Meet our new cat: Russel Crowe.
18 May 2011 03:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cimoreneWhat happened was basically that we saw a picture of kittens for fostering in another part of the world entirely, got to talking about how awesome kittens are, and accidentally talked ourselves into getting a third cat. Our eyes met and we could hear the click and we both said "Shit" and then Wax said "I'll just google".
We planned to only net-browse and think about it, but Wax found a post about a 2-year-old fixed male Cornish Rex (that's our breed of cat) here in town who needed a new home and so she texted the cattery. The next day I woke up to the sound of Wax talking on the phone in Finnish to the breeder. "Dude," said Wax, "it's a little old lady, and she's a crazy cat lady. She has twenty-two cats." The 'crazy cat lady' bit was only said half-seriously because she's still an active breeder and show-er (and prize-winner) of Rexes, with ties to other reputable breeders in the area, including the one that Tea and Lily (may she rest in peace) came from, Darling Isis. So when we agreed to hop on a bus that afternoon to look at the cat, we were thinking it would be a casual look around and a chance to maybe play with some kittens, and we'd have plenty of time to mull over the decision.
No. IT WAS A NIGHTMARE! First of all let me say that there is no animal harm involved here. She's not that kind of crazy cat lady. The cats were all expensively and painstakingly cared for; it's just they are apparently the only things she is conscious of.
The lady lives in a huuuuuuuuge house by Finnish standards, alone because her wheelchair-bound husband is in a nearby home as her arthritis prevents her caring for him. This house holds the remnants of past glories, but what it doesn't hold is any furniture meant for the use of people except a sturdy diningroom table and chairs, and the lady's bed. Otherwise it looks like someone is mostly through moving out. The room pictured is the front parlor, and that is real VELVET flocked wallpaper with a deep, plush pile. A few gold-framed clocks and things still hang on the walls interspersed with the empty spaces, marked with hooks or holes, where other pictures used to hang. This room alone still contains any of its furniture - a bunch of scarred, scratched-up and ruined sideboards and cabinets which, according to the lady, are genuine antique Chippendales. And now ruined. A huge one on one wall is full of empty shelves, with just a pair of little glass doors in the center hiding sad souvenirs from the 70s or something, and what looks like about half their original contents.
The wallpaper in every room is ripped to shreds like pictured here, and it's also stained halfway up in massive blotches representing years of soaked-in male cat piss. The stench is overwhelming and sickening. It was dim and half lit and it was practically a visible miasma, which Wax now says was contributed to by the kind of structural water damage/mold that gives you asthma. All the cabinets in the house, and there are a lot, are taped shut with packing tape to prevent cats getting in. Most of the closets are locked with keys in, and there are a lot of those. There's an old loveseat in the hall, a tiny antique single bed given over to cats, and then the lady's own bed, and aside from the aforementioned table and chairs, the entire house is otherwise empty of non-cat furniture - three bedrooms, the parlor, the bath and sauna and a lot of hallspace. The lady prattled obliviously for a long time and Wax and I mostly communicated via eye contact, and what we said was "CHANGE OF PLAN. TAKE THE CAT AND RUN."
We were there an hour and a half and everything we wore, including our undergarments, stank unbearably and had to be washed. Also the cat's name is "Russel Crowe", with only one L. It's not a very appropriate name. He's been going by Russel Crowe, Rusty, and The Saddest Action Hero around here the last few days.
He came home Saturday afternoon and needed a lot more time to himself to settle in than Arwen did. We were worried at first, because he went about 24 hours without, apparently, eating or drinking or using the litterbox, and just huddled and cringed, first in the cat carrier and then in his nest of blankets, and snuck furtively back to his cave whenever we tried to take him out.
Wax got a cold on Sunday but Sunday evening my persistence paid off and I got him to first headbutt my hand and face, then eat and drink out of my hand, then purr and show me his belly, then to venture out of the sauna/shower on his own. After that it was all improvement and now he seems to be doing really well: he's active, he's getting along tentatively with the Crazy and the BB, he's ignoring the dog, he's chasing strings, he's jumping up inside the bookcases, he's sitting in the sauna and yelling for someone to come play with him.
He also has odd pupils - Wax thinks it's because one is a slit pupil and one is a round pupil, as opposed to simply being different sizes. Both of them expand and contract; it's just they always maintain the obvious size/shape difference. Although the left one looks rather triangular, not exactly what I'd call 'round'. Anyway, it's too bad we can't call him "Bowie", but "Russel Crowe" is just too amazing a name to pass up, perhaps especially when it is so ill-suited to his personality. He's a very handsome ginger boy, and looks like Lily (may she rest in peace) in a number of ways, but rather closer to the breed standard, except for the fused tail-tip, a tiny tiny skeletal flaw that is the reason he's fixed (and reduced price). He's also a lot bigger than the other cats - long and rangy and sleek, and such a beautiful boy! Especially his long, noble little nose.
We planned to only net-browse and think about it, but Wax found a post about a 2-year-old fixed male Cornish Rex (that's our breed of cat) here in town who needed a new home and so she texted the cattery. The next day I woke up to the sound of Wax talking on the phone in Finnish to the breeder. "Dude," said Wax, "it's a little old lady, and she's a crazy cat lady. She has twenty-two cats." The 'crazy cat lady' bit was only said half-seriously because she's still an active breeder and show-er (and prize-winner) of Rexes, with ties to other reputable breeders in the area, including the one that Tea and Lily (may she rest in peace) came from, Darling Isis. So when we agreed to hop on a bus that afternoon to look at the cat, we were thinking it would be a casual look around and a chance to maybe play with some kittens, and we'd have plenty of time to mull over the decision.
No. IT WAS A NIGHTMARE! First of all let me say that there is no animal harm involved here. She's not that kind of crazy cat lady. The cats were all expensively and painstakingly cared for; it's just they are apparently the only things she is conscious of.
The lady lives in a huuuuuuuuge house by Finnish standards, alone because her wheelchair-bound husband is in a nearby home as her arthritis prevents her caring for him. This house holds the remnants of past glories, but what it doesn't hold is any furniture meant for the use of people except a sturdy diningroom table and chairs, and the lady's bed. Otherwise it looks like someone is mostly through moving out. The room pictured is the front parlor, and that is real VELVET flocked wallpaper with a deep, plush pile. A few gold-framed clocks and things still hang on the walls interspersed with the empty spaces, marked with hooks or holes, where other pictures used to hang. This room alone still contains any of its furniture - a bunch of scarred, scratched-up and ruined sideboards and cabinets which, according to the lady, are genuine antique Chippendales. And now ruined. A huge one on one wall is full of empty shelves, with just a pair of little glass doors in the center hiding sad souvenirs from the 70s or something, and what looks like about half their original contents.
The wallpaper in every room is ripped to shreds like pictured here, and it's also stained halfway up in massive blotches representing years of soaked-in male cat piss. The stench is overwhelming and sickening. It was dim and half lit and it was practically a visible miasma, which Wax now says was contributed to by the kind of structural water damage/mold that gives you asthma. All the cabinets in the house, and there are a lot, are taped shut with packing tape to prevent cats getting in. Most of the closets are locked with keys in, and there are a lot of those. There's an old loveseat in the hall, a tiny antique single bed given over to cats, and then the lady's own bed, and aside from the aforementioned table and chairs, the entire house is otherwise empty of non-cat furniture - three bedrooms, the parlor, the bath and sauna and a lot of hallspace. The lady prattled obliviously for a long time and Wax and I mostly communicated via eye contact, and what we said was "CHANGE OF PLAN. TAKE THE CAT AND RUN."
We were there an hour and a half and everything we wore, including our undergarments, stank unbearably and had to be washed. Also the cat's name is "Russel Crowe", with only one L. It's not a very appropriate name. He's been going by Russel Crowe, Rusty, and The Saddest Action Hero around here the last few days.
He came home Saturday afternoon and needed a lot more time to himself to settle in than Arwen did. We were worried at first, because he went about 24 hours without, apparently, eating or drinking or using the litterbox, and just huddled and cringed, first in the cat carrier and then in his nest of blankets, and snuck furtively back to his cave whenever we tried to take him out.
Wax got a cold on Sunday but Sunday evening my persistence paid off and I got him to first headbutt my hand and face, then eat and drink out of my hand, then purr and show me his belly, then to venture out of the sauna/shower on his own. After that it was all improvement and now he seems to be doing really well: he's active, he's getting along tentatively with the Crazy and the BB, he's ignoring the dog, he's chasing strings, he's jumping up inside the bookcases, he's sitting in the sauna and yelling for someone to come play with him.
He also has odd pupils - Wax thinks it's because one is a slit pupil and one is a round pupil, as opposed to simply being different sizes. Both of them expand and contract; it's just they always maintain the obvious size/shape difference. Although the left one looks rather triangular, not exactly what I'd call 'round'. Anyway, it's too bad we can't call him "Bowie", but "Russel Crowe" is just too amazing a name to pass up, perhaps especially when it is so ill-suited to his personality. He's a very handsome ginger boy, and looks like Lily (may she rest in peace) in a number of ways, but rather closer to the breed standard, except for the fused tail-tip, a tiny tiny skeletal flaw that is the reason he's fixed (and reduced price). He's also a lot bigger than the other cats - long and rangy and sleek, and such a beautiful boy! Especially his long, noble little nose.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 18 May 2011 01:24 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 18 May 2011 01:48 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 18 May 2011 02:07 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 18 May 2011 02:35 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 18 May 2011 02:49 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 20 May 2011 05:32 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 18 May 2011 04:15 pm (UTC)And yes, with the broader selection of photos I can see why Wax (if Wax it was?) compared Russel to Benedict Cumberbatch. Same cheekbones and expressive-if-odd eyes.
(no subject)
Date: 20 May 2011 05:31 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 18 May 2011 04:41 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 18 May 2011 07:20 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 20 May 2011 02:21 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 18 May 2011 08:24 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 20 May 2011 02:20 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 18 May 2011 09:37 pm (UTC)re: the saddest action hero, it looks to me like his one pupil is quite large, but slit-shaped, except that he's only looking out the top half of it, giving it a triangular look. Which is quite strange!
(no subject)
Date: 20 May 2011 02:18 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 19 May 2011 01:40 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 19 May 2011 07:06 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 19 May 2011 08:53 am (UTC)Cat!
Date: 19 May 2011 10:11 pm (UTC)