J.M. Hardin, Author at My Two Lives

Louisiana Jones, Treasure Hunter

September 3, 2024

There’s a company in Second Life called MadPea that makes great games and gadgets. They also put on hunts in Second Life. You can earn fun prizes during their hunts, and the most recent hunt had a prize I had to try and get.

In August, they ran the Treasure Seekers Hunt, a grid-wide adventure seeker’s hunt, and what got me to join the hunt was the Explorer’s Fedora. As a fan of the Indiana Jones movies, I had to get that fedora.

I hadn’t joined one of their hunts before, and I joined this hunt with only a few days to go before the hunt ended on 31 August. In the spirit of the hunt, I had to change my display name to Louisiana Jones for the hunt. No, not Dr. Jones, because I’m an amateur explorer, not an archaeologist. And being a transbian, I’m not looking for a good man a la Dr. River Song.

I didn’t collect all of the available prizes, but I got the fedora and sunglasses. There were a couple of other prizes I would have liked to get, but I didn’t earn enough credits to get them I also got several other goodies that were placed around the grid, and I was able to collect enough gems to get the guide and shaman monkeys. You can see the guide monkey in the feataured image, and it joins me in the video below.

My Adventuring Outfit

Me being me, I wasn’t about to go adventuring without putting together a good adventuring outfit. You can see my outfit in this picture, which I took at the hunt headquarters. My avatar is wearing

PRIMA Busty v. 1.5 mesh body
LeLutka Zora 4.0 mesh head
MINA Juul hair
MadPea Exploer’s Fedora
MadPea Treasure Hunter Sunglasses
Meli Imako Ladies Long Sleeve Shirt (Maitreya V3 version since there are no PRIMA versions)
PRIMA Influence High Waisted Jeans
HeelFolly Lace Up Ankle Boot
Xcite! Coiled Bullwhip (wood handle)

Of course, I had to find a way to play the Indiana Jones theme as I hunted. I found this gesture to handle the job, but it’s only 10 seconds long so its use is limited. I ended up grabbing my Raiders of the Lost Ark soundtrack CD to make this video.

Transbian Studio got some more new gear

August 16, 2024

Late last year I decided to create a home recording studio to start working on demos of my songs. Today I got a needed piece of gear, and my studio is almost ready to begin laying down new tracks.

I started with a Fender Mustang Micro headphone amp and Bandlab. Bandlab is an online service that helps music creators lay down tracks wherever they are. Earlier this year, I added a Focusrite Scarlett Solo Studio, a single-channel audio interface combined with a condenser microphone and a pair of headphones. Last month, I got my System76 Darter Pro laptop, but I knew the speakers were an issue. I had figured I’d use the headphones a lot, although I hate living with headphones on, especially with my tinnitus.

Today I was able to unpack a pair of M-Audio BX3 self-powered reference monitor speakers. I had to clear off my desk to find room for them, and I need a stand to raise the speakers (and laptop) to the proper level.

This is my new setup with an early set of tracks of Somewhere Someone Cares that I made in Bandlab.

I still need to finalize my recording software for the studio. I looked at using AV Linux MX Edition, but it’s having issues with my wifi and Bluetooth. If I can’t get those resolved I’m going to add my recording software to my current combination of Pop!_OS 22.04 and KDE Plasma 5.

Five two week old kittens enjoying some of mamma's milk

The Kittens’ Third Week

August 10, 2024

Please forgive how long it’s taken me to get this group of pictures online. Sometimes life comes at you nonstop. -JMH

The kittens started their third week of life still living in my bedroom closet, but they finally began exploring the world outside the closet on their own. I started taking pictures of the individual kittens, and I used some in the article where I introduced the kittens.

14 Days Old: The kittens are two weeks old!

As the kids get another momma meal, you can see how big they’re getting. Of course, if the kittens aren’t eating, it would be a very safe bet that they’re sleeping. But at two weeks old, we’re finally able to spend more time with the kids, letting them get used to the big creatures and finding out that, as Ford Prefect said about our planet, we’re mostly harmless.

15 Days Old: Hi Grandpa

Bobby, Babe’s primary human/daddy, was sitting in front of the closet with Kathleen (who would later be named Kenny) on his lap. She was so comfortable, that Bobby feigned sleep so I could get a picture of the two of them. Kenny would end up being the first of the kittens to find a new home after slipping outside when either Bobby or I were coming inside without us catching him. It drove us crazy for a few days that we couldn’t find him anywhere, but we’re hoping that someone found him outside and adopted him. The alternative could be so bad that we can’t even consider it very long.

Vera (also called Vito and Vivi once we realized she’s a he) got into the floorboards via a gap under the kitchen cabinet. It took a day or so before we were able to rescue him from under the porch when we heard him meowing for us. I always hated the gap under that cabinet, and we ended up shoving an empty jar into the gap to keep anyone else from getting through the gap.

We tried for days to find Kenny, who could be pretty vocal when he wanted to be, but we never could. One thing’s for certain, whoever has him now has a pretty cool cat. 😿

16 Days Old: Sleep snuggling

The kittens still need a lot of warmth, and it’s so cute when they snuggle together while they sleep. As I write this, the kittens are 11 weeks old and it’s amazing how much bigger they are now. Of course, they still like to sleep together and they still sleep in a mound at times. In some ways, the kitty mound has gotten bigger, yet a little smaller. As much as I wanted to keep Lulubelle, she and I never bonded properly, while Chuck made me his human pretty quickly.

This past week, Lulubelle went to live with a doctor that Bobby knows, making our feline family even smaller. I got to tell Lu goodbye, but the other three kittens stayed away from me for a day or so. We decided that they connected spending time with me like I did with Lu and their leaving, but we’re back to all being buds.

Next weekend, Dave and Vito will go to live with Max, and I’m hoping Chuck won’t hold it against me even for a couple of days. After all, once they go live with Max it will just be the four of us, Bobby and Babe and me and Chuck.

17 Days Old: Let the explorations begin!

Chuck, Kenny, and Dave set out from the closet to see what the rest of their world is like. They’re still pretty wobbly, but it’s good to see them out and about on their own. You can see Vito and Lulbelle hanging back in the closet, wondering just how safe it is out in that big room.

18 Days Old: There’s nothing like Momma’s milk

Sometimes you’ll hear about momma cats that won’t nurse their kittens, but Babe has no problem feeding her babies. Her two humans just had to make sure she got lots of noms and water so she had enough nourishment to pass along to her children.

It’s getting to the point where you can tell she’s getting a little tired of being a milk machine several times a day. Don’t get her wrong though, because she loves her kittens and will fight anyone who tries to keep one from nursing.

Day 19: Wat? Iz comfy like dis.

There’s always one that likes to sleep in an odd position, and today it’s Kathleen’s turn. You can tell it’s Kathleen by the white around her mouth and the line of black on the outside of their right eye. Vito has a black line outside of his left eye, and I called them our New Wave kittens with the “mascara” by their eyes.

Sometimes we’ll see the kittens sleeping either in a pile of fur, one on top of another, or in weird positions. We have to wonder how comfortable they are like that. Other times we get jealous that they can sleep in any position they find themselves in and not get up with a crick in their neck or their backs sore as hell.

Day 20: Hi there, Chuck!

I started trying to get the kittens on my bed one at a time so I could get pictures of each kitten, but Dave wasn’t too keen on getting his picture taken yet. On the other hand, Chuck was willing to let me snap a couple of shots.

He’s so adorable, and now he’s a cuddle monster with a very loud purr when he approaches me. The other day I told Bobby that I need to record his purring and work it into a song now that I finally have my new laptop.

It’s almost hard to believe, but the kittens will be four weeks old with the start of the new week of their lives. My, how time has flown by. I almost wish we could have kept them this size a while longer, but I love how they’ve grown into being their own felines.

Darlene II, my Syystem76 Darter Pro laptop wuth Pop!_OS and KDE Plasma 5

Initial thoughts on my new laptop

August 9, 2024

Update Friday 9 August: I got my reference to WSL wrong. I corrected it below and credited the person who pointed out my error.

Update Monday 12 August: Added a clarification about my getting Pop!_OS on my Darter Pro. The screenshot of my desktop was also updated after tweaking my desktop a little.

I’ve had Darlene II, my new System76 Darter Pro laptop, for about a week and I finally have things tweaked to my liking. I may still install AV Linux MX Edition (AVL) on it. I’m trying to decide between a full install or setting up a dual boot between Pop!_OS 22.04 and AVL. But I thought I’d take a little time to share some thoughts on my new laptop.

Initial Software Installations

There are several programs that I insist on having on my computers. The first is 1Password, an amazing password manager, and it has both a desktop version and browser extensions. I moved to 1Password after my old password manager, LastPass, got hacked in 2022. LastPass users’ login information was obtained by the hackers, despite LastPass’ insistence that our private info wasn’t even available on their servers. 1Password isn’t free, but the prices are quite low and you can use it on all your devices. It’s just $2.99 a month for an individual and $4.99 a month for families.

We’re going to need a new web browser

Pop!_OS comes with Mozilla’s Firefox web browser, but I prefer Google Chrome as my default browser. I installed Chrome for my web browser, as well as Google Earth. I recently decided that I want to give less of my info to Google, so I’ve switched over to using the Brave browser. Brave is based on Chromium, the open-source basis for Chrome, and is designed with privacy in mind. Brave is based on Chromium, so I can even import my profile from Chrome. That includes my settings, bookmarks, and installed extensions into Brave. I can cut Google off from my browsing data once the data is imported into Brave.

Houston we have a problem.

But there was a problem. When I installed the browsers from Pop!_OS’ Pop!_Shop software store I installed the flatpak versions of the browsers. It turns out the 1Password extension for Chrome doesn’t play well with the flatpak versions of the browsers. I discovered that when I found myself having to unlock 1Password more often than I should. After working with 1Password’s tech support, I discovered my error. I uninstalled the flatpak versions (via flatpak uninstall [packagename]) and installed the programs with the Synaptic Package Manager. I had also installed Thunderbird and VLC with a flatpak, so they got the uninstall-reinstall shuffle as well.

Pop!_OS: Ugh

As I said in my initial article about the new laptop, System76 installs their Pop!_OS on all the computers they build. My laptop has Pop!_OS 22.04 LTS, based on Ubuntu 22.04 (Jammy Jellyfish). I used Ubuntu Linux as my second Linux distro in 2007 when I decided it was time to leave Windows. I quickly realized that I wanted more customization out of my operating system/desktop environment than Ubuntu can give me.

A quick clarification: System76 gives you the option of getting Pop!_OS or Ubuntu on the computers they build. Having already discovered that Ubuntu isn’t for me, I went straight to Pop!_OS. As the old saying goes, your mileage may vary. Thanks to NoNamesLeft600 on r/System76 for pointing out that the clarification was needed.

Darlene II came with the Cinnamon desktop environment (DE), and I hated how little you could customize it. I’ve been a KDE user for over a decade, partly because I can customize pretty much everything about how it looks and works. This tutorial showed me how to install KDE, but there were some issues.

WSL? Why?

For some reason, Pop!_OS (and Ubuntu) use the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL), which forces some of the Windows environment on Linux users. The problem is that many Linux users stopped using Windows for very specific reasons.

Correction: I referred to the wrong WSL. What I deleted was the Wsman Shell Command Line “whistle.” Somebody seriously needs to rename their tool because two programs called WSL is confusing. Thanks to ahoneybun on r/System76 for pointing out my error. Anyhow…

I discovered that WSL broke my ability to use a local version of my personal start page for my web browsers. WSL also broke my ability to put launchers on the bottom panel and open various programs, including my file manager. It turns out the solution is to uninstall WSL and all of its associated programs with Synaptic Package Manager. I also removed any configuration information for WSL and now all my panel launchers work properly.

You’ve gotta have widgets

I’m enough of a computer geek that I have a collection of widgets I insist on having on my desktop. The Cinnamon DE won’t let you have many of the widgets I use, but KDE loves letting its users use widgets. (You can see the screenshot to the right in almost full size by clicking/tapping it. It’s also available at the bottom of the article.)

The first widget I always add is an analog clock with a second hand. Yes, I’m old(-ish) and prefer using old-school clock faces like I grew up using. My insistance on having a second hand goes back to my days when I worked in radio. I then added the Simple System Monitor (in the upper left corner), something I’ve used to keep an eye on my system since I first discovered it over a decade ago.

The widget won’t show my computer’s uptime (the time since I last rebooted), my network traffic, or the temperature of my CPU since Plasma 5 was released. I added two other widgets to the lower right corner of my screen to make up for it. I now have a network speed monitor and a system monitor to track the load on my CPU and how much memory I’m using.

The bottom panel

I also put a collection of launchers on the panel, a color picker, the Places widget so I can quickly access frequently used folders, and a Folder View widget to replace the old drawer widget that I used with Plasma 4. It lets you show the Desktop folder or any other folder you specify. I created a folder with things I use often and want to get my moue on quickly. It contains a folder for files for my home recording studio. There are also links to the livestreams for WWOZ and WTIX in New Orleans.

The pager widget lets me quickly switch between desktops, and the key status widget shows if the caps and numbers locks are on. Most of the icons in my system tray widget are hidden so they don’t take up space unless they’re needed. My digital clock in the panel uses 24-hour time (like the rest of the world) and a European-style date.

Some of those icons look different

I’m using the Breeze icons for Cinnamon. It’s a discontinued icon set, but it lets me get the icon look I like. The regular Breeze icons have some icons (like Thunderbird’s icon) that have extra bits that I don’t like. Some of the included icons don’t have looks I prefer. I’m not a fan of the default icon for the Calbre ebook reader, so I grabbed the official icon and replaced it on the application launcher itself.

The plain KDE application launcher menu icon looks pretty boring, so I found a colorful version in the KDE press kit and replaced the icon in the launcher itself. The Simple System Monitor widget doesn’t have a KDE icon, but it turns out that you can replace any of the distro icons that come with the widget. I found an SVG version of the Pop!_OS icon and used it to replace the Ubuntu icon in the widget.

Second Life looks much better now

My old computer barely met the requirements to run Second Life. That meant that my graphics were pretty plain. I even had one person ask me why my avatar looks like it was from many years back. My old laptop simply didn’t have a graphics system that could show how pretty Second Life could look.

I also had to make sure I didn’t try to do much at once because I ran out of memory pretty quickly. Running Thunderbird and Second Life at the same time? Two memory hogs running at once dragged everything to a crawl. Being in Second Life while I had MLB Gameday open for a Dodgers game? Also a bad idea. But now I can have email and Second Life (actually the Firestorm viewer since there’s no official Second Life viewer for Linux) open at the same time. I can even play music or even stream a radio station at the same time without slowing my system to a crawl.

Second Life on both computers

The best part is that I can see much more of Second Life at once. This is how my bedroom looked on my old laptop. (I don’t have full-size images for the screenshots below to reduce the load time of this page.)

And now? I can even turn on PBR mirrors without having to turn off other things.

Now I need to upgrade the look of my avatar. The Pride Lanes Bowling Center looks great on Darlene II.

I need to get one of my avatars bowling on my old laptop so I can get another avatar on my new laptop and get some video of them bowling. I especially need video of my avatar bowling with my custom bowling ball. It’s a throwback to a house ball from the 70s, basic black with the suits from a deck of cards spread across the ball. I wish I could find a picture of the old ball to help me position the suits, but I can’t find a picture of the old relic.

What about AV Linux MX Edition?

I couldn’t boot my new laptop from my flash drive with AV Linux MX Edition. It was as if the BIOS couldn’t even see the drive, although once I was logged in I could access it easily. The problem lies with coreboot, the BIOS software that System76 uses. There’s a known issue with coreboot and USB 2.0 devices. Once I got a USB 3.0 drive I had no problem booting into AVL, but as I said above, I need to decide if I want to dual-boot for both Pop!_OS and AVL first.

I’ll also have to do a backup to save my data so I can put it on its own partition. System76 does a basic install where your /home folder is on the same hard drive partition as the operating system. It’s not necessarily a bad idea, but I’ve long preferred having my /home folder on its own partition so if I have to do a reinstall I don’t have to worry about losing any work.

I may add the recording software I want to the existing install, but AVL has everything I need and it’s ready to be used right out of the box.

There’s one big problem

There is one big problem with the new laptop, and it’s literally about size. My old laptop’s screen ran at 1366×768, and Darlene II’s screen resolution is a whopping 1920×1200 (16:10). While it lets me see a lot more at once, it also means the font can be pretty small. I’ve boosted the display settings a bit, but I end up having to zoom into most websites so I can read them without having to get too close to the screen. Of course, having an age north of 60 doesn’t help either.

One more thing

All of my digital devices are adorned with stickers, and I knew Darlene II would be no different. While the Transbian Studio sticker isn’t available to teh general public, every other sticker is. The stickers across the top and in the lower right are now available in the brand new My Two Lives shop on Spreadshirt. You can buy the designs on stickers, t-shirts, and much more. From the upper left corner are BLM Palestinian Lives Matter, Legislate, and Life’s a Bitch. My store just launched today, and for the next 14 days, you can get 25% off everything. Just click the link at the top of the store.

The other stickers are from my favorite New Orleans store, Dirty Coast. From the center just below the System76 logo are River. Lake. Uptown. Downtown. Sticker.; Be A New Orleanian (currently unavailable); The Booker Sticker, celebrating New Orleans musician James Booker (also unavailable, but it’s available on a t-shirt or patch); and the Breakfast Sticker, which features a cup of cafe au lait and a plate of Beignets.

The verdict is…

I love my Darter Pro. Except for the recording software, I have things set up how I like. Once again, I need to give a huge thank you to the friend who paid for my new laptop. There’s no way I could have afforded a laptop that can run digital audio workstation (DAW) software with my own money. Now I need to set up my DAW and start getting tracks laid down some tracks for Somewhere Someone Cares, a blues rock number I first came up with a riff for in 1996.

What about the kittens?

I have most of an article about the kittens’ third week of life written, but as I was finishing up this article I realized I had never imported it into WordPress to get finished and published. I’ll try to get it posted this weekend. Please forgive the delay. Sometimes life happens, and getting Darlene II up and running had to get priority. My bad.

My new laptop has arrived

August 2, 2024

I’m thrilled to say that my new computer has arrived. It took two tries, but I am the proud owner of a System76 Darter Pro laptop.

The computer originally arrived two weeks ago, but as soon as I turned it on, I noticed some glitches. It turns out that there were lines down the screen, which made using it pretty tough on my eyes. But when System76 saw the lines they started the replacement process immediately without any hassles. They even provided a prepaid label for returning the old laptop, which I expected since it was custom-made to my specs. I ended up shipping the laptop back even as they were building the new one, and both laptops arrived at their destinations yesterday. You can get a better look at the issue below on the Firefox Privacy Notice on the Mozilla website.

When I spec’d out the new laptop I had it come with Pop!_OS 22.04 LTS, which is based on Ubuntu 22.04 (Jammy Jellyfish), but putting my beloved KDE on it was pretty easy as I followed these instructions. I’m not a fan of Gnome, Pop!OS’ default desktop environment (DE), so installing KDE Plasma 5.24.7 was pretty much required for me. KDE Plasma 6 has been released, but it’s not available in my repositories yet.

System76 is working on its own DE, Cosmic, but it’s not ready for distribution yet. I may give it a shot when it drops, but I’ve been a KDE girl for over a decade so it’s what I’m used to using.

I hoped to give AV Linux MX Edition (AVL) a spin on the new laptop, but it turns out there’s a known issue with coreboot, the BIOS system on my laptop, and USB 2.0 devices like my flash drive. I’m in touch with tech support and we’re working on the issue. I may have to get a newer flash drive to use, but that won’t be a problem.

Since the new laptop will become my main computer, I’m transferring all my music, images, and other files to the new laptop. I’m moving a handful of files via a flash drive (not my AVL drive), but transferring over 200 GB of music via a flash drive is a pain in the arse. I found a faster way to transfer the files, but it’s still a long process.

Unfortunately, this means that getting more pictures of Babe’s babies is on hold until I get the new laptop set up. I can do some prep work on my old computer, but I’m holding off so I can do it all on the faster computer.

I’ve already installed several programs I use regularly on the new laptop, but once I finish transferring files over I’ll get back to installing programs, including Second Life and my digital audio workstation (DAW) programs. I’m hopeful that it won’t take until Labor Day to start laying down tracks again, but I’m planning on having preliminary mixes of my song Somewhere Someone Cares shared by All Hallow’s Eve.

I shot an unboxing video for the new laptop, and I’ll get those files on the new laptop and get them edited and posted to my YouTube channel.

Huge thanks to the person who paid for the new laptop. I knew pretty quickly that my old laptop wasn’t capable of doing audio recording, and without their gift, I’d be without a way to get my music to new ears.

The Kittens’ Second Week

July 5, 2024

Babe’s kittens spent their second week of life living in my closet, and that worked out pretty well. Mom could lie on my bed to watch over them, and I didn’t have to go far to see them myself. I could also turn on the closet light and get better light for pictures. Bobby and I spent a lot of time sitting in front of the closet watching the pets, a routine that would continue until Mom moved them again.

Momma could lay on my bed and watch over them, and I didn’t have to go very far to see them myself.

These are the pictures from 31 May to 6 June. Want to see the earlier pictures? Here are the pictures from the kittens’ first week.

7 Days Old: Happy Week-Old Kitten Day!

The kittens closed out the month of May by turning one week old, and they spent most of the day asleep. It’s hard to believe they’re a week old, but time has been flying by for me for a long time. As is the case with most babies, they’re wickyd adorable when they sleep.

8 Days Old: Go ‘way picture lady, it’s time to sleep

I almost forgot to take a picture for 1 June, and by the time I had the camera ready, they were going to sleep (again). I missed several cute shots because I couldn’t get a good angle for a picture. It’s hard to see five kittens in the picture, and the one on the top right just wants to sleep. I believe this is the kitten that would be named Lulubelle, but I can’t be entirely certain from the picture.

9 Days Old: Getting so big!

I usually try to get pictures of the kittens without Babe, but today’s picture of them sleeping on Mom shows how much they’ve grown in just a week. I love how one of them is a pillow for Mom and two others drape themselves across Babe.

10 Days Old: Did I interrupt someone’s nap?

The kittens sprawled out for a nap, with one kitten lifting its sleep head as if to fuss at me

I forgot to post a picture to Flickr on 3 June, and the kitten that would be called Dave looks like they’re upset with me. I took it a little after 22:00 (10 PM), and I can’t tell if they’re complaining about my taking so many pictures or if I’m interrupting their sleep.

11 Days Old: The kittens are getting vocal

My hand reaching into the closet to pet the kittens, with one of them being rather fussy about it

Today’s picture is a screenshot from a video I shot of the kittens. They were moving around so much that I knew a still picture wouldn’t capture their cuteness. As I reached my hand in to pet them the kittens started mewing up a storm. Their cute little mews are so adorable! It was hard to keep from laughing at them, as you can hear in the video.

12 Days Old: They’re so cute when they’re sleeping

Sleeping kittens, with several kittens laying atop others

I had to run some errands and didn’t get much time with the kittens, but when Bobby came down to say hi, several kittens came out to see him. Unfortunately, Mom returned from whatever she was doing, gave the kids a good licking, and moved them back into the closet.

13 Days Old: Sisters make great pillows

Another mound of young felines, with two kittens serving as a base for three levels of kittens

The kittens will be two weeks old tomorrow, and it’s adorable how they snuggle up together for naps. I hoped to spend more time with them but they’re asleep most of the day and I hate waking them up. Sometimes I’ll just lay out on the floor and watch them sleep, and mom’s been known to climb up on my back, put her paw on my shoulder, and make sure I’m not waking them up.

Coming up in the next week

The kittens finally start exploring outside the closet, plus more cute sleepers and the first individual pictures of the kittens.

The Babe family enjoying a little dinner

Babe’s Babies: The Kittens’ First Week

July 2, 2024

Babe’s babies are five weeks old and they’re big and playful. They still sleep a lot of the day, but they’re a lot more energetic. Let’s start the collection of their pictures on this site with photos from their first month in the world.

The Kittens’ First Day

As I’ve said before, Babe decided to have her babies in a DIY cat bed I had made for her last August. I used this video as a tutorial, and Babe used the bed several times over the fall and winter until it got a little too snug for her liking. The photo shows Babe in it from September 2023, and I figured it was too small for her and her babies, but she proved me wrong.

Babe started giving birth before 7 am on Friday, 24 May, and by 9 am she had given birth to three kittens and was pretty knackered. She’d have two more kittens, and it got hard to see the kittens in the box. I cut the neckline of the tee to fold it back at the top, but she wasn’t happy with me taking so many pictures of her newborn babies. Unfortunately, I had several people asking to see pictures of the babies. As you can see, she didn’t have a problem telling the paparazzi to bugger off.

Babe standing in the opening of the ca bed with an expression that says, "Do you mind???"

A few minutes later she either decided to let me get more pictures or was so knackered she didn’t feel like fighting me anymore.

Babe laying on her side to let her babies nurse, and the look on her face suggests she's trying to decide who to be more angry with, me for wanting to take so many pictures of her primary human for not spaying her and letting her get pregnant.

1 Day Old

Mom went up to see her human Dad for a few minutes, and I took advantage of the opportunity to get a picture of the day-old fur babies. They’ve gotten a little bigger since they were born, but they’re still so small that they don’t cover from my wrist to the base of my fingers. You can clearly see Vito with his white body and a white gap between the strips on his head and down his back. Kenny’s directly to his right, with his white belly and stripes down his back.

A grey tiger-striped cat, babe's kitty daddy, on my neighbor's landing. He usually runs when he sees us, but this was in mid August, not long after he made some babies with Babe.

The others have their daddy’s stripes, each having their variation on the tiger theme. Daddy is a neighborhood cat, and he tends to get lost when Bobby (Babe’s primary human) or I show up, but Bobby was able to take this picture in mid-March, not long after Tiger (as we’ve taken to calling him) took advantage of Babe being in heat.

2 Days Old

Babe, laying on a bed with lavender sheets

Momma let me take her picture as she stretched out for a break on my bed. My bedroom was the main living area for me, Babe, and her kittens for the first month of the kittens’ lives. I didn’t want to do things in the living room and miss being needed in the bedroom, so I made sure I stayed close as they grew big enough to get around on their own. It worked out well for everyone, and I liked being able to look in on the kids pretty often. I was already taking time to just watch the kittens without necessarily taking a picture of them.

Two day old babies in their birthing box

I posted my first image of all the kittens today, and I also posted my first kitten video to YouTube. The video named itself because it is an adorable kitten pile.

3 Days Old

The 3 day old kittens already getting big. They can finally span my entire palm from wrist to the base of my fingers.

At three days old, it’s amazing how much the kittens are filling out. Mom’s eating as often as she can just so she can have milk for her kids to eat.

The kittens still aren’t very active, but I’ll bet that at three days old, I wasn’t doing much besides sleeping, eating, and pooping. One thing for sure is that I was spending more time putting down my laptop and phone, going over to the kittens, and watching them. I couldn’t wait to reach out and pet them, but I knew it was still too soon.

4 Days Old

I found myself taking a lot of pictures of the kids being fed, and I wanted to try and get photos of the kids apart from their mom. But I saw this scene of the kittens having dinner and I had to get a picture. I also managed to get a little video that went up on YouTube.

5 Days Old

The kittens in a box approximatly 3 times larger than their birthing box. The box has a light green blanket in the bottom with a grey towel on top of it that the kittens can lay on

After taking last night’s picture, Babe moved her litter into a larger box. I knew they wouldn’t fit in the original box much longer. This is one of the possible birthing boxes I made for Babe, and it has an opening in the front that Babe can walk through but is still too high for the kittens to cross. The best part is that the new box has a removable lid that makes it easier to take pictures. It’s also easier to watch them, and I love how some of them use their siblings for pillows.

6 Days Old

Before calling it a night, I knew there would be thunderstorms overnight, so I tried moving the box across the room. Babe wasn’t having any of that, though, so I moved them back. When I woke up, I went to check on the kittens but the box was empty. What the hell??? I called up to Bobby to see if they were upstairs with him, but they weren’t. As I went back into my bedroom I noticed something changed.

Babe had considered having her kittens in my closet, but there was no way there was room to set up a birthing area in it. Babe had tried moving the kittens into the closet, but I wasn’t sure about that. Bobby asked me to block off the closet, so I laid my mirror over to block her access under the door. I also put my personal shopping cart in front of the mirror to keep it from falling over.

The kittens on a dark teal green towel with a tab bamboo pattern tote with lavender straps just behind them.

Momma cat probably saw her kids were frightened by the thunder and lightning and moved the mirror away from the closet door, and when I walked back into the bedroom I saw the mirror had been moved enough to let Babe get her kittens into the closet. Sure enough, when I opened the closet door, I saw the kids nestled snugly in the closet. This is where momma must have brought them during the storm.

I don’t think I have a better picture of the furry family to close out their first week with.

Closing out the kittens' first week with the whole family together in the closet

The kitten pictures are coming

July 2, 2024

Last week I said I was moving my kitten pictures here from Flickr. It’s taken me longer than expected to decide how to present the pictures here. I’m also resizing the images to load better on this site, and I’m re-processing the pictures so they look the best they can here.

The kitten pictures are coming, and I hope to have the first week’s pictures up before the Dodgers take on the D-backs at 22:20 (10:10 PM ET). Please forgive my delay. I hope they are worth the wait. Now that I’ve settled on how they’re presented the process should go faster. I’ll post the photos in one-week groups for the kittens’ first five weeks. That will bring me up to last Thursday’s pictures, I’ll switch to doing one post per day beginning with the pictures from Friday 28 June.

I have some new pictures to share, including some video of the adorable kittens playing in yesterday’s late afternoon sun. I haven’t transferred them from my phone to my computer yet, but I’m looking forward to letting you see the playful kittens.

My kitten pictures are moving to My Two Lives

June 27, 2024

My kitten pictures are moving. I’ve had issues with where I was posting them, and I decided to move them to my website. Here I can post not only the photos, but I can also embed videos without the site I use complaining about links or external content.

Babe taking a break from her 2-day old kittens on my bed

Babe, my upstairs neighbor Bobby’s cat, went into heat in the Spring. A neighborhood cat was more than happy to make some babies with her. Babe’s had the run of the house since autumn, and I was hoping Babe would have her kittens upstairs. Babe had other plans, and on 24 May, I woke to the news that Babe’s water had broken and she wanted to have her kids in my bedroom.

Late last August, I made a DIY cat bed for her in the living room, and after she got pregnant, I moved it into my bedroom beside my bed. When Babe was looking for a place to have her kittens, I turned it to the wall to try to dissuade her from having them in the box, but that’s where she wanted to have them.

I think Babe wanted to have her kids down by me because Bobby was often out much of the day, while I’m always at home unless I have to run an errand. Babe’s made great use of the fact that I’m always home, and knows that if anything happens she’ll either hear her babies cry or I’ll call for her.

She ended up bringing five adorable fur babies into the world, and I’ve often wished I could spend hours watching and playing with them, but real life has demands on my time of its own. I started a Flickr account to post daily photos of the babies, and I also posted some videos of the kittens to my YouTube channel when I could get one. Last week my Flickr account was killed because I posted links to the videos on the picture page, something that is verboten. The photostream was unblocked, but I haven’t been able to log in to remove the links or post new pictures, so I’m moving the kitten pictures here.

I’m still working on the best way to post the pictures, but they’ll be here under the category Babe’s Babies. I may not be able to get a new picture to post every day, but you’ll be able to see the kittens get ready to go to their new fur-ever homes. I know Megan, a friend of Bobby’s, wants two kittens for her son, and I’m keeping a kitten myself. Bobby may want to keep one or two, but he’s not sure yet. He’s trying hard not to get too attached to the little darlings, but every time he spends time with them I know it’s going to be harder for him not to keep at least one of the little loves.

The Kittens

I’ve finally gotten pictures of each kitten by themselves so I can introduce them to the world individually. I’ve given them temporary names to refer to them other than Kitten 1, Kitten 2, etc. Of course, they may get new names when they go to their fur-ever homes.

Vera/Vito

Vera’s one of the shyest of the litter. Like her siblings, once she gets used to you she can be a cuddle bug. When I was first greeting the kittens after they moved into the closet, Vera would hiss at me, although their “Hiss! Hiss! Hiss!” came out more like a heavy breather making an obscene phone call. It was kind of cute, but I backed off until she was ready to get to know me.

Over the last weekend, we discovered Vera’s actually a boy, and Bobby has named him Vito.

Charlotte/Chuck

Chuck, who I originally called Charlotte when I mistakenly thought he was a girl, is one of the most outgoing of the bunch. (He may be a she after all. We’ll confirm their gender when they get their new kitten checkup.) He’s among the most outgoing, and I don’t see him having any problems joining a new family. He’s a very friendly little guy, and more often than not, when the kittens come up onto the sofa with me, Chuck’s right there with his brothers and sister. Surprisingly enough, it’s Dave that I usually have to look for when I’m missing a kitten on the sofa.

You can’t see it in this photo, but Chuck has a light brown diamond shape on his back just below his neck. It became my way of telling him apart from Dave and Lulubelle when I see them from above. If I see his face, Chuck has a white patch above his mouth, Dave has some tiger-like stripes, and Lulubelle has some light brown markings similar to her mom’s.

Dave

Dave (née Davina when I originally misgendered him) is the smallest kitten, but he’s the first to run out and greet me when I get up in the morning. The friendliest of the bunch, he’s been known to snooze against my neck and even lick my neck. Chuck and Dave are partners in crime, and I’m sorry to see they’re probably getting split up.

Why those three names? I recently turned 64, and a certain Beatles song was in heavy rotation in my head for over a month leading up to my birthday. I joked with my neighbor that it would be funny if the kittens were born on my birthday and had a girl and two boys that could be, as the song puts it, “[Grandkittens] on your knee, Vera, Chick, and Dave.”

Lulubelle

Lulubele is the kitten that will stay with me when her brothers and sisters go to their fur-ever homes. She got that name because on Catmas 2023, a very smart young woman sang, “But goblins, you can go to hell, cos you’re not eating Lulubelle.”

There are conflicting reactions to Lulubelle’s name in “The Church on Ruby Road.”

RUTH: She’s called Lulubelle.
RUBY: Oh…
CARLA: What a terrible name.
RUBY: Oh, an absolutely terrible name.
RUTH: Isn’t it awful?

DOCTOR: That is such a brilliant name. I wish I was called Lulubelle. [chuckles]

You can hear the entire “The Goblin Song” on YouTube. In the UK, get the comments about the name Lulubelle in context on the BBC iPlayer. Outside of the UK, you can find it on Disney+ where available.

Lulubelle’s the other shy kitteh, but she was the first to greet me many mornings before Dave decided he wanted to be the first to say “good morning” most days.

Kenny

As I said above, Vera greeted me one day by hissing at me. They reminded me of my ex-wife, but I mistakenly called the wrong white kitten Kathleen after my ex-wife. Of course, Kathleen turned out to be a boy kitten, and I first called him Kelly, but a day later I went with a South Park reference and said no bastards better try to hurt him.

He’s also the chattiest of the five kittens. His early meows used a voice that sounded like it was seasoned with a lifetime of cigarettes and whiskey. Those scratchy meows come back from time to time, but now he sounds more like the great of his family. He loves to wrestle, and I’ve had to scold him for being too aggressive with his sisters, and if I end up having to keep the spray bottle close by it will be for Kenny. But when he wants a nap, he has no trouble coming up and snugging against me. He’s just especially vocal when he’s tired and can’t get the human to figure out what he’s asking for.

Eventually, the band will break up

We always knew we wouldn’t be keeping all of Babe’s kittens. Even before she got pregnant, my neighbor said he wanted her to have one litter, and I’d get my pick of the litter. While Dave and Kenny enjoy spending time with me, little Lulubelle won my heart pretty quickly.

When Bobby’s friend Megan heard Babe was pregnant, she quickly said she wanted to get two kittens for her son, Max. Last weekend Megan and Max came over to visit the kittens, and Dave went right over to Max. Later this summer, Dave will be moving south to live with him. He wants a boy and a girl, and Vera/Veto is so comfortable with him that it looks like she will be joining Dave on the drive south. Of course, there’s only one girl in the litter, Lulbelle, so when Megan and Max come back later this week to see the kittens once more before his move, so we’ll see how he feels about there only being one girl. I think the three of them make a nice looking family.

Max with Dave and Vera/Vito

I’m almost back to daily pictures

I stopped trying to get daily pictures of the kittens when I got locked out of my Flickr account. I’ve gotten back to trying to take daily kitten pictures, and I should be posting pictures almost daily here on My Two Lives. Videos will go to YouTube when I get them, and often the only thing stopping me from getting video more often is that by the time I can get my phone to get video the scene has changed too much to be worth capturing.

I have a few days of photos to add, and I’m still trying to decide on the best way to post each day’s photos. There may not be a new picture posted every day, so the best way to make sure you don’t miss out on a new cat picture is to visit the site daily. I’ll also be posting here about my music, and I’m getting close to finally being able to get back to work on the demo I posted about in February. I’ll also be posting about my virtual life in Second Life, so I’m trying to find a way for my readers to get notifications only when new kitten photos get posted. In the meantime, you can visit the site daily to see if there’s new content. If you have a WordPress account, you can also follow me in their reader apps.

There seems to be a problem with my Flickr account

June 16, 2024

I’ve been posting a new kitten picture every day since the kittens were born. When I tried to post a new picture today I got an error as if my account was non-existent. I’ve reached out to Flickr to see what’s going on, but since I can’t post today’s picture to Flickr, I’ll post it here.

Three of Babe's babies checking out a cat bed that some friends got for Babe

Some friends from Dodgers Twitter bought Babe a cat bed as a Catmas gift but it was a little small for her. I set it up last night to see if the kittens might like it. These three seem to think it’s pretty comfy. The kitten on the right went in it today and was happy to chill out in the bed by herself.