A “Clowder” of Purrr-sonalities~3

Posted on January 16, 2014January 16, 2014 by Dusty Roads

Once Rocky settled in life was never calm again. I still didn’t fully trust Little Joe with Rocky. Little Joe was just too big and Rocky was so tiny. But like a mosquito buzzing your head, Rocky loved to torment and torture his oversized mentor. It was my first real exposure to how different personalities can be between cats.

Little Joe was typically Persian. A couch potato, he didn’t play much, tired easily (or got bored) and was happiest just sleeping. When I took him to get pictures he was just a lump. The photographer could do anything with him and he’d put up with it. Petco used him for training for their new photographers. I got loads of discounted pictures and learned a lot from those sessions.

Rocky was the exact opposite. He was in perpetual motion and into everything. Where Little Joe couldn’t be bothered to try to escape if you locked him up, Rocky made it his mission. His paw would scoot under the door or the door knob would rattle. He’s just keep working it until he got it and came strutting out to say. I’m heeere.

Rocky is also a Pica Cat. I’d never heard of a pica cat before. Pica is a disorder characterized by an appetite for substances largely non-nutritive. In Rocky’s case it’s plastic. Not the hard plastic that bowls and toys are made of but plastic bags or the plastic wrap that comes on magazines, even packing tape plastic. Do you know how many things we use daily that are made of this soft plastic!?

I soon learned to throw those things away or put them in a drawer that he couldn’t open. The biggest scare of my life was when I heard Rocky coughing one morning.

At first I only paid a little attention thinking I’d have a mess to clean up. After all, cats throw up. They throw up hairballs and they eat too fast and throw up half digested food. Sometimes they can get sick if the food is too rich (it’s why you don’t give them table scraps) but this sounded different.

Just as I was about to go check it out Rocky staggered into the living room. He looked at me, his eyes rolled back and he fell on his side. I was frantic. On my knees by his side I thought I’d have to do kitty CPR but as I turned his little body over I saw a piece of plastic in the corner of his mouth. I grabbed it and pulled. As soon as it came out his little body gave a shudder and his sides heaved. A big breath in and out and he was back on his feet like nothing had happened.

To this day I do not know where he found the plastic to chew on. I assume he was chewing away and it covered his windpipe. If I hadn’t been right there he would have suffocated. You’d think that would have taught him a lesson but it hasn’t. I still have to be sure the house is plastic proof all the time!

A “Clowder” of Purrr-sonalities – Chapter 2

Posted on January 15, 2014January 15, 2014 by Dusty Roads

Rocky was named after the Rocky Balboa character.

He was a feral kitten who should have been scared of humans. The neighbor kid had found a nest of kittens and taken the “orange” kitten to play with him. When he went to return him, the mama cat had moved the rest of her litter.

When I found the kid he was using the kitten as a literal “fur ball” throwing the kitten in the air and trying to catch him when he came back down. When I came yelling and screeching the kid threw the kitten in a grocery cart, bounced the cart a few times to see the kitten juggle around and then took off running. The kitten , who would become “Rocky” was so tiny that he fell through the wire bottom of the cart.

I thought oh oh, he’ll head for the woods now but instead he picked himself up, shook his head and with that little kitten waddle, made a bee line for me.

The kitten’s eyes were runny and swollen, obviously infected and who knew if he had injuries from his treatment by the kid. At the vet’s office they refused to treat him unless I named him. Under pressure like that I couldn’t think of anything cute or original. All I could think of was that the kitten didn’t have any more sense than Rocky did in the movie by the same name. Yeah, Rocky got beat up, knocked down but he wouldn’t stay down. He got right back up and in the end, bruised and bashed up, he won. So this little resilient kitten became “Rocky”.

I still planned to take him to the shelter. Little Joe never accepted other cats. So I put the now treated kitten in the spare room for the weekend. The first day was fine. I’d go into the room to spend time with him. As soon as I called “Rocky” he’d come toddling out from where ever he was hiding. The vet was surprised that he was eating solid food. They thought he was too young to be weaned but he didn’t seem to have any problem eating the canned food I was offering. He was so tiny and cute.

This was when I first learned what a great escape artist Rocky would turn out to be. Coming back from an errand I saw the door open to the spare room. My heart dropped. I was sure I’d find his bloody little body shredded somewhere.

Was I ever surprised when I found a black and white Persian cuddled up with a tiny orange kitten on the couch.

Rocky had found a home…fur-ever.

A “Clowder” of Purrr-sonalities

Posted on January 14, 2014January 14, 2014 by Dusty Roads

Definition: Clowder : a group of cats

I’ve been around cats all my life. I haven’t always understood how to be gentle and kind. There are many family stories of me dressing the family cat in baby clothes and pushing her in a baby carriage.. or the best/ worse story is when I was holding the cat while she desperately tried to escape me, the toddling baby terror. As the cat scratched me mercilessly I hung on and screamed for my mother to “help me”!

(Selfish little brat wasn’t I?) My mother’s response was to tell me to put the cat down and she wouldn’t scratch me. But I was stubborn and refused, crying all the time. I don’t remember this , of course, but it’s one of those standard holiday stories that always gets pulled out when the clan gets together to reminisce.

Over the years I always seemed to have a cat, usually just one. I never thought about cats being social animals. I always thought they were quite independent. As my life evolved and my knowledge and empathy matured I decided that maybe cats left alone all day should have a companion.

I worked long hours and didn’t pay a lot of attention to my pets. I fed them and kept the kitty litter clean but playtime was short. My favorite times were the end of the night when we had “cuddle time”.

I’d had a series of solo kitties over the years but when I first thought about adding an extra cat it really wasn’t my choice.

At the time I had a Persian named “Little Joe”. Little Joe had “issues”. He was the original “grumpy cat”.

Introducing him to other cats was futile. He wanted nothing to do with a companion. As he was getting older I rescued a tiny kitten from an abusive neighbor kid.

My plan was to take the kitten to the vet, get a clean bill of health and then surrender it to a shelter. Things didn’t quite turn out that way. To my surprise my grumpy, old Persian liked the kitten and the kitten liked Little Joe. So began my experiences with a multi cat household. That kitten was Rocky.

As grumpy as Little Joe was, Rocky was irrepressible. He was so full of life and joie de vivre he literally bounced off walls.

At the time Rocky joined the household he only weighed in at 1.2 lbs. Little Joe, on the other hand was a whopping 12 lbs. A real David and Goliath match up.

When Little Joe had had enough of Rocky’s antics he’d try to carry Rocky around like a mother cat, by his ruff, except he seemed to always miss the ruff and get Rocky’s whole head in his mouth. I’d hear muffled mews and go check and there was Little Joe dragging poor Rocky along the floor with the head completely in his mouth.

It never deterred Rocky. He’s be right back after Little Joe or racing around the apartment.

Photo of the Week~ Week 2

Posted on January 13, 2014January 13, 2014 by Dusty Roads

Well folks, I made it through another week! Yes I managed to take a picture everyday this week and now I will try to do it all again.

I was surprised again. Tallying up the likes, shares, and hits; the photo with the most points is Buddy 2014.

The runner up was not the one I expected. It was Foggy Woods.

I wonder if being the first picture posted for the week had anything to do with that?

Housework , if you do it right, will kill you

Posted on January 13, 2014January 13, 2014 by Dusty Roads

Housework , if you do it right, will kill you. This is a quote from Erma Bombeck. Do you remember her? She was a very funny writer. February 21, 1927 – April 22, 1996. She would take a look around her and see the humor in everyday lives. In the course of her career she wrote over 4000 newspaper columns about the life of a midwestern suburban housewife. Her columns appeared twice weekly and were read by 30 MILLION readers in 900 newspapers! She was also the author of 15 bestselling books, most collections of short stories about life in the suburbs.

What made me think about Mrs. Bombeck? Quite frankly, envy. I loved her writings. They always made me laugh. I remember one titled “The Grass is always greener over the Septic Tank”. You know, that’s true. We had a regular jungle of healthy green plants growing over ours behind our house. If only the lawn had looked half as lush.

Her stories were short, humorous and contained a kernel of truth. I never would have given that green grass a thought if she hadn’t pointed it out.

And what about those big holiday meals? For years I’ve been saying I cook all day and the meal is over in 30 minutes! Well Erma beat me to it. Her quote was :Thanksgiving dinners take eighteen hours to prepare. They are consumed in twelve minutes. Half-times take twelve minutes. This is not coincidence.

So here I am staring at the blank computer screen with a major case of writers block. I haven’t been anywhere lately, the weather has been horrible, (it’s raining cats and dogs and pitch black as I write this) and I just couldn’t think of a thing to say. In desperation I thought I could gain inspiration like another blogger friend did from the alphabet.

She wrote a blog post for each letter of the alphabet. Author Sue Grafton is wring a whole series of fictional crime novels known as the Alphabet Series (A is for Alibi, etc. ) so it seemed like a good idea but the only thing that I could think of that started with “A” was Arthritis. Unless you’re a doctor I would think that would be a very painful subject.

That’s when I thought of Erma Bombeck. How did she do it? How could she look around and see something not only worth writing about her everyday surroundings but write it with such humor. She could take everyday events and routines and have wonderful observations. Another example: My theory on housework is, if the item doesn’t multiply, smell, catch fire, or block the refrigerator door, let it be. No one else cares. Why should you?