Day Seventeen: 2 AM

It seems that the cats want to keep me on my toes. At about 2 this morning, I woke up and I wasn't sure why. Thunder was curled up next to me, taking up his allotted 1/2 of my bed. I hear a thump. I tell myself that it is just the house settling. I try to fall asleep. I hear a thump again, followed by the pitter patter of kitty paws. I hope against hope that Fury is just chasing after a moth or something. I try again to fall asleep, because if truth be told I don't even want to know what Fury is doing. My attempts were futile because suddenly Fury is under my bed growling at something. Thyen Thunder jumped down to join in the fun. I fumbled for my cell phone in the dark and opened it. I peerednder the bed. I sawwo cats...and one very terrified mouse. I closed my cell phone and sat in my bed, contemplating what I should do next. At first I nursed the hope that the cats would just kill the poor mouse and take it out of my room and eat it elsewhere. I was not so lucky. It turns out that Fury and Thunder like to play with their food, because they would catch it and then let it go again. It reminded me of Scar from the Lion King when Zazu tells him not to play with his food. So I make a made dash in my pajamas out of the volunteer house to knock on Dane's door. Quite honestly, I felt like Sheldon Cooper, because this is what happened:

Knock knock knock "Dane!"
Knock knock knock "Dane!"
Knock knock knock "Dane!"

He did wake up very quickly and rescued me from the mouse in my room by using a bucket and some gloves. We (by we I mean Dane) took the mouse outside and released him back into the field. Yesterday we had discussed the possibility of going for a nightwalk today. I told him that this was not exactly what I had in mind...The cats were put off because I ruined their fun for the night. I eventually fall asleep after an hour or so of me thinking that I am hearing mice everywhere. Hopefully I won't get any visitors tonight...
About four hours later I get up to do morning scat duty and then a cheetah run with Nala. Nala actually ran. I wouldn't say sprint, but she ran fairly respectably for all three runs. I was able to take Nala back to her enclosure all by myself, which I thought was a big deal. After the run and breakfast, Dane and I had to clean the horse troughs, which were pretty unyummy because they were full of floating green algea. But we got that finished pretty quickly and then we had the exciting opportunity to paint more chain link squares. So again with the paint and the squares and the paint and the squares. We still are not finished.
After lunch, we had cheetah time. Jemima was being friendly today, and purred and drooled on my legs. After Jemima, I went in to say hello to my new friend Tigger. They thought about leaving me in with him, I think. I wouldn't have minded.

Then it was time to play with the cubs. They were in a good mood, compared to the last few days. They showed absolutely no interest in their toys, which is nothing new.

They did, however, show a great deal of interest in my toys - namely my hat and my camera bag.

After our unusually nice time with the cubs, it was time to feed and then time to go home. We all made a tuna pasta bake together tonight, and it was very very tasty. After dinner, Dane took me on a proper night bushwalk, this time with no field mouse. We saw some catfish in the river. We had a moment of excitement when we thought we found a black-backed jackal, but then it barked and wagged its tail and it turned out to be Sky, Leante's dog. She can be quite vicious, though...

That's pretty much it for the day. Leante was awesome and hooked me up to go on a game drive tomorrow on a reserve that is close by. It should be so much fun! I just have to remember to charge my camera battery! Which is what I am going to go do now!

Okay. Okay bye!
Taylor