Whew, I'm dragging a bit of ass today.  It was the first day I had to go back to work and it was a little rough getting up super early after staying up late and sleeping in for over a week.  Plus the 4th of July is a pretty hard night to fall asleep on.  It sounded like a war zone around here with mortars going off constantly until at least midnight.  I didn't even get into bed until later than usual, since we shot off a few fireworks of our own and I think I was a little amped up from all the noise and celebration going on.  And then one more factor contributed to my lack of sleep, but I'll get to that in one second.  

So I have some pretty big news as far as updates to the kitty cats that got abandoned by the next door neighbors when they moved out.  I was worried we were going to lose some ground with them when we were out of town for the week, but we've actually gained some considerable ground since we got back.  As soon as we pulled up in the driveway we spotted the one we're calling Little One for now.  That name is very likely subject to change.  She ran around the side of the house and after I brought all our luggage and stuff I went to look and she was still there.  I've been able to pet her a couple times now, but she's always been a little shy about approaching me and just before we left I saw her on the side of the house and tried to approach her and she ran away from me.

This time she meowed at me and then ran straight to me.  I was able to give her a whole lot of treats and a whole lot of pets before she eventually decided to walk away from me.  But she was very affectionate while I was petting her.  She's a very sweet kitty, although she's skin and bones and needs to be fattened up some more.  She's also shedding like crazy.  Every time I touched her a large tuft of fur would come off in my hand.  I grabbed a brush and was able to brush her a little bit and even more fur came off.  It's a little messy as it gets all over your clothes and kind of sticks to your hands, but I think in time we can probably get that under control.  I haven't seen her again yet since that first night we got back, but I got some good bonding time in with her.  I just hope she wasn't too freaked outside while the 4th of July was going on.

We made even bigger progress with the other cat, who we're calling Brownie for now.  That may or may not stick.  The first night after we came home, she decided to come into the house on her  own.  I was worried about how she might do with our dogs and our other cat, but as of right now they all seem to be doing pretty good with each other.  Our dog George is interested in sniffing her face, but she's tolerating it well and he's not being much more aggressive than that.  Even our other cat Holly doesn't seem too perturbed by her presence so far.  Brownie started playing a game where she would keep going to the door asking to be let out, so we would, whereupon she would immediately turn around and start meowing and scratching at the door wanting back in.  A lot of this happened during the first night we were home while I was already in bed, but Kim indulged her a lot before she finally went outside.

Around noon yesterday I looked out the window and saw Brownie just sitting by the front door.  I hadn't seen her around during the daytime before so I opened the door and sure enough she came in again.  She started wanting to do the in and out game again so I picked her up and took her over to the doggy door, which leads to the back yard.  I've never seen her in our backyard before, so I'm not sure if she's ever been out there or explored it, but I wanted to show her she could come in and out on her own.  She made her way through to the backyard and then seemed a little spooked and took off running.  

We didn't see her again until dinnertime.  I knew it was going to get really loud with the 4th of July, so I thought maybe we should bring her inside and keep her shut up in the bedroom.  I still wasn't sure how she would do with our other cat Holly, so I wanted to keep them separate.  We ended up going over to Kim's parents to shoot off a few fireworks so I was curious to see how Brownie would do shut up in our bedroom while we were gone.  I was worried she would be freaked out, but when we got home she seemed fine.  We brought her on the couch for a bit and the dogs came up and so did Holly and none of them seemed to bother her at all.  Brownie seems like a very chilled out cat.  

There were still tons of fireworks going off all around us, so I thought it would be for the best to keep her inside for a while.  It was already later than I usually stay up on worknights and I had to go to bed so Kim stayed up with her while I headed off to try to go to sleep.

As I mentioned earlier it took quite a while to fall asleep.  Every time it seemed like I was starting to drift off a loud mortar would go off nearby and I'd snap back awake.  Eventually I did manage to fall asleep.  But then around 1:30 AM, I kind of woke up from a dream on my own a little bit and I felt something tickling my arm.  I opened up my eyes and saw Brownie standing on the bed right next to me.  I started to pet her and she got REALLY into that.  Up to now outside she seemed to kind of tolerate pets more than be super into them, but in the bed she was a petting fiend.  She climbed right on top of me and started purring and demanding pets.  Eventually she kind of laid down right on my chest and kept wanting pets.  She started touching my face with her paw, which was cute, but not super conducive to sleep.  I eventually had to call to Kim to let her know Brownie was in with me and she took Brownie with her out to the couch.  It was cool, but it woke me up pretty thoroughly and I had some trouble falling back asleep again.  Hence, I didn't get a great night's sleep last night.

Brownie must have found the doggy door on her own during the night because we didn't see her around in the morning and I haven't seen her yet today.  I'm sure she'll show up again at dinnertime, but I think she's well on her way to moving into our house.  I'm going to have to bring Little One in next time I make contact with her.  

Anyway, that's about it for now.