Empress of Mars: Undisputed @zebratron2084@awoo.space

RIP Charlie 😿​

http://www.dailycoyote.net/

I had been braced for this news for years. He was the goodest of wildbois.

e.g. i just found myself filking the "nutty gritty" song from those old ABC "Time For Timer" educational ads with the lyrics "Pooty kitty, pooty kitty/You're a cat that can poot/Pooty kitty, pooty kitty/You're just lucky you're cute!"

Meanwhile in the back of my head I am still trying to use all the postfurry toolset to deal with ALL THIS KITTY PARENTING STRESS

So... Peg and I were on a craft beer run last week and ran into the prettiest red merle Australian Shepherd mix, "Oyster." She flomp even better than Shemp and was extremely friendly, outgoing, and calm. I... I think I developed a mild Platonic crush on Oyster.

And I need an inner mama, someone a little more capable of quiet patience than Aunt Tigress. "I shall slay all who oppose you, tiny cousins" is a good attitude for some situations, but... doesn't really help when they miss the litterbox, yanno?

So here's Brill. She's still in her formative stages, but she's another merle Aussie Shepherd gal. I modeled her personality a little bit after Shreve from Daily Coyote. She's kind of a cross between Buffy and Applejack, a rural but modern Colorado lady who's also a bit softpunk.

She's from a light comedy-horror world, where the Horrible Supernatural Event has already more or less been dealt with, monsters are a manageable (and hotly political) public issue, and not everything spooky is evil or unrelenting.

Brill has dead friends she speaks to on a regular basis. She is a former Final Girl and does charity fundraisers online for other survivors. She is totally unflappable, unswerving in her compassion, but utterly ruthless when she's got an axe in her paws.

Helping raise two little displacer beasts will be NOTHING to Brill. (In fact, I think that's canon now. She breeds pet displacers.)

So yeah. I think another little part of me has gone canid. Laika is thrilled she has someone else around here worth sniffing instead of all these goddamn cats.

gosh my songs about sugarfoot sure seem to involve the words "butt" and "fart" a lot

which is totally unfair of me since even if you take body weight into account peggy farts FAR more than sugarfoot :p

david cronenberg had a more positive effect on furry fandom than i did.

that is not selfdeprecation nor trolling for praise but a sincere appreciation of how well furries do not just body horror but its philosophical implications for identity and sapience

@Austin_Dern I mean, it is pretty rewarding when Sugarfoot comes looking to knead up against me. I'm not sure I ever *did* believe that cats couldn't feel gratitude, but now I know they do for sure.

And the kittens are adorable even if this is gonna be tough. It's just the constant ambiguity. If we don't get just the right litter, will the kittens eat it and die? Do we treat them like "our cats" and give them the full shebang, or do we treat them like porch cats and just do the basics?

If it's cold at night, do I leave the gas heat on unattended? Do I lay a blanket on them and hope it doesn't smother the kittens? Do I just have faith in their fur? And then am I being cruel to the outdoor cats for not letting them in when it's chilly?

Did we do enough? Is there something I never even thought of that's gonna cause a tragedy? What the fuck do we do if we ever want to MOVE?

It's just... a commitment I would not have chosen if it had not chosen us, but what the hell else do you do when a friend in need comes to you with no other alternative?

Now that the excitement of life going back to "normal" after Zeta has worn off, my brain is starting to remember just how fucked up "normal" is.

Honestly, it's gonna be real educational having kittens around to care for, but just having one adult cat to fret over has been a HUGE constant anxiety trigger.

I really wish my brain would internalize the concept of THE CATS ARE PROBABLY FINE. But it hasn't really internalized it about me, Peggy, or anybody else.

And I can't help thinking about the incredibly high odds that over the years one will get sick in a way we can't help with, or run out into the street in front of a car, or just... disappear like Penumbra did (hopefully to a better life).

We have SO MUCH LEFT TO DO and there's really very little anyone can do to help. We have a decent amount of money left from the donations, so that's not a big issue, but the logistics of getting everybody fixed, let alone vaccinated and everything else we COULD do for them, is screwing me up bigtime.

I'm really starting to think the best solution might just be to get Artie and Peebles housed -- preferably together, preferably nearby -- as soon as possible. And PRAY that Shadow doesn't get pregnant before we can shave all the yaks necessary to clear the way for a safe, comfortable surgery. *sigh*

oh in case you wondered they are getting individual names once theyre old enough to be more easily told apart. i have suggested mae and olivia but peg seems to be meh on those. until then they are either "the gremlins" or "thing 1 and thing 2"

bast protect us from these tiny monsters <3

oh shit ok today will be spend largely on kittenproofing, those fuckers are getting to the top of their box :O

pics soon, they sure as fuck look like real kittens now with all the adorable horror that implies :O :O :O

i got a little too close to the gas heater and singed myself *just* enough that everything smells like sulfur and burnt tiger pelt

replying with william blake references is punishable by severe head-mauling 😾​

"I would still eagerly recommend at least 80% of Cory Doctorow's books to any white male I know!"

We are back! Power came on maybe 10 minutes ago. Mama Minipanther is so confused but will probably benefit greatly from the humans' reduced stress.

I am not naive enough to think this means I'm going to finally get to have my first normal week, even by low 2020 standards, in six weeks. :)

I have a tendency to miss things that I put in bold or highlights in my to-do list because I just get kinda used to the markups and my eyes glaze over.

But I just accidentally figured out the perfect way around it. All I have to do is LEAVE A MISTAKE in it. Highlights? Eyes go right over 'em. Bigger font? All a brainblur. Severe typo? Brain says HOW DARE YOU. Whole line italicized except the first two characters? SOUND THE ALARM.

It's gonna itch like hell but it'll be worth it.

@kobi_lacroix i would pay 3.99 to rent 9.99 to own that movie yeah

yup, SEVEN DAYS twitter jail for telling the grand fraternal order of police to go fuck themselves and die over that woman who got beaten in front of her toddler in pennsylvia

only one ethical thing to do: fire up another two or three twitter identities so i can tag team when this happens, because fuck the GLFOP.

i have had to block like five leftist followers on twitter for shitty lazy-ass rhetorical habits today

you can not begin to imagine how much i wish i could just bus down to the audubon zoo, get in the tiger enclosure with my buddy liam, and just hang there with him until the humans go extinct >____<

@Thaminga oh happy birthday! <3

@mawr *meme of Enmerkar as Business Cat reading the paper, captioned "HMM. I SHOULD GET SOME KOBOLDS"*

(and cj i am increasingly thinking is one of those "high functioning special needs" cats who is just not... ailuroneurotypical, you know? i'd rather he stick with us, people who do not expect him to act like an earthly indoor cat instead of the precious weird little dude he is <3 if Artie is the Louise of our clan and Peebles is affectionate butt-obsessed Tina, Ceej has gotta be our Gene and you know I so identify...)