Hannah and Lucy Plus Zoolatry

Our special guests today are the lovely Hannah & Lucy from the United Kingdom. We asked Jan to make this special graphic before we sat down to interview them for Mousebreath.  So stop by to read Dainty and Darling Hannah & Lucy.  and meet the ladycats if you haven't already, or get to know them a little better.

We were a little late posting the interview today.  It's been a crazy week.  We haven't even had a chance to read all our email from Thursday yet.

For example, yesterday Jan didn't turn on the computer until late afternoon.  Yes, we could have pushed the buttons to turn it on ourselves, but now that we're older, we're not fond of being in the doghouse.  Well, Rusty is, but he thinks he's a dog, so we overlook this peculiarity.

Why were we computerless for umpity (or is that umpteem) hours?  Well, to start with, Jan learned a few days ago she had to be in court early as a witness.  So she got up an hour earlier, walked and fed the dogs, but didn't have the time to feed us kitties.  If we didn't have a bowl of crunchies handy, we would have all STARVED TO DEATH while she was gone.

She did get home in time to feed us a late breakfast because after sitting on a narrow, hard bench in the hallway for 62 minutes (yes, she timed it), she finally got to go in and sit down on a chair.  Less than five minutes later, everyone was excused because the defendant requested counsel.  So she'll have to repeat this too-early morning wake-up on another date when there will be attorneys present in court.  She better get up TWO hours earlier then so we cats don't DIE OF STARVATION while she's off having fun.

But even though she got home in time yesterday, did she feed us kitties a late breakfast?  No, she cleaned and "organized" the desks, then went off to lunch with friends and STUFFED HER FACE while WE STARVED! 

And when she came home, she spent the rest of the day working on graphics for Zoolatry's auction.  As you know, Poppy Vic has been very sick and went back in the hospital again Wednesday.  Ann has had to do a lot of distance traveling to and from hospitals and is deluged with extra expenses and medical bills.  So the CB is putting together an auction to try to help.  If you have anything you'd like to donate, contact ML or Marg.  Their contact info is in the Furriends of the CB auction sidebar right under this graphic -

The auction might start tomorrow. .  It will be announced on the CB.  If you'd like to help Ann and Vic now, you can use Zoolatry's Starving Artist Fund button in their sidebar.  

Jan is praying for Poppy Vic and Ann.  We're sending lots of purrs and pawhugs!

Funny Farmers Planning to Backup

Romeo's Staff requested some volunteers for a campaign she's working on and Jan stepped right up.  Remember the Bill Gaither fur-lebrity creation we fired Jan over?  She should have learned a lesson from that about volunteering.  And before you start throwing rotten tomatoes at us, please understand Jan would be the first to admit she's a techno-idiot.  What would she do without us to come to her rescue?

She couldn't access the site.  Yes, you read that right, she could not access the necessary site to do her research. When she'd click on the link, her antivirus would refuse to let her visit.  While she was still scratching her head, we googled the link and found it was a simple problem:  the http url automatically redirects to https, which means it is secure. The same thing happens with a PayPal link in email, but PayPal is well-known to our antivirus and SurDoc is a fairly new company. But our av thought this strange link was redirecting us to a different site. (This is protection we're really glad to have!)


This is our blog and we want to use the computer, so we pushed Jan out of the typing chair .. um, we suggested she have a late lunch, and took over the project so we can get this posted before Christmas. Here it is, furries!

SurDoc, an online document storage / backup company, has a marketing director who learned a lesson from a cat. We cats like to sit, sleep, walk, and on occasion hack up a hairball on a computer keyboard, which can result in a deleted file or more.  So the company would like to remind all of you to backup, backup, backup.  No, don't back up on the keyboard.  Backup your computer files.  And catproof your computer.

** If your cat doesn't type (unlike us), you might want to keep them away from the computer.  Give them a safe zone - a basket or a cat tower nearby.

** Turn off the computer when finished with it. This is to void the invitation a warm computer waves at a kitty.  This will not deter a Percy, though.  Our Percy likes to dump the DSL modem and camera and sleep on the tower even when its cold. 

** Use a keyboard drawer (preferably one that doesn't pop open like ours does cause the floor isn't level), stand the keyboard on end, or cover it with a long basket when you leave the room.  Otherwise, pick up the kitty and take it with you.

**Close CD / DVD drive and printer tray.

**Jan keeps a clean, soft paintbrush and a can of compressed air handy to dust the fans and components every few days before turning it on.. (We help by shedding profusely so these items do not go unused.)

** Don't party on the keyboard or invite your furry friends over to do this. All crumbly edibles and niptinis should be consumed on the human's pillow.

** Auto-save often!

Is your human like Jan? She has external storage but she'll get busy and forget to backup regularly.  External storage media can fail so a lot of folks turn to online storage sites.  We signed up (us, not Jan, she couldn't even find the site, remember!) and we're taking advantage of a special offer during this educate the humans to move the cats off the computer (as if!) campaign.

Jan has been hogging the computer again, but we hope to soon be able to do automatic backups of our photos and Jan's designs. We have over 15 gb of photos on the computer so we figure it's going to take a year to upload them to our new storage.  Yes, we're exaggerating but we've got a senile computer with slow internet so it will take a good while..At this time, Mac users need to upload their files manually.  Romeo's Staff says she did it and it was "easy peasy." 

We have been corresponding with a nice lady from SurDoc who has confirmed --

•    When uploaded SurDoc converts files into visual files so they maintain their formatting. Your files are always uploaded unchanged. If you want to view and edit them online you will see them in our special "VisiDoc" format, however, for backup purposes, when you download them back to your computer they are exactly the same. 

•    With the premium account you get with the code "catproof" there is no limit on file size so you can upload your biggest files.

•    Once you have the SurDoc program installed on your computer, you can adjust the upload settings to tell it how much bandwidth you want it using. (This is called 'throttling.') You can lower the upload speed so it takes up less bandwidth and won't affect your computer. Yes you can upload files on your own.  You could also use the web upload feature instead, so you are uploading when you're not busy with other things.

SurDoc has 3 options: 50 gb or 100 gb storage at affordable prices, and 10 gb at our affordable price - free.  For a limited time our readers can use the code CATPROOF when you sign up and get 30 gb of free storage.  

Check it out at https://www.surdoc.com/.

Remember to use the code CATPROOF when you sign up to get 30 gb of free storage with SurDoc.

UPDATE: You would only have to pay if you wanted to purchase 50 or 100 gb, but the 30 gb is FREE with the promotion code. We were not asked for anything but our human's (Jan) name & our email address. We were not asked any financial information for the free account.

Chey with Gemini and Ichiro

It's time for another Friday with the Funny Farmer Felines. Our guests today are the inscrutable Chey and her housemates (she doesn't call them siblings), lovely Gemini and mischievous Ichiro.

We tried but could not crack the Chey mystique. We did, however, have a good time trying and we think you'll enjoy reading about the ex-Preseidential candidate and her roommates.  We hope you'll pop over to Mousebreath Magazine to read Meezer Star Chey, with Gemini & Ichiro.  And we're sure Chey would love to hear from new and old readers so you can click the link on Mousebreath to visit their .... um, Chey's MySiamese.com blog. 

We are so glad to read happier news on Poppy Vic today! He gave everyone quite a scare.

{{{Hugs}}} and prayers, purrs and pawhugs, Ann & Poppy Vic.

We are having a bit of a giggle picturing Maggy and Zoey being schooled on how to act when Poppy Vic comes home later today.  We'd love to be a fly on the wall in that schoolroom.  Um, on second thought .... maybe we could just hide a bug (listening device) in the room.

Jan is Delusional

Hey, we're all here today - woofies ...

and kitties.(Cotton was still with us when this was done.)

Today is Cokie's Thankful Thursday Blog Hop.  What are we thankful for today?  Each other!  What would we do without each other.  Oh, and Jan.  Guess we should include absent-minded, stingy with the treats ... delusional ... Jan.

Yes, we said delusional.  See, this is what Jan thinks she looks like.

Jan claims when she made her avatar there were no options for gray hair and wrinkles, but we are having a hard time believing her story cause she was using a mirror  to create the avatar.   We'll have to make some reality improvements when she isn't around.

Meanwhile, we are losing so many fbfs (furry blogging friends) and also human friends that we decided to take this day to be thankful for having each other.  Especially after Buddy gave us a scare this morning.  He doesn't do well in this humidity and heat.  

Can we do a group hug?  Come on, all you readers are invited too.  Cause we love you.