January 2001

Happy New Year Everyone!

I have been taking advantage of the cold and staying in a bit, as it has been quite frosty. Sometimes Mum wears a brown/beigy chenille top which is nearly the same colour as me, and I love snuggling up to her....and best of all, when I "tread it down" (also called pedalling, most cats do this before they settle down) she does not mind if there is a thread pulled because it is really old and the style of it "lends" itself to my alterations, shall we say! 

Mum has got a new job - still with the same company, but now instead of working out of different branches, she now works out of different business centres.  There are 4 in total, but she will mostly be working in 3 of them - one is 6 miles away, one is 13 and one is 24 so not too bad, and she seems happier with this than with all the uncertainty.  She will have a few months training in the nearest office though so that is good too.  I am happy with both being "self sufficient" as you know ..."it is important to be true to yourself" (and in my case, that means, be your own cat!) but I like people being here too.

Dad has been in the shed mending a beet harvester (I could tell that this was not a straight forward job, so I did not stay too long, and I did not offer my services either (!)  They are just about "worked up" on the farm - which in normal speech means they are "up to date"  It is always important to "keep as up to date as you can, to allow time for other eventualities"
Someone called Lance was talking to Dad in a field recently (Lance works for one of the neighbouring farmers, and had cut some verges for our farm)  They were just discussing things when I saw them, so I went over to see if Dad needed any help (I've not met Lance before so I did not know who he was)  Later, this was reported to Mum as, "Az came running up, because there was someone in "his" field" - that makes me look like it was me that was afraid, whereas I was running to his aid in case he needed me - humans eh?!  

Dad calls me Az or Az-ley, and irritatingly he has started to call me "Da Waz" which I am not keen on at all.  That said, he is quite a quick learner, and I have been teaching him the art of "belly surfing" as demonstrated in the picture below.  This also has the added benefit of warming my paws up............Dad likes it because it means that he can ask Mum to fetch him things "because he does not want to disturb the cat" - sounds like a win win !

not the most flattering picture of either of us, but you get the idea.................it works better when he is laying completely flat!