Watercolor landscape, with Maine Coon.: seanan

Watercolor landscape, with Maine Coon.

Having been asked to provide personal notes to go with my personal list of places I knew needed to receive ARCs of Rosemary and Rue, and being the balanced, reasonable, under-achieving person that I am, I decided to slack off, and just fill in some pre-printed mad libs...and if you actually think that's true, you should really go take a look at my website. "Balanced, reasonable, and under-achieving" is about as accurate a description as "made of enchanted pumpkin pie, stapled together by magical weasels from the moon." (Actually, the latter description may be more accurate. I like pumpkin pie...) Viewing this as an excuse to acquire new art supplies (always an aspiration of mine), I promptly went to the art supply store, where I acquired...

* Two packs of watercolor greeting card blanks
* A new set of gorgeous watercolors in a cunning stack
* Two new watercolor brushes

...yes, I probably ought to seek help, but I really don't care. I am a content and comfortable addict, whose habits mostly just inconvenience my capacity to put anything away. I've spent a comfortable week composing, sketching, and painting watercolor "thank you for reading" notes to be sent off to my publisher. Since I really wanted to get them into the mail today, I spent about two hours last night doing a watercolor marathon as I finished off the detailing on the various cards.

Enter Alice.

Alice loves water. Watercolors are, surprisingly enough, largely based on what? On water. So Alice thinks that me doing watercolors is awesome. So awesome, in fact, that she really wants to help. Guess what doesn't actually help me do fine detail watercolors? Wow. Good guess.

Step one, set up watercolor station. Take brushes away from Alice.
Step two, start working. Discover that Alice is drinking the water I use to clean my brushes. Take water away from Alice.
Step three, clean brushes. Discover that Alice is now drinking the purple paint. Take paint away from Alice.
Step four, reassure self that yes, this is non-toxic paint.
Step five, discover that Alice is now licking the paint off one of the envelopes. Take envelope away from Alice.
Step six, put Alice off the couch.
Step seven, put Alice off the couch.
Step eight, give up and let her drink the damn paint water if she really wants to. At least she's not drinking the actual paint.
Step nine, discover that Alice is now a blue classic tabby and purple and orange and green.
Step ten, put everything away on a very high shelf, resolve never to work in oil paints.

My cards are done, and you can barely tell how much "help" I got. And since the paint is non-toxic and Lilly loves bathing Alice (whether she needs it or not), everything is basically back to normal. Except, perhaps, my nerves.

scholarinexile

April 30 2009, 16:30:14 UTC 8 years ago

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Our kittens have been similarly helpful to me in grading my current round of History of Science term papers. Eris (for whom I only have myself to blame, inasmuch as I named her that) particularly likes helping me alphabetize student papers, meaning she waits until I have done so and then runs full steam into the pile, head-first, distributing them evenly and randomly across whatever surface I happen to be grading on. Mina is more content to simply plop herself down directly on whatever document I'm examining, purring madly, which seems to be her was of endorsing a good paper that requires no more of my attention at that moment, therefore freeing up valuable time to pet her.

seanan_mcguire

April 30 2009, 16:34:30 UTC 8 years ago

Clearly, your cats have been well-trained in the ways of being incredibly helpful to their owners. I wish Alice wasn't enrolled in their correspondence course.

April 30 2009, 17:28:36 UTC 8 years ago

The 200-level class in Transforming Random Household Objects Into Toys is even better.

qnofhrt

April 30 2009, 17:57:00 UTC 8 years ago

The 200-level class in Transforming Random Household Objects Into Toys is even better.

And don't forget the 300-level class in proving gravity with household objects.

April 30 2009, 18:46:31 UTC 8 years ago

My kittens must be prodigies. They started that as an independent study when they were less than 8 weeks old. Now they've graduated to Quantum Feline Teleportation and what we'll charitably call an arts elective in Synchronized Yowling at the Backdoor Anytime the Sun is Shining.

May 2 2009, 17:40:12 UTC 8 years ago

...you're more charitable than I am...

dornbeast

April 30 2009, 21:30:36 UTC 8 years ago

What level class is Sleeping Human Origami?

(I used to go to sleep on the bed in roughly an "I" shape, and wake up in an "S" shape, with one cat in each curve, and a terrible cramp somewhere.)

April 30 2009, 22:53:57 UTC 8 years ago

Definitely masters level. You've got some advanced cats there.

May 2 2009, 17:39:49 UTC 8 years ago

Alice has passed that class six times, but keeps re-taking it for fun.

May 2 2009, 18:19:23 UTC 8 years ago

I assume there's some sort of intramural league they join once they complete the initial course.

mariadkins

April 30 2009, 16:42:08 UTC 8 years ago

exhibit A

April 30 2009, 17:27:10 UTC 8 years ago

Looks about right.

April 30 2009, 17:30:02 UTC 8 years ago

She's got that whole "solid to a liquid" thing down pat, too. She was thoroughly entrenched on that paper until I opened a packet of her favorite tuna...

April 30 2009, 18:48:35 UTC 8 years ago Edited: April 30 2009, 18:49:09 UTC

Mine can do that even when they're unconscious. If I open a can of Friskies when they're napping, they'll reflexively charge into the kitchen still mostly asleep, and then stand there blinking for a moment, wondering how the hell they got there, until the smell of the cat food catches up with their brains.

April 30 2009, 22:32:28 UTC 8 years ago

Yeah, it's a cat thing.

tezmilleroz

May 1 2009, 02:02:41 UTC 8 years ago

Aw, happy sleeping kitty :-)

May 1 2009, 10:18:05 UTC 8 years ago

Yes look at that smile. I think she approves of my manuscript...

April 30 2009, 16:47:13 UTC 8 years ago

which seems to be her was of endorsing a good paper that requires no more of my attention at that moment, therefore freeing up valuable time to pet her.

No matter what you're doing, it's not as important as petting the cat.