My sister’s birthday is tomorrow. I got her a card, but things being what they are, I didn’t mail it in time. So, I reckoned I’d just sent it to her electronically. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I always draw a little cartoon in the cards I send people. But if I’m Messaging my sister her card, what’s the best way to add my traditional drawing?
With Procreate and Photoshop, of course! And this card drawing is better than most, because I was actually able to do a sketch beforehand. Usually, I just freehand the drawing in ink.
This is the ink version, done in Procreate.
If you’re interested, you can watch the Procreate time-lapse video of the sketch and ink on Flickr. Click the image to view the video in another tab.
And here is the inside of the card that my sister will get tomorrow. The Swedish translates to: “If you were a cat, you’d be turning a hundred and eleventy-twelve years! Congratulations on your Birthday!”
Björn bought some really nice bratwurst and had it for breakfast yesterday.
A certain little girl was very interested in the brat on Björn’s fork.
This was actually pretty unusual for Lorelai; she’s big on raw meat when we’re cutting it up for cooking, but she’s not usually so grabby when it comes to cooked food.
It was so funny to watch her!
It smelled good to me, but it must have smelled amazing to Rory for her to act this way.
But Rory had competition for that brat, though. Someone else wanted it, too, and look at the daggers she’s staring at him.
I know you probably thought it was going to Alfred…but it was Izaak!
And for Zak to try to steal food is even more unusual that Rory doing it. He is strictly a raw meat kind of guy.
And he wanted it even more than Rory, too.
Björn said Zak was really pulling down on his hand. For a little dude, Zak is strong for his size!
Yesterday I posted Lorelai’s and Dashiell’s results in the Garden State Cat Club Virtual Show. Today it’s Izaak’s turn. His best final was 5th Best in Sharon Roy’s ring.
This is what Sharon had to say about him starting at 3:54.
Zak was 8th Best Cat in Championnship in Vicki Nye’s ring. She also finalled both Rory (in this same ring) and Dash, so she liked all of our cats.
Vicki’s assessment of Zak starts at 4:11.
Zak also made 11th Best in my friend Lorraine Shelton’s ring.
She really liked him, too; see what she had to say starting at 2:53. With Dash making two finals, Zak three, and Rory four, this really was our best virtual show ever!
I entered Dashiell, Lorelai and Izaak in the Garden State Cat Club Virtual Show a couple of weeks ago, and the finals were announced earlier this week. Today, we have the Abyssinian finals. Rory got the highest final: SECOND BEST in Kenny Currle’s ring!
You can see his assessment of Rory on YouTube starting at 5:06.
Rory got 10th Best in two other judges’ rings: Jeri Zottoli and Nicholas Pun.
You can see Jeri’s comments at 4:00.
Nicholas’ opinion is at 3:52.
Rory’s lowest final was 13th Best in Vicki Nye’s ring.
Here’s what Vicki had to say about Rory starting at 1:37.
They had a special class for cats who were never shown because of the pandemic called “A Star is Born.” Vicki gave him 4th Best in her ring.
This is was Vicki thought about Dash, starting at 5:56.
Dash was 7th Best in Gary Veach’s ring, just ahead of his nephew Max! Max also finalled in some of the rings that Dash didn’t.
You can watch Gary’s commentary on both Max and Dash here starting at 4:34. Tomorrow, we’ll see how Zak did in the show.
I added the cats to the Cheetas at Boräs Djurparken. Of course, Lorelai running in their enclosure was a no-brainer.
Of course, when we saw the Cheetahs, they weren’t running at all…they were mostly just lounging around. Which Alfred, in particular, excels at.
Continuing the series about the big cats at Borås Djurparken (which, admittedly, I totally forgot about last week). This week, I have a little more about the Cheetah kittens they have at the park.
It was a little hard to tell how many kittens (I refuse to call baby cats “cubs”) there were; I think there were four or five.
I’m also not sure how old they were.
Compared to the mother Cheetah, I would say they were a few months old.
They were wicked cute, though.
Most of them were lounging out in the open. Look at this guy, just chilling.
One interesting thing I did not know about Cheetah kittens is that when they speak…they chirp like little birds!
I love Cheetah kittens, with their fluffy fur.
So, two weeks ago, I posted my progress on my drawing of the cats as the Incredibles family.
Well, today I finished it. First I added a fur texture layer.
Then I added a few details to the ear fur and collars.
One final tweak…and well, it’s as finished as it’s going to be.
Today it was a balmy 10°C (50°F), so I thought I would take the cats out. Lorelai was on a leash again, but I attached Alfred’s leash to hers, so it was twice as long.
I managed to get Dashiell to come out with us too. He’s gotten so little exposure to things: trains, buses, cat shows…and just being outside because of the pandemic. I do the best I can to get him outside, though.
Rory, of course, was eager to run down the hill, but the leash sort of put a damper on that plan.
Maybe next time I’ll attach a third leash so she can go farther.
Freddy came galloping down to join Rory.
Izaak came swaggering over, too.
Look at them. The Three Musketeers.
Dash did pretty well outside. At least, he had a happy tail.
Dash and Rory have a sort of bond, being the two youngest cats.
Freddy had an awesome time running around. At over 5 kg (11 lbs)…he needs to run a bit.
It’s nice to go outside with the cats. It’s kind of nice to go anywhere with them, to be honest.
I walked into the kitchen to find Izaak on the stove. And, as you can see, he’s clearly not doing anything at all suspicious.
“La la la…pay no attention to the feline on the stovetop…”
I have no idea what he was doing there.
He’s not usually the one on that counter. That’s usually Alfred, looking for edibles.
“Oh! Hi! I totally did not realise you were standing there!” (Spoiler alert: He totally did know I was there).
“And I absolutely was not doing anything at all naughty.”
“I promise!”
I noticed Dashiell napping on the back of the sofa the other afternoon.
He has a very…interesting napping style, I must say.
I got an email from Shutterfly today reminding me of photos I uploaded 14 years ago this week.They were all of Gun-Hee.
Most of them were of Gun-Hee “watching” an NCAA basketball game.
He had just turned six months old that week, too.
It was so cute to watch him. On that TV screen, the basketball was about the size of a Superball.
He clearly knew where the ball was. You can see he’s looking at it in this photo.
Gun-Hee really wanted to catch that ball!
Last weekend, we had a little box of various cheeses. The box was pretty nice for putting little things in, so we put it on the kitchen table.
And sure enough, a little thing ended up in the box.
Lorelai loves to chew on her claws.
I think that’s why she hates it when I clip them for her.
“I can do my OWN nails, Mom!”
This isn’t really a cartoon, but it’s pretty cool. Björn’s sister mailed him some old postcards which arrived today. They had been sent to him back in the 1960’s, and, interestingly, they all featured cats.
I guess even back then, Björn was a cat guy.
This card is my favourite. This cat is completely done with your nonsense. And no, it’s not at all creepy to think about these cards are over fifty years old, and the cats are…well, you know.
As I mentioned , Lorelai’s most recent “boyfriend” has been neutered…but she’s in heat again. And we don’t have a new boy for her arranged yet.
So Rory has been accosting…erm…Alfred, for some reason. Björn captured this the other day.
Rory, who weighs 2.6 kg (barely six lbs), decided to tackle Freddy, who weighs 5.2 kg (11½ lbs of not entirely muscle).
And she got him in a pretty decent headlock, too. Do not underestimate the power of a female.
When he tried to escape, Rory bit him in the back leg.
Rory..? Maybe try hitting on the one boy who isn’t permanently castrated?
Yesterday, I was sitting on the sofa watching something on my laptop, when Izaak decided to sit on me.
I was a little bit entranced by the way the sunshine highlighted his colours. In some ways the sepia ticking is so much prettier than the Abyssinian ticking…I think it’s that ivory undercoat.
Someone barfed on the IKEA cat bed yesterday, so it had to get washed.
Lorelai likes to sleep on that bed during the day, and she was really missing it while it was in the laundry.
She was trying very hard to sleep without it.
But it wasn’t working. She kept curling up tighter and tighter…but she just couldn’t sleep. Don’t worry, it’s back now, and clean.
The origin of the Singapura breed is not without controversy. While some people say that the breed occurred naturally, on the island nation of Singapore, others believe the breed is a deliberate hybrid. And it creates a bit of a rift in the Singapura community; not unlike, say, mask-wearing, both factions can be rather…attached to their viewpoints.
Where do I land on the subject? I have been following Singapuras since I first learned about the breed in the early 1980’s. I even wrote a letter to Tommy Meadows, the founder of the breed when I was in high school (and which I wish I could find, because I’m sure I have it somewhere), even though I have only recently joined the Singa community, I have a lot of book knowledge about the breed. So, I lean towards the Burmese/Aby hybrid theory.
This is not without a lot of though, so let me explain: First point: Tommy Meadow’s cattery name, USAF, is attached to both Abys and Singas; she worked with both breeds. She also had Burmese (haven’t been able to figure out if she bred them, too). She imported some cats when she moved from Texas to Singapore, and these were listed as Burmese and “brown Abyssinians” on the import manifest.
Second point: Singapore is an island, and, like mosts cats native to islands (Japan, the Isle of Man), the majority of Singapore street cats have some sort of tail deformation. Singas occasionally have tail deformation, but no more so than appear in other breeds (Siamese, for example). Of course, some long tailed Singapore street cats may have been used in breeding programmes, but that’s quite a bit different from an actual native breed (In Japan, you see feral cats that look almost exactly like purebred Japanese Bobtails).
Third point: Singapore was a British possession colonized in the early 1800’s. Given the British interest in exotic cats from foreign lands (Siamese, Burmese, and particularly the Abyssinian, purported to have been brought back from soldiers after the Abyssinian Wars) and the increasing Victorian interest in creating purebred animals and the Fancy, if the Singapura really was a native breed running around Singapore, don’t you think the British would have jumped on them and exported them back to England they way they did with other cat breeds?
At the end of the day, this is just my opinion. I know there is a romance in the “party line,” but honestly, so what if they ARE a Burmese/Aby hybrid? What’s so awful about that? Ocicats are Aby/Siamese/American Shorthairs, and that’s okay. Pointed Persians (Once the Himalayan breed) are Persians bred with Siamese. Burmillas are Chinchilla Persians bred with European Burmese. That’s all okay. You believe the origin story you feel most comfortable with.
All of this backstory has a point: Last week, I got the newest issue of Kattliv, featuring the (European) Burmese. I was struck by how much some of the photos reminded me of Singas, and I got an idea. I took a photo of Jacoby, and a photo of Butters, the cream EuroBurm we met at a show in Groton.
First, I reduced opacity on Jake and softened some edges.
Then I did the same with Butters, and erased his eyes.
Then I superimposed the two layers, and added a Sepia (of course) photo filter. But the eyes still just weren’t quite right.
So, I made a layer with Izaak’s eyes, reduced their opacity, and added a green photo filter.
And…Voilà! Okay, so it doesn’t look exactly like a Singapura…but it looks like it could be a computer-generated witness-descibed wanted poster image of a Singa.
The Daily Abyssinian...and Singapura 