Ava and I went to Home Depot yesterday and got some half-inch by five-inch molding offcuts. We’re going to assemble a three-layer window insert that includes a cat door. The Beast, aka The Animal, aka Petapod, aka Oedipuss (and more, longer, sillier names), has responded to the arrival of sunshine by insisting, firmly, early in the morning, that he be allowed out to play. I have responded to his rhythmic, ceaseless meowling and prancing about at the foot of the bed with flicks of water, savage kicks through the bed-blankets, grumbles, and summary eviction from the sleeping quarters, but the strength of his craving for the outdoors exceeds all reason, and I’m tired of being woken up at five or six in the morning. Very well, then, the creature gets his own entrance.

Since Oedipuss comes conveniently equipped with his own RFID tag, my plan is to stick a 134KHz reader on the door and use it to control a solenoid rigged as a deadbolt. It’s a very small door, and it would be difficult for someone with nefarious intentions to fit more than an arm through it, but we’d still prefer to leave it locked. If the system works, the reader will simply retract the solenoid when the cat comes in range, and with luck the cat will never notice the “locked” state.

I spent yesterday afternoon helping out with a work party at ALTSpace. We got started around noon and tackled a long list of “wouldn’t it be nice if” projects. It was five hours of nonstop welding, cutting, drilling, screwing, pounding, and hauling, and it felt great.