Tag Archives: Cats

Four Sick Cats

Our house has been turned upside down lately with all the illnesses going around. I don’t know how it started. Frankie has been sneezing for several months. We even took him to the vet for it back in April, but he never really got better. I thought it might be an allergy, but it persisted through an entire season.

Floki had a slight eye infection when we got him and a day or two later I noticed him sneezing like Frankie. About a week or so after that, Frankie also had an eye infection, but his was worse than Floki’s ever was, at least since he has been with us. If that wasn’t bad enough, Frankie started sneezing more and had snot coming out of his nose.

We brought Frankie to the vet on Friday, and they gave him antibiotics and eye medicine. The next morning, he still looked bad, but now he was sneezing up blood. I am not a fan of antibiotics, but since that is what he got we wanted to give it a few days to see if it would start working.

Also during the weekend, Puck developed an eye infection so we started putting Frankie’s eye medication on both Puck and Flokie as well as Frankie. Chris was the only one who seemed unaffected… until yesterday.

Yesterday morning I heard Chris sneeze a couple of times. That was disappointing because Chris is our rock. He rarely gets sick, probably because he has never had antibiotics or steroids. Those things will really mess with your natural immune system.

By last night, Frankie still looked pretty bad.

20160718_Cats_2267 Frankie

My new job is working for a company that makes natural herbal health products. One of the things they sell is colloidal silver. I thought maybe I could pick up a bottle of that and it would be a good natural treatment for not only the eyes but it can also be taken internally to help treat the sneezing.

Unfortunately, things got worse overnight. Frankie spent the entire night sleeping on the rug by the side door. When we got up the next morning, the door was spattered with Frankie’s blood.

20160719_Cats_2268 blood on door

So Rose decided to call the vet when they opened at 7:30 and was able to get an 8:20 appointment. I had a chiropractor appointment, so I was not able to go.

Later, Rose told me that “they just filled him with lots of drugs” or something to that effect. She said they gave him steroids, antibiotics, antihistamine and probably anything else that was profitable for them. She did say Frankie gave them a very hard time when they tried to get a pill in him. Can you blame him?

So far this past week Frankie has cost us $500 and they want to see both him and Floki on Friday for vaccinations. Rose’s sister says that Floki got some of his shots but not all. I don’t know what he is missing but I would very much prefer that both of them NOT get anymore shots.

When I got home from work, Rose said she was worried about Chris because he was very lethargic all day. He stayed in one spot on the cat tree, never coming down to eat, drink or use the litter box. He did come down when I got home and I tried feeding him wet food but he wasn’t interested. I decided it might do him some good to eat grass, so I let him outside for a while.

He went straight for the grass like I knew he would.

20160719_185022 Chris

I think that revived him a bit because he suddenly became adventurous and went around to the other side of the house.

20160719_190239 Chris

By this time, he seemed much more perky and ventured into the neighbor’s carport. That is when I picked him up and brought him home.

By the way, I did buy the colloidal silver, but things are complicated with all the medications we have. So, we will put Floki’s eye medicine on Floki, Frankie’s medication on Frankie, and Caeser will get what is Caeser’s. Wait… I mean, Puck will get the silver, and we shall see what happens.

Meet Floki, Our Newest Addition

Meet Floki, Part 2

Another Vet Visit For Frankie

Frankie Update

Photo Friday: The Enemy of my Enemy…

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This picture was taken the day we adopted our kitten, Floki. I think they were discussing how to take him down when they fell asleep.

Meet Floki, Part 2

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At this point I think I could write a book about adopting our latest kitten. Instead, I just posted the related links at the bottom of this post so if you have missed what is going on, and if you have a bunch of free time, you can catch up.

Our last episode ended up with our heroes trying to rescue a kitten from the dreaded carrier. By “rescue” I mean they hissed and whacked at him, especially Frankie, but the kitten endured and seemed to be having a good time exploring the house. Whenever Frankie would approach him in a threatening manner, the kitten would hide under the sofa or wherever he would fit and Frankie would not. Once the danger passed, he was out running around again.

Once things settled down a little, I opened a can of cat food and split it in fourths. Chris never eats much of his wet food and this time Frankie didn’t eat much either. The kitten, however, ate like a pig. I had to keep adding food to his plate.

Later that evening we sat down and watched a little television. The kitten was pretty busy since we brought him home and we wanted him to take a nap so Rose held him on her lap for a while.

That calmed him down but sleeping was not on the agenda.

He then found his way to my lap where he dosed off at 9:30. At 9:31 he was awake and ready for the day. That lasted until 10:00 when he fell asleep again… for five full minutes.

We went to bed sometime after 11:00. At this point the kitten had been awake for at least 12 hours straight, minus six minutes. We didn’t want to close our bedroom door and “throw him to the wolves.” so to speak, so he slept on the bed with us. Rose was worried about squishing him in the night but he survived.

The following evening we had to think of a name for him. Rose and I were both reading through seperate lists of cat names but nothing sounded right. Finally I said “Rollo” from the show Vikings. I had a new appreciation for the character when I discovered that he was an ancestor of mine (I also learned he probably never even met Ragnar). Rollo seemed like a great name for a cat but another character from the show, Floki, seemed even better. So Floki it is.

Today the cats are still jealous of Floki but nobody is fighting with him except for the occasional hiss and whack. Rose worked from home the last two days but today they will be without supervision all day. Let’s hope the peace lasts.
Related Posts:

A New Fourth Kitty

The Kitten Dilema

We Came, We Saw, We Left With No Kitten

Meet Floki, Our Newest Addition

A New Fourth Kitty?

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My sister-in-law is at it again. She has been busy saving the lives of more kittens and still has one gold kitten that will need a home soon. Rose has been hinting that she wants to adopt him but emotional decisions do not always end well. Let’s consider the pros and cons, starting with the cons:

We are already over our two cat limit.
Raising cats the healthy way is expensive.
We already have three boys. Perhaps a girl is needed.
Our dream of traveling after retirement could be more difficult.
We would be dangerously close to entering the Crazy Cat Lady/Man Zone.

Now for the pros:

Chris is a very touchy-feely cat. He might like having someone else to nap with.
Cats can tolerate a new kitten better than a new adult cat.
A new kitten might motivate me to start making my own cat food.
We would be helping a kitten in need.
Retirement is still more than 10 years away, 20 if they keep raising the retirement age.
Kittens are super cute.

I do not yet have a picture of the kitten but I snagged this picture off of Pixabay. It is what I imagine he looks like.

Photo by Rudy and Peter Skitterians, Skitterphoto on Pixabay.

So what do you think? Any suggestions?

On another note, I actually won the Tuesday Teaser on One Spoiled Cat and get to display this badge.

I had a long streak of missing the Teaser but catching the Tell-All the next day.

Morning Sunbathing

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Cats, like humans, follow a routine. Our cats are no different. Our catio has awnings that block the sun most of the day but there is a great chance to catch some rays after the sun comes up and all our cats usually take advantage of that. In fact, as I write this, Chris and Puck are lying in the sunbeam. I don’t know where Frankie is off to now but he is usually here to enjoy the sun.

Fourth Blogiversary

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I know I just celebrated my 500th post two days ago but today is my fourth blogiversary. According to WordPress, the anniversary of this blog was Wednesday, the same day as my 500th blog post, but they are using the date that I registered for the blog from WordPress.com. I go by the date of my first blog post, which was June 3, 2012, Since then I have met a lot of great people, and pets, along the way, and I have had a lot of fun.

Here are some stats about the blog you might be interested in:

The most popular day for this blog is Thursday.
The most popular hour is 1:00 p.m. Hmm… maybe I should schedule posts for just before 1:00.
My most prolific commentor is Summer from Sparkle Cat. Very close behind is The Island Cats, Ellen Pilch from 15 and Meowing. and Sammy from One Spoiled Cat.
My most viewed post this year was Are Ginger Cats Friendlier? which was posted in 2013. The second most viewed post was Feral Cat Ear Notching, posted in 2014.
Readers this year come from 86 countries. The U.S. is first followed by The U.K., France, Australia, Finland, Canada, South Africa, Brazil, New Zealand and Switzerland.

Since this post is interrupting my regular Photo Friday post, I thought I would end with a picture taken on the day this blog started. That’s what I thought but I didn’t take any pictures that day so here is one I found from almost two weeks later.

I used this picture on Chris’s Twitter page but I don’t think I ever posted it here. I like it because it is related to my last post and shows that Chris has always been a good lizard catcher. I actually found another picture of Chris with a lizard from a day or two earlier than this but the quality was not good.

In closing, I just want to thank you all for reading this blog and being so nice in your comments. I hope blog here for many more years.

King of the Lizard Catchers

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Sunday I decided to take Frankie for a walk. He loves to be outside but since he is an adventurer, I have to bring him out on a leash and harness. That means he doesn’t go out much because I am either too busy, too tired, it’s too hot outside, or I am just plain lazy. These are the same reasons I don’t have a dog.

Frankie likes to travel in a straight line down the sidewalk, like he knows what it is for, pausing occasionally to smell stuff and then moving on.

I let him lead and keep hoping he will eventually start travelling back toward home but he rarely does. I usually have to pick him up and carry him home. I tried to pick him up on this day but he would have none of it and changed direction on his own and headed home.

When we got home he walked up to the front door, instead of the usual side door, and I opened it a bit for him to go inside but he changed his mind. I changed it back for him and picked him up and put him inside.

Chris was at the door wondering why Frankie got to go outside without him so I let Chris out. Chris usually goes out the side door and eats grass next to the driveway so this was a bit of a treat for him.

He started by looking for lizards but found none so he ate a little grass for a while.

Before I knew what was going on, Chris was at the door with a lizard in his mouth. Even with his added girth, he is still the King of the Lizard Catchers.

I tried unsuccessfully to get him to give up his lizard but he is stubborn. Finally I was able to get him to drop it and the lizard ran away, but Chris was off in hot pursuit. He caught him, lost him and followed him into the brush to catch him again. Check out the video of the incident below.

Just so you know, the lizard survived the ordeal.

500th Post

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It is hard to believe that I have been blogging about my cat for almost four years now and have today written the 500th post for Bad Cat Chris.

When I started, I told Chris’s story from the beginning in short Anecdotes. I worried that when I reached the present, I would have difficulties finding things to talk about. I was wrong.

Chris, Frankie and Puck are a source of daily entertainment. Much of what they do is worth sharing and I enjoy sharing it. I even have another lizard video coming up if I can find time to edit it. Thank you all for reading this blog and I look forward to many more stories.

Goodbye My Ferals

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I am starting a new job on Tuesday so Friday was the last time I will see my feral cats at work. The week and a half after I gave my notice I saw very little of them. Sometimes I would put food out at 8 a.m. and it would still be there at noon. Other times it would be gone but I couldn’t be sure the birds weren’t eating it. I was actually glad about that because it meant that the cats didn’t need me and I could stop worrying about not being there for them.

Then the shy one showed up on Tuesday morning.

I was off on Wednesday and the gold and white cat was there Thursday morning, waiting in the parking lot for me.

On my last day both the gold and white cat and the grey and white were there waiting.

I feel bad about leaving them but I do have to live my life too.

I’ll leave you with more recent pictures since I won’t be taking any more. So sad.

Photo Friday: Lost and Found

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I ran across this picture in my downloads folder and I really liked it but I thought it was odd because I don’t remember ever seeing it before. I must have seen it or I wouldn’t have downloaded it. That brings up another mystery, Why would I download my picture? It’s possible I was looking for a picture on my Flickr page, saw this one, and decided I could use it for something. I guess what really bothers me is the fact that Rose is right. If I develop Alzheimer’s, nobody will notice.

This is a picture of our three cats, Chris, Tigger and Abbey (in the background). It was taken February 12, 2011, three months after returning from South Carolina where we found Chris. Chris is three months shy of his second birthday in this picture. Sadly, only Chris remains of the three.