opinion

Blogmas day 8 - giving 3 cats a furrever home

Publié le 9 Décembre 2022 par Charly C.

Catégories : #about life, #advice, #animals, #cat adoption, #cats, #help, #life, #life experience, #love, #opinion, #pets, #real life, #blogmas

Hello there!

I decided to make this entry as part of blogmas 2022. The challenge is for day 8 and it consists of some gift ideas. There are many ways of making a person happy, but not many think of making animals happy. I wish this would change.

Several entries ago, i wrote about adopting animals. Read one of them here and read the other one here.

Last year in the summer, my partner decided to take a walk in Carol Park. I wrote about it in this entry, if you're curious. So, we go in the park, on a certain side path. As we walk, we see a white and orange kitty. As we approach, we see the kitty has more brothers. They also had some food and water container that other people filled. We also ran to the store and bought some kitten food. which they ate.

The white and orange kitty had a white/black brother, a 3 colored sister, an all-orange and stripy sister (we first thought it was a boy), and 3 all-black brothers. We first saw just 1 of the black cats. Then, we saw the 2nd one after some time. And yet, after some more weeks, a 3rd fully-black cat cam. We only realized this because all of them were present at the same time.

feeding stray homeless cats des Chats sans maison

In these 2 pictures, we can only see 3 of the cat brothers, eating well. They were hungry even though they had quite a bit of food. brought to them by other people.

In some ways, they were lucky because several people were passing by daily to feed them and to give them water.

The first cat that got a family

The first cat that wanted and found a family is the one that appeared in front of us, the white and orange one. he's not seen in the pics above, but below.

The image is blurry, sadly. I believe this is an iPhone 4 picture. He was maybe 2 or 3 months old at the time, and a bit on the skinny side.

When we saw him that evening when he got home, he appeared not to feel very well. Clearly, thinking he was sick, we decided we take him home, regardless of the fact that we had no bag or cat carrier on us.

It didn't matter, because he acted sick all the way to home. Once we 'quarantined' him, he sprang back to life. He was eating, and drinking, and i think he even used the litter box right away.

We didn't think we can keep him, and personally, i didn't feel much attachment towards him. :( We knew someone who wanted a cat for some time, and we also wanted to rescue as many of his brothers as possible. So, Whuay went to another home where there were no other cats to compete for human attention.

He did spend some time with us, getting used to life indoors which seemed to be all he ever wanted. I say this because once at home, he started exploring the "quarantine" room right awaya and wanting to make friends with our older cats, Whiskey and Mickey.

As far as we know, he's doing fine, he's loved, and this is what matters. I do miss him now that i looked at the pics i have of him.

The 2nd cat getting a family

The second cat finding a family is the white and black one seen in the first image. This is because we still went every other day to give the kitties water and food. That summer was brutal, with very high temperatures.

His current name is Churro, but when we first saw him, we called him Oreo because of his color combination.

I have basically 2 memories of this kitty in the park, though we saw him more often than that. One time, when we went to feed them, he was up on the tree, trying to sharpen his claws. We knew he is a very playful fella right then and there. He was absolutely adorable.

The other memory i have of him from the park is from one evening when 2 young girls came to feed the kitties. However, this is not all they did: they also left with this kitty but said they'd bring him back.

Why did they take him, you ask? it's because they wanted to play with him in a safer environment. They couldn't keep him though, as it was their parents who had the last word on the matter.

We got quite mad with the girls because they gave Churro, at the time Oreo, fake hopes of a home. :( One of the next times we went to feed the kitties, only Churro/Oreo was there, all alone. He looked sad and lonely. We didn't think twice about it, we just grabbed him and went home with him, after leaving food for his brothers.

Look how handsome he is! Sadly, the red bow didn't last for long, but it sure fitted him. However, the surprized face expression persists, and he's just amazing!

The 3rd cat coming home with us

The 3rd cat that came home with us is probably the black one in the first image. Why do i say probably? Because they were a total of 3 black cat brothers! proof below! The black cat we first saw got named Shadow, and then all the black kitties received the same name because we couldn't tell them apart.

There are 2 things i need to mention:

we didn't know there are 3 black cats from the start
the 3rd cat didn't come home last year like his brothers, but this year

I forgot how many of the kitties we saw the very first time we went. I do remember that we were surprised to see a completely black cat among the others. Then, one evening, we saw a 2nd completely black cat. Again, we were surprised and felt as if someone played a trick on us.

But, then! a 3RD FULLY BLACK kitty appeared from nowhere! They were there all 3 at once, as seen in the pic above, and all of them were boys. One of them was more scared of us than the others, and another one more friendly.

Another memory i have regarding these black brothers is that one time, one evening, just 1 of them was there out of all the remaining brothers. Not only this but the one that came to eat was one of the friendlier black brothers. So, i managed to touch him and cuddle him.

I believe that was the evening he followed us through the park, almost close to the entry point we use. He was also crying/meowing and looking sad. T_T We were certain he wanted to come home with us. We ... just ... thought we couldn't deal with so many cats. We felt really bad and sorry we didn't take him with us that day.

Almost a year passed by. During these months we continued to take food to the kitties. however, sometime in spring, they disappeared. The area where they were being fed was demolished further - it used to be a restaurant type of location that caught fire at some point.

This led the kitties to scatter, we think, or perhaps someone took 2 of the remaining cats, leaving the 3 black brothers. Then, not even they came to being fed anymore. So, we stopped going seeing that there were no more cats to feed.

But life is twisted and at the beginning of September '22 we went again just on a whim. And we found Shadow! He recognized us by our voices and came to eat and drink. The next day we went with the cat cage in tow, hoping to find and catch him. And we were lucky! he was very easy to "catch" and now he has a furreverr home and he adapted VERY well to his new environment.

In the middle, is Scotch the dog that i haven't introduced yet. We currently have 4 cats, a dog, and a crow. Life is stressful with so many pets, but we are very happy to have rescued 3 kitties out of maybe a total of 7 brothers.

Do you want to buy me a coffee? this is a 1-time donation, thank you very much!

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No, darling, it's not that you can't do it ...

Publié le 8 Août 2022 par Charly C.

Catégories : #about life, #advice, #annoying, #beliefs, #bullying, #helpful, #life experience, #life, #life lesson, #learning, #opinion, #real life, #warning

... it's that you don't want to do it. There's a difference there.

Hello everyone!

You probably wonder what's this title all about, though it should be self-explanatory. Yet, i need to rant and get angry at certain people and at myself as well, and my blog is the best place and way to do this.

It's less damaging and maybe, just maybe .... maybe?

Outcast - Miss Jackson video still; copyrights belong to the creators/band

someone [including myself] will understand this, and stop saying "i can't" and just admit you don't *fducking* want to do whatever there must be done.

rollback film to what started this rant

Except there's no film to roll back, and i have to explain the situation. if you don't want to read the backstory, feel free to scroll down to the next title.

This past week [10 to 16 of july 2022] we went out on a very hot day for some beauty treatment. Seeing it was so hot, we decided to have some ice cream, though all we wanted was to drink something.

We found this *NEW* ice cream place uptown that used a chimney cake, aka Kürtőskalács, as the cone for the ice cream. There aren't many flavors of ice cream to choose from, but their names were really cool: fashion vibe or strawberry vibe. This is what they look like:

As you can (or maybe not so much), the fashion one (on the right), is actually cocoa ice cream with pieces of chocolate, and with the chimney cake covered in cocoa powder. That one was my ice cream. The other one was anna’s and she didn’t want to eat it right away.

Taking it home was troublesome for this Vibe place didn’t have anything to carry the ice cream in. Luckily, the area has plenty of other options for ice creams and many have containers for takeout.

So, we went to the nearest one, and I asked for one such container. Not for free, mind you. And the cashier says “oh, sorry, I don’t have containers!” They were piled RIGHT behind her! Everyone could see them!

I had to point out that my ice cream was melting and making a mess in her store. That was when she decided to ask her supervisor what to do. This situation turned my into THAT customer that says "can i speak with a manager? :) "

‘Can’t’ - reserved for very few instances

1. PTSD or phobias

These are mental health issues that are difficult to ’cure’ or overcome. They simply incapacitate the sufferer from doing whatever caused them to suffer in the first place.

Not everyone might suffer to the same degree from the same issue. For instance, I can’t watch scenes with folks trapped in tight spaces: I feel as if I am in their shoes and I start panicking and hyperventilating. Others in the same situation as me might have a different reaction.

2. Lack of knowledge

Let's say, you just start learning something new just for fun, or for whatever reason. Someone asks you to help them with a project in your new area of study. All sounds nice, and they even offer to pay for your service.

The problem is when they ask for help on something you didn't get to study yet or is a bit too difficult for you to understand.

3. Other plans

Let's say you might plan on meeting with your friends a few days in advance, but then you forget or something else comes up that needs your urgent attention.

In such a case, you clearly have to say "I can't, something else came up that is more important." You don't really need to explain more than this unless it's a close friend.

4. You're simply unable to do something

This usually applies to those with a disability. Let's assume you have to climb some stairs, but you're bound to a wheelchair and there's no ramp available. Sadly, there still are places in such a state. It's not as if you're going to crawl to wherever the stairs go.

It also applies to doing something that goes against your beliefs. This can be related to consuming alcohol, smoking (anything), sleeping with someone to whom you're not married, etc, etc.

Should any of these be the case, it's PERFECTLY fine and acceptable to say "I can't" and you could explain why as well unless it's visually noticeable.

Do you want to buy me a coffee? this is a 1-time donation, thank you very much!

The first image belongs to Outcast and is shared for educational purposes.

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Ladies and Gents, if (s)he acts weird, run!

Publié le 15 Février 2022 par Charly C.

Catégories : #advice, #life experience, #life lesson, #tips, #opinion

Hello everyone...

I didn't think i'd actually I'd come here to talk about this. Although, the whole point of my blog, this one, was to talk about this topic at least once.

You see, in almost 40 years of being on this Earth, I did meet a decent share of people. Weird people. I feel I only met weird people. This made me NOT like being around people and instead live in a comfy bubble with my fiance. And you know what? it's not so bad.

Weird comes in many different shapes and forms. there's one common point though: the type of weird I'm talking about, makes you feel drained, makes you question yourself (you generally shouldn't question yourself, but more about this later - i think), this weird doesn't respect you or your boundaries. This type of weird makes you live a toxic life.

ok, ok. I'll jump into the meat of the topic because i don't want a longer intro than i need. There's no order to the signs or red flags, but if you see them, RUN!

Ladies and Gents, if (s)he acts weird, run!

they write. a lot

When a person writes a lot is not always a sign you should run. except for me it is, because I'm an introvert and i rarely can connect with a stranger and just be able to talk about everything under the sun.

But, let me define this "a lot":

long and VERY long messages (at least longer than you're used to)
often - say several times per day if it's an email; or too many texts in a very short period of time
at odd hours - or what you consider to be odd hours; this applies to text messages

Now, i heard that in some cultures, like in East Asia (South Korea for instance), sending many text messages in a short period of time it's just a sign of caring for the other person. They might think you're already in a relationship if they do this. if you find yourself seeing an East Asian* person who acts this way, you don't really need to run, just talk about it and see if they see you as their partner already. If you're looking or hoping for a relationship, then you probably just got lucky.

However, if the person is not East Asian, but as we say, a Westerner, you might want to consider ghosting this person, hide, and run. Why? because the majority of Westerners don't show affection through many and long messages or emails. We mostly use words and objects instead of actions and gestures in a more direct manner, whereas an East Asian person would use more subtle words and actions that could make a Westerner feel suffocated.

*I have to say East Asian because I'm not familiar (in any shape or form) with the behavior of Asians from other regions of this large continent, sorry. I also want to mention that by East Asian i refer to those who grew up and live in this rather large area of Asia, because i have no idea if people of this descent that grew up in a different part of the world act the same or not.

they tell you 'stuff' (too soon/fast)

The stuff i refer to here is inappropriate stuff. I'll give you some examples.

a. If the person is of the opposite gender, and suddenly mentions yours or their relationship status, this could be a red flag and you should probably stop communicating with them. The 'relationship status mention' could be casual and direct "Oh, so do you have a boyfriend/girlfriend?" But it can also be indirect, but still sounding casual "So, what does your partner think of us talking?"

Do i need to mention that if you can't trust your partner (if you have one) or if they can't trust you, the 2 of you probably shouldn't be in a relationship? It's true that people cheat. it's also true that once you've been cheated on, it's hard to trust a new person not to do the same. However, this is not the topic I want to talk about today.

b. Another thing they could say is "i hope you won't tell me things like ...." This is reversed psychology and they actually hope and want you to tell them those things. Don't let yourself be manipulated like this! Nobody should tell you what you can say or not say.

The only exception here is if you offended them or someone else without knowing/meaning to, and they're asking you to apologize.

c. They could say "I love you" a bit too soon after the 2 of you met, say in less than a month. "I love you" has a lot of weight. Also, not everyone is comfortable hearing it. There is such a thing as "love at first sight," sure but i believe it's usually reciprocated. If you don't feel the same for the other person, perhaps you should run away.

Now, you'll have to pay attention to the background of the person too. People living in different cultures will approach a new relationship in different ways. They also may perceive those from a different culture in a certain light (usually stereotypes), and I'm sure you do so too. Stereotyping is not ok, it's just what we're exposed to the most. if you're not searching for a partner, make this clear to the person from a different culture you just met.

they don't understand hints

or even direct words.

Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. This is a long one to explain and can turn into a dangerous situation. I'll try and be as brief as possible.

Clearly, we all want to be liked and be seen as good people. This makes us act nicer than usual towards those we just met. i call this "testing the waters" to see what kind of person the other one is.

However, sometimes we meet new people and we simply don't like them. We can't like everyone and not everyone will like us. This is normal life. Yet, the other person might actually like us, even if we don't like them.

At a certain point, we realize we receive unwanted attention, but because we don't want to be the bad guy, we're trying to be diplomatic about it. This could be avoiding spending more than 2 minutes alone with them, making up excuses for leaving faster/not meeting up, trying to suggest to them to leave, and a bazillion other things. The result? they still linger around, making the situation awkward. By this point everyone else knows how you feel towards the new individual and how that individual feels towards you.

Seeing that these hints don't have any effect, it's time to be more firm and clear about how things are. Tell them directly you're not interested and have someone else around as well, and have the 3rd wheel (so to speak) talk in your place.

If this also doesn't work, perhaps simply ignoring them and not replying at all, might work. Depending on the situation, you might want to change the environment in which you met this pest. in other words, run and hide.

they might talk about a single topic

or very few topics.

Or something you aren’t interested in, and they might talk A LOT about it, to the point of repeating everything, several times.

Talking about a single or a limited number of topics can be a sign of some mental issue or illness - i forgot the correct term, sorry. Here I mean people who are on the autistic or Asperger's spectrum, have Dawn syndrome, and a few others.

Being involved with such a person can be difficult without the proper training or exposure. Not even all therapists can treat/counsel these individuals.

This is a touchy/sensitive topic to talk about, and again, this entry is not the right one for it. i also don't have the proper knowledge to write about it. at least not for now. i want to make it clear that I'm not looking down on these individuals, as i think I'm also on the Asperger's spectrum.

What I'm trying to say is that dealing with such individuals requires certain patience and empathy. Not everyone has these, hence the Mother Theresa mention. I've seen 'normal' people getting quite annoyed with someone who mentioned they're autistic. The annoyance came from how the autistic person was talking about a certain topic, not because of the "autism mention" itself. i hope this makes sense?

If you feel or know that you can get easily annoyed by certain mentions or behaviors, and you notice them in someone you just met, it could be best if you stayed away from them.

they don't say they're sorry

not even half-assed when they should.

Let's say they say something offensive that is not directed at you. Or they could say something that disturbs you a great deal. This could be any kind of insult, sexist, racist, or homophobic words/opinions. I'm not here to teach you WHY such language/behavior is NOT OK. If you use such language, you stink, and I don't want you reading my blog.

You let them know how you feel about what they said, why isn't ok, while trying to be as clear as possible.

Except, they don't (or refuse to) understand, and as such, they don't say "I'm sorry" but instead they search for excuses and explanations. This is NOT OK.

Furthermore, they might add more offensive/upsetting statements or might try to turn the tables around, in an attempt to blame YOU for feeling the way you do. Such "explanations" could be anything really, and they usully start with "OH, but you don't know XYZ from my past."

In this regard that person is correct: you are highly likely that you don't know XYZ from their past. Yet, it is THAT PERSON'S job to overcome whatever injustice they faced and be a better individual, teach others that what happened was not acceptable. The "others" in "teaching others" includes those who performed the unjust act, if they didn't die.

The person who does something wrong towards another, should at the very least apologize. If they do not, they're a bad person, a monster.

This song says quite a lot of the stuff i mentioned above. So i thought it's relevant. You should look up the lyrics and translation as well, if you can't understand what they say.

Some Sort of a Conclusion

The above are the main red flags about a person that you should stay as far as possible from. Most of these come from my personal experiences with "weird" people over the years. These signs are for both genders.

The worst is that usually, it's rather difficult to get rid of. Some might become obsessed and turn into stalkers. Stalkers are some of the most dangerous kinds of individuals out there.

And on a similar note, being a Stan is not a cool thing. Look up the video "Stan" by Eminem. Still relatively relevant for this topic.

Have a lovely February!

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