Tag Archives: cat

A Nice Walk and Then a Freak-Out

18 Replies

Chris is a master at escaping. He knows how to stand back far enough and seem like he is not interested and then he is out the door like a flash. He typically stays close and I usually give him a few minutes before bringing him back in.

Frankie will run and make it a nightmare for anyone to catch him so he doesn’t get out as much, but I do feel guilty that Chris goes out and not him, so occasionally I put his harness on and take him for a walk. I did that last week and he was very happy about it.

After Frankie’s walk I wanted to let Puck go for a walk. He has not been outside since moving here so I put the harness on him, which was not easy, and opened the front door. I knew he would be a little shy at first but thought he would enjoy being outside. Unfortunately, we never made it that far.

A car drove by, which happens all the time when the door is closed, but this time Puck panicked and freaked out. He has been a bit more nervous lately and has been over-grooming himself to the point of licking himself bald so I have to pack him up now and bring him to his vet’s appointment.

Pay Attention to Me or Else…

34 Replies

Chris used to hang out in the bathroom with Rose while she got ready for work but he stopped doing that until recently. Now he is in the bathroom with her every morning taking up the little space she has. There is even less space in this house because there is a fan on the counter to compensate for the lack of an air conditioner vent in the bathroom.

Chris can stay with her as long as he stays on the other side of the sink, but that is too far for Chris so a conflict always arises. Rose either has to push him off the counter or she can ask for help in the form of, “Chuck, Come get you cat!”

This morning, Chris decided he was going to get attention one way or another so he got on the toilet and unwound the toilet paper roll. Maybe next time rose will think twice about sharing her space.

cat unwinds toilet paper

A New Level of Badness

36 Replies

“If this behavior continues, I will take that cat to the animal shelter so fast your head will spin!” Yes, those words actually came out of Rose’s mouth on Thursday morning. She wouldn’t really do that but she was very angry, and rightfully so.

To explain, I need to back up this story to last weekend when we got new furniture for our patio. We got a sofa/sleeper along with a baker’s rack and a dinette set. The sofa came with a sign in cat language that said, “SCRATCH ME,” so Chris and Frankie complied.

our new patio furniture

I covered it with a blanket and a couple of towels over the arms, not just because of the scratching but also to keep it clean and free of cat hair. When guests would come for a visit, we could remove the covers and they could wonder how we keep it so clean with three cats.

The covers didn’t completely stop the scratching. Chris would get under the towel and scratch the edge. That prompted Rose to buy a product called 3M Petcare scratch protection film, which is basically wide packing tape for ten times the cost. I put in on the corners and have not seen any cat scratch there since then.

Rose must have decided that the blanket was ugly so she folded it in half and placed it over the top of the couch only, leaving the seat cushions exposed. By now you probably see where I am going with this.

Thursday morning I did my usual chores. I gave the cat’s wet food, made coffee, scooped the boxes, swept the litter, put down fresh water and dry food, etc. Shortly before we were to leave for work, Rose walked onto the patio and said, “It smells like poop out here!” For this story, I have decided to substitute the word “poop” for another word.

“Can’t you smell that? Someone has pooped out here!” I did clean the boxes but they do tend to use them when they are clean.

“Oh my God! There is poop on the couch! Chris has pooped on my brand new sofa!”

Sure enough, there was a pile of poop on the seat cushion. That was bad enough, but instead of a nice hard poop that would be easy to clean, this was like soft serve ice cream. What a mess.

Chris has long had a problem with pooping outside the box but that problem went away two years ago when we moved into our last home. He always had a chronic loose stool but around the same time he stopped pooping on the floor, his poops got better too. I hope this doesn’t cause Chris to fall off the wagon.

To make matters worse, we hired a painter to paint our cabinets. He was here Wednesday and removed all our cabinet doors and drawers and brought them to his house to sand and paint them. With no doors, Chris was in the cabinet with our food, probably looking for treats or catnip. That happened right after he was yelled at for pooping.

bad cat chris in cabinet

 

I had enough and yelled at him and tried to pull him out but he put up heavy resistance. I finally got him out and finished getting ready for work. When I was leaving, I gave him a little pet goodby and he growled at me. I pet him again and he growled some more.

I don’t know why but I was actually upset about it on the way to work, even though I wasn’t the bad guy.

Feral Cat Update

29 Replies

Since my last post on the subject, I have seen the feral cat that has been eating the food I put out at work two or three more times. It is strange that I put food out for a month or more without seeing who was eating it, but now I see him almost every day I am at work. I call it “him” because it sounds better than “it” but I don’t know the sex of the cat. I know there have been other cats in the area. One even looks like a skinny Chris, but they have either moved on or are much shyer than my new friend.

The last time I pulled into the driveway at work, he was nearby. It almost seemed like he was waiting for me. I quickly went inside for the cat food, put a handful in the usual place, backed away to a safe distance, set my camera to “video” mode and waited for him to move to the food, but he didn’t move. He stood there waiting for me to leave. It was just as well. The camera lens had fogged up due to leaving the air condition truck to the warm, humid Florida outdoors.

I walked inside my work and wiped the fog off the camera lens. I then looked out the door to see he was no longer in sight. I walked outside and quietly walked to the edge of the building while zooming out the telephoto lens. I peeked around the corner and saw him eating the food I put out. I then pointed the camera in his direction and got off a couple of shots. I even made a noise so he would turn around and look. People driving by must have thought I was some weird voyeur or something.

Feral Cat

Feral CatI can’t wait to see if he is waiting for me on Monday. Maybe I should bring him a treat like sardines or something. What do you think?

Feral Cats at Work

15 Replies

We have feral cats that hang out behind where I work. I don’t see them very often and when I do it is from a distance. There is a large fenced in area that has been abandoned for about a year now, although the cats have been there much longer. Because seeing the cats is rare, I thought there was no colony of cats, just a few loners who’s territories intersect near my work. If there was a colony, I thought, my work is at the outside of their territory.

About a month ago I saw a cat walking the perimeter of the fence behind my work and I thought maybe the cat has a routine. As an experiment, I brought some food to work and put a handful near the fence, on a plastic Verizon cover. By the end of the day the food was gone so I decided to continue to put food out.

I don’t want to feel responsible for these cats because I only work four days a week, but I thought a handful of food three times a week would be more like a treat for them. I have been doing that for a month now, never seeing the cat, or cats, that have been eating it.

Yesterday morning, to my surprise, I went out with the food and surprised a beautiful feral cat that was walking across our parking lot. I don’t remember if it was the same cat I saw last month, but it could be. It immediately ran to the tall grass to take cover. I said some friendly words to it and then set down the food and went back inside, but I peeked out the door and watched the cat walk toward the food. I then quietly walked back outside and saw the cat eating the food I put out.

Feral cat

Later I went out again to empty the trash and saw the cat not far from the dumpster, watching me. He made no attempt to run away as a dumped the trash inside. 20150706_Feral cat_1809I went back inside and about ten minutes later I decided to bring out another handful of food. My hope was that the cat would see me as a friend, but when I got outside, a man on a riding lawn mower was outside and, of course, the cat was gone.

As I edited these pictures, I noticed the cat had its ear tipped, which means he is probably part of a TNR program. If that is the case, perhaps there is a colony nearby and perhaps someone is looking after them. I hope so.

On the Cat Walk

10 Replies

Saturday morning Chris and Frankie were being very loud and annoying in their efforts to be let outside. Since Chris was throwing up a lot on Friday and a little more that morning, I thought eating some grass might be good for him, so I let him out. He didn’t go for the grass as expected but instead went up the driveway and found Rose’s plants. He then did some nearby exploring before settling down and eating grass, which he soon  up when he got inside. I guess he needed that.

Bad Cat Chris in flower bed.

It was then Frankie’s turn. He’s a runner so I had to put his harness on before going out.

I then grabbed my Canon Powershot camera and then walked out the door with Frankie. The camera is about six years old, ancient but today’s standards, but it takes good pictures. It was also close and my good camera was in the closet, too far away to make an excited cat wait. I turned the dial to video mode, pushed the shutter button and off we went.

Frankie is quite the explorer and we went here, there and everywhere. He even saw a bunny before I did and ran after it, surprising me and probably him too when the leash tightened up. Towards the end of the walk we came across a couple of neighbors which made him a little nervous and hastened our return.

Later, when Rose’s mother and sister came to the house, I cooked some hamburgers and hotdogs on the grill. As I was bringing in a plate full of food, Frankie ran out the door. I quickly put my shoes on and went after him. Eventually I ended up on the next street over trying to coax Frankie out from under a car. I actually was giving him space, hoping he would move on.

That is when Rose’s sister, Felice (our hero kitten rescuer), showed up to help. She kneeled next to the car to see where he was at. I knew she was thinking about grabbing him and dragging him out from under the car but I remembered when I tried to do that Frankie scratched up my arm and became even more entrenched and angry as well. Felice managed to grab Frankie and drag him out without getting a scratch.

When everybody left, I was excited to upload the video I took of our walk but I had an unpleasant surprise. I discovered that the video was set to the smallest resolution possible. It was so small that it was essentially worthless except for maybe an iWatch.

I did find another video though. It was Frankie and me walking around the neighborhood for the first time about two weeks ago. That day Chris escaped when I took out Frankie. He normally stays close so I was trying to watch him while I was walking Frankie but he wandered too far and I had to put Frankie away and get Chris. When I came back out I couldn’t find him at first. When I did find him, I brought him in and took Frankie out again.

Walking a cat is not like walking a dog. They go where they want and if you try to influence them too much the resistance increases. The best I could do is keep him from going to far into people’s yards.

Cat Frankie outside