I have been singularly unobservant of my cats

I had thought that Shadow had continued as dominant cat over Christian. Then, perhaps two weeks ago Shadow rolled backwards off of her perch, falling about 7 feet to the floor. There was a flurry of black fur and flailing limbs and then a 'thump' as she struck the ground. She did not appear to have suffered in anything but her dignity, though she was slightly less active for the next three days (she still ran around, but didn't climb the vertical poles as much) and it seemed in the aftermath of that that Christian became more dominant, as if the accident had upset the hierarchy.

But then I thought back over the past few months, and realized that perhaps Christian has been dominant for some time. This would explain why Shadow gave up some of her activities after he moved in (specifically, she no longer climbs the longer of the two climbing posts, even when I attempt to lead her up there with a favorite toy). So, I think she's been bumped.

All of which probably means a lot more to me than it does to her. I am guilty of anthropomorphizing the cats to a degree, and I feel very badly for her not being allowed to do things that she previously enjoyed. I also feel guilty, since of course it's my fault that she's in this position. This is in addition to the guilt I feel for Scruffy himself.

Because Shadow is the favorite. She has been since day one. She wanted attention when I first met her and her brother, Scruffy, at the store to which the shelter had brought them, and when I tried to reach over and pet him, he didn't respond (apparently it had been a long day for both of them) but she came over for further petting and attention. Really, he came to my house because I was enthralled with her, and couldn't see separating them. I liked him well enough, and developed real affection for him, but she was the draw. And when he was removed from their cage for me to meet and eventually take home, he clung to the bars at the door, not wanting to leave the safety of that cage.

And Christian, too, is here in some degree because of Shadow. I didn't want her to be lonely and bored when I was away all day. If both Shadow and Scruffy had died - if I had killed them both, I wouldn't have adopted Christian. There would have been no reason to do so.

Which brings me to my point. I want Shadow to be top cat. I want the best of everything for her, even more so than I want the best for Christian, or wanted the best for Scruffy. All of it is ridiculous - ridiculous and juvenile - but that doesn't change the desire, or the pain at realizing that she's at the bottom of the hierarchy.

My poor kitten.

My poor Shadow.

There is one major dfference between the photos

There is one major difference between the photos, though - look at their pupils: Christian is a lot more relaxed than Scruffy.

A better photo of Christian

There is a striking resemblance between his photo and several that I have of Scruffy, such as the one below. I'm not sure what I think about that. Another thing that I don't understand is how Christian fits himself into that condo. At fourteen pound and change he is a bit overweight, but according to the vet his optimal weight is probably about thirteen pounds, so he's a big cat.

Lap cat, fat cat

A few nights ago, Scruffy, of his own accord, crawled into my lap to be petted for twenty or thirty minutes. He only left because I had to stand up - I forget why.

Of course, once he was out of my lap he ran off back to his lair.

I think it's a combination of general shyness and agoraphobia, as he sometimes will run to his shoebox, which offers him no protection at all.

Shadow, on the other hand, is overweight. That thought had been in the back of my mind for several days - her outline no longer looked quite right - though it hadn't moved forward enough to really reach conscious thought, and it has to be the reason for the real difference in weight between her and her brother. She was at the vet again a few days ago for her ear and this was pointed out to me. So, food is no longer available 24 hours a day, and I try to play with her and stir her up more that I had been, and we'll see what happens.

I'm also a little confused about her sociability. The past few times I've had visitors she has generally been willing to sniff an offered finger, but then will deliberately, unhurriedly walk off and disappear under the bed. Strange.

I have over a stone of cat

Scruffy went to the vet today to receive his microchip, and though Shadow already has one, I took her along for the opportunity to weigh her on their scale. Scruffy weighed in at 7.5 pounds; Shadow at 8.2. If a stone is fourteen pounds, I have 1 and 1/10 stone of cat.

Excessive Scruffy petting may lead to dehydration

I may have commented on this before, but when Scruffy is petted, he purrs so strongly that he drools. Five minutes ago, he got an extended petting/brushing session. By the end of it my face was all wet with his drool, all of the fur around his mouth was dark with drool, his whiskers were wet with drool, and several drops of drool lay on the table before us.

At this point he probably weighs between 7 and 8 pounds (a little over half of a stone), and there were probably between 7 and 8 mL of drool, at least, spread over all of these surfaces, which would account for between 1 and 2 percent of his body weight.

Maybe I should start weighing him before and after petting him.

Feline training has begun

Over the past few weeks Shadow has become a bit less active (she's no longer a little kitten, and I think that's the reason for it), and of course Scruffy has never been terribly active when I'm around, so it seemd to me that it was time for some training.

Last night or the night before I made chicken, and I prepared some of it for the cats (no herbs, spices, etc - just chicken with nothing added). I cut this chicken into pieces of perhaps a half square inch and froze it, and tonight I defrosted and diced one piece for use in training.

Shadow's exercises consisted of convincing her to climb her pole to close to the top, after which she received a few pieces of chicken, then she had to climb up and come down again to get more. The only problem seemed to be that she sometimes had difficuty seeing the chicken, which I held on a neutral colored dish (and which is neutral colored to begin with); perhaps I'll get a green plate to use in the future.

During this, Scruffy wandered over to investigate what his sister was up to. He was willing to sniff at an extended finger, but when I moved to get him a piece of chicken, he ran off. So, his training took place at his lair; if he sniffed a finger he got a piece of chicken. Unfortunately, there's no easy or comfortable place for me to stand and reach him when he's there, so his training session was shorter than his sister's.

At present they are silently playfighting as they sit in the shoebox. They don't fit in the shoebox without spilling over its edges when they are content to merely lie there peacefully, so their playfighting has a very comical look to it.

A half-bath takes less time than a full bath

Scruffy is currently looking all prim and proper up front, and something like a drowned rat behind, since it finally occurred to me that even if his hind quarters need cleaning (for the usual reasons) his front quarters don't necessarily. So, today he got a half bath (yesterday he got a full bath, not only for the normal reasons but also because he smelled foul. I tried being a bit lenient with the bathing and cleaning, reasoning that cats generally manage to keep themselves clean, but although he licks himself enough to give himself hairballs if I don't brush him regularly, he apparently isn't very successful at keeping himself clean.)

So, for the future, half baths will be replacing full baths when feasible.

My cats hang out in their carrier

One of the last things I do before going to bed is to take all of the cat toys that make noise and lock them into the cat carrier. Between doing this and turning my air filter up to top speed, when its fan produces a sort of white noise, I am able to sleep through the night without that cats waking me as they frolic. In the morning, I unlatch and open their carrier's door, leaving it to them to retrieve what toys they want to play with. My hope is the cats will see the carrier as their toybox more than as the path to the vet. Several times I have seen Shadow disappear into the box and reemerge carrying a toy, so I think this is working to a degree.

Of course, when I need to carry the cats somewhere in their carrier, I remove it from its usual location by my bed, empty it of most of the toys, and place it in the middle of the floor, which may offer its own cues as to its immediate purpose. From time to time I place the carrier in the middle of the floor and just leave it there, to reduce the validity of that cue, but I tend to leave the toys in place.

The result, and this is probably more due to the cats' sweet nature than to the dual identity of their carrier/toybox, is that I rarely have any difficulty in getting them into their carrier.

Then last night I collected the noisy cat toys and knelt down to place them into the carrier, but in placing my hand into the carrier I immediately encountered a warm, furry face. Shadow was lying in the carrier, stretched out and relaxing, and a closer look showed Scruffy in the carrier as well.

:)

No more plastic bells...

Both cats ran into trouble today. It started with the my discovery, on waking up, that Superfund Cat had once again soiled himself to the point of needing a bath, and had spread his feces about the bathroom and a window sill, too. Shadow had gotten some of his feces on one of her paws, but she could be spot cleaned.

Superfund Cat's bath went easier this time. At least in part this was due to my having a better sense of how to do it - I placed a towel in the tub to give him some traction, and the water was warmer than last time, but he did not enjoy the experience. He shivered as I toweled him dry, so I held him to me until the heat came up, then moved him to the floor heating grate.

Once he stopped shivering and seemed okay, I wolfed down breakfast and ran out of the house for an appointment, coming back in an hour, and then this is a neat thing about giving him a bath: he fluffs out as he dries (he's a long hair). He kind of has his own fluff cycle.

Then about an hour ago I found Shadow sniffing about the floor and eating something. Closer inspection revealed a broken piece of the plastic bell from a cat toy at her feet, and it looked like she had eaten at least one other piece.

The internet was not much help, other than to say that this might be a problem. So I called the off-hour animal hospital to confer with them. If she had eaten this plastic, I should bring her in, they said. Plastic can cause an intestinal blockage, which can be fatal. The consult would be $125, and X-ray, should one be needed, would be over $200, and on top of that any other diagnostic or therapeutic measures that looked to be necessary.

I'm already a bit hard up for cash - I'm in debt to my credit cards for more than I care to admit, I don't have enough hours at work, and yesterday I learned that I lost several hours of teaching that had previously been assigned to me.

You can therfor imagine my relief when, in gathering my jacket, etc together prior to placing Shadow in the carrier I found the rest of the plastic bell. It had occurred to me that it might be helpful to have a complete bell to show the vet and give her a sense of what Shadow might have swallowed, and the bell on the toy I picked up was missing a piece the size of the piece I found earlier at Shadow's feet.

After calling the animal hospital back to say that I wouldn't be coming after all, I had the chance to sit and realize how very attached I have become to Shadow. The thought of her dying of this was very painful. My beautiful kitten.

...and more water

This morning's pleasant discovery was cat feces on the bathroom floor, again. Shadow had some of it in her foot fur, and I spot-cleaned her, but Scruffy seemed to have sat in it, so he had to be bathed.

No surprise, he wasn't pleased, but things went better this time than last time. I did feel sorry for him, though, particulary when he started to shiver as I towled him dry. If he wasn't so skittish, I'd consider getting a hair drier, but as it was, I held him to me and cranked up the heat, then brought him to the floor heating grate once the radiators had warmed up.

One thing that is kind of neat about bathing him, though, is how he fluffs back out in an hour or so, being a longhair cat.

So, along with the water on the kitchen floor and the remaining dampness in the living room, there's water and cat feces all over the bathroom.

Water, water everywhere

Cats are, perhaps, notorious for their dislike of water. I think this is a simplification, however; I think it's more that they will accept water, but only on their own terms.

Scruffy and Shadow get their water in a steel bowl with a rubberized bottom. The bowl is pretty large for them - too big, as it turns out, as it often ends up with dirt or food in it before it's even half empty. A lot of water gets dumped when I clean the bowl and refill it with fresh water. So, the solution is a smaller bowl, yes?

Well, no. I bought a smaller bowl, and filled it with water, and Shadow, on discovering it, spent several enjoyable minutes pawing at the water, dipping her paw in it (then shaking her paw off, sending water everywhere) sloshing it out of the bowl, and in the end the bowl was empty, and the floor was very wet. Fool that I was, I refilled it, and was treated to a repeat performance, so we went back to the large bowl. We waste the same amount of water, but at least it isn't all over the kitchen floor.

Then, yesterday, the toilet broke. The part of the handle that's inside the tank snapped off (this is the only toilet I've seen where this was plastic, though I suppose they all are these days), so I have to lift the lid off of the tank in order to trip the valve and flush the toilet. Until this is fixed, poor Shadow is banned from the bathroom while the toilet is flushed.

So, I've taken a washtub and partially filled it with water, then placed it on the floor. This is a source of fascination for both cats, though Scruffy doesn't have the nerve to approach it while I'm nearby. And again, it's paw at water to see it move, then hastily withdraw paw and shake it off. Shadow will actually climb part way into the pan, getting her front legs (and occasionally a back leg, too) soaked in the process. As she walks forward she lifts each paw out of the water, shakes it off, then puts it back in the water.

So, I have water on the kitchen floor, water on the living room floor, and have to get my hands wet to flush my toilet.

Probably I should talk to the ladnlord about the toilet - I guess that is his job.

Please stand by...

I'm emerging from my two week funk, but now it's time for final papers, exams, etc. So, a quick update:

Cats: still getting bigger. Scruffy is more trusting, though it's still an issue. Presently he's stretched out with his sister on my old school bag, which is impressive, given how exposed a position that is. Shadow seems frustrated at the lack of spiders and crickets in the apartment - she's eaten them all and it takes time for them to respawn. She also destroyed another dangling feather toy thing, so I'll have to find another one.

Practicum: still not done

Thesis: have a meeting with my advisor tomorrow (Friday)

Katrina: Bush shares some of the responsibility at the local level, too, basically because he encouraged government at all levels to abandon their non-terrorism disaster prepredness preparedness work. Eventually I'll get around to writing about that in some more detail.

Cold weather: sucks

Things should be back to normal fairly soon; please continue to tune in.

- B

Scruffy is a Superfund cat

Remember how I said that Scruffy was separated from his mother at too young an age, based on how he follows Shadow around like a puppy, and doesn't know what to do with himself in her absence? Well, another piece of it is that he doesn't really have the litter box thing down. He does use the litter box, but his attempt at burying his feces, though I often hear him scraping away busily at the litter, is generally inadequate, to say the least. He often manages to step in his feces in the process, though, and since he frequently has loose stools, he then proceeds to track fecal matter all over the bathroom floor (and sometimes the walls, too), to say nothing of the rest of the apartment.

I have half a mind to send him back where he came from.

The amount of time, effort, and cleaning supplies that this cat will cause me to spend during his 20 year life will rival that of a moderately-sized Superfund site.

Of course, given how high strung he is, he'll probably die of a heart attack by age 12 or 13, so maybe I'm only dealing with a minor Superfund site.

Update

1. I found another spider late last night, but I was too exhausted to bring it to Shadow's attention. What's more, she was asleep, and it seems rude to wake her for that.

2. Some time back I wrote about placing clothes in Scruffy's lair(s). I don't know what effect this has had, if any, but Scruffy is doing better. He also hasn't coughed in a while, so I think he's healthy, too.

3. Welding class has now ended. For our last class the instructor collected scrap steel in various sizes, and we sorted through it to build sculpture. I made a horned snake out of a busted chain hoist and a mouse with a wind-up key for a tail.

4. I am now another year older. Amazing how that can happen in just 24 hours.

Why does Scruffy have to sleep on Shadow's head?

Scruffy and Shadow have resettled into our home after their time being boarded at the vet's. Scruffy seems to be enjoying the new chew-resistant kitty condo, though he still spends a fair bit of time in his lair behind/between the bookcases, but what really strikes me is his need to be sleeping on his sister's head. (Sorry - no pic at present, as I lifted him off of her head (for the 3rd time) before it occurred to me to take one.) This particularly bothers me because it increases her respiratory rate, which suggests to me that he is making it hard for her to breathe.

All of this is exacerbated by their decision to continue to sleep in the same shoebox, in spite of the fact that they're getting bigger, but the shoebox isn't. Or maybe it's more of his decision to crawl into the shoebox that she is already all but filling. Very cute, but I worry for Shadow's health.

More Scruffy pills -> more Scruffy unhappiness

Scruffy lost his appetite and stopped eating after a day or so of his medication, and I was advised by the vet to stop the medication for the moment. After his recheck yesterday, his medicine was restarted. Last night and this morning he came when I opened the canned food, but he didn't put in an appearance tonight, which meant that I had to pill him again.

Since the last time, I had learned both a better way to hold his head and to use a syringe to give him a bit of water and help him swallow the pill, so I was feeling reasonably confident of being able to give him his meds with little trauma to both of us. I rinsed out the syringe, laid out his pill, and went over to his bookcase lair.

Collecting him and carrying him to the kitchen was no trouble, but then things went rapidly downhill. First, I couldn't quite remember how I was supposed to hold his head. Thus, it was a bit of a struggle to get him in an opened-mouth position that allowed me a free hand to drop in his pill.

Then, once I successfully got the pill in his mouth and clamped it shut, I realized that although I had cleverly placed the syringe within reach, I had failed to preload it with water. I was using one hand and both legs to hold Scruffy, so getting to the sink wasn't going to happen. Luckily, I found the cup of water I had drawn from to rinse out the syringe earlier.

At the end of the whole thing, I had successfully given him his meds, but not with nearly the ease I had hoped.

Separation anxiety

Remember how I said that Scruffy followed Shadow around like a puppy? Scruffy spent all of yesterday alone. He then spent the evening with me, because Shadow was in no shape to receive him. And while I don't know what he did in my absence, after Shadow and I came home he spent almost all of his time in his bookcase lair, until I foolishly made him aware of her presence in the apartment, in the bedroom area. Then he spent all of his energy doing two things:

1) trying to get to Shadow, and

2) trying to continue to avoid and hide from me.

Most of this consisted of sitting in front of the gate to the bedroom, sniffing at it, and occasionally trying to paw his way past it, but once Shadow had recovered enough that I turned off lights to try to get some sleep, Scruffy climbed up the pole to gain access to the bedroom, then quickly repeated this performance after I had chased him off and turned off the light again. Ultimately, I had to place one of the litter boxes in the kitchen and shut him in there for the night.

This leads me to wonder what he would do if she vanished for several days. If it weren't cruel to Shadow to send her off (does anyone know of a kitty sleep-away camp?) I'd experiment and find out, especially since I seem to recall reading that isolating a kitten from other cats can bring it to turn to people for interaction.

Though maybe that's a bit manipulative.

The taming of Super Scruff, the timid cat, part 12

Scruffy continues to do better and better, and is now willing (though not thrilled) to be picked up from his lair between the bookcases (he lost his cardboard box lair because he ate it, which explains the radio-opaque spots in his intestines on X-ray). The expression on his face and the attitude and tone of his body all suggest that being picked up is something that he resigns himself to, rather than enjoys, but he's no longer bolting, or trying to squirm free at any cost. It has been several days since he clawed me, though I have picked him up at least once a day since the end of last week.

Of course, he still runs and hides if I come near him while he's out in the open, but his stints in his lair have become much shorter, often lasting less than a minute.

Hooray for Scruffy!

Scruffy's diagnosis: bronchitis; unhappiness for all

Based on his history, physical examination, and X-ray, Scruffy has received a Dx (diagnosis) of bronchitis. While this is far better than the asthma I feared he had, it's nothing to celebrate. For his part - well, he's sick. He's coughing. He's uncomfortable. He has a fever. What's more, he now gets chased down twice a day, and when he's caught (as he invariably is), no amount of scratching, biting, or yowling can save him from having yucky-tasting stuff rudely shoved down his throat. (His appetite is poor, so hiding the meds in his food isn't successful.)

For my part, I now have to terrorize him twice a day in order to ensure that he gets his meds, and I have a collection of fresh cat-scratch scars to prove it.

All of this occurs just as he was really starting to trust me, to sometimes allow me to approach and pet him, and to even enjoy being petted from time to time. Every time he progresses a bit, something happens that I have to chase him down again. If this cat ever comes to really trust me, it will be a miracle. If I manage to pill him for two weeks and don't give him an aspiration pneumonia, that will be another miracle.

On the other side of things, he has grown - he weighed 5.5 pounds on his visit to the vet on the 3rd, up from 4.3 pounds less than a month before. So it's not all bad.

* Aspiration pneumonia @ Wikipedia; @ eMedicine.
* Asthma @ Wikipedia.
* Bronchitis @ Wikipedia.