All of our cats are interested in fresh laundry but Floki is the one cat I can count on to always be there when clean laundry is ready to be folded.
Photo Friday: King of the Laundry
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Author Archives: Charles Huss
Fearless Cats
I hope all of our American friends had a great Fourth of July. I know it can be a difficult day for people with pets, but our pets are not normal.
I vacuumed the house in the morning while Chris and Frankie were napping in the Florida room. They weren’t bothered by the noise in the slightest.
Later that evening is when the fireworks started. Judging by the sound, a very close neighbor spent a fortune on fireworks. I think it peaked around 9:30 when there was a continuous stream of loud bangs over our house but all of our cats were napping on our bed like nothing was going on.
How did your pets handle the Fourth of July?
Photo Friday: Time For a Rest
Here is Frankie on a recent walk. During our walks, he often takes a time out for some rest and relaxation.
Making the Bed… With Cats
Here is something I posted in 2014 for Throwback Thursday but I could have just as easily posted it today. Somethings just never change.
I have learned that if you want to get a cat’s attention, start making the bed. They could all be sleeping in the other room but once you start to pull the sheets up, you’ve got a party.
I didn’t always know that bed making was a favorite activity of many cats. I first noticed it with our cat Tigger many years ago. I would pick him up and put him on the floor and he would jump right back up on the bed. This became the routine every morning. I started singing a song by Chumbawamba while making the bed; “I get knocked down but I get up again. You’re never going to keep me down.” I never knew the rest of the lyrics so I would just repeat those to Tigger while I struggled to finish the bed.
Now that Tigger is gone, Chris and Puck are happy to…
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Bad Cat Chris versus Just Fur Laughs
About a year after I started this blog, I started another blog called Just Fur Laughs. It is a blog featuring memes with animals. I worked on it diligently at first but after a while it sort of faded into the background.
Meanwhile, Bad Cat Chris continued to gain followers on the blog but not so much on the Facebook page. So I decided to put Chris in charge of the Facebook page and he managed to get 2500 followers by 2015. At the same time, or maybe shortly before, I considered dropping the Just Fur Laughs Facebook page for a lack of followers.
Since 2015 however, Chris has pulled in less than 300 more followers and is at 2792. I’m not sure why that is because we post on that page quite often. Just Fur Laughs’ Facebook Page, on the other hand, has been steadily climbing lately and I am not sure why because I have not been very consistent about adding new content, although I plan to do better.
Even though Bad Cat Chris has way more blog followers. Facebook is a different story. Every day recently I noticed that Just Fur Laughs was gaining and has now surpassed Chris with 2846 followers as of Tuesday morning.
I guess the reason I am writing this is because I don’t know how I feel. On the one hand, I am very happy that people like my work, but on the other hand, I wonder why Chris’s Facebook page has become stagnant. I guess even after all these years I am still learning. What do you think?
Volunteering Again
The SPCA announced recently that they were allowing the volunteers to come back. I took that opportunity to trade my 4-7 shift on Thursdays for a 1-4 shift on Fridays. This means that I will be volunteering at the same time I am on call at the Red Cross but I have gone on two calls in six months so I thoght it would be no problem.
When I walked into the cat room I noticed that all of the pods were empty, at least all that I could see.
I thought maybe they moved the cats and didn’t tell me but as I continued I saw a pod with four cats in it. I was pleasantly surprised to find seven of the eight cat pods empty. The next room has the smaller cages where cats are kept in isolation, either because they are recovering from surgery, they have a special diet, or the don’t play well with others.
There were four cats in that room, including a very friendly black cat named Sassy who had a skin condition from a flea allergy. I took her photo but it is too blurry to post.
There were also six kittens in the room in three separate cages, probably separated by litter. There were two black kittens that I failed to get pictures of. There was also a single gold and white kitten who was curious but shy.
Then there was three kittens together in one cage, a ginger boy and two females including one tabby and one tortie.
The ginger kitten was the most outgoing of the three and would come down from the shelf for attention.
The four cats inside the pod were pretty shy except for a white and gold cat named Max.
When Max wasn’t busy catching some rays he was busy looking for attention
While I was there, a man and his two boys came in shortly before a woman. All of them decided they wanted to adopt the ginger kitten but the woman recognized that the man was first and let him take the kitten. Perhaps if he didn’t have two young boys who wanted the kitten, he might have let her have him. Unfortunately, the woman left without a cat.
Another woman, who had been in earlier, decided to adopt an eight year old male Siamese cat named Sage. He was hiding under their homemade cat tree so I had to pull him out and put him in a carrier. I’m sure he wasn’t happy about it then but today he is living the good life.
While I was there I spoke with someone about doing animal transports. It is an on call position that I know almost nothing about yet but she did ask if I would be comfortable handling wildlife and mentioned birds of prey and a few others that I don’t remember. My guess is these are animals that are injured and need medical attention but I don’t know. I have an appointment to meet with her at 7:00 am this morning where I will learn more about the job. I think it will be interesting.
Photo Friday: Young Chris and Tigger
Here is a photo from ten years ago of Chris and Tigger. It was taken when we lived in Myrtle Beach on June 28, 2010. It shows Chris was as touchy-feely back then as he is today.
Happy Father’s Day
Happy Father’s Day to all the Dad’s reading this.
In our house, as far as our cat’s are concerned, Chris is like the father figure, especially to Floki.
My father passed away in 1999, but I still miss him. Here he is with his father in 1988.
While it is sad that my dad was gone before his time, there is also reason to celebrate because my son is celebrating his first Father’s Day as a new dad.
Photo Friday: Balcony Cats
My wife was promoted to property manager in 2009 and transferred to Myrtle Beach to run a property there. We got a third-floor apartment at the back of the property. If I remember correctly she wanted to be out of the way so most residents wouldnt know where we lived.
I rigged screening around the balcony railing with double-sided tape so the cats could go outside without the temptation to jump down. I also attached screening to long pieces of wood and hung them from the top of the balcony so the cats couldn’t jump onto the railing and possibly hurt themselves by falling off. That screening was then rolled up when not in use so nobody would notice it was there.
All of these photos were taken almost ten years ago on June 21, 2010 using a digital camera that was outdated even for the time, so forgive the quality.
The pool noodles were added after we adopted Chris because he was able to squeeze his body under the railing and jump down from the third floor. (see here).
So what do you think of our little trip to the past?
Patio Life
This is from 2014 for Throwback Thursday. Back then we had a nice patio for the cats. Hopefully, someday we will again.
Here on the west coast of Florida, it gets pretty hot in the summer. It seems almost every afternoon the temperature is at or near 95 degrees Fahrenheit. There is also a high humidity in the summer that makes being outside during midday quite unpleasant. We try to limit our outdoor activities to the mornings or late afternoons.
Chris and Puck feel that way too. Often they use that time to nap on the sofa or, in Chris’s case, find a human to bother. Frankie is different. I often look out the window to see him napping on the patio during the hottest part of the afternoon. He must be part camel or something because he spends much of his day outside in the heat and does not seem to be bothered by it in the least. Perhaps he still retains some of the traits of his distant ancestor, the African Wildcat.
