Catmint

The other day I had picked some mint from the garden to make mint tea. Since I wasn't ready to use it yet, I put it in some water on the counter. A while late, my kitten jumped on the counter (as he does often). When he saw the mint, his eyes went wide. Then he hooked it with one paw and carried it to the floor.

Once in his possession, he chewed it, tossed it around, shredded it, and just generally enjoyed the life out of it. My older cat entered the room, saw the mint, and grabbed some for himself.

I've heard of catnip, but I never heard that regular spearmint would invoke this kind of reaction in felines. Anybody else?

Drop everything

We have a drop ceiling in our basement. You know, where a metal frame is installed below the ceiling beams and then tiles are suspended in the frame. Now, with a drop ceiling, you expect certain things. You expect the occasional spider to drop down at you. You expect bits of the tiles to drop off if you move them.

We didn't expect that a DROP of water, followed by many more drops, would DROP one of the tiles onto the basement floor in a gooey mess, but that's just what happened back in the fall (hmm... fall. Coincidence?). And we didn't expect last night to have a cat DROP out of the ceiling either.

Apparently my kitten discovered a way up into the ceiling through one of the missing tile holes and was making himself at home up there. My mom and I heard a loud crash as he jumped out, but at the time we didn't know what it was. It was only later when he once again climbed up there that my sons saw a little kitty muzzle sticking out of the ceiling. Now that he knows he can get up there, there's no stopping him.

So before he DROPS down into the wall and we have to pry the paneling off to get him out, we need to go the store and buy some new panels. He's a sweet kitty, but he's not the brightest bulb in the lamp.

My Precious

It is tiny and golden.

Battles have been fought for it.

Every human who sees it is possessed with a strong desire to have it for his own.

Once you have held it, you must hold it again.

And I must admit, it is Precious to me.
The One Thing that rules us all.

Introducing Rusty

We added a new family member over the weekend. Allow me to introduce you!
Um, okay, well, you can't really see him there. Let me see if I can get a better angle.
There's his leg! Uh, let me get the boys to hold him so you can see him better.
I'm guessing he's in the box, but that doesn't really help, does it? Let's open the box and snap a picture real quick.
Oh. Well, there's his tail! (Ignore the dust. And that white blob is one of the kids' toys.)

Time for me to take over. Here he is! Meet Rusty!

I think these cats are better off than I am

Look what showed up on an ad in my gmail account: a cat retirement home! Just when you think you've seen it all!

I actually really like the concept - they take cake of people's cats when those pets outlive their owners or when the owners have to go into a nursing home or similar place that won't allow cats. It just struck me as hilarious when I saw it.

"Well, old Felix has had a long productive life, dear. What do you say we go ahead and let him retire to Florida?"

Cat-astrophe

If I didn't just pay so much money to the vet for that cat, I'd kill him. A hundred and eighty-five bucks to get four abscesses drained and stay two nights at the vet's office. Plus, he has a monster bottle of amoxicillin he's supposed to take twice a day for the next, oh, five years or so (judging strictly by the bottle size - the instructions just say "until gone").

The swollen cheek turned out to be just one of his battle scars. I think I'm going to count this as his fourth AND fifth lives since it was so nasty.

Honestly, this cat has got to learn to walk away from a fight. Just turn the other cheek, Smokey. You know, the one that doesn't have the oozing abscess on it.

Dog days

We went to one of our rental houses the other night, and the tenant has a puppy. My six year old had such a fun time running and playing with him, it became obvious that this boy needs a dog.

You may remember that our dog died back in January. He hasn't stopped talking about how he misses her. At least once a week, he'll say, "I miss Zelda," with a sad look on his cute little face.

As for me, while I'm not consciously aware of wanting another dog, I do keep dreaming about them. My dogs show up in my dreams all the time. And I'm always freaked out because, of course, they're dead. But other people in the dream will look at me funny and tell me, "No, they're not."

Once, right after we buried Zelda, I woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of her collar jingling and the feel of a wet nose on my foot. Then I woke up for real. Freaked.Out.

Did I ever mention the movie Pet Sematary totally screwed with my head?

So a puppy might be in the future for us. I hope the cat will understand.

Because

Since I want to blog about AI, but Julie's already pretty much covered it, I'm just going to show you a cute picture of a cat:
Visit Stuff on My Cat for more great pictures of stuff and cats.

Pet tips - from me to you

Quote of the Day:

"This is more fun than giving medicine to a cat!" - Me

Saturday morning I noticed something odd about our cat, Smokey. Odd may not be the right word. Gross or disgusting perhaps might better describe it. He had yellowish pus oozing down the side of his little cat face. Quite a lovely sight, let me tell you. Naturally, our vet is closed on the weekends, so we had to wait until Monday morning to call.

The vet kept him overnight, cleaned out his wound, and returned him to us along with a bottle of antibiotics. For anyone who has never given medicine to a cat, you don’t know what you’re missing.

It starts with the towel. This is a trick we learned from some random cat book, a trick that served us well when Smokey was attacked as a kitten by some unknown nasty assailant and left severely wounded. He had to be given medicine something like twenty-seven times a day, and on top of that he needed drops for ear mites. The towel kept all of us from needing antibiotics to treat all of the cat bites and scratches we certainly would have otherwise received.

What you do is, you wrap all but the cat’s head in a towel, then force his mouth open and medicate him. First, of course, you have to find him. Because I guarantee you, when the cat sees you coming with a towel, he will disappear, and quickly. Last night, for example, he hid in my closet, where it is nigh on impossible to see him, let alone get him out.

Once you’ve caught the cat, one person must hold him while the other wraps the towel tightly around the body and all four legs. The cat’s head sticks out, but you have to be quick. If the person administering the medicine is not fast enough on the draw, the cat will disappear inside the towel like a turtle, except he’ll come out the other end of the towel and make a break for it.

If you’re fast enough, grab the cat’s jaw and gently pry his needle-like teeth apart with your bare fingers. Slide the dropper into one side of his mouth and release the medicine. Usually about half of it will make it into the cat, the other half will decorate his fur with a nice pink stain. I don’t worry about that – I figure if he licks it off, as cats are wont to do, he’ll get the full dose.

Then release the cat and stand back. Depending on the cat, you might be on the receiving end of a playful swipe of the claws as a little “thank you” for helping to keep him healthy. He loves you, really he does.

And you only have to repeat this process twice a day for ten days! Nine days left to go…

Clean sweep

So many thoughts are running through my head this morning, I'm not even sure in which direction to go. I need to do school with the boys, but I'm obsessed with the idea of cleaning my house. The type of cleaning usually reserved for spring. You see, this is the first time in 14 years that I will be able to remove all the dog hair from all the corners, and it will stay gone. On the other hand, this makes me sad, like how dare I removed all traces of the dog? Shouldn't I just look at those piles of hair and smile a bittersweet smile full of memories? Ugh, I'm so confused.

Of course, eventually I'm going to have to clean. I'm not so sentimental that I will leave dog hair dust bunnies to roam around my house indefinitely. Maybe just for another day or two.

The boys are handling the whole thing very well, but the five year old already wants a new dog. I have firmly vetoed this idea. It's not something I want to do again right now. But just a quick question - what do you people without dogs do with table scraps? After dinner last night, I was utterly stumped. Throw it in the trash? Doesn't that start to stink? I could toss it in the yard, I suppose. After 14 years with dogs, it's an adjustment, let me tell you!

She's gone

I just got home from taking the kids to the dentist and found the dog had died while we were gone. Naturally, Hubby is out of town, so I have to take care of this myself. We're just going to take the body outside and cover it up until he gets back. {{Sigh}}

Doggy Death Watch

It's an odd feeling waiting for a pet to die. Four weeks ago, the vet told us our dog wouldn't last 24 hours. She's still here. But I can tell she's wearing out. She used to follow me around, all over the house. Last night, she couldn't even make it up to the first floor, let alone the second floor bedrooms. That's got to be hard for her. She's always wanted to be where the people are.

Four weeks ago, we all said goodbye to her. The boys cried. They slept downstairs with her when she couldn't climb the steps. Then, she seemed to get better. Slowly, they've forgotten that she was going to die. For a week, they gave her hugs and petted her every night before bed, in case she didn't see the morning. Now, they tell her to move if she's in their way.

But I can tell she's winding down. Like a clock ticking slower and slower until its pendulum stops swinging altogether, one night she will exhale and that will be that. Part of me has started to believe that she just doesn't want to leave us, that sheer loyalty to her family is keeping her here. But mostly I just try to show her all the love I can, so she leaves us knowing she was needed and wanted. And I don't think any of us will realize how much until she's gone.

Your dog is dying.... or not

We took our dog to the vet Thursday night. She had been very lethargic, not eating or drinking, and was having trouble walking. He examined her and told us she probably had a bleeding tumor that was slowly sapping her energy. Based on her rate of respiration and her heartbeat, he estimated she had less than 24 hours.

So we took her home to say goodbye to the boys. The vet assured us that she wasn't in any pain, she would just get weaker and weaker until she died. We had a very tearful night of farewells, and the boys slept down in the basement with her since she couldn't climb the steps.

That was Thursday. She's still alive. In fact, she's acting almost completely normal - going up and down steps, eating and drinking, even stealing food off the table. Now I'm wondering if I should take her back for a new diagnosis, or just leave well enough alone. I mean, the girl is 14 next week. It's not like I haven't been expecting her to die for the last two years. But if it's something simple we can treat, I want to know about it.

At least the boys don't have to remember their dog dying at Christmas.

So it goes

The bird died, of course. It was just too small and weak. But I think it was a good learning experience for the boys. They buried it out in the back yard and went about their lives. The seven-year-old, in particular, was very upset about it, but I pointed out that he helped give that little bird a very nice, if short, life. Maybe it would have been more humane to drown it, like the neighbor was going to do, but I don't think so.

So, the weekend is coming. It's not exactly a holiday, but we in the US are coming up on one next week. Hubby gets only next Wednesday off, so it's pretty much pointless to go anywhere. Even a day trip would be too crowded and annoying, I think. Instead, we're going to hit the free family movie at the local theater, then probably spend the day working around the house. How about you? Any big plans for the 4th?

And my seven-year-old will turn 8 next week. How weird. How could he be 8 already? Sigh. They grow up too fast.

WCW - The letter H

This week's close-your-eyes-and-poke-a-random-letter-on-the-keyboard letter of the week is "H", brought to you by TKW.

Last evening I had just settled in to watch "America's Talentless Hordes" or whatever that show is called, when my five-year-old came running in to announced that the neighbor had found a baby bird in their barn. She didn't want it, but wanted to know if we did. So we got up and went next door. I have never seen such a tiny bird that wasn't in a nest. We decided to try and take care of it, so we built it a little nest in a flower pot and then started digging for worms.

This morning, I fully expected it to be dead. It's so tiny and frail, and I don't know how often you have to feed a baby bird, but we didn't feed it during the night. And yet, it's still alive and kicking! We mashed up some worms and fed him breakfast and now he's sleeping. So with no further ado, may I present our hatchling!It's only about an inch and a half long. It must have just come out of its egg yesterday. But the good news is he's healthy so far, as evidenced by the bird poop behind him. As I learned with babies, if they're pooping, they're probably okay. I'll keep you updated!

RIP, Dobe

I couldn't write about this until the kids got home. I didn't want them to read about it on the computer.

On Friday, our male dog died. He was 11 1/2 years old. He'd been losing weight for a few weeks, and we had an appointment at the vet for him, but he never made it. It was really hard for me, much harder than I ever thought it would be. You see, every time before that I've lost a pet, I never had to watch it die. I knew Dobe was dying and I couldn't do anything about it. I just had to watch. I wish I could have comforted him somehow, but I just couldn't bring myself to touch him. I wish I had cradled his head and petted him, but I didn't. Hubby came home from work to bury him. He went out in 95 degree heat in the middle of the afternoon and dug a grave in the back of our field. I haven't been to see it.

He was such a good dog. He loved attention, he loved people. We taught him to shake hands when he was a puppy and that was always the first thing he did when he came up to someone. He used to wag his tail so hard he'd practically bend in half; talk about the tail wagging the dog! He wasn't the brightest dog in the world, but he more than made up for it in love and devotion. When he looked at me for the last time, I could still see that in his eyes.

I'll miss you Dobert, Dobe-man, Dobinator. Rest in peace.