Welcome to Carnival of the Cats, this week’s edition dedicated to the Furry Fighter, Storm, who braved lymphoma to the end. She didn’t let disease stop her from living and being a lovable kitty. See her brother loving her. She touched the hearts and was loved by all that knew her. She showed us what true bravery is. It must be harder on the kitties as they don’t understand all the medical stuff, they just know they hurt. To her family, we send our purrs, purrayers and {{{{{{hugs}}}}}}.

On with the show assisted by them.

Cat in Hat Can’t Quit cause he’s the Station Master, cushy job I tell you.

Next up, Kiki and Precious. Guess which one poses nicely for the camera.

Oooo, look. Now that’s precious. Sleepy Bebe. They’re always sweeter when asleep, don’t get into trouble that way.

THE LEAN AND HUNGRY LOOK, Hakuna the predator, the opposite of cute, sleeping kittens.

Purrsday Night - Separated at birth, two kitties one out in the street, one rescued. Breaks my heart to see what they’ve suffered thru.

Rahel always catches the kitties in better circumstances. Let’s do lunch and they do look well fed.

“Mmmmm, yummy. Yeah it’s water, so?”

Blissed Out, that is one happy cat. Rahel treats the kitties rather well.

Please send a Purr for Ping as he hurt his foot.

Easy like Sunday and Parker shares another classic pose. Desktop wallpaper for sure.

Feed the cat first and maybe he’ll get his laptop back. Barry’s brave, I won’t let my cats get near the MacBook nevermind take it over.

Friday Cat Blogging: Where are you, Miles? All curled up in blankies, how cute.

Finally Feline Friday: What you don’t see is what the cats don’t want you to see.

“Didn’t see it, nope.”

Friday Catblog: Maus prepares for Flag Day and the photo spread, that’s one cute kitty you have there.

Unhappy and showing it, Mycah. Really, really unhappy. Poor kitty needs some Temptations perhaps or nipravioli. That might cheer him up.

LOL Cat Bible: Lectionary Readings for the Fifth Sunday after Pentecost This week you can learn the words to the Gloria Catri!

Clover is growing old and showing it. I’ve got two elderly cats too, they have given up on grooming but are first at the food dish. They can still move very well.

Meezer and Midnight Monday Sabrina came to visit And they cuddled on the gizzy, how sweet.

Finally Friday and Meowza posted something. What’s he so happy about? Hint, it involves food.

“And me. It involves meeeeeeeeee!”

Nother hint, I caved, gave in to the little beasties.

T13 - Faith Boo - Favorite Things #11 is a blogger’s nightmare come true. #13 she must destroy, sounds like my kitties, destructive down to the core of their beings.

It’s Caturday! and these kitties are just too cute.

Wishful Sunday with a mancat and his lunch. So thoughtful to photograph lunch.

Simulcats, what one human has to do to photograph two cats together despite the passive-aggressive tendencies of one of them.

Weekend Cat Blogging: Father’s Day celebrating the joys of fatherhood from a cat’s perspective.

Another sweet kitty, Kali, was helped to the bridge yesterday amid much purring to wish her well as she crossed by the gang at Gree’s shower and much screaming by herself. She didn’t go quietly, expressing her purrsonality all the way. Purrayers and hugs to her family too.

And say hi to Pet who just got out of the hospital. She’s still one sick lady. Keep her in your purrayers.

Photo Hunt # 114-Emotion(s) captures the emotions of both kitties and beans. I especially like the last one. The bean is pretty cute too.

That wraps it up for this week except for late comers. Next week’s Carnival of the Cats is at the Skittles the Huntress. Submit here or email your cats to carnivalofthecats(at)gmail.com.

Other kitty carnivals this weekend:

Bad Kitty Cats Festival of Chaos at M-Cats Club
Friday Ark at the Modulator always
Weekend Cat Blogging at Kashim & Othello

Technorati tags: carnival of the cats, CoTC, cat

Cause I’m working on Carnival of the Cats for tomorrow.

Submit here or email your cats to carnivalofthecats(at)gmail.com.

And spoiling them.

Then there was Kashim and Gree’s shower which I stopped in for a few where they mixed a new drink called a Blue Tuna Gizzy which the kitties imbibed along with niptinis then they went for a ride on Vespas which they pawsed to pay their respects as Kali crossed the bridge. Lots of purrs and hugs. Then back on the scooters but I was bout wore out for the day and had CotC to do so I left.

Now I’m tired so going to rest, nap with them probably.

Other fine catting this weekend: Bad Kitty Cats Festival of Chaos at M-Cats Club, Friday Ark at the Modulator always, and Weekend Cat Blogging at Kashim & Othello

Was laying with the kitties giving them the requisite skritches and petting. They did the licking each other’s heads as they jostled for the best position on my lap. First Meowza got the coveted spot then, after Meowza moved further down my legs, Bazel moved in. Meowza moved on to the cushion. After the better part of an hour, Bazel got down and I got up. Let the two of them out. This is Meowza out from a previous day cause by the time they went out, it was too dark to take pics today.

The cat carnivals and festivals:

Bad Kitty Cats Festival of Chaos at The Cheezits
Optional Theme - Bachelor and Bachelorette Kitties
Carnival of the Cats at Pet’s Garden Blog Carnival of the Cats
Friday Ark at the Modulator always
Weekend Cat Blogging at What Did You Eat

I had let Meowza out then ran to get the camera. Too late. He had already rolled in the dirt. I told him I had hoped to catch a tummy shot and he obliged by going for another roll. This was the result.

He is rather dirty, isn’t he. Here’s a closeup of his dirtiness.

And the backside. Or flipside.

He came in afterwards. I’ll be washing the sofa slipcovers very soon.

BKCFoC CotC Cat ARK FF MM TT TT WCB WW

Yesterday, I noticed uploading pics was extremely slow. And this before I ran backup. Maybe it’s WordPress or the site.

Wrong.

I tried the MacBook and everything worked fine, fast even. So I thought probably this computer. I need 2 GB of RAM instead of 1GB that I have. The old iMac is showing it’s age… especially when I insist on having a dozen programs, couple browsers, countless tabs and windows open in each.

Wait, that’s it. Too many windows and tabs open in Camino. Browser slowed to a crawl here. Did a force quit then closed those extra windows. Picked up a little speed.

Yeah, yeah, I could just use the MacBook. But I did get the Bad Kitty Cats Festival of Chaos done on time.

Don’t feel much like doing anything except lay around. Maybe a nap on the sofa with kitties is in order. Don’t want to go out, it’s 94° outside. Wait for the carnivals to post while Backup runs, yes a nap with them is perfect. Backup slows everything down to a crawl anyway. Here’s where I usually haul out the MacBook but it gets warm fast. So too does a lap full of kitties. Can’t pet the MacBook thou. It’s the kitties. At least til they get too hot for comfort.

I don’t think so, one backup per day is more than enough. Sides, I’d be up all night inserting DVD’s if I ran that one. Slows my machine down to a crawl too when running it. 1MB RAM is just not enough, iMac that is. MacBook has 2GB and is way faster.

It runs every Sunday at 4PM which is why when I host a cat event, I have to have it done before then. Or use the MacBook.

The economy may suck but not if you’re Apple now bigger than even Wal★Mart. In music that is. And…

Shares in Apple rose 2.8 percent to close at $151.61 amid a 1.9 percent gain in the broader Nasdaq market. The stock is about 25 percent below its all-time high hit in December, but has risen 25 percent in the last month amid signs consumer worries over the economy have not dampened Apple’s sales.

People still buy Apple stuff. Well, not the poor folks out of work, those that can afford Apple stuff.

That leaves me out. Course, I already have plenty of Apple stuff. No compelling reason to buy more.

Find something new every day. The winner in six categories in a survey that has absolutely nothing to do with politics.

Take that to the convention.

Hattip Yahoo. Yeah, I’m lazy. Easier to check My Yahoo than open up a newsreader.

In less spectacular news, the Dow is down again after it had bounced back from it’s low point week or so ago. Now at 12,265.13 down some 370.03 points which is a 2.93% drop, biggest all year although not the lowest level it has seen.

Stocks tanked Tuesday, after a report showing a big slowdown in the services sector of the economy and cautionary comments from a Fed official amplified fears that a recession is underway or imminent.

…The speed of the retreat added to investor jitters, said Peter Dunay, investment strategist at Leeb Capital Management. “If we lost that much over three weeks, investors would have seen it as a period of consolidation, but to drop 370 points in a day is really rattling.”

OK, maybe that is a spectacular drop. Not good, economy is in a recession IMHO, mine anyway. OK, reading more here. I’m not the only one who feels that way. I feel better already. Putting it in perspective as to how far it has fallen.

Even if the stock market is near its low point, though, it has a lot of ground to recover. The Dow is down more than 13 percent since its Oct. 9 record settlement of 14,164.53. Meanwhile, the S&P 500 — the measure most watched by market professionals — is down 8.9 percent for the year, the worst year-to-date performance for the index ever. The S&P 500 has fallen 14.6 percent from its Oct. 9 high.

Alas, the high was nice while it lasted. Looking on the bright side of things, Apple upped the memory in the iPhone and iPod touch or at least is selling a model with more memory but for more bucks. Appealing but I can’t afford one so I’ll just have to make do. Wonder how many others will have to pass on Apple’s latest tech toys cause the economy sucks.

Yesterday did the 10.4.11 combo update, the security update, the quicktime update and the iTunes update to get rid of the software updates notice I keep getting on the iMac. Hesitant to do the 10.5.1 update as I lost my history and Saft settings when I did that on the MacBook and I have files to read, lots. All updates went flawlessly. As expected.

Incidentally, Leopard runs beautifully on the MacBook. I especially like Coverflow and the ability to actually see what the file is not just see the file type. Helps in sorting stuff and I do have a lot of stuff.

Checked this morning and the market is still down. Dow sat at 11766.50, down some -204.69 points. And why is it so down?

Apple’s shares fell more than 11 percent before the opening bell after it forecast a quarterly profit below analysts’ expectations and posted disappointing holiday-season iPod shipments late on Tuesday.

Analysts said the Apple guidance and lingering worries about the credit crisis were adding to investor unease, a day after the Federal Reserve slashed rates by 75 basis points in an emergency move to forestall a recession.

…Apple shares fell to $137.89 before the bell, with other major technology companies, including Google Inc (GOOG.O) and Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O), falling in Apple’s wake.

It amazes me how one company can have such influence. Outside the tech sphere. Incidentally, Apple sold a lot of iPods, just they were expected to sell more. And profits from said iPods were up substantially, 17 percent. Bet the Zune didn’t do that well.

In today’s economy it makes sense that Apple would be conservative in it’s projections despite just having it’s best ever quarter. That’s a hard act to follow just as the iPhone was although the iPod touch has become almost as good in it’s software offerings. Better even as it’s use isn’t tied to AT&T. That’s got to be good.

Why does this interest me? I like my Apple stuff and I also like the thought of having a retirement income in a few years. So I pay attention to the market.

Even more good news, Microsoft is now going to allow home versions of Vista to be run inside virtual machines like Parallels. We no longer have to shell out for Vista Ultimate as I did way back when I got that MacBook.

Good for us Mac users that really want to run Windows without rebooting. There is always Boot Camp if one prefers one’s Windows that way.

The economic news isn’t all bad. Apple reported it had the best quarter ever these last three months.

“We’re thrilled to report our best quarter ever, with the highest revenue and earnings in Apple’s history,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO.

Lots of computers (2,319,000), iPods (22,121,000) and iPhones (2,315,000) sold. Even thou sales elsewhere disappointed, Apple products were in demand. Bet that made Steve’s holidays happy.

And Jill’s bf still doesn’t have an iPod. He wants one bad too. There’s still a market for those things. An iPod touch is looking more appealing too with the added apps. *sigh*

The story heading over at CNNMoney read:

Recession fears batter stocks

Dow, Nasdaq and S&P 500 fall to more than 9-month lows on Citigroup’s almost $10 billion loss and a weak Dec. retail sales report. Intel earnings and forecast disappoint after the bell.

For the market, it was not a good day, the Dow plunging 277.04 points - 2.17 % - to 12,501.11. Even Apple fell 5.45% to 169.04, MacWorld underwhelming expectations and rumors. No “One more thing…”

However, it was a good day for Mitt Romney as quoted by Yahoo.

Mitt Romney scored his first major primary victory Tuesday in his native Michigan, a win he desperately needed to give his weakened candidacy new life and set the stage for a wide-open Republican showdown in South Carolina in just four days.

Thus overall not such a bad day after all.

Thin, light, less power than my present MacBook and way more expensive, the MacBook Air was introduced at MacWorld. I missed the keynote, sleeping as I were. I wasn’t feeling well so I slept. I so don’t want one.

More useful may be Office:mac 2008 from Microsoft. Still not interested. Why would I need it seeing as I don’t work anymore?

Guessing I’ll catch the keynote in reruns to see what else Apple is up to.

OK, I couldn’t resist. I was on My Yahoo! and noticed. Looks like it was a good day for everyone (on my list), especially Microsoft, everyone except Yahoo.

So the iPhone can send an ID back to Apple reports CNNMoney.

The brouhaha started Friday, with a posting on the Hackintosh online forum of a line of software found in iPhone features for gathering financial and weather information.

According to those who have seen the code, it is used to report back a unique identifying number assigned to every iPhone.

With that information in hand, any number of scenarios are possible, from Apple knowing what software program the phone is using, to hunting down and shutting off rogue iPhones that have been unlocked, and thus can work on any phone network.

How’s this scenario - Apple needs to tie one particular iPhone with AT&T’s assigned phone number since activation is via iTunes.

Moreover, how is that any different from T-mobile knowing every call, text and picture message I make on my cell? And probably monitors, can monitor, the more advanced features Jill uses on her Blackberry. I get a very lengthly bill as Jill uses it way more than I do. AT&T has that data on their users too. I don’t know if having a number is sufficient to know what software is installed or if it is unlocked. It’s probably much ado about nothing.

Upon further reflection, WWMSD (what would Microsoft do)?

First software update runs in Windows. Windows! Installs iTunes. What do I need with iTunes in Windows on a Mac? I’m only running Windows for Incredimail anyway. And PSP if I ever get around to installing it. Program is somewhere.

Anyway, after downloading the update, I get this. “iTunes + QuickTime” has an invalid signature. It will not be installed. Waste of perfectly good bandwidth.

Good going Steve!

The stock market although the Dow didn’t drop near as much as yesterday, only 0.25%. Nasdaq faired worse today falling 1.92%. Found this interesting, the plunging stock market even hit Apple. Share price $175.47 -10.83 which is -5.82%. Fairly big drop considering Apple is making record profits.

Even bigger drop than Google. Share price $693.84 -39.10 only -5.33%. I was amazed at the share price. Who can afford to buy stock in Google anyway? Not me.

Yesterday, it was trigeminal neuralgia sucks.

Today, it is shimmery vision and feeling woozy as a result sucks. Hard to blog.

MS sucks period. And I don’t mean Microsoft although that too sucks.

Thou maybe not as much.

Hardly ever use IE but, as I had closed Parallels, I hadn’t checked it in a while. Last night I opened Parallels and noted my site looked broken, bullets before the list items. Seeing that people actually use that browser, I had to fix it and spent the next hour or so fiddling with my CSS. Failing to see improvement and this morning noting the Meowza and Izzy’s sites weren’t broken and they used the same CSS, figured I messed up the widgets. Spent the last hour fixing widgets and site is no longer broken.

I feel so bad that it was messed up for so long and I didn’t even notice. Note to people using IE, switch to Firefox or Safari. They’re better and, more important, overlook my mistakes.

I bit. New Apple Store. New mall, opening day celebrations. Should I or shouldn’t I? Oh, why not. I didn’t have anything else planned for the evening. I had all night. So I went.

Had to wait in line some twenty minutes give or take a few (in line 6:47), got in the store (at 7:05) only to be given two free t-shirts, both black, one with the Leopard X on it and the other with an apple and SanTan Village written on it. The latter is big enough to be a sleep shirt, no way am I an XL.

Place was packed, looked for Leopard. Waited around for a helpful employee and told him what I wanted. He got it, rung up the sale and I was out of there. Total time in store ten minutes (out by 7:15).

The surprise was the packaging. Apple went for a minimalist approach. No big box like with Tiger. No larger than the DVD it comes on. Guess I’ll be busy installing it.

And Zygote is still waiting for his. Poor guy.

Today’s the big day and I haven’t even ordered it. It’s got a slew of features I want so guessing I’ll hit the Apple Store sometime. Don’t particularly want to wait in line thou. Maybe tomorrow.

Almost forgot until Zygote reminded me. Looks like preordering will get his tomorrow, not today. I remember doing that for Tiger too, can’t remember if I got it in time either. Doesn’t matter.

Ooo, there’s a new Apple Store here in Gilbert, exciting. Maybe I won’t have to drive all the way to Chandler. Still a drive thou.

Jim Dalrymple - Macworld reports on this very interesting bit of news.

The Center for Environmental Health on Monday said that it has given Apple 60-days legal notice — a step required by California law before a lawsuit is launched. The action is based on the report by environmental group Greenpeace, released earlier today, that found hazardous materials in Apple’s iPhone.

The Greenpeace tests revealed chemicals that included “phthalates” in the vinyl plastic earphone wiring at levels that are prohibited in young children’s toys in San Francisco and the European Union (EU).

Under California’s Proposition 65 law, products that can expose consumers to phthaltes or other chemicals that are reproductive toxins or carcinogens must carry a warning label, according to the Center for Environmental Health.

Interesting cause Al Gore sits on Apple’s board of directors. You know the Al Gore who won a Nobel Peace Prize.

Incidentally, phthaltes are also found in jelly rubber sex toys. Best to avoid them both.

Yesterday, I tried using Backup for the first time. It took a whole eight hours to complete, uses a fair amount of processor power and memory too. Hard drive isn’t even full. I’d hate to see how long it would take if the hard drive ever gets full.

It’s set up to do it weekly. I don’t think so. Will change settings.

I want to actually use the computer.

Course there is the MacBook. I could use that while doing backups.

Wonder how many DVD’s I’ll need for the monthly backup. Might have to scrub that. Fun. Fun. Fun.

The hard at work hackers have unlocked iPhones that have had the 1.1.1 update brick their previously hacked phones.

Isn’t that nice?

I so am not in a hurry to get one of those, not that I can afford one anyway. I can’t. Don’t need one either.

Good news for my very small 401k/403b, the Dow is up. Quoting from Yahoo:

The Dow Jones industrial average (.DJI) finished up 191.92 points, or 1.38 percent, at 14,087.55. During the session, it surged to an all-time high of 14,115.51. Monday’s close marks the index’s 33rd record finish in 2007 and its 55th since it began a record-setting streak about a year ago.

I like good news, yes I do. And for those following the tech stocks, there is good news there too.

On the technology front, Apple, the maker of the iPod and the iPhone, finished up 1.9 percent to $156.33. Chip maker Intel gained 2.0 percent to $26.37.

I’m sure that will warm the hearts of all the iBrick owners out there. Well, this will. There is hope. And updates, Apple always frequently updates apps that pose a risk of less than total control. Hackers beware, Apple doesn’t play nice.

Would be nice if Apple allowed third-party apps. Maybe someday.

Finally they made the iPod like the iPhone, the iPod touch is what they’re calling it. Now if it only came with a bigger hard drive, only 8 and 16GB models. I surpassed my 20GB iPod some time ago and that was without pics.

Still it has Wi-Fi and one can surf the web with it. And it is very pretty. Has that gorgeous Cover Flow too just like the iPhone. Fewer widgets but with people making widgets for the iPhone, should work for the iPod too.

Nice.

It was a dead power supply. Can’t get it to turn on very well with no juice. I was in and out of the store in under an hour, all fixed.

I was impressed.

Cost $0 cause I’ve got the Apple Care Protection plan, it’s worth it.