The girls, only a year old, caught a mouse yesterday… their first one.

They cornered it live and were bapping it on the body a few times to get its attention while I went for a container to take it outside with.
Very good! We need more mouse catching and catchers. The image above is not the real mouse… that will be coming soon.

ok.. here is an image of the real critter:

Today, Dora

experienced her first guarded excursion outside.

Armed with spritz bottle , one person on the deck, and one off, she explored the deck. The flutter of birds, the cat bird hunting call, and many attempts to jumps on the rail proved fruitless. So inside she went after 10 minutes. Coming in and seeing if Peyton

wanted to go out, in which, she did not, Dora soon piped up saying she wanted too. So out she went. Again armed with spritz bottle, this proved uneffective, as she soon jumped to the rail to take in a more birds eye view of the chickedees at the feeder. She was soon scolded, whisked off the deck and inside she went. Perhaps later in the day when things calm down a bit after the morning canned cat food …….the adventures continue.

Got Peyton out on the deck again…this time more time sniffing, exploring and listening to the birds, and seeing the flying shadows. A little less timid this time, but still unsure…..Peyton’s adventures will continue, as she is a couple of months in age from Dora, so this will be an interesting time.

Sunday morning was yet another exercise in futility, wasted time! and effort for no good reason also known as Spring Ahead! for Daylight Savings Time.

Personally we:
-walked throughout the house changing every clock we came across. still missed some;
-tried to get our radiosync wristwatch to update, ineffectively for 3 days now
-troubleshoot the interaction between a data logging computer running the -allsky camera in UT time with the house file server running local Eastern Time
- reset the weather station receiver time
- got 3 nights of very bad sleep as the cats still get up at 5am est and we don’t. No one has taught cats about daylight savings!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daylight_saving_time

“The practice has been both praised and criticized.[7] Adding daylight to evenings benefits retailing, sports, and other activities that exploit sunlight after working hours,[9] but can cause problems for evening entertainment and other occupations tied to the sun.[10][11] Its effect on health and crime is less clear. Although an early goal of DST was to reduce evening usage of incandescent lighting, formerly a primary use of electricity,[12] modern heating and cooling usage patterns differ greatly, and research about how DST currently affects energy use is limited or contradictory.[13]

DST clock shifts present other challenges. They complicate timekeeping, and can disrupt meetings, travel, billing, recordkeeping, medical devices, heavy equipment,[14] and sleep patterns.[15] Software can often adjust computer clocks automatically, but this can be limited and error-prone, particularly when DST protocols are changed.[16]”

The above is part of the wikipedia article.
We agree to the part that says its time is past. When the primary energy saving was for indoor incandescent lighting, it did work as intended. In this day and age of air conditioners, massive home electronics, and efficient lighting, it does not work as intended.

A good article was found over at the Edmonton Sun newspaper:

“EDMONTON – There are not many weeks of the year in which I wake up and cry, “Oh, how I wish I lived in Saskatchewan.”
This is one of them.
Saskatchewan has a deliciously insouciant attitude toward daylight saving time. It simply ignores it. No springing forward. No falling back. With sturdy-minded prairie independence, Saskatchewan skips the whole stupid ritual.
Would that we here in Alberta might find the courage to follow Saskatchewan’s lead.
I hate daylight saving time.
Especially now, when we turn our clocks forward a full month earlier than we used to.
When the Americans opted to change the day on which they moved their clocks ahead in 2005, Canada meekly followed the U.S. lead. The logic, on its face, was unassailable. We needed to be in sync with our neighbour and largest trading partner. But what might make sense in the Lower 48 is a torment for those of us at higher latitudes.”

We watched an episode of AMC’s The Walking Dead for the first time last night and were reminded of it by this photo of Dora. She’s a dead ringer for some of those walkers!

Payton is doing fine… still waiting for the shelter group to schedule her spaying but otherwise rid of the kennel respiratory cough, fleas and other issues she came home with.

Welcome to Dora and Payton!
They came out of the Napanee SPCA branch on Saturday.

Dora is an 8 month old female tabby? who is full of energy and rarely slows down.	Payton is a polydactyl 6? month old female calico mix. She is still pretty scared and sick but will get better soon!

They are old enough that there shelter given names will probably stick, especially in this day and age of microchipping.