Rubinary Blog » kitten

Дама с Собачкой

Alena — Wed, 20 May 2009 23:26:55 +0000

А я люблю прогуляться по квартире со своей собачкой. Такой маленькой, ушастой, зубастой, рыжей и пушистой собачкой.

Кто кого выгуливает — это, конечно, вопрос спорный…

Shublik The Model

Daniel — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 18:42:23 +0000

I managed to take a few photos of Shublik’s eyes today. Normally it’s a hard task since he just does NOT sit still for a second, and today wasn’t any different.

My trick was to use a lens with a focal length of 105mm at f/2.8 and a flash. This way I could stand far away and the amount of light allowed me to freeze his movement — very short exposures. The macro lens has performed well, I think.

I still had to discard most of the photos, but these 3 are the best of the series. Hope you like them too, as I’ve become very biased with things related to this little monster.

Some More About Shublik

Alena — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 01:29:07 +0000

Our Shublik is getting bigger and heavier, but people — he is still tiny! For some reason on many pictures he appears bigger than he really is…

This creature loves to eat. We try to keep him on cat’s food, but let him experience other tastes from time to time. We gave him a little bit of meat the other day (fried on a pan with a bit of water and no spices) — within seconds it was gone! He managed to almost steal Danya’s fried egg on Sunday, and snatched a piece of white bread from the table today. Luckily for me, he can’t get on the counter top in the kitchen yet, but I fear that day when he’ll be trying to help me cook is not too far away.

He likes to drink from all the places other than his bowl – bath tab, toilet bowl, my glass…

He has a peculiar urge to use his letterbox right after I start cleaning it (which is totally cool with me – I just have to wait a couple of minutes).

I really like it when he purrs, although I wish he would stop doing that at night! Tonight Danya was my guarding angel and was taking Shublik off the bed every time he was starting to purr, so I was finally able to get a good night’s sleep and felt especially energized at work today.

Шубля-Бубля

Daniel — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 16:29:08 +0000

I took these pictures this morning and I think it’s just too funny. Too bad I had to use an iPhone, so the quality of the shots are far from good. That doesn’t make them any less funny thought.

Saturday Morning

Alena — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 17:48:27 +0000

Today Katie came over and gave Shublik one of his shots (the last on is due in 3 weeks). For some reason he was a little agitated and not quite his usual self — maybe because he smelled other cats from Katie’s clothes. Katie said that she can see that he’s grown and that he is going to be quite big, just like his father.

Shublik did not let us sleep too much tonight again, but I hope he will just grow out of it. Katie suggested buying some kind of special cat’s tent where Shublik can be put for a couple of hours in the morning so we could sleep. Maybe, we’ll try this.

After driving Katie to the subway, we’ve decided to get summer biking t-shirts since the weather is getting nicer and nicer. We picked two matching red t-shirts, and also got a spare tube and a cycling computer. The funny thing is that Alan did not recognize me at first, and when it finally hit him, he said to Danya: “And I was thinking – are all of his girlfriends 6 feet tall?”. Alan noticed that I dyed my hair and kept saying that I look different today. What can I say – no makeup and new hair color can do tricks!

It was also funny that one of the guys who works there told us that two people came to their site from our blog (I am amazed that he easily figured out who we are when we entered the shop today). I can only say again that I am very happy that we bought our bicycles from the local bike shop, and that dealing with people there is always a pleasure.

Curiosity

Daniel — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 22:32:52 +0000

An accidental perspective resulted in a good photo.

Shublik during his first moments at his new home.
March 28, 2009.

Шублик — Первая Неделя

Alena — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 14:52:16 +0000

Даня говорит, что мне надо написать о своих ощущениях от Шублика на данный момент, ибо со временем он подрастёт, я попривыкну к его присутствию, а память, как известно, штука не очень надёжная.

Вообще он мне нравится. Смешной. Бегает за нами хвостиком. Очень любопытный — иногда даже сверх меры. Во второй день мы ужинали с Данькой в зале, а эта ушастая морда пыталась попробовать нашу еду. Нет, ну какой нормальный кот начнёт лизать помидоры в салате? Мы его не подпускаем к нашей еде (стараемся), но это требует определённых усилий.

Мне очень нравится когда он начинает муркать — Даня называет его маленьким трактором. Правда, у Шублика еще есть дурная привычка муркать среди ночи и будить нас, тычась мордой в наши лица. Мне вчера даже сон снился, что какие-то наши враги запрогромировали в Шублика команду будить нас в 3 ночи, чтобы мы хуже днём соображали, но мы это дело просекли и команду из памяти Шублика удалили, и спали спокойно. В одну ночь он разбудил нас 3 раза, в прошлую — только один раз.

Он очень ласковый и спокойно даёт себя гладить и щупать за любые места (лапы, хвост, живот и т.п.). Рыся, например, такого нахальстава не потерпела бы.

Что мне не нравится, так это то, что Шублик любит помяукать — мне кажется, он делает это когда ему становится скучновато и он требует внимания. Он не любит быть один, и когда мы дома, Шублик должен находится как минимум в той же комнате (а еще лучше на том же диване, стуле, кресле, столе, коленях, животе, шее и т.п.).

Шублик мне кажется очень красивым котёнком — мне нравятся его огромные уши, необычный окрас, изогнутый знаком вопроса тонкий хвостик, умильная мордаха.

Признаться честно, забот поприбавилось и иногда (особенно по утрам, когда хочется спать, а он муркает) Шублик меня раздражает. В целом же я к нему уже привязалась, и не жалею о решении взять в дом эту маленькую пушистую врединку.

Shublik Playing

Daniel — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 15:08:47 +0000

We took a bunch of pictures yesterday, but most of them are not sharp since it’s really hard to catch him sitting in one spot. As Alex said, his attention span doesn’t seem to last longer than a quarter of a second.

He slept the whole night in our bad with us, without making a single sound. Just moving around from time to time. In the morning he ate his breakfast and went back to meowing.

Now he fell asleep on the window in our office, next to me typing. Where-ever we go, he comes with us.

Shublik!

Daniel — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 03:00:59 +0000

We went to see a kitten today. We were supposed to see if we like him and if so we could get him when he would turn 16 weeks. He turned out to be a super funny creature with never-ending source of energy.

To our big surprise we ended up coming back home with him! Shublik has arrived. He’s going to turn 12 weeks tomorrow and his birthday is January 4th. First thing he did was eat his dinner, which is a good sign.

For the past 2 hours he’s been inspecting everything and playing, but he also makes sad meowing sounds from time to time. Hopefully he will get used to his new home quickly and won’t be sad.

Aby Kitten

Alena — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 03:06:06 +0000

I’ve always considered myself a dog person. Cats, even though I must admit some of them are very cute, never touched my soul in quite the same manner. I think that my mindset is about to change…

About a week ago Danya casually said — wouldn’t it be nice if we had little, funny and fuzzy kitten living with us? And I thought that indeed it would! For some reason this thought wasn’t particularly appealing to me before, but somehow Danya’s suggestion hit the right spot — and so our search began.

At first we just wanted to adopt some poor soul and provide it with shelter, food and lots of attention and love. We did not really expect to pay for a kitten, since from our understanding there were enough kittens out there which could be obtained at no cost. We started our search at Craigslist, but there were no deals of interest. Then we googled for adoption sites in our area and tried our luck there. Danya found a photo of 3 Russian Blue kittens, who were really adorable and supposedly ready for adoption, but nobody returned our calls or answered our emails. We really did not want any particular breed or anything like that, but we knew that the kitten should be young and a male one at that.

By that time the weekend has started and we’ve decided to try our luck at local pet stores. One of my co-workers, Wes, has bought a kitten for $50 at some pet store and is very happy with the cat he owns now. To our disappointment, there are practically no pet stores in Brooklyn (or we were not able to find them). The fist one that we visited is specializing in little dogs only, but the owner sent us to another store located on Coney Island Avenue.

That store did not have any pets at all, but a weird Russian lady said that they’ll get Abyssinian and Bombay kittens in about two weeks. We asked her if she ever gets Russian Blue breed, and she said that she doesn’t get them because they are ill tempered (which is not really true from what I understand). Then she started talking about Abyssinian breed — how beautiful, smart and good-natured they are. The price that she quoted was way beyond our expected budget — $950! Who would pay such money for a kitten? The Russian lady kept insisting that this is also a very good price, and in Manhattan same kittens are selling for as much as $2,000. When we asked her about the age and vaccination shots, she said that the kittens will be around 7 weeks old and will have no shots.

When we got home that night we’ve decided to do some research and check the claims of the weird Russian lady about this Abyssinian breed, and the more I read, the more I was getting obsessed with it. Abys in my opinion are one of the cutest and beautiful cats out there! And many people say that indeed they have great personalities — very curious, very playful, very communicative.

After looking through pictures for a couple of days I realized that I want no other cat but Aby in our lives. We tried to find kittens through the internet in hopes that we’ll find a better deal than the one the Russian lady proposed us. We visited one store in Long Island, and they quoted $1500 per kitten. We sent out emails to different Abyssinian breeders, and one woman, Molly, who now resides in Florida, was particularly nice in her correspondence.

Molly’s been breeding Abys for over 25 years by now, and all of her 3 cats are expecting babies in 1-2 months (starting in mid February and ending in mid March). Her price is $850, and she said that they can deliver the kitten to us at no additional cost (her family used to live in Manhattan and they travel to NYC from Florida pretty often). We’ll be able to choose any kitten from all 3 litters (there is only one person in line ahead of us). Molly already e-mailed us a contract, so tomorrow Danya will print it out, and we’ll sent it along with the deposit to her. We’ll get the kitten when he turns 12 weeks, and he will have 3 vaccination shots by that time.

One thing that upset us a bit at first was that all the cat breeders would only let kittens go at the age of 12 weeks or even older. We really wanted a smaller kitten, since they are so adorable when they are very little. However, after doing more research through the internet, we realized that there is a good reason for this age limit. Veterinarians believe that kittens who are separated from their mothers at very early age (say 6 or 7 weeks) would have a considerably higher risk of both health and behavioral problems. There is a very good article related to this question.

We’ve decided that the well-being of our cat is more important to us than having a chance to enjoy the early stages of his development at our home, and this is the major reason why we will not buy a cat from the Russian lady. Molly also said that respected breeders will never sell their kittens to pet stores, since the stores are only concerned with making money and would offer the breeders to buy their weakest and sickly animals as long as they’ll get a price break.

So now we’ll have to wait for at least 4 months for our new kitten. But I think that it’s worth waiting! Molly promised us to send pictures of our kitten as it grows, and I hope that dealing with her in the future will be as pleasurable as it is up until this point.

Now we need some suggestions for a name, since we can’t come up with anything that we like. We want some hissing sounds to be present in the name (like “sh”). Help, people!

Мысли Вслух

Alena — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 21:55:59 +0000

Хочется пару слов написать о жизни, да всё как-то руки не доходят. Попробую исправить ситуацию.

Новый 2009 Год, как уже писал Даня, мы встретили дома у его родителей. Было хорошо, по-семейному, много подарков замечательных получила, но как ни странно настроение было какое-то неновогоднее. Это не значит, что оно было плохим или грустным — напротив, очень даже замечательным, но не праздничым. Может, старею, может, дело в отстутсвии снега, а может просто год на год не приходится?

На работе всё больше осваиваюсь. Подружилась с Галей — мы с ней откровенно говорим и многих вещах, и это общение больше всего напоминает мне разговоры по душам с Кузей. Брэд, который на первых неделях доводил меня до белого каления, стал как-то приятнее и спокойнее, и работать от этого стало легче (хотя о помощи я его стараюсь просить по минимуму). Сегодня в офис заходил Гил — трепался с нами минут 30 о жизни. Говорит, надо привыкать к тому, что можно спать до скольки хочешь, и никто тебя не ждёт где-то в назначенное время. Он признал, что несомненным плюсом отсутсвия работы является свободное время, которое можно потратить на то, что годами откладывалось на потом.

Данин папа подарил нам свою книгу рассказов-статей. Я её потихонечку читаю и очень горжусь своим свёкром!

Мы думаем купить котёнка. Вообще-то я больше люблю собак, но в условиях небольшой квартиры в большом городе (да еще учитывая запрет на домашних питомцев в нашем доме) кошак — это намного более удобный для всех, включая животное, вариант. Раньше не хотелось брать не себя ответсвенность, а сейчас как-то дозрела. Да и хочется иметь в доме это маленькое, нахальное и смешное живое существо.

К слову об ответственности — подавляющее большинство моих подружек дружно родили / рожают / планирют рожать. Нам тоже задают вопросы — а не пора ли? С одной стороны — конечно, хотелось бы. С другой — еще бы немного крепче встать на финансовые ноги… На сегодняшний день мы этот вопрос отложили на пару лет. В какой-то степени я чувствую себя средней свежести продуктом с неточным сроком годности, но я стараюсь не накручивать себя и наслаждаться свободой и отсутствием тех обязанностей и огромной ответственности, которые придут с появлением малыша.

На выходных зашли в русский книжный магазин и купили 8 книжек. Давно я не баловала себя бумажными книгами, поэтому покупка оставила очень приятные ощущения. До сих не могу получать тоже удовольствие от англоязычных книг (ну, не считая Гарри Поттера) — не хватает знания языка к сожалению. Знаю, что надо делать усилие, но силы воли не хватает, да и книг хороших под рукой нет.

Рада, что мы решили попробовать себя в роли велосипедистов. Я, конечно, как всегда побаиваюсь — велосипедистка из меня пока, мягко говоря, чрезвычайно неуклюжая, но в то же время когда села на велик и прокатилась пол блока в груди появилось восторженное чувство предвкушения чего-то освобождающего. Так что посмотрим как всё пойдёт.