The week beginning 20 July, 2002.
This page is the colour of the sky in the photos when the sun shines.  I'm using it as an expression of hope!

Here's the second cat-biography (actually she's the third cat, but second to appear here).

Foxton Beach in a bag

The bag cat!  This is Foxton Beach, so named for that was where she was found, under the house of my favourite aunt. (Foxton Beach is about an hour north of Wellington, on the west coast of the North Island).
Foxton Beach cat was only about 10 weeks old at the time, a very tame little kitten, but obviously the victim of some trauma which included the loss of the end of her tail.  I was there on holiday and my aunt had to return to a city apartment and couldn't take the kitten, so sent her off with me, with complimentary cage and vet visit.  After a week in her little cage (while I continued my holiday and waited for phone calls about the kitten from someone who might have lost her), Foxton travelled the 500-odd miles home with me and here she has tried to rule the roost!  Every visitor is offered ownership of FB if only they will just take her away.  Whilst this has become a bit of a standing joke around here, there have been some periods during which FB has been close to receiving a fast moving lead deposit.  She is a delight at times, a very entertaining family member, but she mercilessly harasses L.C. (Elsie - cat #2), catches birds whenever she has the chance, walks her muddy little feet all over any surface she can reach and has a nasty habit of spraying her signature in inappropriate places.  (Not much of a recommendation for a new home, admittedly.)

Why, you might well ask, has there been no real 'news' from this week?  I have to admit to having spent more time watching the election debates, than sitting writing for this site.
However, in a flurry of activity today, Friday, I moved hungry cows around all over the place, brought the Autumn calved cows in for their copper supplement shots and the calves for their booster vaccine shots and ear-tags, including Sapphire, Onix's daughter, who is now #444 as per Issa's request.  Once we'd finished putting the cows back on some more grass, we brought the sheep in for the ewes to receive their booster vaccine before lambing and for them all to have another worm drench.  We are short by one ewe, which worries me considerably.  I saw them all a couple of days ago, but she wasn't with them when we brought them in this afternoon.  I went out for a look just on dark and Stephan's been out looking for her and for 'possums to shoot, but to no avail.  Back up and out early tomorrow in the hope of finding her still alive.  I suspect she's lying somewhere, either physically stuck, or down due to some metabolic difficulty in late pregnancy.