Your Chiquito of the Month for December

This one is another wedding shot, combined with holiday cheer.

He's popped up in his wide-eyed best pose to wish all his internet friends a Merry Christmas!  Thanks for all the many wonderful things you all have said about him this year.

Your Chiquito of the Month for November

Happy November, everyone.  I hope that you all survived the ghouls and goblins last night, and that you got lots of goodies.  It's a new month, and that means a new Chiquito pic.  This time there seems to be some tomfoolery afoot.

I don't remember Chiquito being at the wedding, but I was a tad emotional, so maybe I didn't notice.  It would be just like him to hide away in a box like that.  He's got lots of hidey holes and cubbies around the house.  I'm not sure I even know them all.  That worries me sometimes.

This is the next to the last Chiquito of the Month pic.  I hope you've enjoyed your trip through the year with my little rascal.

Your Chiquito of the Month for October

Sorry for the lack of posts this week.  The booth has been kicking my ass. Will get back in the groove next week.

In the meantime, here' is your October Chiquito of the Month.

He's in one of his favorite spots, the back of the toilet.  If he even thinks you're heading to the bathroom, he runs in there and gets on the back of the toilet.  He's not a cat that allows you much personal space.

In fact, Tuesday night when I was getting into bed, I found that he had left me a present on my side of the bed--a dead mouse.  (I'll spare you the pictures.  You're welcome.)  I told Keith that must mean that he loves me more.

Actually, I think he was trying to make up for the one that he had SET LOOSE in the bedroom the week before.  He came running in with something n his mouth, and I thought "Oh no!"  While I was looking for something to catch it in, he dropped it and it scurried off before he could grab it.

Poor guy.  He's only a so-so mouser.  But don't tell him I told you so.

The usual routine around here when a cat has a mouse is to get the mouse away as quickly as possible and then toss it over the back fence.  It worked with every cat we had until Chiquito, who can't seem to hold on to them for very long.

My rationale is that the other mice are sitting around outside waiting for Ferdinand to come back from his scouting expedition with reports of bounty.  If I toss him way out, he won't make it back to the hordes, so they'll assume the worst and move on to some other house.

If Ferdinand should happen to make it back to his tribe, he'll have such a wild tale of frightful happenings that the group will vote to move onto the neighbor's.

It's more humane than traps and definitely cleaner than getting mouse guts everywhere.

If you're eating breakfast, I apologize for the mouse guts.  Unless you like that sort of thing.  If you do like that sort of thing, please don't tell me.

Weekend Finds (The Smalls)

First things first, as always at this time of the month, we have Your Chiquito of the Month for September.

He stretches out like this, on his back, front legs extended all the time.  I swear, if he weren't a cat, he'd have to be a rag doll.  I love that rust colored fur on his belly.

And now, the junk.  I'm sparing you all a lot of the more repetitive usual kinds of stuff that pops up a lot here.

You can't shop at a closed preschool and not buy a tub of wooden blocks. Or, at least I can't.

Lots of them have that wonderful wear that only hordes of four and five year olds can create.

There was one little block with cute blue stars on it.  I saved it for something else.

There were also two tubs of these small colorful plastic animals.  I guess they were given out as rewards or something.  You'll see some of them again, just as soon as I get something worked out in my head.  You have been warned.

That's a lot of red!

Vintage letter tray.  I love these!  Don't you?

There was another one of those cross hooks, but I forgot to bring it out for the pics.  Oh well.  Bad blogger strikes again.  Captain America guards my treasures.

Fun assortment of items.

Handmade wooden altar.  The seller told me his father in law used to make them.  I want to keep it so bad, but I've been keeping a lot of religious articles lately.

A bunch of 1980's school folders.   Everyone I knew had that mountain scene folder back in the day.  The presidents folder ends with Reagan.  There were five of the Muppets folders.  I got them all.  Muppets rule.

This was my "fortune favors the bold" moment.  The box of shutters was in a church with a sign that said "make offer."  I found the dishes, put them in the box, and went to pay.  They were looking at the dishes, and I offered them five bucks for the shutters.  They countered with five for the whole lot.  SOLD!

Your Chiquito of the Month for July and also Treatment Updates

Survey Says: "We are moving in the right direction!"

That's a direct quote from the doc.  The tumor is responding and has shrunk a bit.  We've still got a ways to go, as the tumor has to (of course) go all the way away and my immune system needs to develop to the point that it will fight off future recurrences on its own.  That's the part that takes so long, which is while I'll still be on this drug for months and months to come.

For the first time in a long time, I feel optimistic, but cautiously so.  There is always the chance the drug could stop working.  The doc says that "rarely happens," but I am nothing if not the exception to a lot of rules already.  There is also the possibility that my immune system won't respond as expected and there will be a recurrence on down the line.  But those are all thoughts for the future.  Right now, the damn thing has shrunk a little.

I'll take it.  And the damn fatigue that goes along with all this.

Also, your Chiquito of the Month for July.  He only takes second billing to treatment updates.

It's obvious he has a new theme song.

And....We're Home!

We got in late last night early this morning.  Good to be back home.  Flight went smoothly, if long.  We were afraid at one point that we might miss our connection, but it all worked out.

The wifi at our hotel was so spotty that I gave up on the idea of the photo dump I was planning for yesterday.  Complicating things even more, the laptop seems to not want to install Dropbox, which I do not understand at all.  I was even going to try it from the airport while we waited for the plane, but I could not get on their wifi.  Sometimes, technology is frustrating.

Give me a couple of days to get everything sorted out and edited, unpacked and photographed and washed and put away and I'll have a travelogue and some pics for you all.  Today, I've got to go see how bad the booth looks.  Another damn shelf sold yesterday.  It's occurred to me that every shelf I've put in that exact spot has sold lately.  I need to ponder that.

We had a vociferous welcoming committee last night.

This was the longest we've ever been away from him, and he had a lot to say about it.  He even woke us up every so often to say it again.  Poor little guy,

That pic, by the way, is your Chiquito of the Month for June.  Welcome to the Eddie-torial Comments age of multi-purposing!  Woo hoo!

Your Chiquito of the Month for April

Somehow, it's sort of fitting to feature this silly boy on April Fool's Day!

He's even doing one of his topsy-turvy, upside down poses.  Can't beat that.

By the way, Blogger's spell check suggests "autopsy" as a correction for "topsy-turvy."  Now, that's some April Fool's stuff going on right there!

Your Chiquito of the Month Catch-Up

Here are the January and February pics from the Chiquito calendar.

January:

This is one of those sleeping poses I was talking about in Wednesday's post!  He seriously does this all the time.  How can you not love it?

February:

Look at that face!  You just have to love it to pieces, I tell you!

BONUS SHOT:

Here's the cover for the calendar.

This was right after he came to live with us.  He has always had to greet us when we come home. Vociferously and enthusiastically.  The first one home gets the most intense treatment.  It's like we've been gone for days.  Seriously.

So on this day, Keith got home first.  He did the whole "love the kitty" routine, then bent over to take his shoes off.  Chiquito, not being done with the loving part, hopped up on the table, then crawled over on Keith's back and started kneading and purring.  Keith said it was hard to keep him balanced, but he managed to grab his camera and snap this shot.  I love it.  It so totally captures the sweet natures of both my fellows.

I'm so freaking lucky.

Your Chiquito of the Month for March

Keith made me a calendar of pictures of Chiquito for Christmas.  I have been intending to do a post sharing the picture for each month for a while now.  January and February kind of got away from me for reasons that I don't need to repeat again. (Waaaaah! My store got closed!  Waaaaah!)  It slipped my mind this month, but we still have a lot of March left.  I'll do a catch up post in a couple of days with the Jan-Feb pics.  I've already created posts for the rest of the year, so this endeavor will go back on a monthly schedule.

In the March pic, you get two recurrent Chiquito themes.  One is his upside down perspective on the world.  He is the longest, slinkiest, twistiest cat I have ever known.  It's not uncommon to find him completely sacked out, while twisted around with his head upside down, his belly facing to the right and his rear end planted flat on the bed.

Then we have that paw, reaching out for...something.  He is always sticking that paw out for one reason or another.  To shift his water bowl around and splash water out of it.  To play with something.  To tap me on the arm (when I'm on the computer), shoulder (when I'm on the toilet), or face (when I'm asleep) when he wants attention.  A lot of times, you can find him laying asleep with one or both paws completely stretched out like that.  Even when he gets his loving, he'll lift that paw up and flex it while we rub his head.  This isn't usual kitty kneading.  He does this in mid-air!

The other day, I was out thrifting, and I found this:

Even the over-sized ears are perfect!

 Of course, he came home with me.  He's siting on top of my desk, watching me type right now.