Florida 2020: Orlando Cat Cafe

In our quest to find non-theme park activities in Orlando, we discovered our new favorite place: The Orlando Cat Cafe. The Orlando Cat Cafe is a feline rescue organization, that as of our visit, has placed over 929 cats in new homes.

Located in a quiet shopping center, The Orlando Cat Cafe is split into two halves: The cafe and the cat playroom. The cafe portion is open to everyone and had viewing windows to see the cats. The coffee and cat themed desserts were delicious. Guests visiting the play room can bring cafe food and drinks inside.

Entrance to the cat play room involves making advanced reservations and paying an eight dollar hourly fee. The fee goes towards care for the cats, all of whom are from the SPCA Florida. Children are allowed in the play area, but there are many rules to keep the cats safe and calm in their environment.

Although it felt a bit like cheating on our own cats ( Slinky and Tom) we visited The Orlando Cat Cafe twice, since we loved it so much. An employee even gave us a frequent visitor punch card. It seemed like a majority of the other visitors were on a mission to find their perfect cat, and there is quick turnover for cats getting adopted, which is of course wonderful.

Here are picture of The Orlando Cat Cafe.

Due to Covid, we were not free to walk around the play area. We had to stay in our assigned corner of the room. If the cats didn’t wander into our area, staff members would bring a cat over with toys to entice them. For those looking to adopt, the staff brought over cats that they felt would be a good fit. For example, there was a single guy living in an apartment who wanted a quiet cat, so they found one with the right temperament. I can’t say enough good things about The Orlando Cafe Cafe and the caring people who are trying to match cats to humans.

We discovered our perfect match in a black and white cat named Todd. Todd was the sleepiest, most snuggle-bug that I have ever met. He was just so sweet. We seriously contemplated ways to get him back to Colorado, and I think had we not learned that he was already spoken for, that we would have filled-out adoption papers. He was picked up by his new family while we were at the cafe. It was bittersweet, but we hope he is having a good life that is filled with optimum napping spots!

Todd was clearly our favorite, but we also enjoyed playing with the other cats. The Orlando Cat Cafe had an abundance of kittens who were so friendly.

In Colorado we have a cat cafe called The Denver Cat Company. It’s also a great organization, but The Orlando Cat Cafe edged it out for the friendliest felines. If we lived in Orlando, we would certainly be adopting a new family member!

As an added bonus, we discovered a British pub across the street. Friar Tucks was just like a typical village pub in England: no frills decor, delicious food, and chatty patrons. On our first visit, we had dinner, which included Scotch Eggs for Dan- his favorite. We went back for a full-English breakfast on our final morning in Orlando. The food is both good value and authentic. They even have a small shop with British import items, like Cadbury chocolate. We learned that Florida has a large British community, so it’s another reason to love “The Sunshine State.”

We hope to return to Florida in 2021 with the kids, and we will definitely visit both The Orlando Cat Cafe and Friars Tuck. They are Orlando gems.

Social Distancing in Littleton: Week 33

I’m writing this post at 6:15 on the evening of Wednesday, November 4th, and we still don’t have a winner in the presidential election. This was expected. The race is heated and so very close. It’s actually more worrisome to have yet another confirmation of the deep divisions in our country. I’m cautiously optimistic that Biden will prevail, but I’m nervous and won’t be surprised, if Trump is victorious. I dread the contention and possible violence that will occur when Trump fights to overturn the results, should he lose. Based on his statements, I don’t expect him to graciously concede.

The election has dominated everything this week, yet we also made some great memories.

Due to covid concerns, we decided not to pass out candy to trick-or-treaters. Next year, we will definitely participate. Instead, we went for drinks and Italian food with our friend’s Julie and Ryan. We watched “The Hunt,” and ate Nigella Lawson’s coffee layer cake.

After initial success the previous week, I tried to make Lawson’s layer cake two more times. I attempted a smaller, triple layer cake which was a disaster. I should apply to “Nailed It" after this epic failure.

Luckily, I succeeded with the cake for Halloween. Dan decorated it.

Monday was our 7th wedding anniversary and we celebrated it at the Denver Zoo. I will write a more extensive review for a future post, but we had a great time. I was thrilled to discover that the zoo sells Dole Whip. This was my first Dole Whip outside of Hawaii and Disney parks.

Rather than having a big anniversary dinner, we opted for lunch at a new-to-us curry spot called “Spice Table.” Dan thought the curry was the most English-style he as found in America. It was great and definitely a new go-to spot in Denver. It had pretty, colorful lamps too.

We started watching “Lovecraft Country.” We are three episodes in and it is a completely overwhelming experience. It’s timely, emotional, and quite bizarre. I love the blending of genres and the cast is great. So much has happened that I can’t even imagine where it will head next. We are hooked.

Dan took a pretty picture of our neighborhood during one of our walks. Autumn is a lovely time of the year in Colorado. It has been warm all week.

And the obligatory cute cat pictures. Slinky is showing his Halloween vampire cat fangs! I call him count catula.

Social Distancing in Littleton: Week 32

The big news this week has been the Colorado wildfires. Even though the election is less than a week away, the wildfires have been at the top of the news and it is devastating. We are not close enough to be evacuated or to really worry, but the clouds of smoke that we could see from our neighborhood were apocalyptic.

Luckily, a heavy snow storm came a few days later, which really helped the fire fighting efforts.

It was a cozy Sunday, as we stayed inside and watched the falling snow. I baked my first layer cake with homemade icing. It was Nigella Lawson’s Coffee Layer Cake and I was thrilled when Nigella commented on my Instagram picture!

Dan made a Dutch Baby pancake. He loves the Dutch Babies from The Original Pancake House, so it was great that he figured out how to recreate it at home. His were even better than the restaurant. It looks like our weekend tradition of breakfast at the pancake house will end. We now need to figure out how to make their tropical syrup that I love!

We watched the latest Borat film :”Borat Subsequent Moviefilm: Delivery of Prodigious Bribe to American Regime for Make Benefit Once Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan.” I’m exhausted from typing that title! Sacha Baron Cohen certainly knows how to push buttons and this will not be everyone’s taste, but as with the first film, the reactions of the unsuspecting American public are the most shocking. Thankfully there are a few really good people in the film, but that doesn’t make up for the genuine racist/sexist/lack of humanity responses that some people gave. The film is timely with stunts involving Mike Pence and Rudy Giuliani. It was of course, released to tie-in with the election. I enjoyed it and I was impressed that Baron Cohen put himself in risky situations to pull this off. Maria Bakalova who plays his daughter, absolutely steals every scene. It wasn’t nearly as entertaining as the first Borat, but I don’t feel that it was supposed to be. These are seriously times and the film reflects the tone of the United States. It’s the type of film that I’ve continued to think about five days later, so to that end, it was very effective.

We also finally broke down and paid to see “Bill and Ted Face the Music.” OMG…this might just be the worst film that I’ve ever seen. Not only was it bad, it was boring. BORING!!! I love Keanu Reeves, but it hurt to watch this. I had high hopes from a nostalgia perspective, but it missed the mark in every way.

We played Top Golf with our friends on Saturday night. I played worse than my first time, but I still had fun. I’d love to go again. I did notice that the employees at Top Golf seemed to be less rigid about the covid protocols. For example, there were more than six people in some of the bays, and there were a few big parties happening. This made me nervous. The covid cases are really on the rise, and I think we will need to revert to being even more cautious. I’m anticipating locking down like last spring.

The field near our house was full of cows and we saw a gorgeous hawk.

To end, a few cute pictures of Tom. He enjoyed the snow too, and wondered why he couldn’t catch the snowflakes. The window glass is full of paw prints from his furious attempts to catch snowflakes.