Cats of DOOM

[Greg]

First off, you'd never find Skittles in that palace.

Second, didn't the release date put it out in 2017?

[Drunk Monk]

right?  can't even find him in the freakin bungalow and several bungalows could probably fit in one chamber of that palace.

the film came out in prc in december of 2017, but is just being released here in the u.s. for chinese new year (next week).  it did well in the asian film awards circuit and tiff, which runs a lot of asian film. 

here's something for you, greg - that set is allegedly so massive that there's talk of salvaging pieces of it for a theme park.

[Greg]

Been there. Done that.

Slightly. We had to salvage pieces of The Haunted Mansion set for a walk through installation for the Premiere of the movie at the El Capitan theater.

[Drunk Monk]

I saw THM mainly because you worked on it and there’s no comparison.

I really think Skittles escaped. He’s nowhere to be found. The litter box evidence is inconclusive. If he did get out, he got out of Tara’s room and then out of the bungalow. We can’t even imagine how. Maybe there holes in the walls we don’t know a out. His old home is only a few miles away. Maybe he’ll find his way back. 

I feel terrible about it all - my mom’s injury and now this.it seemed like such a good idea at the time but it has brought so much woe. I just hope he is okay, wherever he is.

[Drunk Monk]

Food and litter box untouched this morning.

He’s gone.

[Greg]

Don't give up. McRae lived under the house for three days before we found him again.

[Drunk Monk]

That could be the case.  We often hear weird sounds within our walls.  Shiva used to stare at the walls in that cat predatory fashion. 

Stacy left all the doors open and multiple food dishes out.  

We shall see.

[Drunk Monk]

Still no sign.

Skittle surely escaped.

I feel horrible about this whole thing.  It's been a complete catastrophe, and I've been avoiding that term because of the pun, but nothing describes it better.

[Drunk Monk]

We've heard the ghost of Skittle 3 times.  Loud meowing in the middle of the night.  Once so loud I thought he was in the room.  Another time, Stacy looked out of the window and could see the neighbor's cat was tucked in the neighbor's bungalow, so it had to be another cat.  It's been over a week since we've heard any ghostly meowing, so hopefully he's exorcised.  So tragic.  So very very tragic.

[Drunk Monk]

Dammit. Heard it again. Saw a cat outside in the backyard. Might’ve been Skittle but it was dark. 

This cat...

[Drunk Monk]

I'm looking out of my mom's living room window at the sunset.  Skittle had taken to perching on the sill at night.  I would pet him there. It's where we bonded most.  Now I can see the marks he left on the window, nose and paw prints, forming two horizontal lines of smudges.  

This cat still haunts me.  He will haunt me forever.

[Drunk Monk]

HOLY CATS!

Skittle has been spotted in our backyard by our neighbors.  He's been living under a rose bush and feeding off the food that our neighbor leaves out to feed the cats, squirrels, birds, skunks, possums and whatever else lives back there.  It's been so stormy in the Cruz these last three months but Skittle looks in good shape. What a survivor. He came to my neighbor's daughter and allowed some petting.  

I'm interpreting this as a good omen.

[Greg]

Grab him! I hope you can reintroduce him to the house.

[Drunk Monk]

We've seen so many pix of the Lynch Lair pride o kittehs (best thing on sitonmyfacebook) that I figure I should update our bungalow cat scene.

Skittle is alive and well, looking big, strong and clean.  He lives in our lot somewhere.  Our neighbor Mary in the back of our lot (three houses here - our century+ old bungalow and two rather odd granny flats) feeds all the beasts in the yard - intentionally birds and cats but ostensibly squirrels, gophers, rats, skunks, possums and coons.  She's been away for the last 2 months but she hires our old neighbors, who were evicted by our drunk surfer neighbor across the street and now live on the other side of town, to come over every day and feed them.  Their eldest daughter, Sophia, has a good rapport with Skittle.  He comes to her and lets her pick him up.  He spots me from across the yard and high tails it out of there. In his mind I took him from his comfy home (from his owners that kicked him out) took him to this strange scary place (my mom's) then to this other weird place (our bungalow) from which he escaped and now lives free as a feral in our backlot.  I'm glad he looks healthy.

Then there's Billy.  Billy is old, frail, arthritic, half blind and deaf.  He was our neighbor's cat two houses down, but they gave up on him (in their defense, that neighbor's son was born without any body muscle.  His mom is his caretaker - he is wheelchair bound and cannot do anything really - needs help to eat and eliminate.  He's smart though - all he has is his mind.  I'm not sure of his age - 40ish - I know he met Shatner and Nimoy when they filmed ST4 in Monterey because he had a lot of pix of that.  I only met him once a few years ago when they needed some help moving him).  Billy used to have a tag with their phone number but they've removed that.  Now he just lives off Mary's feeding.  But he doesn't.  Skittle and Squirtl (Matt's cat from the other granny flat) are bigger and get all the food.  So Billy comes by our place.  And we started to feed him.  So now he's adopted us.  We just started letting him in now that it's getting cold. He's told us when he needs to go out and eliminate.  Stacy bought him a chicken which she cooked and stripped, and we've been feeding him.  I've been tapping Mary's tuna cache (she's given us a key to help but we don't get paid like our old neighbors).  

Billy is not long for this world.  He stumbles a lot and looks the wrong way when he hears noises.  He doesn't groom himself well so he's scruffy and kind of smelly.  He's been eating a ton.  He's very bony.  I'm a tad worried about fleas. 

It's cat hospice and we just hope to give him some comfort for the transition.

[Greg]

Current Lynch Lair Cat Pride count: 12

It's really easy to take photographs of cats. Fish. Barrel.