Category Archives: animal rescue

Ernest Hemingway has Something to Say

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Call me Ernie. I’m a rescue cat. No, I don’t have Hemingway thumbs. I have Hemingway attitude. You can practice homage to Catalonia on me. I was made to be adored.ernest

I used to live outside, run across the river and into the trees. The hills, man, they were like white elephants. Then somebody picked me up and dumped me at the shelter. It looked like death in the afternoon, then this chick got me and took me from the shelter straight to the vet. To have or have not, I am still confident in my manhood.

I’m looking for a forever home. Right now I’m in a bachelor pad called a foster home. It’s a clean, well-lighted place and I can stay here as long as I want. But I’m waiting for my garden of Eden.

a farewell to arms

a farewell to arms

I like to be cuddled. I love to be fed. A movable feast suits me just fine. I’m a solid kind of guy. Dames worship me. Dogs fear me. Other cats think I’m cool. They want to be me. The sun also rises but not as big and bright as me.

I like a drink now and then, but what I really like is to play with my water dish. I make the torrents of spring with my splashes. Pretend I’m an old cat on the sea. Chicks think sailors are sexy. Hey baby, wanna play islands in the stream?

Naps are good. 14 hours a day is right. The other 10 I spend playing. Ask not for whom the jingle bell rolls; it rolls for me.

So c’mon down to the bookstore, if you’re a big two-hearted giver, and I promise not to give you a dangerous summer. Really, I’m a pussy-cat once you get to know me.ernest 2

Don’t take that the wrong way.

A Little Help from our Friends

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gutted buildingEvery year in September Jack and I trot happily off to emcee the Sycamore Shoals Celtic Festival in Tennessee. This year the chaos of getting away from a busy time at the shop and in my new book prep had us flying out the door Friday at 5 pm, shouting “and don’t forget to give Bert his pill” to Thom, the poor lad we’d sucked in at 10 that morning to shopsit the rest of the day. Since we’d be back Sunday and the animals have feeders and water jugs, and the yard is fenced, we weren’t worried. We got to our luxury hotel, bounced on the king sized sleigh bed a few times, and went out to grab an Indian meal.burning 2

When we awoke next morning to Facebook postings from home about the building downtown that had burned, you can imagine the luxuriated, lazy blood in my veins turning to jelly.

The building was a block away; no one was in it; all is as well as it can be. But I panicked, thinking about our three staff cats (one of whom resides by choice outside) two staff dogs (Bert the Terrier is terrified of loud noises) and three foster cats, sojourning with us until their forever families find them. Would Bert have dug under the fence to get away from an event so reminiscent of the dreaded thunderstorm? Would Beulah (outside greeter) be run over in the chaos of downtown fire traffic? Ernest Hemingway, our newest foster, landed with us Friday morning. He’d never even spent a night in our house; we took him straight from the shelter to have his balls cut off, thence home to abandon him for two days, and the firetrucks came. burning 1

(“Call this a rescue?” I could hear Ernie thinking. “Take me back to the shelter! I’ll take my chances!”)

So I did what any modern American woman panicking does: got on Facebook and begged our Saturday shopsitters Wes and Rachael to let me know as soon as they got there if everything was okay. And here’s what happened