I had some dental work today.

Ugh.

In all of the ugh though, there is some kind of wonderfulness in an old clunker walkman that when you roll your thumb rapidly over the volume dial towards the big end of the embossed triangle and have Brad Paisley or Darius Rucker or I-don't-even-care-who burst into song and overwhelm your ears and mind and senses and almost cancel out the horrible whirrrr of the drill.

We think the cat is out of the garage. The rib/salmon entree went uneaten yesterday.

We shall see if we can keep spooky kitty out from under our cars.

At least we didn't get skunked. By the cat. Or injure any cats in the process. Or get rabies from feral cats. Or never drive our cars again. Or dissolve into melodramatic fits. Or anything like that.

What are we going to do about this cat?

We have tried trapping the cat with an actual small animal cage trap baited with salmon and ribs (this particular cat's fancy). Repeatedly. The food is consumed and the trap tripped and no cat in site. Deep breath. Closer observation of the abysmal-failure-of-a-trap reveals that this cat is much smarter and more resourceful than is helpful or desired. He/she is apparently batting the food out through the bars and dining while outside of the confines of our we-want-to-be-your-kitty-diner trap.

Time to try something else.

Yesterday morning, David opened the garage door donned safety goggles and crawled under his truck. Using a flashlight and an air compressor, he searched the underside of the truck for the I-am-now-gray-just-like-the-underside-of-the-truck colored kitten. Seeing nothing, but convinced that the feline was in there somewhere, he sprayed compressed air into all of the crevasses and potential hiding places and, hearing nothing, left the cat to emerge and run free. We left the garage door open quite some time. Hopeful that the cat took off for more desirable surroundings and after another visual inspection, David cautiously drove his truck to the front of the house. Another period of waiting and off he went to work, sure that the kitten had ventured out and joined the rest of his/her cat family.

A day at the office, a run down the freeway to pick up our replacement for our doesn't-clean-worth-a-cockroach-head-and-I-haven't-even-rolled-a-watermelon-on-the-top-rack-yet dishwasher. Another run across two freeways to unload the new dishwasher at home and back to the office. To sit. In a parking lot surrounded by a field, a lake and lots of greenery. And not much traffic. Just calmly sitting. For hours. And hours. And hours.

David parks in the newly cat-free garage and starts to install the fabulous new appliance. (I am not home or would be drooling over the thought of having a dishwasher that actually, get this, cleans the dishes. I know. The madness of it all. That's what I am all about.) Needing tools, he heads for the garage and WHAT? The kitten is shaky, staggering and clearly frightened and IN THE GARAGE! At the sight of David he dashes up in the underside of the truck. Again. Sigh.

We don't understand. Why is living under a truck, high speeds on freeways, bumpy roads, appliance stores, long waits under a dirty, exhaust smelling truck in a nicely landscaped parking lot and compressed air a more appealing option than, well, anything?

David stared in amazement, put a bowl of water out, figuring I-like-an-adrenaline-rush kitty really needed a drink and went inside to install the dishwasher.

And what are we going to do with this cat?

Tell me if you have heard this one before...

A girl walks into a kitchen. Sees her mother kneading bread and asks if she can knead too. "Sure!" Her mother replies and the girl kneads away happily. As her mother finishes up the loaf and places it all buttery and smooth in the pan to rise, the girl asks "May I eat all this?" and gestures to the surface on which she had been kneading. "The flour???" Her mother questions with sharply raised eyebrow and more-than-mild disgust on her face. "Yes!" The girl sparkled as she spoke "It soothes my mouth."

Note: No disparaging cat comments will be allowed. I will delete you. And enjoy it. This is my site so be nice, even if it is an effort.

We have a kitten in the engine of our car. Not sure which car at the moment. The kitten seems to like them both. (As do we, but I guess that is a bit off topic…) And I am distressed. I have spent the last several hours trying to coax the kitten out of the engine with a baby back rib. (That’s what she dug from the trash two nights ago, so I figured he/she was into pork.)

You see, a Tomcat (or so I thought) has roamed our neighborhood for years. A white calico who loves to torment the local mockingbirds (Which is not a bad thing. We have street gangs of mockingbirds that spiral about the street, generally wreaking havoc on all moving things.) and generally slink around. About a month ago I observed the “Tomcat” dozing on our front porch and…Oops! Must be a “Jeanettecat.” Definite signs of suckling. This and the fact that she must have done some birthing recently assured me that this was indeed a girl cat. (I’m a smart one, ya know?) My infinitely quick brain (don’t spew that coffee, it’s bad for your keyboard) began to piece the clues together…mama cat, birthing, suckling, birthing…right on cue, a kid yelled “Mom! There’s a cat in the garden! With KITTENS!!!”

At this point people began arriving at my house for dinner and several of us trucked ourselves out to the garden to see. They were gone. We finally figured out that mama cat has been raising her kitten in our tomato plants. (Which are tall and bushy enough to hide a small colony of capybaras, so four kittens were nothing.)

These kittens were no longer tiny, so when the next weekend hit and the plan was to remove the unruly tomatoes, (They were blocking all walkways and were probably the reason we had not made it to the back of the garden and seen the feline family.) I figured they were big and independent enough and would move on. I ripped out the tomatoes and left the garden bare except for the blackberries and our one jalapeño bush/tree type thing.

We have since seen the kittens (4 of them: smoky black, orange tabby, white calico and another dark one that I have not seen, but am taking Parker’s word on this) roaming about our yard and surroundings. The orange kitten hangs out in the storm drain behind our house. (and did fine with Ike, we saw her yesterday) (Ike did blow down our pepper plant, and I am a bit bummed about that, know a good way to store jalapeños?) The smoky black kitten lost a battle with a car in the alley right beside our fence, I am very, very sad about this, I have not seen the other dark kitten and the white calico is hanging out in the engine of my car.

Fortunately, I did not drive my car yesterday. Monday morning we found “someone” had carefully torn into our trash and cleaned off some baby back ribs. David said it had to be one of the kittens. We looked and looked but found nothing. He went to work and my car sat. Last night, some guys came over to watch football and I went to bed before the game was over. I heard David come to bed really late and said “hi”. I heard “The kitten is in your engine. I have been talking to him for over an hour, but I can’t get him to come out.” I jolted to alertness. “My engine? Oh no!” “Yep.” He replied. “After B and S left, I heard crying in the garage and there he was. I talked to him and he meowed back, but wouldn’t let me see him. Are you going anywhere in the morning?” “Yoga.” I replied, “But I don’t have to go.” David told me to get him up before I left so we could make sure the kitten was out before I turned on the car.

I got up and walked this morning, as I came into the dark, quiet house I heard the plaintive cry of a kitten. Over and over and over. So sad and pitiful. I slowly opened the door to the garage and all sounds ceased. I heard small movements from David’s truck. Aha! I raised the hood and there in the far, back corner of the engine area was a small white calico kitty all curled up and snug. So cute. And so far away. You see, David’s truck fills the garage bay from front to back with only an inch or two to spare. Certainly less room that I would require to actually walk around it.

Kitty and I watched each other silently for a long time. When I moved closer, he/she slunk out of sight into the recesses of the engine. I could peer in and see two little eyes watching my every move. I would venture to guess that these kittens have had not had direct contact with people and they seem fearful and skittish.

Update: (I know. Is it really an update when I haven’t even posted this? You ponder that a bit and get back to me.) We got my car out of the garage so it is cat-clear and useable, and we set out a dish of rice milk and one of salmon. We are now all four hunkered down on the floor of the garage silently waiting for little kitty to get hungry enough to venture out…

Update #2: I abandoned the thought of yoga, David took my car to work, Kitty periodically meows at us from various sites inside the care frame, no interest in the food yet and we will check back later.

Update #3: Spooky (as I have named him) cleaned off the rib and ignored the rice milk (Hey! It's all we stock.) and the salmon.

I came home Saturday and told Parker, who was smeared with grease and had obviously been doing something under my car, that we were going to learn to crochet. His eyebrows raised and he asked skeptically "All of us?"

"You, me and Caroline." I replied. "And K is going to teach us."

"ohhhhh kayyyyyyy....." he strung out reluctantly.

"Crochet will help you with your fine-motor skills and you'll have fun." I encouraged.

"Wait!" he suddenly burst out. "Fine motor skills! Okay! Yeah! It'll help me play Guitar Hero! That sounds great! When do we start?"

So my boy is learning to crochet to enhance his Guitar Hero prowess and advance his game... Works for me.

He'll probably crochet better than me anyway.

Maybe this will help my Guitar Hero skills.

That would be good.

Rock on, Parker.