Matt the Cat (Update)

Well, Matt the Cat is doing so much better than we thought he would. When I got home from work yesterday, he was awake and purring like a lawn-mower! He came straight over to me, and wound his way through my legs until I picked him up, then he was headbutting my chin, just wanting cuddles! His eyes (yes both of them!!!) look a lot better now too, one is still slightly more bloodshot than the other one, but they're nowhere near the red they were when we found him. He's an adventurous little thing. We put him outside in our back garden for a bit of explore, and he was not afraid of anything. In fact, he was giving those dried leaves what for! Then he wore himself out a little bit, so fell asleep on my knee still purring away! All night he was like that, awake and exploring the new sights and smells of our house and garden, and then falling asleep again. My housemate Rich has become all soft and gooey over Matt the Cat! They fell asleep together on the sofa. It was one of the cutest things I've ever seen!

We did take him down to the vets, just so that they could give him a check up and make sure that it is just a cold that he's got. he keeps sneezing a lot, bless him! But because it was out of hours, they were going to charge us £85 just to have a look at him! Luckily Daisy and Rich have today off work, so they are going to take him down later on this afternoon. However, if the cost of the treatment is going to be too much, we may have to give him up as we won't be able to afford it. I'm really hoping that he's not too poorly, because we've all fallen so in love with the little thing! He's such a little character!

When I came down for breakfast this morning, he was curled up asleep on one of our dining chairs. Then when he woke up, he managed to jump over the little barriers we had made for him, and he just sat on my feet while i was making my sandwiches for lunch today. He played with my toes, and again, wound himself around my legs. It was as if he just wanted that contact all the time! I really didn't want to leave him this morning...he kept miowing at me!!! Bless!

I just hope we get to keep him for a little bit longer! I'll keep you posted though!

Matt the Cat

We got back from our usual Monday night out last in the small hours of the morning, and we were milling about outside as you do when you're saying good bye to people, and my house mate Rich grabbed me and exclaimed, "look Rach, down there!" On the door step of the house 2 doors down (a notoriously dodgy house at the best of times) all curled up in the rain and the cold, was the tiniest black kitten. i could hear him wheezing, and he was visibly shaking. His fur was all spiky because he was soaking wet. I was not going to leave him out in the cold all night, so I picked him up, (getting an earful and an evil look from the man in the house, who claimed the kitten was not his - although I have my suspicions) and we took him inside. We wrapped him up in a towel and just hugged him and calmed him. We tried to give him some milk, but you could tell he was a poorly cat! Eventually the wheezing got better, and the only reason he was shaking is because of the faint purring we could hear. We have fallen in love with him, and have named him Matt - as we found him on a door mat!!!! Matt the cat!

We left him curled up in a box with lots of towels in the kitchen last, thinking that he'll go one of two ways, and when we came down this morning...My goodness! When we went to stroke him it was like someone had put a mini pneumatic drill in the box. His purr was incredible! We think that he may have lost an eye, and we still couldn't get him to eat anything, but I'm going to go and check on him now, and make sure he's still ok. He's such an adorable cat, and none of us could understand how anyone could leave an animal like that out in the rain and cold? It's just pure cruelty. Well, if we can't keep Matt, then we'll find a good loving home for him to go to, but hopefully Matt will become the new House Cat!

It all paid off

After about two and half months of planning, one of the best weekends ever happened last weekend! It was my housemate Daisy's 24th birthday party. As she is a musician, she made an off the cuff remark about how, for her birthday, it would be cool to have some people round, for a bit of jam, and a mess around with instruments. At the time, I though, "wow, how vain???" but then I thought...hhmmm, let's take this one step further. So I did some enquiries, and managed to rent the community hall just down the road from our house - without Daisy's knowledge! The next few weeks were spent organising food, PA Systems for the musicians, a compare, and trying to tell all of our friends, without Daisy finding out. Between us all, it came together! So many people helped out, and last Saturday night at about 7.00pm I led Daisy down to the hall, on the pretense that we were going to a friend's house for dinner. As we walked past the hall, all of our friends were stood outside with a Birthday banner! It took a couple of seconds for Daisy to register the fact that she knew all these people! All the lies and the stress, the organisation and the planning paid off when I saw the look on Daisy's face...It actually brought tears to my eyes! In front of everyone!!!! The whole evening was one surprise after another for her, as not only had I got the party sorted, our musician friends had all learnt some of Daisy's own songs, as well as some of her favourites. It was a whole musical evening dedicated to Daisy and her love of music. Rich, our other housemate was the first one to get up and play and he opened with a song of Daisy's called Go Away, and that too almost made me cry, when she realised that he was playing one of her songs! The goosepimples were out in abundance that night!!

Everyone had such a good time, and I couldn't have asked for it go any better. I loved it. We had friends, live music, presents, party games, food and whole lotta love in that room! It's what birthday's are all about...Having a good time, surrounded with people you love ignoring the fact you're one year older!!

Humans vs. Robots

I received a comment on my previous post from the Street Philosopher, who you can always rely on to give some good philosophical points on the everyday workings of life. I checked out his blog for the first time in a while, and the first post really got me thinking. He talks about a new education scheme called PEBBLES (check out his post for more information), which is a form of home schooling for people who cannot attend regular schools. He then goes on to talk about human interaction, and how essential it is to our lives. I thoroughly agree with this. It still amazes me how easy it is nowadays to go through life with very limited actual human meetings...You can buy all your groceries online, you can borrow books from libraries, buy or rent movies, attend an online university with things like the Open University over here in the UK, get all your news updates on the web..One could quite easily go through life living alone with hardly ever having to talk to another human being. As Street philosopher points out however, there is nothing better than a hug when you're feeling a bit down, or sitting down to a meal with either family or friends around a table as supposed to in front of the television. Now don't get me wrong, in my house, we quite often sit in the living with our meals, but I do enjoy sitting around the table and actually talking to each other. Also, sometimes there is nothing better than curling up on the sofa watching a good movie, or even going to the movie theatre, for a bit of pure escapism from the busy hectic world that is our lives, but my favourite part about that escapism is discussing the movies afterwards with my friends.

So, what I'm trying to say is, although the modern world of technology is great for some things, I really hope the art of actual conversation, and real human interaction does not get superseded by machines and robots...I'd miss hugs too much!

He Wishes For the Cloths of Heaven

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)





This is one of my favourite poems, and I have just found it again, after years of not really thinking about it! My world at the minute is pretty rubbish...i'm in a job I don't enjoy...having man troubles - but then what girl isn't?!?! - had my cell phone stolen last night - got turned down for a job that really really wanted! But life could be worse for sure, i have my friends, a roof over my head, and as of this afternoon...food in the cupboards! YEY! But i just though i would share this little poem with you all.

Take care
Rach