Apples

It's slowly going towards Autumn, the Summer came early this year and brought plenty of rain, so the garden started growing fast and furious. This had advantages and disadvantages. The snails quite enjoyed theirselves this year. It is not one of the top meals that my cats enjoy - they actually avoid snails. It think it might be because they stick to their paws when they touch them. Nera, my big black fat cat, just squashes them when she lays on them. They dry up in her fur and that was one of the reasons she has a fur shave now and again under sedation at the vets.

Anyhow the weather seemed to do my apple tree good this year. Actually I have a soft spot for my apple tree. When we moved in ten years ago, we just had a lawn with a hedge round it. I then got to work on digging up the lawn, but the first plant I bought was my Apple Tree. Our local supermarket chain, called Migros in Switzerland, had a special offer going for apple trees. At thirty Swiss francs it was quite reasonable so I took it home. My other half was not so keen on the idea, having the vision of a five foot tall apple tree blocking the light from all the windows. I reassured him that it would grow taller than me (actually I am 1 m 75 cm, and the label said two meters, but 25 cms doesn't really make a big difference). I had to be patient - although the tree did flower from the first year I got my first two apples three years later. Over the last ten years it has had good years and not so good years. This year is quite good and looks like an over 100 apple year. The problem with having one apple tree is that it cannot make apples itself and you need a second one. I decided not to try to persuade my other half a second tree was necessary and just hoped that a neighbour had one that would flower at the same time.

I was lucky, just round the corner there is a small garden with an apple tree. I was doubly lucky as the bees and flying insects actually found their way to my garden, and the result was my first harves. I also have a smaller apple tree growing next to this one, which I have grown from a pip. That will probably be bearing the first apple in five years.

As it is now going towards end September, I decided that harvest time was getting near. I fought my way through blackberry/raspberry bushes that seem to have started taking over, and found that yes, there were apples looking ready to be eaten. Hubby found a few on the ground, some the victim of wild insect life, but a few looking quite healthy. I decided to try one and found it quite good. So it is now apple time again.

9-11 and a Missing Cat

I was going to write a few words about 9-11 yesterday but Tabby managed to distract me. On 9-11 I was spending a week with my dad in London. I usually visit on my own (hubby is then cat sitter for the week) and I catch up on visits to friends and family. I remember the day quite well when it happened. On that evening a family get together was arranged with my cousins and families who I hadn’t seen for at least fifteen years. We had all grown older and greyer in the meanwhile – not yet grandparents but we all had good chances of becoming such like.

Anyhow I was looking at the TV with my dad, a black and white old English film where they all spoke like they had apples in their mouth, but it was nostalgia pure. I went to the kitchen to do something or the other and when I came back saw on the TV two buildings burning. As I didn’t hear the commentary before, I really thought it was an advertisement for one of those Bruce Willis films where everyone dies at the end except for Bruce Willis, but it seemed to be too real. Eventually I got the hang of it and was shocked, amazed, and still couldn’t believe it was really happening. My cousin called about thirty minutes later and as he was on his way from home in the car he didn’t know what was going on. Funnily my first reaction was to say to my dad “I bet Bin Laden is behind it all”. He answered “Who’s Bin Laden?” so I decided to end the discussion. Me having Internet and a fan of the most wanted on the FBI site, I was in the picture – my dad doesn’t have a computer. Anyhow how true it all was afterwards. I had been in New York about two years before it happened and had a meal in the cafeteria on top of one of the buildings.

My next problem arose when I wanted to fly back home to Switzerland. I heard that London City Airport had been closed down for the time being so phoned to see what was going on. It seemed that everything was under control and they gave me another flight leaving from Heathrow on the same day. It meant travelling from East to West through London, but it was all by underground, so just needed a bit more time. London City was only fifteen minutes on a clear road (which is not usually the case) from where my dad lives. Eventually I arrived at London Heathrow and as I had time I e-mailed my hubby from the public computers in the airport to say I was at the airport and with the English pounds I had left decided to treat myself to something from the caviar restaurant. I didn’t take caviar but smoked salmon and only got plastic cutlery when they brought the food up. The impact of 9-11 was still to be felt and I remember I observed the people on my flight a bit closer than usual. I just had a funny feeling. London City airport remained closed for two weeks and when we flew off from London Heathrow the plane made a large detour around London. I had flown the route so often I more or less recognise places that the plane flies over.

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And now to Tabby’s distraction – When I got home yesterday I was told Tabby the cat was last seen at one o’clock lunch time making her way to other pastures. Not an exception with Tabby but after tea in the evening around seven hubby decided to go on a walkabout and see where she was. We knew she didn’t have a boyfriend as over the last years tom cats didn’t seem to interest her very much. Her favourite walking place is a villa just across the fields near where we live. In any case hubby came back half an hour later with no Tabby. In the meanwhile I had drunk my coffee, it was almost eight in the evening so I decided to see if I had any success. I took the same route and met two Italian workers on the way whom hubby had also met. I asked if they had seen a cat and they said they had already been asked. There was a big evil looking black cat – that was our Nera and she was already at home. Then there was a small tabby cat who was running away from a barking dog. Unfortunately my cats are stupid – instead of trying to get friendly with dogs they just run away. I went further down the path and who did I see. Tabby walking on the edge of the path near the bushes. “Komm Tabby komm” I said in German softly. My cats only understand German and it is not necessary to speak in a loud voice as they hear quite well. Tabby looked in my direction and made a dive into the bushes. Super I thought, so I sat down on a nice stone seat in the gardens of the villa (the villa is up on a hill and the owners died a couple of years ago so there was no-one really to see me). My patience was not rewarded with Tabby’s appearance and I suspected she was peeping through the bushes at me. Eventually with a few quiet swear words under my breath I decided to walk home. Looking back who did I see - Tabby following at a distance. I carried on walking and Tabby got nearer until eventually she overtook me and went through her cat path into the garden Unfortunately her cat path is only big enough for cats so I squeezed through the bushes, scratching myself on the way, and tired but happy we both arrived home again. Big welcome for Tabby from hubby, although Tabby was busy eating for the next five minutes and showed no interest in being welcomed home. I returned to my computer and it seemed that Tabby was bored so she went out again. I think she was just showing off and saying I go out when I want to. She came back half an hour later and went to bed in her favourite cushion on top of the cupboard. She must have been tired as she stayed there the remainder of the night.

My First Cat - Whisky

Our first cat was called Whisky. He was black and white and so was the Whisky label, so his name stuck. I was about 11 years old at the time, living in the East End of London with mum and dad in our attached house in Norah Street. We had a small garden and around us there was quite a bit of building going on. The debris remaining from the bombed houses of the second world war was being cleared. In these bombed houses a few mice had found a new home. My mum did not like mice and for my dad they were just vermin. In a way it is understandable. In London you didn’t find the sweet little field mice, but grey mice lurking in every corner for food bits and pieces and spreading their germs everywhere. This was the main reason that mum and dad decided we should have a cat. I was, of course, really happy about this decision. Since I was a kid I always wanted a pet, but up to the time I was 11 we had only really had a sweet little budgerigar called Bill. Quite a talkative budgerigar really, but that was no wonder as he was surrounded by noise in Bethnal Green.

Coming back to Whisky, he was born in a wood yard near a canal. My friend’s father worked there and told my mum and dad about the kittens that had been born and we could have one. In those days cat psychology was non-existant. If you wanted a kitten you took it. I am sure Whisky could not have been much older than 6-7 weeks when he came to us as I do remember he still had blue eyes. He was such a sweet little thing and spent the first night hiding under the cupboard. My mum had made a nice bed for him - a wooden drawer with a cushion. When Whisky eventually came out of hiding (I think the curiosity got him) he found his bed and promptly left his mark in it, which my mum was not so pleased about. I mean cats are supposed to be clean animals. The next day mum took the cushion out of the drawer and filled it with earth from the garden. This suited Whisky much better and the drawer remained his toilet for ever. In those days the pet industry was not so developed as today. There was no clumping filling for the cat toilet – you just used what you found.

Mum’s next problem was what to feed the cat. Dry vitamin food for cats had not yet been invented so there was a limited choice and you bought the cat meat in tins. Whisky was not fussy and ate anything that smelt like meat. We were a working class family, so our cat was a “working class” cat. My mum had had cats when she was younger and remembered that her mother (my grandmother) used to buy offal from the butchers and cook it for their cats. I remember my mum buying lung to cook. Now as you can imagine lung is something you breath with and is fairly light weight and porous. She cooked the lung first of all, although I think Whisky would have eaten it raw if asked. Whisky had his own enamel plate and I remember when he got his first (and last) dish of lung, did he have fun throwing up into the air catching it and rolling it around with his feet. He never actually ate it but he played with it. That was the beginning and end of saving money by cooking your own cat meat, so it was back to Kit-e-Kat or whatever.

Whisky was growing and was no longer the sweet little kitten, but a sweet little cat. He was spoiled by us all, both mum and dad. I used to play with him quite a lot. We had a staircase in the house and we lived up on the first floor. I used to roll paper into a ball and throw it down the stairs. Whisky would charge after it, pick the ball up in his mouth and bring it back to the top of the stairs and drop it at my feet, for a second round. Eventually after charging up and down the stairs about 10 times (he was panting eventually) he gave up and went for a sleep. He was a real home cat and often made himself comfortable on our lap for a nice quiet sleep.

The original purpose of Whisky was to catch mice, but we saw very few after getting Whisky, probably the mice noticed that a cat now lived at No. 45. He did catch one once in the garden. Basically mice in the garden were accepted, but no-one told Whisky. Being a good thoughtful cat he naturally brought the mouse in to show my mum. After a scream from mum we noticed there was something wrong and I am afraid Whisky lost a few points on that day.

Another trick Whisky had was to sleep in an upright position on the back of a chair (see photo). He balanced himself with one front leg stretched out and would close his eyes and nod off for a few hours. Another favourite place was on the window sill on the top floor where he could watch the pigeons flying on and off the neighbours roof. Once he misjudged the distance and reached out for a pigeon falling off the window sill to the ground floor. A big distance for a cat to fall, but like all good cats he managed to turn in the air and land in a cat safe position. Mum was frightened to look in case anything had happened, but he recovered safe and sound.

He had his first visit to the vets as an 8 month old male cat. When he came home he was still a male cat, but not quite the same as before. At that time, in the 1950’s-60’s you really only went to a vet if a cat was ill. You didn’t have it protected again various illnesses as you didn’t really know they existed. My cats cost me a fortune once a year to get them immunised against this that and the other, but at the time of Whisky, it just wasn’t done. We had one small problem when Whisky got fleas. If a cat got fleas in the 1950’s you had bad luck, There was no frontline or whatever to rub into the back of their neck. Mum was a bit overstrained with dealing with a flea attack, so the only thing that came into her mind was to bath Whisky. Cats do not like to have a bath, so the first problem was actually getting him into the water. This being done, mum was not very happy when the fleas deserted the wet cat in one cloud. However, this also passed and Whisky remained quite flea free for the rest of his life. At the age of 10 mum had to make a visit to the vet as he kept having saliva dripping from his mouth. The remedy was he had to have two teeth removed. Whisky even survived this operation. We know today that a cat needs something hard to chew on, but at that time you just gave a cat tinned food. I also remember that mum’s idea of bringing up a cat was like bringing up a human. You fed it three times a day. Whisky was not a fat cat, but he wasn’t actually thin. Every time mum put his food in his dish she emptied the rest on the fork by banging it on the metal rim of the plate. This noise became a signal for Whisky to come and get it, grubs up.

I left my London home to go to Switzerland to work when I was 20 years old. Of course I always came home once or twice a year to visit and Whisky was there. After a couple of years in Switzerland I met Mr. Swiss and got married and started my own family. I one day got a letter from mum (you didn’t have computers in those days to send a quick mail and telephoning from England to Switzerland was a bit of a luxury). The news was that mum had to make the last visit to the vet with Whisky. He was getting older and suffering with his old age. He couldn’t walk properly any more. She couldn’t bear to see it and although she didn’t want to, she had no choice. Whisky was my first cat and I have never forgot him even today.