolina Casuality Insurance Company as a Claims CSR (which is to say, customer service rep). It's a very -good- job, despite the fact the schedule reminds me vaguely--strongly--okay, the schedule is exactly like the one I had when I went to highschool. Get up at 6:00/6:30 and get home at 4:30 (although in this case I'm getting home at 5:00 instead). Not only that, it's good, and I'm not arguing, especially since now I am the sole income for the family, minus social security and whatever else the hell my parents get (which isn't much). Dad still hasn't found a job, and I doubt he will, since he was planning on retiring in October anyhow, and two heart attacks and a bad leg and a bad back later, it's not like he has many options for his line of work. Anyway, for more details about my new job I can't state here, you can always ask me (if I haven't gushed to you already) -- I may or may not answer depending on who's asking.

Oliver had to go to the vet today (without his mommy, I'm so sad!) -- Mom took him, because the eye infection/whatever I thought was previously healed came back, and on top of it he developed a respiratory infection. I called my mom during my lunch break for the update (he went to the vet this morning), and he has to stay on antibiotics for ten days, and mom made them give us something specifically for his eye as well. He's three months old, weighs three pounds, has to go back for his shots, and oh, we found out he's a girl.

Yeah.

Let me repeat that.

OLIVER is a GIRL.

My response on the phone when my mom told me: "..... I'm sorry, what did you say?"

So now I either have to pick a new name or just keep calling HER Oliver. I'm tempted to just keep the name and treat her as a boy and just keep the official records as her being a girl, and whatnot. She can be a lesbian with me, right?

It sure beats calling her "Olly" or "Olivia," as my mom suggested. Ick.

Anyway, got my hair cut, dyeing it again this weekend, and thus I need a vote: deep red as usual or dark brown/near black this time?

mood: awake ;p // music: daddy yankee - mami no me dejes solo

Oliver has settled in quite nicely! It only took a short time to coax him to play games with me, after I let him explore my room. He was zoom-zooming all over the place after his sparkly bell-toy, and even took to attempting to pounce his own tail from time to time when it unexpectedly showed up in the corner of his eye. It was like he went, "..! What's that! ::Pounce!::"

We played for an hour or two, and I got everything of his setup in various corners of the room, got his food and water, and got his little papasan-tent set up. We had a bit of an argument over that, as I had to lift the top of the papasan chair up to get the blanket spread out for the tent, and it's a pretty big piece, so he spent a good minute in the corner hissing at me for spooking him. It was okay, though, because five seconds after I finished getting the tent set up, he was playing with me again.

His favorite game seems to be gnawing on my hand, which was the exact way Katie was when she was little (she's still that way, in fact). He loves grabbing onto my hand with all four of his paws and rolling onto his back so he can chew on my fingertips.

He has a fascination with my ceiling fan -- or more appropriately, the switch-string for controlling the fanblades. If you've ever seen a picture of my room, you'd know that I have the length of it tripled by a decorative pull, and then a black ribbon tied to that and left to dangle. (Why? Because it makes it so much easier to reach in the middle of the night when I want the fan on/off. All I have to do is lean up and snag it.) Oliver hasn't -yet- tried to leap from the bed towards it to try and pounce it, but he's made several starts and I don't doubt he will eventually.

He slept in bed with me last night -- he loves jumping off just to climb back up the side again -- and we both got fairly good sleep. This morning, he was back to racing around a mile-a-minute, and insisted on waking me up. By chewing on my hand, of course. And then he fox-pounced all over my bed (I have a queen size, plenty of room), with his little back arched, fox-pouncing my arm, my legs, my feet (look, the toes wriggle!), and my head. Yes, my head. He seems to have taken an utter fascination with my hair and pounces my head whenever he can. He's such a goober.

So, in short, Oliver is doing very well, and has settled into his new home almost immediately. He likes peeking out from underneath my pillow when people open my door. ;p

EDIT: ( cuteness asplode )