It has been extremely cold for the last few weeks and our cats are seriously worshipping the God of Warmth (i.e., the pellet stove). For those who don’t know, a pellet stove looks sort of like a wood stove, but it burns pellets made out of pressed sawdust instead of logs. Unlike a wood stove, it can be controlled by a thermostat; the stove calls for heat and draws pellets in from a big hopper.
In any case, the cats now are in the habit of loitering around and staring at the pellet stove, whether or not is actually on. Alia, the elder feline, loves to stare into the flame. I think that, like pretty much everyone else in the house, she’s tired of the cold snap we’ve been having. It’s a bummer to be a heat-worshipping cat in deepest Idaho.
In administrative news, this is the last issue of Pet Tails that we’ll be publishing on a regular Friday schedule. We’ve decided to switch to an automated notification system, which will send you an email when we update the Pet Tails site with new articles.
Although I haven’t got the template completely set up yet, the new Pet Tails emails you receive will be shorter so they will be less subject to getting caught in email filters. The email will just contain a link to the article with a description. It also generally won’t have a musing like this one. Also, you may receive the newsletter on Friday or you may receive it on another day.
Because my pet articles appear in local newspapers first, I do still write them. And when I update the site with them, you will know.