We don’t know when Chris was born but I set his birthday at six months before we adopted him, May 14, which I missed. Sorry Chris. Here he is sleeping with Frankie. When Chris was young, he was far from a normal cat because he rarely napped. He was always up and getting into trouble. He still naps less than Frankie or Puck but he is closer to normal now.
My friend was at our house on Sunday and as he was coming in Chris ran out the door. With quick reflexes, my friend grabbed Chris before he made it past the first stair. Unfortunately, the delay in closing the door was long enough for Frankie to slip out. That, in turn, was the distraction Chris needed to get away as well.
Chris usually stays close so I don’t worry too much about him. Mostly he just eats grass but he will wander away if given enough time.
Frankie is the one I worry about because he just takes off. I think he searches the neighborhood for fleas, at least that seems to be the result sometimes. If he is not going under homes then he is hiding under cars so I can’t catch him.
On this day I just gave up and waited until Frankie was ready. While I was waiting I retrieved Chris and put him in the house. Eventually, Frankie came out of hiding and I coaxed him to the front door. I didn’t want to scare him by trying to pick him up so I just opened the door and let him walk inside.
But wait…. As he was about to enter the house I could almost swear he had a look of surprise on his face like he thought he was about to explore a strangers house and found out it was his own. When he saw where he was he quickly turned around and ran off. Not long after that I found him too pooped to resist and carried him home.
At dinnertime in our house, Chris is, surprisingly, our best behaved cat. Last night I was cooking steak and they all lined up waiting for it to be done because they know I am a sucker and will give them some.
Frankie is the worst. He will just steal a big chunk of meat off my plate and eat it with no remorse.
Puck is a little better than Frankie but Puck is all about food, always has been. That is part of the reason we named him Puck. Think Wolfgang.
Chris, and to some degree Puck, are dainty eaters when it comes to meat. They don’t like large chunks so I have to make sure they have little pieces. It is like I am feeding babies instead of full-grown carnivores.
Frankie could live in the wild and probably did. He has no trouble scarfing down big chunks of steak.
Yes, we have spoiled our pets and created beggars and thieves, but why not? We don’t have to worry about them going to college and getting a good job or a nice woman. They are only with us for a short time so why not spoil them?
My wife sometimes works from home and has do deal with this whenever she gets up to take a break.
I have been around cats long enough to be able to predict their behavior somewhat and not be surprised by behavior I didn’t predict. Of course, predicting behavior and understanding it are two different things and I sometimes think I will never understand why cats behave the way they do.
Chris, for example, will often straddle Puck and hold him down by the neck and then he will wash him like nothing ever happened. It seems like he’s showing his dominance but Puck never challenges Chris’s position so I don’t know why he feels compelled to do what he does. If anything, Frankie is the one that challenges Chris leadership but Chris doesn’t hold him down by the neck although he does whack him from time to time.
This photo of Frankie and Puck would make a great print, if only I had a printer that wasn’t jammed with a cat.
Puck’s last vet visit left us with some hope. We went to a new place called The Animal & Bird Medical Center of Palm Harbor for Puck’s over-grooming problem. The vet put him on a limited ingredient diet and didn’t push the steroids and antibiotics that most vets use to solve all problems that cats have. He did suggest antibiotics as an option but did not push it. He also suggested a Feliway diffuser to help with Puck’s stress, which we bought and plugged in between the Catio and living room.
Unfortunately, after giving the diet and Feliway a good amount of time to work, we saw little improvement. I then tried changing their water and gave them bottled spring water. Puck seemed to improve slightly after that but then got worse again. I hesitated to bring him back to the vet for fear that they would use the nuclear option of steroids and antibiotics but I had to do something so I made an appointment for last Saturday.
My wife went with us this time and just as we were ready to put Puck in his cat carrier, Frankie went inside of it and I couldn’t get him out. I tried reaching in and pushing but that didn’t work. I then picked up the carrier and turned it so the opening was facing the floor but Frankie held on like he was Spidercat. I finally had to shake it to convince him that maybe there were better places to nap.
Puck was good and didn’t cry one time on the way to the vet but when the vet tech needed to get him out of the carrier he decided to apply the lessons he learned from Frankie and made it very difficult for her.
After the vet tech left, Puck just stayed where he was. If that was Chris, he would be exploring the exam room.
We saw Dr. Murphy, the owner of the clinic. Dr. Murphy had a lot of good reviews when I was originally looking for a new vet and I noticed he was trained in traditional and holistic medicine, which is what I was looking for. Puck saw another vet the first time we came but I wasn’t disappointed. He seemed to know what he was doing.
The Doctor ran a flea comb through what was left of Puck’s fur and found no sign of the little buggers but he still suspected fleas might be the culprit. I have not been a fan of putting poison on the cats and even bought a container of Diatomaceous Earth, which is a natural, edible product that kills fleas, to spread around their napping areas. Rose is more concerned about effectiveness and has insisted we treat our cats with Advantage for several months now. That started when Frankie escaped and came home with a flea.
We told the vet we were using Advantage and he said it no longer works in our county because the fleas have become resistant to it. Later he said that it doesn’t work in the entire state of Florida. That was a shock because it is very expensive. It’s $58 for six treatments on Amazon but we were buying it locally at Petsmart and paying around $80 or so, with the two pack being much more per dosage. A lot of money for a product that doesn’t work.
He said Revolution works 90% of the time and it has the added benefit of preventing heartworm. He seemed to think it is very safe for the cat. He also recommended another product that was even better but only controlled fleas. That product was called Activyl.
In the end, Puck ended up getting a shot of Steroids and antibiotics. I think I should find a supply of steroids and antibiotics and start treating cats in the neighborhood for a fee because that is always the solution. Do you think I’d get in trouble? Actually, the vet was very nice and really seemed to care so I need to trust that he knows what he is doing.
We also got a tube o Activyl for each of the cats and the doctor put it on Puck. He said he wanted us to use that for six months and by then we should know if fleas are Puck’s problem. After six months, he recommended we switch to Revolution for the added heartworm protection.
Rose was also convinced she saw tiny black spots on Chris and Frankie’s tails, indicating fleas were there, even though there were no fleas found on any of the cats. Nevertheless, she also had them add a shampoo to our bill which ended up to be about $230.
When we got home, Chris and Frankie were more interested in Puck’s carrier then they were in Puck.
It wasn’t long before they forgot about that because Rose decided to wash their tails and backside. Chris was first and he was miserable to deal with. He spent the entire time growling, hissing and crying while he struggled to get free.
He then went into the living room to groom himself. Frankie was very curious what happened to him but he soon found out. At least Frankie was a little better behaved than Chris.
It wasn’t long before Frankie was in the living room grooming himself too.
I sure hope this works for Puck because I don’t know what else we can do.
I don’t know why sleeping cats are so cute but they certainly are.
I don’t usually get a picture of all three boys in the same place. Usually, if I notice it, I will reach for my camera or phone and by the time I turn it on and focus, one of them decides it’s time to go. That is what happened last night. I was trying to help a Rose with a work project and all three were on the table helping me. As soon as I got my phone out, Frankie left.
My wife started a new job a few months ago that allows her to work from home a couple of days per week. The company provided her with a laptop and she had been working on a small table on our patio. The cats are all interested in “helping” her with her work, especially “Chris” who helps the most.
One day, Chris almost got fired when he dumped a full cup of tea on the laptop. It stopped working and Rose immediately took the battery out and let it dry for a day. When that didn’t work she brought it to a local computer shop who did nothing for several days and then said she needed a new mother board. Fortunately, I thought they seemed shady so we picked up the computer, brought it home and it worked, so Chris got to keep his job.
Puck works behind the scenes rubbing the excess good luck that all black cats have onto Rose’s computer.
It didn’t take long before Rose realized that one table was not big enough for three cats and all her work so we bought a small desk and put it next to the table.
Now she has more room for her assistants.
It seems that gold cats also have good luck to share.
I’m sure all you pet bloggers out there can relate to this.
Bad Cat Chris 