We went on a short trip recently and I wanted to show you pictures of Chris and Frankie before and after the trip.
Before:
After:
Can you tell these photos are three days apart?
Chris has not been feeling well for the past week or so. He spends more time than usual resting.
When he is not resting, I hear plenty of sniffles and sneezes. Often he will get on my lap just in time for a sneezing attack. Lucky me.
This is a story about a cat I called Lucky. At the time I did not realize how wrong I would be about choosing that name and also how right I would be.
It started on a Saturday Night, October 8, 2005. Our neighbor across the street, Doug, called and said there was an injured kitten under my wife’s car and it was hissing when he tried to get close. Of course, the last thing we needed was another cat (we had six then) but we couldn’t leave it there.
I went outside and tried to coax the kitten out from under the car but she was not going to budge. I didn’t know the sex of the kitten at the time but we found out later it was a female. Her front paw looked broken and she had a hard time moving. She hissed at me a few times, probably because she was scared, but she never tried to bite me.
I put some dry food near her and she ate it all, so I gave her some wet food and a little water. She was very hungry and thirsty. Since I couldn’t get her out from under the car, I decided to move the car. I very carefully backed it up while Rose and her son’s girlfriend watched for any movement. Rose threw a towel over her as soon as the car was clear and we very carefully moved her to the garage.
We got her into the garage and put her on a couple of towels. That’s when we noticed a chunk of skin about the size of a quarter, maybe bigger, missing from her hind quarter. She also had cuts on one of her ears and it looked like her jaw was slightly out of alignment. We suspected right away, but we knew then, that a car hit her.
Rose put some antibacterial ointment on her wounds and we moved her near the door and made a make-shift barricade around her so she wouldn’t hurt herself further in the garage. I gave her some food and water and checked on her a few times before we went to bed.
At the time we were raising two boys and six cats and did not have money to spare so a large vet bill for a stray cat was not in our budget. Because of that, we decided to bring her to the SPCA in New Port Richey, Florida, which opened at noon the next day. We got there when they opened and they turned us away before we even got to the door. They said they had no vet on duty and they were full. Vet or no vet, full or not full, they were still in a better position to help an injured cat than I was and should have done something. Since then I have not been a fan of the SPCA, even though I know I shouldn’t judge because of one incident.
Rose was very upset and said to the person at the SPCA, “What are we supposed to do, put him back on the side of the road?” They did give us a list of vets in the area and I called a place called Little Animal Hospital, which was named that because they were on Little Road. They told us to bring the cat in, which we did.
When we got there they took the cat in the back while we waited in the front. We noticed there was a big window showing a room full of cats that needed to be adopted. It was nice to know that they cared enough to do that. A few minutes later we were called to the back where we spoke to the vet.
She told us her foot was broken and would need to be amputated. There was also unknown internal injuries. We didn’t even ask about the cost because we knew that the surgery, combined with all the other rehabilitation costs, as well as the costs of getting her spayed and immunized would be way more than we could afford. Our other choice was to have her put to sleep. I didn’t like that idea but there seemed to be no other choice so we agreed to that, paid the $73 bill and left feeling horrible.
On the way home I told Rose we made a mistake. This little kitten needed us to save her and we failed. We should have arranged to make payments or something. Rose agreed with me but it was too late.
Around the same time, Rose’s Mom was looking to adopt a cat so Rose told her about the cats at the vet’s office that were for adoption. She found a Maine Coon cat there that she adopted and named Monkey.
She also came back with a story that we were very happy to hear. Our little girl lucky was not Euthanized. The vet decided to try to save her. They did not amputate her paw either. She did require a lot of rehabilitation. Just using the litter box required human help for many weeks until she healed. I do not know what happened to her after that but I was very glad that the story had a happy ending.
All my recent cat photos are still on my camera and Chris is on my lap so I decided to look through old photos for something to post today. As some of you know, my wife and I spent 16 months in Myrtle Beach between mid 2009 and late 2010. It is where we adopted Chris late in 2009. While there we enjoyed going to a place called Murrell’s Inlet.
Murrell’s Inlet had several shops and restaurants, one of which was called Creek Ratz. We liked eating there but I also enjoyed the company of a stray cat that was a regular visitor at the restaurant. I would always order a salad with grilled chicken when he was around and then slip him most of the chicken.
We have literally dozens of toy mice in our house but Floki only likes one of them. Actually, “like” is too weak of a word. He loves this one mouse. I often see him chasing it around the house and sometimes the play will last for a half-hour or even longer.
The problem is, the mouse gets lost quite often. My wife is always telling me to “find Floki’s mouse.” The fist place I look is under the coffee table, which has an opening big enough for a mouse but not big enough for the Siamese cat that’s chasing it. I also check under the beds, under the sofa, and in the closets. Sometimes it’s hiding in the closet.
While I am looking, Floki follows me around, waiting for me to find it. Sometimes I think he knows where his mouse is but he enjoys watching me look for it. I think that because there have been a few times when I couldn’t find it and gave up. I would then see Floki playing with it an hour later.
I want to buy a few more of the same mice but a web search revealed no results. I was hoping someone out there could help me identify who makes it so I can by more. Here is what it looks like.
It has a furry cover around what seems to be a plastic interior. It is not soft like some stuffed mice although the plastic is probably hollow so it has some give to it.
If you have seen this mouse please call Crimestoppers let me know in the comments. If you haven’t seen it, tell me about another mouse that your cat loves.
Chris and Frankie’s relationship is back to normal but I’m not sure how happy Frankie is about it. The look on his face here is a classic “help me” look.
In my mind he is saying, “Please save me from this annoying cat.”
What do you do when you missed the lizard you were after?
You look around to see if anyone saw you, of course.
We had a nice Christmas and I appreciate all the well wishes. My son and best friend came over and we had more food for lunch than anyone should be allowed to eat. Afterward, we all felt like taking a nap.
Meanwhile, our cats beat us to it.
How was your Christmas? Was there any napping going on?
Frankie, Chris, and Floki want to wish everyone a Very Merry Christmas.
As my gift to you, my Kindle book, Bad Cat Chris: The Baddest Cat You’ll Ever Love, will be free all day on Christmas. It is five years old now but if you haven’t read it and are interested in what we went through after adopting Chris, I encourage you to pick up a copy while it is free. The special is from midnight to midnight Pacific time.
Things are pretty much back to normal in our house since the big fight on Monday morning.
I brought Chris to the vet on Monday afternoon but the vet didn’t find anything wrong with him, other than his weight. We didn’t do blood tests because it didn’t seem necessary but Rose thought it would be a good idea since Chris seems more lethargic lately so we decided to bring him to Frankie’s appointment that Thursday.
Chris and Frankie were separated for a little over a day. After introducing them back on Tuesday morning, Frankie was trying to be nice but Chris didn’t trust him and growled at him for a while. I went to work so I didn’t see anything but Rose sent me this photo.
It was an uneasy truce but it was a truce.
By Thursday things were mostly back to normal.
By Friday everything was completely back to normal.
I don’t know any human who would be best friends with the guy who tried to beat the crap out of him four days earlier.
I took Chris to the vet for blood work and got the results on Friday. Everything is good except for a couple of things that are in a grey area. So for now, we will go on like nothing happened.
