Funny

Once a year, as the full moon rises and the planets align into a cat-shaped orbit, the scribes of the feline world join together. It's a sacred gathering of secret handshakes and mystical rituals that date back to 1992, when the organization first came into being.

In other words, The 2010 Cat Writers' Association, which was established in 1992, held its' annual Conference in White Plains, New York at the Crowne Plaza hotel. Oh yeah, and there was a full moon.

Prior to the formal Conference starting, many of us got together for the “TNT”-Thursday Night Thing? I have no idea what the last “T” stands for, so you'll have to excuse me for guessing. The goal of TNT is for everyone to help stuff the HUMUNGOUS SWAG BAGS full of cat-centric goodies and to get to know each other. After the bags are stuffed, we get to stuff our faces with pizza. Post stuff-fest, We were asked to form a circle, but no joining hands or animal sacrifice followed. We simply took turns saying a few words about our background, how many cats we had and what sort of books we had published so that everyone could get to know us a bit better. There were quite a few folks in the circle, so we added a second concentric ring to accommodate everyone. Many folks said their bit and moved on to the next, but a few decided to pontificate (that's a big word meaning they were time-hogs/show offs, were inconsiderate since it was pushing 9pm and instead of being naked, perhaps we only needed a tease to know enough. I struggled to fight off the urge to roll my eyes back and scream; NEXT! as loudly as I could.)

The thing that surprised and or scared me was realizing that with the exception of only one person, we had the MOST cats of anyone else-by far.

Oops.

I hoped we'd get an elevated status within the organization for our cat-population prowess, but maybe these folks knew better than we did- that having so many cats is not necessarily a great idea. (this is written as I fear finding out how many times my cats puked, pooped and peed in the house while I'm away from home.)

©2010 Robin A.F. Olson. Enter the Swag Bag!

But then there was the swag bags. As I live and breathe, it's like the Christmas I never had, looking into the depths of that black World's Best Cat Litter Bag. Every time I took something out, I'd get a peek at something even better. My imagination ran wild, anticipating how my cats would dive bomb the bag the second I walked it in the door. They'd drag out the catnip laden Hot Cat (awesome!) or wrestle the KONG Kickaroo (love those!) and we got a NEKO Flies wand toy (with the great tagline: “It's swat cats love!”). I can't wait to see how the cats will react once they see it. In addition to the super-schwing-swag-bag, we got eve MORE goodies. I scored some Feliway diffusers (THANK YOU CARRIE!), a cute kitten-sized cat tree (THANK YOU ALLIA ZOBEL! and ARUBACAT) and coupons to buy World's Best Cat Litter at a discount (YEAH, BABY!). ...AND some folks didn't want some of their swag so they gave it to me to give to my foster babies!

©2010 Robin A.F. Olson. Blitzen and Pattycake get first dibs.

Honestly, I could have just gone home with that bag and skipped the Conference, but heck, I had a hotel room booked so might as well stay...oh that and This year I was slated to be a Speaker! The topic was: “Using Analytics to Measure Your Reach.” How boring does this sound? Yeah, pretty boring. In fact, our (Sam was a Co-Presenter with me) presentation was quite perky and charming, but there wasn't much time to get folks excited about it since we were FIRST to go on Friday at 9AM.

©2010 Robin A.F. Olson. I can't believe Blitzen used this tiny cat scratcher right away!

But now we must change pace. This is the first of two sad parts of my story. We got all set up, the projector ran just fine. Mary, my sister-in-writing, had loaned us her projector as a backup! How great was this? No worries about a failed projector. The Keynote presentations we created were working fine, too.

©2010 Robin A.F. Olson. MINE! MINE! MINE!

©2010 Robin A.F. Olson. Like Catnip much?

©2010 Robin A.F. Olson. Spencer, Nora, Petunia and Blitzen are mesmerized by the Neko Flies.

©2010 Robin A.F. Olson. Moonpie grabs it!

But my camera was not doing so well. It showed signs of being under the weather about a week before the Conference. I didn't have time to fool around with it before we left and it was in our room, moments before we were to being that I realized my camera, though it functioned, it only worked when it FELT like doing so. I thought it might be the battery or the fact that my Digital SLR had reached retirement age. Drat! Not having a good camera is like having my arm cut off. Let us take a moment to reflect on the thousands of cute kitten photos that camera has captured for me, as we try not to be pissed off that it's going to cost and arm (and leg) to replace it. But, the show must go on...camera or no.

©2010 Robin A.F. Olson. No, our Presentation wasn't in an empty room. Folks actually showed up!

©2010 Robin A.F. Olson. The graphics are ready, the bowels are empty, let the Presentation begin!

The Presentation went well. Sam did the tech stuff, I told the warm fuzzy story. We hit our times well, fielded a few questions and were done! Felt good.

Then I realized I had a “pitch” session with Susan Logan the super-boss of Cat Fancy magazine in 30 minutes. I'd worked so hard on the Presentation, I didn't prepare my pitch, which I hate doing in the first place. If I ever want a shot at writing for a national publication, I better get my act together.

My brain started to fuzz over. I hadn't sleep more than an hour the night before. You know how it goes when you try to sleep in hotel. Some times it just doesn't happen. The thought that I'd become accustom to cats jumping on my face, screaming in the middle of the night and laying all over me as my evening tonic was depressing. Here I was in a king sized bed and no cats and sleep would not come. The real reason I couldn't sleep was this.

So I dragged my sleepy self over to the Editors room. I prayed my mind would begin to fire on at least ONE cylinder. I sat down to speak with Ms. Logan and my mind went blank...

...part two of my adventures at the CWA Conference soon! Will I face plant in from of a respected colleague? Will I WIN an AWARD for..umm...ANYTHING YOU MIGHT BE READING? Will I make a new friend? Get rid of an old one? Will I wear more bling than the ladies from Texas? Will there be an underlying theme of FIRE TRUCKS and loss in this story?

Stay tuned...

Between rescuing cats and building a non-profit from the ground up, I also have time for rebuilding the engine of my 10 yr old car, knitting cottage cheese colored mittens for my kittens and cooking complicated cuisine featuring paprika for my man. I'm so completely fabulous that Sharon Castellanos of GrouchyPuppy.com has decided to interview me and share my fabulousness with the world.

You can read the interview in the “Cleo's Day” section of her web site HERE.

...or you can skip the whole thing since you already know how fabulous I am...and isn't that enough?

Note: if you're playing the drinking game where you take a shot of vodka for every time I wrote “fabulous” you should be pretty wasted by now! See? I am...fab...you know...

©2010 Robin A.F. Olson. Pattycake LOVES her treats!

Dear Petcurean Pet Nutrition,

Two of my foster kittens have ringworm. They're locked in the bathroom for the next month while I'm treating them for this fungal infection. It breaks my heart to confine such perky, happy creatures into such a small space, so every day I try to do something fun for them to keep their spirits up.

Normally, I don't ever buy any dry cat food at all, but in this situation, since these cats once had lots of dry food at the Kill Shelter I rescued them from, I thought I would find a good quality, grain-free treat to hide all over their room. That way they'd have fun trying to find the yummy pieces and give them something to do.

They REALLY like the treats. A lot.

They both look like crack addicts about to get a fix whenever they hear the sound of the treat bag being opened and once there are treats to be found they scamper about, hoovering up every morsel.

They seem to be having fun. This all sounds great, right?

Here's the problem:

©2010 Robin A.F. Olson. The bag in question. No. I did not do anything to the bag other than photograph it. This is how I found it.

I must have inadvertently left the bag where they could get at it. Since they get a bit too much "alone time," they had plenty of time to figure out how to EAT open the bag. Yes, I said, EAT. Once I found this bag, stashed behind a blanket, I realized that there were pieces of the bag that, even now, are still missing. Maybe they're only temporarily missing...if you get my drift.

The real question is, do you have a program to provide grants for emergency surgery to remove bits of the treat bag from my kitten's belly?

Just wondering if I can start the application process now. If I don't see any shiny surprises in their litter pan soon, I'm thinking I'll be going to the ER Vet since it's a HOLIDAY WEEKEND here in the USA.

Really good treats. Maybe you should consider packing them in KEVLAR?

Sincerely yours,

Robin, the freaked out foster mom

Looks like our good friend, Sockington made the headlines again. Fortunately it was not due to having many secret Mistresses. Socks was at it again, being featured for his Twitter follower-prowess, which is now at over 1.5 MILLION! Socks is so big, he caught the attention of THE People Magazine-May 17th issue, page 152! Are we proud of you, Socks, well, DUH, of course!

Would we be AS proud of you if PeoplePets didn't do an additional article about you called: “The 5 Things You Didn't Know About Sockington?” (that happened to include our former foster, Tweetie?) Well, yesssssss, yes. Of course!

See point number 2, above. Thank you to Helin Jung, my charming friend at PeoplePets for including Tweetie and moreso for declaring aloud that I'm a comedian to the general public! Maybe I can get a booking doing a “stand up comedy, socializing feral cats world tour,” next?

Who knows what's next? I know that Tweetie is doing well, hogging the food at meal time so he has to be separated from Socks and Penny Cat and that otherwise he's getting along well with his “Dad.” Of course what PennyCat thinks in another story.

Oh and WELCOME People Pets readers! I forgot my manners. Hope you'll come back and visit again, soon!

I promise. No more creepy close up shots of my feet! (see below a few posts..wait, no, don't look).

Anyone who visits this web site regularly knows there aren't enough cat photos. There just aren't. Thankfully, Davander Mobile just released the latest version of CatPaint for lucky iPhone and iPod Touch owners. For 99 cents it's great for creating absolutely absurd images using your own photos as a background. Then you simply add their pre-loaded cat images to any "catless" image or add more cats to an existing photo; if you feel badly that you only have 2 cats and want to seem more like a hoarder (like me with 8 cats).

I swiped a few examples off the Cat Paint Gallery so you can see the work of true “artistes.“ It's very simple to pick up on how to create your own Catserpiece, and during the creation, the cat art meows every time you place one! Great for taunting real cats while you do your art.

As seen on Cat Paint's Gallery Page! Nice job, whoever you are!

Of course if Taylor Swift can enjoy this, well, that just says it all. What it says, I do not know, but heck there's a CAT in the photo. WIN!

I just did my own Cat Painting. It might not have been Mewseeum quality and of course I would pre-fur an option to add my own cats. Maybe that will happen in a future version, but for now, I feel satisfied that my boring photo of the Tappen Zee Bridge has been transformed into a moving tribute to something. Maybe. Maybe not a tribute, but not a bad effort. Okay. Just look at the photo I made and like me so I can feel good about myself! I don't have Taylor Swift's legs...or anything else that she's got, for that matter.

©2010 Robin AF Olson. “The Bridge to Tabbybithia”

So go. Create art. Or bug someone with an iPhone to share this app with you. Just don't bug me. I'm busy creating another catsterpiece.

...yeah. I gotta million of 'em! That one was so funny, right? Right, buddy?

How 'bout this one:

What do you get if you cross a cat with a tree? A cat-a-logue.

Get it? Cat-a-Log??!!

Hey. That was funny! Hey! Come back here!

Donner declares; “Mmmm...nothing smells like home more than me mum's bum!”

This post is not for the faint-of-heart. This is about a kitten, who was cuddly and sweet when he was little, but who has now turned EVIL. Yes! He IS a ZOMBIE-KITTEN!!!! His only interest is to CHOMP on an innocent Blog-writer's head, taking huge mouthfuls of hair, in a depraved desire to gnaw away until the skull can be penetrated and the juicy brains gush forth!

I don't know how much longer I can survive this vicious attack, but at least I was strong enough to warn all of you that if you see this furry fiend to RUN, RUN, RUN away-just as fast as you can!

Consider yourself warned...ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!

Clean up in aisle 9!

By the way, no, we do not leave our towels on the floor. They're hung on the racks (see top right) Prancer has a mouthful of toilet paper. She's licking her lips. I can't understand why, since the TP came out of the GARBAGE CAN! Donner (front) seems to think if she squooshes down no one will see her. Huh. Right!