Howl

For the last several nights between 9 and 10 pm, we hear cats howling in our front yard.  Last night, it happened again.  This time, it sounded like one of the little monsters was in our house he was so loud.  So we went to investigate.  Now, I thought I knew all of the cats that hang out in the neighbourhood.  But when I opened the front door to a pale coloured fluffy fellow sitting on the porch, he was a new one to me.  His rival, one of the black cats that hangs around was on the driveway.  They were in full standoff mode and didn't immediately react to my clapping my hands at them to get going on their way.  The black cat (who I have a soft spot for, loving black cats as I do), took off quite quickly after the first period of resistance.  And the other guy went the other way.

All of this got me to wonder about the other guy.  Has he been hanging out in our yard because he has nowhere else to go?  Is he just trying out a new territory and has heard through the cat grapevine that our yard is a good place to hang out?  Maybe he lives with the new people a few houses down.  I may never know but am sure the nights of serenading aren't over yet.  Some territory still needs to be sorted out.

Cleo

Our beautiful cat is gone.  She developed a tumour on her face that we removed a couple of years ago but it came back, eventually closing one of her pretty green eyes and more.  We are so very, very sad.  We couldn't have asked for a nicer kitty and it's going to take a while to get over her loss.

Bye bye sweet Cleo.

Neighbourhood Kitties

I worry about all of the neighbourhood cats.  Take this one, Silver, for instance.  He has absolutely no street smarts.  He likes everyone.  And he sits in the middle of the road.  He always wants to play and rolls around on his back until you pet him on his belly.  He does this with everyone.  No street smarts what-so-ever.

We have been fortunate in our cats because none ever had any interest in going outside.  Of our current cats, one is a complete chicken who was a stray which might have something to do with it and the other is just way too attached to us to be very far away.

So I worry about the neighbourhood cats instead.  I worry about Silver because he is too trusting.  I worry about Carmen because his people are always yelling for him for ages at night.  I actually thought Carmen might be gone because we hadn't seen him for so long but he was out this morning and his people were yelling for him last night.  And then there is the big black cat who stays well away from everyone.

I know I can't worry about all the little buddies roaming around the neighbourhood but I do.  I can't help it.  I love them all.

And the Vet said that it would be soooo easy

Our cat has a kidney problem - losing weight and had bad scores on her test.  Since we've had 2 cats with kidney issues in the past, we pretty much know how it goes and are sad.

The vet does want to rule out an infection though so we had to get a urine sample.  A clean, not in the regular litter box, urine sample.  It's easy, the vet said, just lock her in a bathroom and show her the box like you would a kitten - no problem.  Well that didn't work.  She just waited until we let her out to eat and then snuck down to the regular box.

This morning, I followed her downstairs when she was headed that way and put the sample box inside the regular one.  This was a brilliant plan, I thought.  Not so the cat, who clearly had to use the litter box but crossed her legs and left in disgust.

Next brilliant plan, let her go in the regular litter box but hold something under her butt and collect the sample.  Excellent.  Dropped her in the box for this process and again, she crossed her legs and left in disgust.

So the better half suggests locking her in the bathroom again with the sample box.  Obviously she has to go and we will have success this time.  After an hour, we go check and .... not a chance.

Finally, after stalking her around the house,  I used brilliant plan #2 and got a sample.  The ladies at the vet were impressed by my method.  They said I did it the hard way - yeah right.  I'm just hoping the cat doesn't have bathroom issues now.  I'm pretty sure she won't use the litter box when I'm in the room anymore!