Breaking Cat News by Georgia Dunn for January 06, 2023

Buttermints? Mmm. Wait, buttermints from the 1980s? Uhh . . .

♬Soaky soaks you clean

And every girl and boy

Gets a toy when it’s empty

When it’s empty, it’s a toy!♬

Christmas morning!

“Wow, Elvis! That’s so smell…I mean swell!”

Is Buttermint a small village just outside of Buttertown?

Way to greet the New Year.

Ask Bea; she’s been in there. Maybe don’t ask Baba.

I can’t remember the last time I had a buttermint? I have a faint recollection of an elementary school teacher having us kids make a batch around Easter-ish? Very much a minty-melt-in-the-mouth-memory …

Does a quick consult with Google …

Ah, I found a recipe for it, and yes, it’s mostly butter and sugar.

https://www.landolakes.com/recipe/16639/buttermint-twists/

“YES” = “I am now, d@mmit”

So I think he is being very tolerant with Puck.

It sounds a little like my grandmother’s downstairs bathroom, not the same smells but I remember slightly flowery soap. The butter mints were in the front room on a dish on the coffee table.

I’m glad we’re home

Now are you really sleeping?

I guess you didn’t by the look in your eye

(Look in your eye, look in your eye)

Well lay back and relax

While I put aside all questions (put aside the questions)

Then you and me consider the new rooms’ smell

We can think of smells, think of smells…

(Ring My Bell / Anita Ward)

B-U-T-T-E-R-M-I-N-T-S and what does that sp-…ummm…smell?

From the set of his eyebrow in panel 3, Puck is worried. Elvis is a good friend to reassure him with words and the paw touch, even if Puck did wake Elvis up.

Twelfth Night, and I’m trying to take the decorations down, but it’s absolute bedlam here. I’ve got twelve lords and eleven ladies leaping and dancing around among the cows and maids, egged on by ten drummers and nine pipers. Everything is covered in feathers from all these d@mned birds, and I can’t find the gold rings. Maybe a goose ate them.

I don’t know who sent this lot (certainly not my true love) but l’ll find out. I have been most notoriously abused, and I will be revenged.

Dad Cat knows all.

Awwwww. Elvis controls his grump.

I don’t recognize that wall paper in the background. It looks like gray umbrellas.

There are so many new smells awaiting them! Sleep first.

Elvis always has a soft spot for Puck.

Can you smell the, 1980’s, Puck? Puck sniffs the air and yells, Yes, and it’s Gnarly Dude!

love the paw bump

Love the multiple Pucky white floof sightings.

YES! I can smell the rooms already! :-)

I love the holding paws. Makes my heart warm!

And all this thanks to Beatrix’s courageous ‘expotition’.

I found this one endlessly adorable. While Puck and Elvis are now parents themselves, it’s still adorable to see Puck with just this childlike wonder as he thinks about the new room and to see Elvis still soothing his brother to sleep with thoughts of 80s boath toys and buttermints (Which also begs the question of what happened with the real cats involving 80s bath toys and buttermints). I also of course, being Elvis #1 fan love him darting awake like a vampire when puck wakes him, eyes wide and furious. I like to think that’s how he wakes up most of the time.

I have buttermints in my house. So what are you implying, Ms. Dunn? Hmmm?

Sweet Elvis

Honestly, what are butter mints?

It is so lovely to have a friend to soothe late-night worries. Even Mom Cat needs a Dad Cat sometimes.

I drive past one of the city’s best barbecue places on my way to work. Not even 7:30 AM and there are people lining up for lunch – they’ve brought blankets, folding chairs, coffee…and that’s nothing out of the ordinary for this place. Talk about your good smells! Even if you don’t eat meat, it smells amazing.

Meanwhile, Back on the Nile

At the Royal Kitchen

Thomios: The Artisans are working on repairing the Red Planet Spider. I thought it’d be nice to have some snacks to bring down to the harbor for them.

Sue Chef: We have plenty of butter, thanks to the Royal Procurers, who haven’t said where they got it. And there’s also a quantity of powdered sugar. Any ideas?

Thomios: Maybe we could add some s-p-i-c-e-s and make a candy. How about mint?

Sue Chef: We need to knead the dough. I wonder who could help with that.

Enter Multicolored Tornado

Ora Zedd: It’s Little O, don’t you know!

Thomios: Ora, just in time! Can you help us with making butter mint candy?

Ora: Sure can!

That "paw"bump in the last panel!! awesome!

Elvis is so sweet to Puck. Still the big brother.

So sweet – nice to have someone to talk to in the night

The dreams of friday

Best friends, innocents, hoping to find

Good smells, happy things, Elvis so kind

Occasions, persuasions are on his mind

Bath toys and buttermints, had for a dime

He cares ‘bout breakin’ cat news

To little Puck, helping him snooze

Bath toys and buttermints, what will they find?

Turn on, tune in, to 80’s time

See for yourself, smell for yourself, yeah, Puck

Good boys, hopeful hints

Bath toys, buttermints

- John S. Carter, Tim Gilbert – Incense and Peppermints – Strawberry Alarm Clock

Lynyrd Skynyrd: Sweet Home Alabama

Big Pink House once grand and still loved,

Home to cats and humans, too,

Spirits of long-lost cat friends,

Soon you’ll be grand again!

…….

Starting with Freddie Quinn’s vision,

And Dr. Man, to this day,

Finds a place for homeless kitties,

And so many other strays!

…….

Pink House in Rhode Island

Guided by Angus’ lantern’s glow,

Pink House in Rhode Island,

Soon to be forever home!

…….

With two adults and two children,

Two small cats and three of reason,

There is much need for planning,

Especially when you have Lupin!

…….

Pink House in Rhode Island

Guided by Angus’ lantern’s glow,

Pink House in Rhode Island,

Soon to be forever home!

Tweets from Dr. Scuttles

Jan. 5

Sometimes I pull my head, limbs, and tail into my shell and pretend it’s a rocketship.

I’d prefer a lighthouse (especially on stormy days) but the shape is wrong, all wrong.

The interaction between Elvis and Puck is very sweet. I wish Smudge and Mouse could be like that, but more often that not it starts out sweet and turns into a rolling cat fight.

Like I said above, I need to make some buttermints. I don’t know if I have all the ingredients. I know I have the ingredients for shortbread, so I may make some of that later today or tomorrow.

So as soon as I read butter mints I know what they were, though I haven’t had them in quite a while, and I kind of remember what they smell like, but what exactly do 1980s bath toys smell like?

Isn’t Elvis just lying to Puck to make him feel better? Or has he actually been in the new rooms to smell them?

It’s already Friday. We won’t be seeing the new rooms until next week, will we? [Impatiently tapping].

Well, a little orange ring-tailed kitten is in big trouble with Marie. It turns out Holmes thinks 4:00 a.m. is playtime on top of Marie, particularly on her head. So she would shoo him off, only to have him pounce on her head again and try to eat her hair.

Fortunately, Hamilton sleeps curled up by my side and will smack Holmes if he tries to bounce on Dad.

“Robert! The kitten won’t leave me alone.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Do something!”

“Uh-huh.”

“Now!”

“I really think this is a ‘you’ problem and not a ‘me’ problem.” Whereupon Holmes and I both got hit with a pillow. Poor Hamilton, who became collateral damage, looked up as if to say, “What did I do?”

Elvis looking forward to something new? I dunno.

I love Elvis’s idea of what good smells are.

“1980s bath toys and buttermints.”

I got a chuckle out of this.

I seem to recall those bath toys smelled like vanilla.

So adorable. Elvis has been very sweet this week, in his own way. First concerned about Lupin’s safety, then reassuring Puck’s kitty concerns.

Elvis looks so grumpy in panel 2! I’m glad he listens to Puck’s questions & replies calmly.

So I guess we’ll never know why the notary’s coat smelled like maple syrup??

OT: Home again…

Did anyone else expect an angry “I AM NOW!!” to Puck’s first question?

Now I want butter mints—and there are none in the house. And I doubt I could make them. Dang. Now to watch for Le’letha to tell us her news.

So…the universe has handed me a kitten.

I was coming back to the library from checking the mail when I heard a tiny “mew!” I put down all the packages, look around, and sure enough there’s a tiny orange kitten in the bushes. “Oh no,” I say. “I don’t need a kitten.” (I genuinely do not know if I can afford a third cat. This isn’t the best time for me, financially.) But it’s cold out. This kitten is crying. It’s about to get very busy, with a lot of cars, on campus as students return for Monday’s classes. So of course I pick up the kitten.

Orange boy, maybe 4-5 weeks, big little voice, hungry and cold. No momcat to be found.

So I put the kitten in my jacket, TinyKittens-style, and go tell my boss that I have the mail, and also a situation, and that situation is a kitten. She let me go home early to get him some kitten milk replacer and somewhere warm to stay – did I mention this kitten is yelling? – and so I did. And so now I have a tiny orange kitten asleep in a crate with a towel, the tiniest litter box, and a heating pad on low. I should see if he’s hungry again.

Updates to follow, I guess.

This is so sweet.

I love how Elvis treats Puck as the little brother he’s always been, grumpy at first, then comforting him with soothing words and a paw touch. He really is a loving cat.

And buttermints and 1980s’ bath toys . . . I can almost smell them, myself. And it is soothing.

Catnip is in the mint family, so it’s possible buttermints would smell nice to cats =)