Poor Kubota

The poor guy is going to be shaved bald in patches forever if he keeps it up.
When Mr.C picked me up from the airport on Saturday he told me that he had a feeling we would have to take Kubota to the emergency vet clinic as soon as we got home. He had spied a large gash on his side just before he left the house to come get me. He said there wasn’t any blood so I was praying it could wait until the next morning since I was way beyond exhausted.
But sure enough, it warranted a visit to get some stitches and even a drainage tube.

They stitched him from the inside with dissolving sutures so I wouldn’t have to make a trip in to have them removed. I did have to take him in yesterday to have the tube removed though. He’s recovering nicely.

Back At Nine

Yes, I know, quit rolling your eyes!
Here’s the story, we kept getting middle of the night calls from the security company about the warehouse that Mr.C. runs. The motion sensors kept being activated.
It was happening quite a lot and usually birds are to blame. But this time someone spotted a small orange and white cat who was the culprit!
“WILD, FERAL, no one can get anywhere near it” Mr C said!
So on Sunday we took a havaheart trap and a can of cat food out to trap the little rascal. But FIRST, I said I wanted to call it and see if it would come to me.
He was in my arms in less than 10 minutes. Purring louder than any kitten I’ve ever heard! The poor starving little thing hadn’t had anything to eat or drink for nearly a week! Unless you count the rat poison he ate in desperation.
I knew within seconds that he was MINE… Mr C knew it too, AND Mr. C was perfectly fine with it! He calls him his “Little Man”
We named him Casey, because he was found in the case center.
He throws himself at your feet offering his belly for a rub at every opportunity. He wants to be around us at all times and purrs constantly
So far the other cats seem to be ok with the situation, their noses are a little out of joint, but no major problems. Casey actually pretty much ignores the other ones which I find kind of odd.

He seems to have had no ill effects from the poison so far. We are giving him Vitamin K tablets which is the antidote for rat poison.
On Monday there were two of his brothers found outside by the dumpster that Mr.C caught and took to the humane society.
They were all obviously friendly and socialized, I will NEVER understand how people can care for animals and then just dump them somewhere.
It makes me physically sick.
So meet our “wild and feral” Little Man, Casey…

Mr. Personality Plus, that’s him.
Have I mentioned that I don’t even LIKE orange cats??

An Open Window

Oh how the Sassy-Cats LOVE when I open the windows for some fresh air!

This is awesome!

Left to right…
Kubota, Bits and Kibbles

More Company!!

Mr. C’s sister, bro-in-law- and nephew came down for a long weekend for some r&r.
Of course you know what THAT means!!!!
More LAPS!!!!

Miss Poppet had tested every lap within the first 10 minutes of their arrival. So far I’m pretty sure that she thinks D.J. gives the best spanks, but the weekend has just begun!

After a frost warning on Thursday night it’s supposed to be in the upper 80s all weekend. The activity in the pond has picked up considerably. We heard the toads singing last night for the first time. And yesterday the green frogs were competing for a spot in the iris pot…

And here are the promised pics of the dogwoods blooming..

And just because I love this plant combination…

The Trouble With Company…

… Is that they have to go home. A lot of people are happy to see company leave, but for me;  it’s always a sad day because it reminds me of how far away our families are and how much of their day-to-day lives we’re missing.
Capri D has finally convinced BFG to build her that long-desired chicken coop so she can collect fresh eggs each morning. How much fun it would be to go out chicken shopping with her!?!

Anyway, we had a wonderful weekend even though we didn’t do much of anything other than eat and enjoy each other’s company. Mr C. and BFG managed to go and wet a line in a neighborhood pond… no luck.
The best fun was had when we took Paddy to our neighbor’s built in pool for a swim in some deep water! They haven’t opened the pool yet so it doesn’t have any chemicals in the water and has enough algae growing on the walls to make it ‘kinda’ like a real pond.
She had a blast and so did we… Mr C and I both used the fishing waders to get in the water and play with her… what a wonderful opportunity!

A little hesitant, but getting her feet wet. 

 

A good deep breath and a dive!

 

C’mon Dad, dive under, the water is fine! 

Ok, time to head back to the palace for a nap!

 

We also had some visitors come on Saturday… cousins of my Dad.  This of course meant that Poppet found a couple of more laps to sit on…

Here’s cousin Joan who isn’t very fond of cats…

With cousin Dottie who was happy to provide a lap and a pet.

But she always went back to Uncle Jeff who gave the very best spanks!

 

So now the house is quiet again and  Poppet is asleep on the couch with not a lap to be found. *sigh*

Company is here!!!

And Miss Poppet is taking full advantage of the wide variety of laps to choose from!

Apparently I’m harboring a criminal

So, Kubota is home after surgery and a long weekend in the hospital. I actually picked him up late Monday afternoon. Well, Mr. Kubota had apparently had enough of the constant picking, poking, slicing and dicing that he had endured while there and he bit the vet tech as she was trying to put him into the carrier. No one really mentioned the incident to me while we were there other than an off hand comment about how he was a very unhappy cat.  Well DUH!

I would imagine that ANYONE would be somewhat unhappy to have endured THAT! Especially since there was nothing foreign in his intestines to be removed! He has irritable bowel disease.

We got our instructions from the vet and were preparing to leave when they asked us to fax them a copy of his rabies certificate, and said that he had bitten the tech through a blanket (how bad could it have been?).

Imagine my surprise when I got a call from the SHERIFF’S office later on saying that Kubota had to be kept confined(at home) for 10 days and the HEALTH DEPARTMENT was going to be paying us a visit! HUH?

They explained to me that it does not matter that he is up to date on his vaccines, anyone bitten by an animal has to report it and said animal has to be confined for 10 days to prove that they aren’t rabid.

So yesterday a guy from the health department came out to my house to look at  Kubota and had me sign a form saying that I would keep him confined and agree to notify them if he should escape confinement. He will be back in 10 days to look at  him again… apparently to ascertain that he is indeed still alive and not  gone on some rabid Kujo-type rampage.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy the the health department wants to stay on top of potential problems but really, isn’t this is a bit of overkill and a waste of  tax dollars?

On a bright note, Kubota raced me to the top of the stairs this morning and waited for his morning loves.  Oh yeah, he’s definitly a danger to society!

If you have a prayer to spare…

Could you send one up for our feline King -in-training, Kubota? 

 

I’m going to break out of order in introducing the Sassy Cats because one of the youngest is having a bit of a crisis right now.

Kubota is one of three kittens born to Nervous Nellie, our semi-feral porch cat who I’ll introduce later on.  There is a long story involved in how I managed to obtain these three kittens, but that will be told in Nellie’s story. 

Kubota is a fat orange tabby cat. He’s very reserved and shy and doesn’t like to cuddle much. He does have a sweet side that he shows every morning when he rushes ahead of me to block the stairway until I give him a bit of morning love. He also tries to make sure that he is  the same room with me whenever possible… although if he has a particularly comfy napping spot he’ll stay put. He also makes his love known by snuggling every night up against either MrC’s or my legs.

Right now he is at the hospital under observation because he began vomiting  some blood on Tuesday night.  The vet might have to do exploratory surgery in order to find out what is wrong if the vomiting continues.  Please say a little prayer for our shy little man. I sure missed my morning love at the top of the stairs today.

HELLO??? Is this thing on???

OH, hello there, my name is Kismet. I’m hi-jacking my mom’s blog because she seems to have developed a case of writers block with introducing us Sassy Cats. Perfectly understandable, as I’m sure it is very hard to come up with the correct words to describe my unmatched handsomeness,  my supreme intelligence, and my incredible fluffy tail.

I come from very humbling circumstances as mom adopted me from the humane society here in Front Royal. My brothers and sisters and I were left there in an effort to conceal the illicit tryst of my obviously pedigreed parents.  Clearly my birth mother didn’t want the gossips talking about her. O’well, it’s definitely her loss as all of her children were quite lovely.

In fact, mom had her eye on one of my sisters who was unbelievably beautiful with markings showing her Siamese heritage. Unfortunately for her, she also had a bit of an attitude problem! When mom took all of us into a special meet and greet room and sat on the floor with us, I was smart enough to climb directly onto her lap and stay there as the rest of those fools actually explored the room and played with each other! Really, how stupid could they be? In other words, I made it perfectly clear to mom exactly which one of us she would be taking home with her! In fact, I sat on her lap and watched as she filled out the paperwork to make sure that she dotted all of the i’s and crossed the t’s.

Really, I only had to gaze at her with my striking  baby-blues and I had her! Honestly, who could possibly have resisted this?

I think it helped that we slightly resembled each other too…

Mom was pretty disappointed that my eyes changed color as I grew up. Well, the blue served their purpose and I’m perfectly happy with the lovely amber-gold they have become. I think they make me look very dignified.

I am the undisputed king of our domain now after the tragic death of my most beloved mentor,  Buster. I now have a little(well, he isn’t exactly little!) orange protegee who isn’t quite catching on to what it takes to become king. I’ll just have to keep working with him. He does worship me and follow me around like a shadow, so clearly he has the brains to learn. His bloodline is slightly less than it should be but his father wears a tuxedo very well and his mother is a vision to behold. There’s no hurry anyway since I plan on sitting upon my throne for quite some time to come!

An equal opportunity lap-cat

Last weekend the Capris came for a Fall visit. We had a great time although we had to stick closer to home than usual since I had to take care of little Paddy. Mr. C did a great job of helping with that though.

Little Miss Poppet was very happy to have all of the extra laps to sit in. She goes from one to the next so no one feels left out or unloved.

                                 On Capri K’s lap… love those Life Is Good jammies!

Getting good spanks from Capri P

Lovin Capri D

And back where we started to begin the next round!

Say it in an English/Pirate accent… “Elllllloooooo Poppet”

Sassy Cat # 3…

Little Miss Poppet… aka Pop-a-licious, Pop-a-dilly-ding-dong, Poppadopalous, Wobble-Bop Pop-Pop, and the list goes on.

She is our little Yooper kitty adopted from the wonderful Eva Burell Animal Shelter in Manistique Michigan. She is a bit balance-challenged due to some kind of a neurological problem but we adore her just the way she is.  She has never seen a lap she didn’t want to sit in and is the sweetest little girl.

She’s definitely quirky though… she LOVES to be spanked…  the harder the better and she makes chicken noises when she’s unhappy or feeling grumpy (which is mainly when you are moving her off of your lap so you can go to the bathroom or get the cramp out of your leg).

Everyone that comes to visit threatens to sneak her away with them when they leave.

Sassy Cat # 2

  This is Roxanne. She is now our oldest Sassy Cat. Roxie lived on the hill even before us. She lived with and graced the home of our good neighbors, Patrick & Nancy. Patrick died of prostrate cancer several years ago and Nancy died only 3 months later of breast cancer. It was a sad time on the hill.  Nancy’s two sons live down the road from us and took Roxy to live with them. But Roxy kept coming back to her home over here and I would hear her crying to be let in at the now empty and lonely house. I noticed that she was becoming terribly thin and  I couldn’t stand it anymore so I began taking tasty treats to her, and lovin up on her until she finally decided to follow me home and adopt us.

The big problem was… and still is, Roxy HATES other cats! Any stray dog can walk right up to her and she couldn’t care less. But if another cat shows up, look out… claws and fur start flying! 

Naturally that presented a problem since we had three cats at the time. So Roxy became our ‘garage cat’ . We would love to bring her inside especially since she is well into old age for a cat… (we think about 17 years), but she will have nothing to do with it as long as there are other cats inside.

So the garage is where she lives with a very nice carpet lined house and a nice warm heating pad to sleep on.

Introducing the Sassy Cats

I was talking with Mrs. Schmenkman this a.m. and she insisted that I must have pics of the Sassy Cats on my blog.

Since posting pics of ALL of them at one time would be a huge task, I decided to do one at a time to make it easier.

I guess we should start with the oldest. About a month ago that would have been my dear sweet Buster.

 Sadly, my good old Mr. Dependable, Buster-Bean succumbed to cancer on January the 4th.

He was an awesome cat. I never really liked orange cats much, but I wanted a buddy for another good old cat of mine that has been gone a few years now, Boomer. (More about him later on.)  I had gone to the vet and saw an add for a free kitten, already neutered and declawed about the same age as The Boom so I thought… ‘Good deal!’ Cam and I went to check him out. I was pretty disappointed when I saw him since he was just a plain old orange tabby cat. But the lady handed him to me and he immediatly planted a big kiss on my nose! His fate was sealed… or should I say MY fate was sealed? I brought him home and introduced him to Boomer who didn’t really LIKE the idea of a buddy at first, but Buster quickly charmed him too and they became fast friends.

Buster made the big move from Michigan to North Carolina and then later on here to Sassy Cat Hill.  Through all of the changes and new kitty additions he stayed the same sweet boy. He was always the first one on my lap in the morning and the first one in bed with me at night. He had several favorite places throughout the house and I always knew at where he would be at different times during the day. He had a schedule and he kept it!  He had an extreme fondness for catnip and any other plant that he could eat… even fake plants! He always knew where the best ray of sunshine was streaming through the window and claimed that spot. He joined me when I was doing yoga and even continued doing it long after I stopped. He loved having circles rubbed on his belly… we called it giving him a hurricane belly because his fur looked exactly like a radar picure of a hurricane when we were done.

Until he got sick he was a healthy 18 pounder who could be counted on to wake me up in the morning by putting his full weight right on my full bladder… same time every morning too… remember, he had a schedule!

Capri D described him as being “the picture of forbearance”. I have to agree. He patiently dealt with all life gave to him; two big moves(the first one involving a plane ride!), new kittens climbing all over him and driving him crazy, and finally cancer.

He was a good cat, a good friend… I miss the old boy.