Hey @rumtscho!

hey @Jolenealaska, how are you?

Not awful! Got time to chat a bit? If so, I'll dig out my spare microphone.

If you don't mind me multitasking :)

Not at all. How's the kitty?

growing impossibly quickly

I love her.

They have a way of doing that! What's her name?

Edda.

That's what her shelter nurse called her, and I kept it after all.

She is cuddled in my lap as we speak.

Tell me about her. By now she has shown you a charming idiosyncrasy or two. Oh there's one!

I am still learning the finer points of cohabiting with her :)

She is a big cuddler - which is expected in hand-reared kittens, one scientific publication calls them "hypergregarious"

she loves body contact when I'm not physically active

Mine has just now become accustomed to my talking to my Google Home all the time.

It has taken the better part of a year.

but that also means that, in the night, when I'm under the down duvet, her sitting on top of the duvet is not sufficiently close.

That is a little dance that will be a part of your existence with her for the rest of her life.

her favorite solution is to sit on my neck, and lick my face.

She does leave me alone when I'm asleep or meditating, it's amazing 1) that she can tell the difference and 2) that she has the decency to not bother me then

only, it's very difficult to fall asleep when there is a weight on my larynx and a wet raspy tongue flanked by tickly vibrissae goes over my face!

Mine has learned not to snuggle when I'm trying to fall asleep. She'll wait till I'm asleep, and then fuse to me.

I wake up to her basically velcroed to me.

If I try to move under the duvet to dislodge her, she goes into full play mode, hunting my moving hands through it

for now, the winning strategy for me seems to pull down the duvet (on whose edge she is sitting), pull it out from under her, leaving her on my chest, then cover both of us, so she completely disappears under the duvet

Enjoy the most comical of the play behavior now, because you'll miss it when she gets older.

she is then usually happy to curl up in my lap or under my knees. Which is convenient, not every animal (or human) likes to sleep without fresh air.

indeed, the play won't last forever.

Every once in a while I can get bacon to chase a laser pointer or toy on a string, but it's half-hearted.

And short-lived.

oh, really? I thought that the laser pointer stays a favorite with adults too

well, after three weeks with a child cat, I can see the advantages of a comfy level-headed cat too :)

She's still intrigued by it, although she's totally wise to where it comes from. She just doesn't feel any particular necessity to chase it.

She'll bat at it

But it's not worth getting strenuous.

Just the right amount of catnip and a just right mood can bring out the kitten in her for a few minutes.

heh, as long as she's comfortable without play - she would do it if she wanted to

And I'm afraid her extreme reaction to loud noises, little shakes, and stuff like that is going to be forever. She is never going to get over her terror at that earthquake.

It really does seem like something broke.

oh, poor thing

If I didn't know better, I'd think that she saw her own mortality in that moment.

No, I don't think she can conceptualize that. But she sure shares a lot of emotional circuits with humans, including ones for terror and trauma.

And she has decided that she would really rather not die.

Well, that's why I did preface it with "if I didn't know better"

This is a fun conversation starter:

One of my favorite YouTube comments was along the lines of "if she growls at Scar, I'm going to freak the fuck out"

yes, animals do have a lot more wisdom than we give them credit.

@rumtscho On that note

Did you see the way Bacon nurses her blanky?

yes, I saw the video

it reminded me what gorgeous color she is

I can't tell you how many times I attempted to get that on video. It's the kind of thing she stops the moment she realizes that she's being watched.

oh yes, cats know it when you watch them!

And like people, cats can react to being watched by getting shy, or by hamming up whatever they're doing that's adorable.

Do you watch or listen to Voice of America?

No, I think this is a radio station?

I have some memories of it having a special Europe part that was available in Bulgaria in the first years after the wall fell, before we had interesting stations on our own

I just saw on Wiki:

> It is the largest U.S. international broadcaster. VOA produces digital, TV, and radio content in more than 40 languages which it distributes to affiliate stations around the globe. It is primarily viewed by foreign audiences, so VOA programming has an influence on public opinion abroad regarding the United States and its people.

So I went to the YouTube channel

The comments there are fascinating.

youtube.com/channel/UCVSNOxehfALut52NbkfRBaA

I pick a video of interest to me, and I get an international perspective on whatever the topic of the video is.

I'm afraid that like most Americans, I have a tendency to kind of feel like the US is the world.

Stack Exchange helps a lot with that, but more is better in that regard, I think.

interesting view!

I have the opposite feeling, that through Stack Exchange, I'm more Americanized than most other people here

Well that would be expected too!

Exposing oneself to an international community can't help but make a person more aware that there are perspectives other than those of the community in which they live.

In your case, you frequently get a healthy dollop of American perspective, simply by virtue of the fact that you interact with Americans. Like me.

I'm sure you've told me, but how old were you when you left Bulgaria?

I was 18, finished highschool and came to university in Germany

I just looked up some dates in order to put a few things into perspective. I joined the army 6 months after Ronald Reagan's "Tear down this wall" speech.

@Jolenealaska Somewhere around your joining date, I was celebrating my fourth birthday :)

Do you refer to the era of history between World War II and the falling of the Berlin Wall as the"Cold War"?

yes, we do.

@rumtscho So you are also a winter child?