Susan Abel Sullivan, author
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The Origin of Brown Nosing

1/22/2014

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PictureMoxie "brown nosing" our cat, Ernie






























The origin of the term "brown nosing" has GOT to come from dogs.  If I didn't know better, I'd totally think it was inspired by my pit bull, Moxie. 

Notice where brown-nosing-the-cats falls on Moxie's list of favorite things to do:

1. Eat wild animal poop in the backyard.

2. Eat cat poop from the litter boxes.

3. Lick the cats' butts, aka, brown nosing.

4. Lick Bo's junk (Bo is our other dog).

5. Tie: play with her tennis ball; swim in the pool.

6. Eat any food that isn't hers.

7. Eat actual dog food.

8. Sleep.

9. Play with Bo.

10. Get a back scratch and/or belly rub from her humans.

Here's the thing about the dogs brown nosing the cats . . . the cats LOVE it.  They ASK for it.  They writhe with pleasure, the little hedonists.  And apparently the dogs get something out of it, too, although it may be an addiction like gambling where they keep hoping they'll hit the jackpot of golden poop popping out of a cat butt.

So now you know the (unofficial) origin of the term "brown nosing."  Yes, thank you very much.  I'm always happy to provide educational tidbits on this blog.  Ha!













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Are Some Animals Psychic?

1/15/2014

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If you don't believe in psychic ability in humans, then you most certainly won't entertain the idea that animals might possess this trait, too.  But if you're open to the idea, read on.  I have a true story for ya.

When the hubs and I moved to Alabama from Chicago back in 2001, we, of course, had a veritable zoo of companion animals: two dogs, two cats, a king snake and a Vietnamese pot-bellied pig.  My tendency, if left unchecked, is to live life surrounded by animals like Dr. Doolittle.  And yes, I even talk to the animals and often I understand what they're telling me, although they don't speak English, but communicate with a combination of sounds, expressions, and body language.

So I was determined not to fill up the wee house we'd inherited with animals like I had when we'd lived in Missouri and Kentucky.  And I managed to sustain this for a year. 

But in January of 2002, the urge to visit the animal shelter struck me out of the blue.  I'd never been to the Calhoun County Animal Shelter, had no idea where it was even located, and most certainly did not want to be adopting ANY MORE ANIMALS.  I resisted the urge to act on this impulse, but it only grew stronger and stronger over the next two weeks.

I'm a big believer in listening to my intuition, especially when it's persistent and shouting at me, so even though a trip to the shelter didn't make any logical sense, I looked up the address and paid them a visit.

First stop: the cat room.  I walked in and about thirty cats ran over to check me out.  Three seconds later, twenty-nine cats decided I wasn't worth their time.  The one cat who remained was a beautiful calico and she jumped up into my arms and went, "Meow!!" quite emphatically. 

"Hello, kitty."  I put her down and she kept jumping up on me...in my lap, on my back, in my arms.  This cat really dug me!  And she was so enthusiastic. 

I asked how long she'd been at the shelter.  The volunteer said, "Two weeks."

Two weeks.

That's how long my intuition had been hitting me over the head about visiting the shelter.  Had this calico been sending out some sort of psychic signal that I was able to receive?  Did we have some kind of extra-sensory connection?  It seemed coincidental that I'd been resisting an insane urge to visit the shelter for two weeks and she'd been AT the shelter for TWO weeks.

So the next step was to bring the hubs to meet her.  He didn't find her particularly alluring; he liked a long-haired Siamese mix better.  But once again, as on my initial visit, when the hubs and I walked into the cat room, every cat rushed us and then every cat but the calico decided they had better things to do. 

My husband WAS amazed at how she kept jumping and climbing all over me with such emphatic MEOWs!

So I asked if we could adopt her.  The hubs said yes (he rarely says no about these things), but someone else had expressed interest in her and we had to wait a week to see if they'd come back for her. 

They didn't.  On VALENTINE'S DAY in 2002, the shelter called and said we could adopt the calico if we still wanted her. 

How could we not?  She was meant to be with us. 

I brought her home and I renamed her Zoe.  It fit her high energy, enthusiastic personality.  If Zoe were a person, she'd be a cheerleader and the president of the welcome wagon.  I don't know if she'd ever had kittens before winding up at the shelter, but she is a natural mother.  When we wound up adopting a kitten in 2003 and two more in 2004, she treated those kits like her own and still has a strong mother/son bond with Spencer who is now nine. 

So do some animals have psychic ability?  Or do some people possess a type of extra-sensory radar that is tuned to an animal frequency?  I'd like to think so.  There are stranger things in heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy. 

Picture
Zoe with one of her grown-up foster kittens, Cleo
If you enjoyed today's post, please check out my guest blog at World Weaver Press where I write about how a dog on death row inspired the character of Luna in my latest novel, The Weredog Whisperer.

http://worldweaverpress.com/2014/01/14/saved-from-death-row-the-inspiration-for-the-weredog-whisperers-luna/

Picture
Moxie enjoying her perch on top of the love seat
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Pet Porn and Confused Critters

12/13/2013

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PictureMoxie and Ernie: pet porn???














Okay, I'll say right off the bat that this photo is NOT pet porn! 

Ernie, however, is a very confused kitty.  He's NURSING on our American Pit Bull Terrier, Moxie.  Moxie had her last litter of pups (at the animal shelter) October of 2006.  This picture was made late summer/early fall of 2011.  So Moxie didn't even have any milk for Ernie to nurse.  But she did have some bodaciously large nipples from all the puppies she had birthed during her previous life before we adopted her.

But giant nipples aside, Moxie looks nothing like a cat.  And she smells like 100% dog.  We even have four female cats that Ernie could have chosen for surrogate moms.  But Ernie wanted Moxie.  Kinda reminds me of Babe the Sheep Pig who took up with a litter of border collies in the movie BABE. If someone made a movie about our Not-So-Little Ernie Hemingway, it could be titled:  Ernie, the American Pit Bull Maine Coon Kitty.  Yeah, I know, it's a long title. 

Ernie is all grown up now, but he STILL tries to nurse on Moxie from time to time.  "You're too grown up for this," she tells him with a growl.  But she WILL lick Ernie's privates clean, so I guess he's not too old for THAT!  It's a service she's willing to provide for all of our felines. 


The cats actually "ask" her to do it by walking up to her face and turning their backsides to her.  She gladly obliges probably hoping some delectable kitty poop will pop out from their butts like candy from a gumball machine.  Anyone with dogs and cats knows that cat poop is considered a delicacy to dogs. 

Cat poop and cat on dog porn--just another kooky day at Casa Sullivan.






















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Polydactyl, Pterodactyl...What's the Difference?

11/22/2013

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PictureErnie the Polydactyl (or Hemingway cat) going ga-ga over the scale















Yesterday I promised a blog about Pepper the Vietnamese Pot-bellied pig.  Sorry, but I changed my mind.  It's a woman's perogative after all. 

Instead, today's blog is a lesson in vocabulary.  Before you yawn and go check your horoscope or see what everyone's posting on Facebook, you should know that I'll be writing about cats with THUMBS.

Cats with thumbs, or any extra toes on their paws, are known as polydactyl cats, ie, cats with many digits.  Pterodactyls were flying dinosaurs.  They might have had extra toes.  I don't really know.  But pterodactyl SOUNDS an awful lot like polydactyl.

Why cats with opposable thumbs haven't taken over the world yet is beyond me, but I suspect it has something to do with their extra toe not being a true thumb.  So they're really not all that good for opening cabinet doors or handling tools or using computers--all necessary for world domination.

Polydactyl cats are also known as Hemingway cats because Ernest Hemingway had cats with extra toes down in his Key West home.  Rumor has it that all polydactyl cats are descended from a Hemingway cat.  I don't know if that's true, either, but it sounds really cool.  Ernie is from Jacksonville, Florida so there might be some truth to that.

We originally called our polydactyl cat Little Ernie Hemingway, but he quickly outgrew the "Little" part of his name and now we just call him Ernie.  He has a thumb on each front paw and is really good at catching toys tossed in the air. 

He also loves it when I weigh myself.  Out of the five cats in the house, on weigh day Ernie magically appears as soon as I step on the scale.  Usually he tries to grab my toes as I stand on the scale, but he was a bit camera shy today and wouldn't perform on film. 

I did, however, get him to look up at me.


Picture
Ernie missing a major film opportunity
Picture
Ernie and Sabrina on the kitty tree. You can see his thumbs in this picture. My niece wanted to name him "Thumbkins."
And that concludes today's lesson on polydactyl vs pterodactyl.  Thanks for tuning in.  Ernie thanks you, too.
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Weird Science #1

11/8/2013

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NOTE: If you're squeamish, find rotting, maggoty body parts gross or distasteful, or lack a sense of scientific curiosity, then I recommend you skip today's post and go read Hello Kitty or something.

Bo found a rotting cat's foot out in our jungle of a yard and brought it up to the back deck to gnaw on.  I walked right past it several days in a row, but upon closer inspection, I thought it was part of a dead bird.  Then I looked even closer and discovered that it was a cat's hind foot and lower leg.

And it was riddled with maggots.

Gross, huh?

Instead of throwing it in the trash dumpster like a normal person, the part of me that's kin to Victor Frankenstein wanted to examine the cat foot in closer detail.  I noticed that part of the tibia was missing, but the fibula was still intact.  I hadn't realized how thin a cat's fibula is.  Makes me appreciate my veterinarian's surgical skill.

Oh, I should tell you that I was a pre-veterinarian science major for two semesters in college.  It wasn't squeamishness that drove me to change my major, but Organic Chemistry.   And when I finally settled on Exercise Science, I had anatomy and physiology labs involving animal dissection and vivisection.  The first was fascinating, but the latter rather distressing since the animals vivisected were still ALIVE! I took an "F" on those particular labs.

PictureLook what the dog dredged up...rotting cat's foot with maggots--yummy!












So back to the Weird Science part of this post. 

I bagged up the foot, maggots and all, and put it in the fridge for several days until I could get around to this post.  I figured the cold air or plastic bag enclosure would kill the maggots, but when I pulled it out this afternoon, the maggots were alive and well and wiggling at the bottom of the bag.  So cold temperatures don't kill maggots, but it does seem to put them off their feed since they left the corpse to congregate together.  I suppose maggots don't use up much oxygen so the air pocket in the bag hasn't dissipated yet. 

I do have to wonder what happened to the rest of the cat?
Maybe possums ate it.  Opossums do eat carrion and our neighborhood is home to many possums.  Or maybe our dog, Bo, ate it.  He is a goat in dog's clothing, although I don't know if goats eat rotting meat. It's a mystery any way you slice it.

But the fun part about all of this is what my husband is going to say when he gets home from his business trip tonight and opens the fridge to find the cat's foot.  I can guarantee you it won't be yummy.

Stay tuned for more Weird Science at Casa Sullivan . . .

Picture
Maggot Convention at the Rotting Corpse Hotel
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Cats and Writers Go Together Like Martinis and Olives

11/7/2013

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Picture










It's practically in the author handbook that if you're a writer and female, you're also a cat person.  Maybe even a crazy cat person.  I used to be a crazy cat lady, but once you reach a certain number of indoor cats, some or all of them will have pissing contests with each other in your house. 

And man, cat pee reeks.  Does it ever.

So, we're down to five cats in the Victorian house and that seems to be the right number for our square footage because the piss-offs have stopped.  Order has been restored and all the felines are happy again.  Because Lord help you if your cat isn't content.  It'll make your life a living hell. 

Pictured above are my two love birds, er, love cats, Zoe and Spencer.  Zoe came from the animal shelter and Spencer was born to a stray cat in my neighbor's yard.  They luv each other...can you tell?

Now, what would a cute cat story be without a Casa Sullivan oddity?  Check out the photo gallery below.  Before we acquired the Charles Wysocki painting of the orange and gray tabby sleeping together, none of our cats cuddled.  Once we hung it over our bed--BOOM!--we had 3 pairs of cuddling cats: Cosmo & Cleo, Zoe & Spencer, and Buddy & Ernie.  I had to stop buying cat art because it seemed like as soon as I bought a piece, a corresponding cat would show up wanting a home. 

This mystical happening inspired my short story, "Finding the Way Home," in my short story collection Fried Zombie Dee-light! Ghoulish, Ghostly Tales (available in eBook from Amazon and Barnes & Noble.com.)

Fix yourself a nice martini, kick back, and enjoy the story.  Or cuddle with your cats.  Or both.  And don't forget the olives.

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