8 posts tagged “cat”
I heard the cat out in the kitchen furiously lapping something up. When I ran out there to see what it was, I saw her face buried in 12-hour-old raw egg that had been used to coat pork chops last night. As soon as I approached, she shook her head about, flinging raw pork-infected egg all around the kitchen and even into her fur.
Usually I dump my egg dish and rinse the bowl immediately but she's never expressed interest in eggs so I didn't think it would be an issue if it waited until Mr. Val got around to dishes (which would be sometime this morning).
Now I'm just waiting for the vomit that is sure to follow this binging event. Oh lovely, she's sitting on my lap and the very moment I finished that sentence her stomach began to gurgle. Wee.
When the cat first adopted us we had her using a plain clay litter. After a couple of years I became worried about the effects of it on her health so I tried to get her to use a number of different litters. Of course I did it properly, changed her over gradually. Eventually we'd find that most litters would do some, but not all, of what we wanted. Most recently I tried P-Pod. I switched her over slowly and when she finally fully using it, I was in love. That litter never smelled bad, it was all natural and it was light and fluffy. Kitty seemed happy, I was happy.
Then there was the day we saw her pee on our cds. Hmm. What could it be? She seemed to take to the new litter so that couldn't be it. Then she started peeing on the floor of the bathroom where her litter is located. I gave her a second box of litter and ended up taking her to the vet and racking up about $300 in visits, shots and tests. Her urine sample indicated she might have an infection, but the vet thought that some levels were not as high as they would be in some infections. She decided to run a course of antibiotics to be safe since we couldn't peg a behavioral issue.
One course of antibiotics plus one week later and she's still peeing on the floor. No matter how quickly I've tried to clean it, our house has that pee odor now. Guh. I was at my wits end and decided to do an experiment. Since she now had two litter boxes, I decided to fill the newer one with the hands-down cheapest cat litter on the market. I found a bag of something called Soft Paws, it was $3.25 for 25 pounds, it was even less expensive than the store brand.
She's stopped peeing on the floor and loves her cheap, nasty, bad- for- her- and- probably- has- radioactive- materials- in- it clay litter. Go figure. At least I'll be saving loads of money but it'll still take me a couple of years to recoup the $300 vet bill.
Like real children, you cannot force your ideals on to your pet. So no environmentally-friendly and healthy litter in our house. Nothing but the worst for my baby.
- Many autumn leaves never fell of of some of the biggest trees in the State Office Campus last autumn. That changed with the high winds we've had in the past couple of days. This morning it looked like November when I left my house, there were brown leaves everywhere. When I drove through the State Offices I happily plowed through giant piles of swirling leaves. I don't know why, but in the fall this gives me great joy. It's like jumping into a pile of leaves but without the chiggers. It was a nice little treat this morning.
- In other, more interesting news, PZ Meyers was Expelled (but you'll have to read to the end to find out who wasn't).
- In other, less interesting, but more personal news, kitty has a second littler box (in a bathroom the size of an outhouse) and will be visiting the vet this afternoon (how can you not be in love with a practice called "Just Cats"?...I guess maybe if you only had a dog).
- In other, more interesting and personal news, if I play my cards right, I'll get to hang out with Myke next week! Feeling jealous? You should be!!
This is a cat post, I need some help from the cat people here on Vox.
Last weekend Mr. Val and I watched in horror while the cat stood on a batch of our cds and just peed away. We spent the next two hours cleaning cds, cases, drying inserts and being pretty angry. It's not the first time she's attacked our cd collection, a couple of years ago she did it much worse and it was obvious that it was in retaliation for food or litter, I figured it out at the time.
So now our music is completely inaccessible to her (or us for that matter). Problem solved, right? Wrong.
When I went to change her litter last night I noticed that she had been using one corner of the bathroom just for peeing. I thought the litter had seemed exceptionally easy this week. Before I went to bed, I checked the corner again and - PEE! This morning I went downstairs and found the corner dry...until I was on my way back upstairs and I caught her in the act. There she was, just standing on the floor peeing away (and in very cat-like fashion, she tried to cover it up with the tile flooring).
What the hell? I finally nailed down her diet, so she's eating well without vomiting (which was a problem for years), we did only switch to this litter a couple of months ago, but she took to it right away and seems to like it (and was peeing in it until last week).
Should I move the litter box from poo corner to pee corner? The litter box has been there for 9 years, I would think moving it would be a bad idea. Should I just get some shit litter and put it in a second tray in pee corner?
Oh, and another note, she WAS toilet trained when we got her. We thought it was cool so we left up the lid for her. But when I later caught her also DRINKING out of the terlet we started closing the lid. Maybe letting her at the toilet again might not be a bad idea?
Halp!! I have no idea what to do. She seems so normal, healthy and playful as usual, I can't figure out what's going on here.
Holy shit folks, I dragged my ass out of bed on a Saturday morning and actually DID something. It's been a while. I didn't even have to make a list to motivate me (although the ladies in the 'hood with their lists are doing that for me). Saturday's have been too good for snuggling down under the covers for the past two months.
I started out at Target, they have some bookshelves on sale that I wanted to get. They were out of the 5 shelf (why wouldn't they be?), so I grabbed a 3 shelf one and headed to the new nearby Lowe's for more paint samples. Driving back by the Target I was tempted to swing back in and grab a second of the 3 shelf cases but resisted. By the time I hit the Interstate I was regretting not going back.
I made my first trek out to the Winter Farmer's Market this year. There are still apples and plenty of veggies, but I was there for syrup and beef. I also wanted some corn for popping and garlic, but no such luck. I did, however, find the Troy Pork Store and got some landjäger, franks, chops and sausage. Yum.
I decided to head back to Target after all, I felt like it was a race to get in there and grab that last shelf before someone else did (the sale knocked like $20 off the shelves, which is pretty good and I am in desperate need of shelving). I made it, got the second 3-shelf case and grabbed the last two 2-shelf cases. It all (amazingly) fit into my car (thank goodness for fold-down seats!).
It wasn't until I was unloading the car that I saw they were made in China. Ugh. Nothing against China, but it's like the country exists just so we can furnish our homes with STUFF. Then I noticed the shelves were made of Melamine. Great, now my cat will eat it and die a terrible death. (I do realize it's Malamine resin in the shelves, but it still made me laugh.)
Warning: Cat Talk Ahead
Hey, speaking of, I've been trying a few new soft cat foods for my little baby. Right now she's eating Wellness which is like a freaking dollar for the small can, but it has the BEST ingredient list (yeah, I'd eat it on a dare). I picked up a few random cans of stuff that a had similar (but not as good) ingredients list. The first kind (and I can't remember what it was now), was some brand out of Texas and she LOVED it (and it even smelled good). Problem was, she vomited it up and that's the big problem I have with keeping her on a dry diet (whereas a combo dry/wet diet seems to limit her vomiting). The second kind I got her was NutroMax. She seemed to really like it, the price was really good ($0.55), but then the next day she had weird vomit. I won't describe it, but it was out of the ordinary. Then I was looking at the NutroMax site and saw that all of their shit was on the recall list. Of course, I've already recycled that can, so I can't find out now, but could it be possible that some stores are still selling this poison? I only go to a small, local pet store (rather than a big chain like Petsmart) and I'd like to think they'd have been on top of that, but now I'm worried. I'm hoping that the weird vomit was maybe related to her experimenting with eating things that weren't in her food dish. I think I'm going to write down the recalled UPC code and take it with me back to the pet store.
Out of curiousity, for those of you with kitties (and by kitties, I do mean cats of all ages, my kitten is 10 and weighs 13 pounds - haha) on soft food, what do you feed them?
On a totally different subject, I'm still listening to CSN constantly. When I listen to this song, I can't help go to the bathroom. Enjoy.
I live near an awesome little family-owned, hole-in-the wall Italian deli. This morning, Mama was slicing eggplant while Papa was making my subs. Suddenly Mama screams out causing Papa and I to jump. She turned around and I was expecting to see blood gushing from some place when she laughs, saying, "I stepped on the cat!" Poor deli-cat. I thought Papa was going to have a heart attack. We all laughed, but it did give us all a good scare.
I present, the perfect sub:
In case you've been living under a rock, Dancing Bear has a great idea to show some love for our fuzzy little loved ones without homes this winter. Go ahead, go read it if you haven't, I'll wait until you return...
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I did my duty and picked up a few items for my local vet's office and to send to Dancing Bear. I picked them up at the grocery store this morning and put them up out of reach from my Sweet Pea. Before I was even done putting away the rest of my groceries, however, I heard some scuffling coming from the dining room. I had forgotten that one of the items I purchased was the ONLY kind of catnip that my baby loves.
I had to give her the package just to keep her from tearing everything else to shreds.
Having a 2 GB memory card in my camera has made me lazy about downloading. Check out a few recent pictures I downloaded tonight.
Here's my Sweet Pea enjoying another OCD bath.
And an avatar I made for Mr. Val out of one of our favorite warning packets.
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