Spring in Texas

Yep, it's definitely spring in Central Texas. I can tell because the local news outlets are breathlessly watching and informing us about a series of about three thunder/wind storms washing over us. So far as I can tell, no tornadoes actually touched down, though supposedly some were sighted. There has been heavy rain and rather large hail. I actually got a tad worried there for a bit -- the area that was most likely to have a tornado in it was going by just a mile (maybe less) north of us. Mostly I look at what's forecasted and stop paying attention, cause there's never been a touch down closer than 10 miles away from us.

However, having 11 cats in the house will give one pause, when considering having to hunker down in an interior room. Our only truly interior room is the spare bathroom/Isolation Ward, currently occupied by the Gone With the Wind Group. I was pretty sure we could get all 9 kittens in there. I even thought it likely we could keep any of them from killing any of the others. (Most of the little ones will play together nicely, really.) And, if we could find him, Simba would most likely behave himself. Angel, though. Just getting a hold of him would be challenging. Picking him up and taking him into the spare bathroom would probably result in bloodshed (not his). Keeping him in there with 9 kittens and Simba -- dangerous for everyone involved.

Fortunately, that didn't become necessary. At one point, though, Angel was heard in the bedroom, making his mournful sounding meow. I went in after him, closing all the kittens out of the room (much to their surprise and dismay). It took some doing, but I did catch him and pick him up. I tried to comfort him -- he was clearly frightened -- and got a couple of dandy scratches for my trouble. For most of the time he moaned in a way I've not heard before while hiding his face in the crook of my elbow. Poor baby! Eventually DH came in and attempted to comfort him, after which we let him go back under the desk or behind the bed or wherever it was he went to hide. DH assured me that he didn't think we were going to have to round him up for the fun hunkering down stuff.

The alert among my few readers will notice that I am up late. Not that this is terribly unusual, but I wish to state for the record that I'm mostly keeping an eye on the weather, in case of needing to hunker down. I'm a bit pissed at the local cable company (not an uncommon happening), as they recently took the NOAA weather radar out of the regular lineup of channels and I have no clue where it went, so I was dependent on their news channel (which was doing a lot of the breathless reporting) and the Weather Bug I have on my computer. I'm gonna have to find out where they moved the thing to. I think it was somewhere in the 2000s. (Grumble, grumble, curse.) As far as I can tell, the point of moving it was so that anyone that wants to see it will have to go with the most expensive cable package. I've already got that, so it's not a huge big deal to me (once I find the darned thing), but the principle of it makes me mad.

Also, for the record, I wasn't at my morning meeting or choir practice this evening as I was feeling a bit unwell. In case anyone was wondering.

More email this evening from the shelter with six more litters of kittens (one with a mom) that need fostering. Most of the babies were long-hairs, which I guess is the theme for this year. I couldn't count the number for sure, as the number in each litter wasn't always listed, but there were at least 20 and one mom. I am not having to exert any self-control about these -- we have 7 fosters and 2 new family members, and I really think that's plenty! (Or possibly more than plenty!) I'm wondering if the number of tiny kittens is related to the length and/or heat of the summer about to begin. (I would like to think it means a shorter and cooler summer, but somehow I doubt it.) We'll just have to see!