Rosie

It’s full-on fall, y’all. On windy days when I see the fallen oak leaves pick up and swirl around, I think of how Tabs loved to chase them. He’d sit there and wait for a bunch of leaves to swirl around, and the he’d just bound on over and get up in the mix.

Did he ever actually catch any leaves? I don’t know. But it was the cutest thing to watch. Another thing he loved, absolutely loved, was chasing squirrels. Again, did he ever actually catch any squirrels? No, but he sure had fun going after them. He’d do this funny thing where he’d run up a tree, and he’d only get like 5 feet up at the most, and then he’d just pause with his claws on the trunk and be like, “Oh, now what?”

I wish I could have brought tabby with me to Starbucks so that I could have a pumpkin spice latte with him on my lap. Maybe if we’re ever reunited again in the universe we’ll do that on a chilly fall day. Of course, he’d do his tabby a-hole move and spring off my stomach when I least expect it and I’d end up with pumpkin spice spilled all over me, but if I could spend a little time with my boy, it would be worth it.

As you can tell, I miss him a little extra today.

Rosie

Oh, Rosie-pose! We found out this weekend that she absolutely loves egg yolk. I gave her a little bit yesterday after eating my breakfast. I just set the plate down with the leftover yolk on it, and she went to town on it.

Ever since that little extra treat she’s been my little shadow, following me around, snuggling on my lap. I don’t know if it’s appreciative, or if she’s just trying to bank some extra points so I’ll give her more yolk in the future.

Cats are funny. She has such a different personality than Tabs did, but she’s also very loving and sweet like he was.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Even though it was crazy hot this weekend, it still felt like full-on fall. There are leaves everywhere, it gets chilly and breezy at night, and people and cats are starting to put their Halloween decorations up.

As I’m sure you can imagine, Tabs never missed an opportunity to celebrate Halloween. For him it was an entire season, and it lasted more than a month. Sure, he wore costumes all year round, but he took it to the next level in October.

One day he’d be punk rocked out, the next he’d be decked out like a dinosaur.

Rosie

We put up some decorations already, and Rosie helped. She has a great eye.

She also loves fall and Halloween almost as much as Tabs did.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Tabs was a firm believer in the transformative power of treats, and he was partial to turkey Temptations and Purina Pro Plan Savory Bites. He believed that if you eat well, and often, you can accomplish great things.

Rosie

Rosie is also a huge proponent of frequent treat consumption, and she’s all about chicken Temptations. She gets some every other night, and she can tell when it’s her treat day (we call it Ladies’ Night). She’ll follow me into the kitchen and block the doorway until the treats magically appear.

She sent us to Target today to scope out looks for her Halloween outfit, and while we were there we saw the treats.

We’re usually a family that gets the bagged treats, but this time we brought home the giant 16-ounce tub.

The treats power her up to perform the advanced mathematical calculations she has to do for her side hustle as a professor at MIT (the Meowsachusetts Institute of Technology). 😹

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Man! I cannot believe summer is over. What the!? And we didn’t even get many hot days this year. It’s weird out here in the Bay Area because we get some of our warmest weather in early fall, but still. I wanted more pool days by now.

Tabs would have done a big summer send-off this weekend with a full-scale kitty modeling show. He always liked to end the seasons with a huge event of some kind, and then follow it up with a party to ring in the next season. To him, everything was a good reason to celebrate his fabulousness.

Rosie

Rosie loves fall just as much as she loves summer, so she’s perfectly fine with the seasons changing. She’s all about the science of seasons, and botany is one of her many interests, so it’s all just so fascinating that she looks forward to every season changing. She sees the wonder everywhere she looks in the natural world.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Rosie doesn’t want to manage. She’s not like Tabs in that way. She doesn’t want to be the big boss. Sure, she’s a boss lady cat, but she doesn’t want to have to tell everyone what to do. She doesn’t particularly enjoy being in charge, unlike Tabs, who loved calling the shots and making the tough decisions.

Rosie would rather leave the drama to someone else and stay in the lab. She’s all about the science, not the drama.

Going for these morning walks now with Rosie, it’s a very different experience than it was with Tabs. He, for lack of a better word, dominated the circle. He didn’t just walk around it. He owned the asphalt all the way around.

All the other cats in the neighborhood knew Tabs basically owned the road and the sidewalk, and he didn’t just “go for walks.” He strutted. To Tabs, the circle was one giant catwalk.

Rosie

You know Rosie though. She has panache, obvs, but she walks around the circle like she’s conducting an experiment. She studies the plants, measures the distances between the houses, records light levels and air quality in her journal, and she even measures the ambient acoustics to estimate the number of turkeys, quails, dogs and cats. It’s quite extraordinary.

That said, she isn’t always serious. She also knows how to let down her fur. Sometimes she’ll pull me toward a tree and climb up it, or she’ll chase a squirrel, so, I mean, she also has fun sometimes.

And yes, occasionally she’ll also strike a pose. After all, she is the new CFO (Chief Feline Officer) of Tabs the Cat Industries, LLC.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Oh, my gosh, this time of year on the hill? Tabs loved late summer here so much! The long days, the active squirrels collecting acorns and leaping from tree to tree, the noisy woodpeckers, the huge flocks of overstuffed turkeys, the breezy nights and afternoons that send leaves and dry grass dancing. It’s a super exciting time of year for a cat, and it thrilled him.

The wildlife has been more active than usual this year. My tabby would have loved it.

Some nights after he got home from work, El Hub would take Tabs out on the hill, and the two of them would explore every nook and cranny. Tabs would climb oak trees, chase lizards, stalk moles, and he even caught a bird or two WHILE ON HIS LEASH! Now that’s the dedication of a natural born birder.

Rosie

Rosie has also found her groove lately. She knows what’s up about September. Just like Tabs, she gets totally fired up when it’s windy outside, which it is a lot here from now till November.

When everything around her is rustling and moving, all the leaves, grass and branches swaying, it really gets her kitty senses tingling.

I wonder if they could have hung out together, if they would have gotten along. I think about it a lot. Most of the time, I think they probably wouldn’t, because both of them are fairly standoffish around other cats. Tabs certainly was. He was very territorial.

But maybe their mutual love for September would have brought them together.

Maybe. I like to think so.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Among turkey circles, he was known as the terror of Mt. Tam. Tabs was infamous as a killer of…careers among turkey models, because he had no patience for imperfection when it came to working with other models, whether feline, human, avian or otherwise.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, he worked on many modeling campaigns with turkeys.

His affinity for turkeys was multifaceted. He loved everything about them and found them both fascinating and delicious.

Rosie

Rosie, on the other hand, hasn’t worked with any turkeys yet, but she does find them to be interesting. Today on her walk, she followed a gang of them around the hill. She pretended to not notice them but nonchalantly got progressively closer and closer until they were 10 feet away. She tried to play it cool, but when one of the larger turkeys stood up tall and flapped its wings, probably as a signal to Rosie to “step off,” Rosie flipped out and ran all the way back to the front door.

She’s not quite there yet in terms of having a full on conversation with them.

Maybe soon, though.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

I’m so fortunate to have lived with two smarty pants kitties who were both genuinely good natured. I mean, I joke all the time about how Tabs was so demanding, and he did have his diva tendencies, but I appreciated his capacity for work and how he loved pushing himself.

He made me a better assistant, and the best assistant I could be.

Rosie

Rosie, on the other hand, is not as bossy, but she keeps me on my toes by dropping countless tidbits of scientific knowledge on me, whether I like it or not.

She’s my sunshiny and smart kitty, whereas Tabs was my demanding diva.

I love them both for their minds, but I also love them both for their tum-tums. There’s something about a kitty tum, especially one so plush and chonky. It’s just the sweetest thing.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen