We own birds.

This may surprise you. You might think, “Gosh Mel. I would have never known you own any animal, let alone birds.” But its true. Not one, but two! Two birds, ah, ah, ah.

And while we had the cages, the right food, the toys and the time to spoil them what we didn’t have was the $ for an awesome perch where the two of them could totally climb all over and fling more seeds and bird poop all over our house.

So we went to Home Depot and came out with enough supplies to confuse and frighten the Home Depot people and built this:

I can't think of anything to write today and I have to. None of the prompts are doing it for me and I know I owe ehzoterik a bit of top sekret IC writing in some top secret place some where--and I'm blank there too.

The whole point to this July Flashfiction month wasn't really to write anything earth shattering or moving or best evar, it was just to prove to myself that if I really sat down....If I really applied myself, I could do something! I could do something consistently if I had to.

Hopefully I'll get an idea tonight before it's too late. I also need to make 4 more avatars next week. That is my goal that I want to finish while Shawn returns to work, I hope I can stick to it.

IN THE MEANTIME since I do not have anything hastily written, until I do, enjoy your daily dose of Nugget:

You're the one!




You make bath time soooo much fun!

Some of you may remember my post a while back about Raven, our getting-elderly-pee machine.

The issue wasn't that Raven was going outside the litter box purposefully, the issue was it seemed to be such a struggle to get into the box, she'd hang half her ass off the side (because she'd only go as far as RIGHT at the front) and then pee. Without squatting. So of course, there she'd be IN the litter box, peeing...out of it.

We've mostly solved that issue with a random find at a local pet store. This experiement has been running since a few days after asking advice and I gotta say, it's been pretty kick ass.

This dog litter box.





Yes. Dog. I am so far behind the 'pet times,' I guess. I hadn't a clue that they were making dog litter boxes. The one we have as pictured above is roughly as deep on the back and sides as the largest cat litter box, but without the huge wall of plastic at the front for Raven to jump over.

In fact, I'm not sure if you can tell by the picture, but there's a little plastic piece that fits over the opening that can be removed too--forming a lip that's nearly flush with the floor. Maybe no higher than an inch or two. Essentially, any cat with joint problems or too old to jungle-gym all over the place just to go poop can waltz right in and go.

With the old litter box, I was cleaning up her pee on the mat (a little blue mat that picks up some of the litter from their paws) four or five times a day. Now, with the newer, lower doggy litter box I might catch her having an accident once a week. With the added bonus of the puppy training pads around the front, I have even less clean up than before.

This dog litter box was a large--apparently you can order much, much larger ones. This will set you back $30 dollars, but, for Shawn and I, that really wasn't much to ensure our ol' kitty comfort and ease. Flora took to it in seconds too. So that's one worry out of the way.

It's heavy duty plastic and really durable so far, even with all the scratching and clawing. It's surprisingly light and easy to pick up when empty and clean. I really, really, really recommend this instead of the usual cat litter boxes if you have room for it and don't mind the fact there's no cover for it.

In other pet news: Some of you may recall that I was trying to move Nugget from a mostly seed and some pellet diet, to an complete pellet diet. We figured out what was wrong with the first set of pellets: they came in three colors, two shapes. Red, green as little beads and yellow/beige as banana shaped as well as smelling like fruit. He would eat all the red and green and leave the banana. So when he ran out of the little round red and green pellets he'd behave as if he were starving to death, tweeting and chirping and chirping and tweeeeeeting--leaving the 'naner shaped ones. So we didn't get it at first, as his food bowl would still be pretty full.

Eventually, we caught on and changed him over to Zupreem pellets. These pellets are round only with pieces of real dried fruit mixed in. He eats all of them without issue and we haven't fed him any seeds at all for over a week and a half. I'm very relieved we figured things out, as we realized that seed diets were simply awful for birdies.

And that's it on the pet front!

For the tl;dr crowd: Cat's peeing less due to a doggy litter pan and the bird's now eating an all pellet & fruit diet. Mel's a crazy animal lady. Blahblahblah.

P.S RANDOMRANDOMRANDOM: MY CAMERA WASN'T DELIVERED FRIDAY SO IT MIGHT COME TODAY AND I'M STILL EXCITED OH LAWD.

Did you know that April 10th is ASPCA Day?

No? Let's find out what the ASPCA day says about it!

ASPCA website says:

"On Thursday, April 10, cities all over the country will be going orange to celebrate the ASPCA’s victories on behalf of animals and the joy they bring to pet parents everywhere. Lend us your voice on April 10 by dressing yourself, your kids, your pet—even your school or company!—in ASPCA orange, and show the world you support the ASPCA and the pets we protect."

Sounds pretty damn good to me. I don't think I have anything orange, however. I think Shawn might have an awful Hawaiian shirt. I'll have to drum up something! Won't you wear orange on April 10th for me? Won't you help speak for those who don't have a voice?

If not, do it for Nugget:


EDIT: APRITH? I ORIGINALLY HAD APRITH IN THE TITLE. WHAT THE HELL IS AN APRITH?

This afternoon while attempting to capture the elusive Raven Meow (which I managed to capture, but I'll worry about posting another video tomorrow instead of flooding your friends list tonight) I managed to catch Nugget giving kisses to himself.

This is recorded with my Fujifilm S700 camera instead of my webcam :) For those of you with no clue as to what I am going on about, Nugget is our cockatiel. :D

To make up for an actual no-fooling serious post with all kinds of Mel-anger, here's an important message from our sponsor in video form:

That's not 100% true. I did take pictures, but well after dragging all 20 bags, 40 pounds each, of dirt to the garden.

This is where we found out we calculated the correct amount of dirt!

...For a much lower garden. We'll probably need another 20 bags of dirt at least. We've raised it 10 inches off the ground, not 8, and there's the matter of some of the dirt getting packed down after the edges went in.

Now, I will stfu and show you the goodies!

Nugget watched over the project with an eagle eye.



The edging of the bed just starting.




Nugget's friend, Baby, our next door neighbors green conure (I think?) had an important message to tell all of you. "karatz r delishus n' nootrishush nomoumoum."




Our neighbor, Velma, has a green thumb even though it's difficult for her to garden anymore. She's got a lovely little Bleeding Heart plant though.




I don't know what these are, either, but they're growing in Velma's yard.




Velma says these are Gardenias, and that they're being overrun with bugs and dying. That's a shame, they smell wonderful and look the same.




Uh-oh. Someones impatient foot tap reminded me that I had a garden to work on.




Not bad, though we'll need more dirt.




Nugget approves by giving us his good side--





as the sun begins to set.





THE END.