For God’s sake, let us sit upon the ground
and tell sad stories of the death of cats …
— Shakespeare, Richard II
(if it had been about cats)
I come not to bury Mr. Blue, but to praise him.
— Shakespeare, Julius Caesar
(if it had been about Mr. Blue instead of J.C.)
… and our little life is rounded […]

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About two and a half years ago, I adopted a big blue talkative cat named Mr. Blue (aka Barabajagal). Below the jump is the email I sent out to my cat-friendliest friends announcing his arrival.
I didn’t have a blog in those days, but I wanted to post it here to document it, and provide […]

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OcPot is still on hiatus for at least a couple-few more days. But yesterday, down in the comments to the hiatus post, Miss Rubbery Nun asked how I was doing and I thought I’d repost my answer here for anyone else wondering how the move went:
Survived. Just barely. No thanks to AT&T, who, in […]

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Disturbing changes are taking place in the world, and we do not know what they signify. We are afraid that something terrible is going on, some fundamental destructive process that is entirely outside of our experience. You can read this in our wide-eyed stares, our defensive crouches, our tendency to go into hiding for longer […]

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Next Wednesday, September 19, I’m going to be participating in a way-fun event called The Nod, in which some of Chicago’s best bloggers will be reading posts from their blogs live at the Uptown Writer’s Space.
And for some reason they’ve asked me to be on the bill, as well. Possibly to make the rest of […]

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Haven’t posted any cat pictures in a while, so…
First up, here’s Mr. Blue — who wants you to know that he prefers the way you look upside-down. It does so many good things for you.

Really, you should just start walking around on the ceiling and save him the trouble of correcting your appearance.
And here’s Kiwi, […]

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I’m getting a lot of Google traffic today from people who are searching for information about the recall of Natural Balance’s pet food, specifically the venison varieties.
So, if you’re one of those folks, here’s a link to the Natural Balance site and here’s what it currently says:
NOTICE:
We are receiving consumer complaints regarding the Venison & […]

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So, in the comments to my previous post on the pet food issue, I promised I’d provide a progress report on transitioning my little monsters over to the Newman’s Own organic cat food. And the short version is, so far, so good. (See this comment in particular for why I chose Newman’s Own over other […]

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In the comments to my post about the Big Pet Food Recall earlier this week, AmyC pointed out that the pet food industry isn’t regulated by the FDA; instead it’s self-regulated by an industry group called the AAFCO (Association of American Feed Control Officials). And then Grendel posted this link: What’s Really in Pet Food, […]

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I hear the cool kids like to post pictures of their cats on their blogs sometimes. Except I think you’re supposed to do it on Fridays. In 2005. Well, never let it be said that Ocelopotamus colors inside the lines!
Anyway, here’s Barabajagal (aka Mr. Blue) and Kiwi, even though they don’t really deserve the good […]

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