She may still snarl and growl at the other cats, but she’s doing really well. Last night, I put her on my bed and she actually stayed for a while, rolling around and streeeeettcching herself out. I sent a picture to the cat lady, who was shocked. She’d never shown them her belly!
The outside cats have been pretty excited about their wet cat food treats this morning, with a couple of them cleaning out the bowl for me. I’ve been mixing in some lysine before doling it out.
I spotted the tuxedo in his favourite spot under the cat house, so he got a big dollop. I later spotted the bitty tabby under the cat house in a different spot, but couldn’t get a picture. Pinky kept blocking my view!
I left quite early to take my mother’s car to the garage, and my daughters took turns supervising the cats in my room, and indulging Marlee. She has started to jump up onto the bed with them, and rolling around while being petted. She still snarls and growls at most of the other cats, but she was okay with lying on my bed next to Cheddar, which is awesome.
Cheddar is really good with other cats!
Big Rig has been a pain! She wants out of the room, but when we did let her out, she immediately went after one of the other cats. She has only a tiny incision, but if she’s going to be picking fights with other cats, we’re going to have to keep her isolated longer, to give it more time to heal. The last thing we want is for her to open it up because she’s being a big B to the other cats! The problem is, even when being kept in my room, she’s been going after Butterscotch, too! I’m not impressed with her. 🤨
As I write this, she’s made her way onto my arms and is currently using one of my elbows as a pillow, while her body is sliding down and pushing my keyboard further and further away.
She makes it quite difficult to type!
While I was in town, I was early enough to fill my mother’s gas tank and get a car wash. I figured the mechanic deals with enough filthy vehicles. Especially with our current temperatures hovering around freezing, making for some very messy roads. When I dropped off the keys, I was still almost an hour early, so I went for lunch. He wasn’t very busy, and since I was just there for an oil change and coolant check, he got it in and finished before my official appointment, so it was ready and waiting when I got back. It has been so long since the oil was changed (thankfully, it doesn’t get used all that much), the tag from wherever it was done last was unreadable. Whoever did it last hadn’t done a good job, and it may have been leaking slightly all this time. The oil level was a bit low when I checked it, but not much, so it wasn’t too bad, at least. The filter was changed and the coolant topped up as well, and now my mother’s car is very happy! I could feel the difference as I drove home.
Gotta make sure it never gets that long between oil changes again!!!
By the time I got home, it was time to feed the outside cats again. This time, I saw Shop Towel coming a lot closer than usual – he was smelling that wet cat food and I could see he was wanting some! I don’t know of there was any left, by the time he showed up. My focus is on making sure the bitties get their fill.
Shop Towel (aka: Sad Face) was not looking good today!
He has clearly been in fights recently. You can even see blood in his fur on his side. We haven’t been hearing any cat fights, so this likely happened at one of the other farms in his territory.
I want to snuggle that sad faced boy so badly!
I ended up sending a picture to the cat lady. I told her, this isn’t one of our cats, but he’s been coming around for a few years. Because he’s so aggressive with our male cats, we haven’t been encouraging him to stick around, aside from filling his belly. We’re not exactly chasing him off, either. We’d love to actually befriend him, but not with the way he behaves with the other cats. I suggested that, if we could ever trap him, he’d be a good candidate for a TNR.
Much to my surprise, the cat lady said that she knows of a farm with no other cats where he could be released! That would be ideal for him – and there would be a better chance of him being at least somewhat socialized, if he’s not fighting for territory with other males.
Of course, the idea of a farm that doesn’t have cats is just… so foreign to me! 😄 Usually, they just show up.
Now that the car is taken care of and the cats brought home, we actually have some quiet time over the next while. No trips to the city, no errands, no more waiting for the roofers… I can actually stay home for the next few days! About the only thing I expect to need to do is help my mother with her shopping, now that her car is done.
I look forward to tucking my head into my shell and being a hermit for a while!
I heard from the Cat Lady today. Now that Turmeric has had time to recover from her surgery, it’s time to put her profile up on the adoption list at the Cat Lady’s new rescue site. She was asking for a little write up to include, so I got one of my daughters to make one up. She’s much better at that than I am (and funnier, too!).
I also too a more recent photo of Turmeric, since the last ones I sent her were from the trip to and from the vet, so they weren’t the most flattering! 😀
I disturbed her cuddles with her mother. 😀
The Cat Lady also sent us a photo of Cabbages.
Her phone’s camera takes much better pictures than mine does!
Don’t you just want to boop that little pink nose? ❤
She was cooking more chicken for Cabbages at the time she messaged me. That cat is really living the high life with them! I’m so glad they ended up deciding to keep her themselves. They fought so hard to save her life!
She has been coming out more often, even with other cats around, though she wants nothing to do with them, and is more likely to growl and hiss, even if they’re just going by, than anything else.
Interestingly – and not necessarily in a good way – she and Beep Beep are not getting along at all. I’m sure they remember each other, but Beep Beep has been pretty aggressive towards Butterscotch. Mind you, Beep Beep bullies the other cats a fair bit, too, but she seems to be unhappy to be reunited with Butterscotch!
The main thing is the Butterscotch actually does seem to be happier now that she’s indoors, which was so totally unexpected based on her past behaviour. She would just rather be with people (not me, though! LOL) instead of other cats.
We have another day that is turning out to be warmer than predicted – again, by only a degree! We were supposed to reach a high of 1C/34F but, as I write this, we are at 2C/36F, and for this time of day, we could potentially warm up a bit more before cooling down for the night.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t feeling very well this morning, and one of my daughters was sweet enough to do the morning outdoor chores for me. It seems we all had rough nights last night, though with the girls, they are having issues with the roof leak coming in at one of their windows. They ended up having to move their computers (they have a double sided desk that they share) and other electronics. Unfortunately, one of the only 2 outlets in that room happens to be under that window, and it’s the only one that takes 3 prong plugs, so they don’t have a lot of choice on where to set up. For my older daughter, that means a delay on her being able to work on commissions.
The temperature changes fluctuating above and below freezing have been absolutely brutal on my husband. He’s had to resort to “take as needed” medications he’s been able to avoid for months, just to be able to stand up more or less straight. The down side is that one of those medications causes drowsiness, and while a deeper sleep may seem like a good thing, it isn’t when one is also on a water pill.
Among my disturbances of the night was dealing with the mess Nosencrantz made. She has been using the litter to pee in just fine but, for some reason, she prefers to poop in my closet, near where we’ve got a cat bed set up in an old laundry basket; one of her favorite places. I’d already resorted to using carpet cleaning powder on the area and leaving it there instead of vacuuming it up (the replacement band for the new vacuum cleaner still hasn’t shown up, so we’re not able to properly vacuum right now, anyhow). It seemed to be working but, last night, I discovered her pooping right next to the powder.
*sigh*
So at 2 in the morning, I was cleaning it up, adding more carpet powder, and re-arranging things stored on the bottom of my closet to protect some of my longer clothing, like my summer dresses, that the cats were mucking about with. Then, since I was up anyhow and she was cooperative, I checked out Nosencrantz’s surgical site.
The stitches they use are supposed to dissolve, but for some reason, only with Nosencrantz, some of them aren’t. We could feel them when brushing a hand across her belly, but this time I took a closer look. One piece with a knot at the end that stuck out seemed to be loose, so I thought I could gently brush it out – only to see skin being tugged in another spot!
After getting a better look at it in daylight, I decided to call the vet about it. They asked for a photo for a technician to look at it, so I sent this one – at full resolution, so the tech could zoom right in.
My daughter’s fingers are pointing at the 3 spots of concern. On the right, that purple dot is the knot. It sticks out surprisingly far. In the middle, you can actually see a stitch joining two reddish spots. On the left is another slightly reddish area. We couldn’t actually see anything there, but we can feel something. That spot seems to be the other end of the thread.
I got a response from the vet very quickly. The technician said that sometimes, stitches just take longer to dissolve. It should be fine, but if it seems to be irritating her, we could make and appointment and they would remove it.
So it still should dissolve away. Nosencrantz seems utterly oblivious to it, except when we are checking it. The slight redness is a bit of a concern to me, but it isn’t getting infected or anything, and the knot doesn’t seem to be catching on anything.
We decided not to take her in, but having been assured that it will, indeed, dissolve, I did snip that bit in the middle, and was able to pull part of it out, from the knot.
It was almost an inch and a half long! That doesn’t look at all like it’s in the process of dissolving, either.
The main thing is that there is no longer a piece sticking out, and no loop tugging her flesh together, which is likely the cause of the redness we could see.
We will keep monitoring the area, of course, but I think it should be fine, now. We could have done it earlier, but I didn’t want to remove only part of it, if the rest of it wasn’t going to dissolve away.
I also have some news that I’ve been sort of waiting until I had more information to share.
There have been some major changes in regards to the Cat Lady that has slowed down the adoption process for a while.
The Cat Lady has left the organization that was covering most of the vet bills to get the cats spayed, examined, vaccinated, etc. There had been an intake freeze with the clinic we use, because of the vet costs of so many sick cats, but now there is an organization wide intake freeze. This organization is completely by donation, so I can understand that needed to happen at times.
The Cat Lady was also having issues with them. There was, of course, the usual issues that seem to plague any organization; gossiping, internal politics, etc. The final straw, however, involved out of province adoptions.
They wanted to adopt Saffron and Nicco out of province.
It would have meant a THREE DAY van ride!
The cats get stressed out enough just with a ride to the vet in the city! She couldn’t let them inflict that on Saffron and Nicco. Since they are still with her, instead of a with fostering household, she simply quit her job and is hanging on to them longer.
She is now going independent, and Saffron and Nicco will be the first cats up for adoption when her new website goes live. Cabbages is the model on her flier, though Cabbages is not up for adoption. Her daughter is too attached! She already has 10 foster families lined up, has the support of the local shelter, and just worked things out with a vet, but she has to get things live quickly. She’s picking up another 10 or so cats from the area this week! In the middle of all this, she was also able to get another pair of cats settled into a new forever home. She has placed a priority on getting our cats adopted out, though, so as soon as she can, she will be taking on the next pair of cats for a trip to the vet, recovery time, then adoption.
Now, we could continue to work with the organization she left, as they do have a lot of resources she doesn’t, however I’m not keen on the possibility of cats being adopted out of province, so we are sticking with the Cat Lady! Her organization is going to be specific to our region, too, not the entire province.
This is a huge leap, but she’s got 13 years experience in animal rescue, and clearly cares deeply about the cats, and where they get adopted to. I think she will do fabulous.
Which brings me to our ongoing fundraiser. I’d set a goal of $1500 to surprise reimburse the Cat Lady for Cabbages’ vet bills, knowing it likely would be more than that. I’ll be keeping the goal at $1500, but anything above and beyond will still go to the Cat Lady, to help with her new cat rescue organization.
If you would like to contribute to the fundraiser, you can go to the fundraiser page though this link, or click on the button below.
Hard to get a head count, when they move around so much.
But I think I saw 13 cats in total this morning, out of the 18 yard cats we have outside right now.
I’ve been in touch with the Cat Lady recently. Yesterday was Cabbages’ day to be spayed, at the special vet that works with cats that have had neurological problems.
If you would like to contribute to our fundraiser to reimburse the cat lady for Cabbages’ vet bills, click on the button below, or click here. If you would like to read more about it, click here.
Cabbages seems to have recovered completely, however, so that’s amazing news. The original plan had been for her to stay with them for another 2 weeks, then go to someone she’d found to adopt her, that works in animal welfare. It’s looking like that won’t happen, though. Cabbages has adopted her daughter, instead, and it looks like she will be staying where she is!
Saffron and Nicco should be on their way to fosters, and the adoption process will begin. It seems that the three of them remembered each other, as the Cat Lady found them all sleeping together in a big pile. 🙂
With her help, we’ve had 6 cats spayed, vaccinated, etc. at a steeply discounted price. The amount we pay for can be done as we are able. Two had already been paid for, and I let her know that I’d made a payment for 2 more, and would be able to send a payment for the last two at the end of this month. She let me know that we do not have to make the next payment.
It was already paid for by donation!
I asked for our thanks to be passed on, if possible, and it will be. It turns out that someone had bequeathed a donation to the organization for spays and neuters! That was so thoughtful of them, and much appreciated.
There are some issues going on, partly in regards to the vet bills with the clinic we use, partly due to finding fosters, so we do not have any more appointments set up, yet. The Cat Lady is trying to find us an alternate clinic we can take cats to. Worst case scenario, she would pick up cats from us to stay with her for a few days, they would have their appointments with a vet, and then they might have to stay with us for a while until fosters can be found and the adoption process started. Which works for us. We’re already taking care of them all, so there wouldn’t be much change. We still have several females to do that are indoors, but we should also be able to start catching some of the outdoor males, as well. Of all the outdoor cats that we can actually catch, Rolando Moon is the only female left, and she’s already fixed. Oh, and sometimes Rosencrantz, depending on her mood. It would be better if we could have started with the females, but that would require trapping, and we’re not going to do that until the temperatures are safer.
The Cat Lady will contact us as soon as she has information, and then we’ll decide on which cats are next in line for a vet visit.
We’re okay with any delays. At least the process is happening, and we will slowly be able to find forever homes for most of the cats.
After seeing a deer eating cat kibble out of the kibble house, it was no surprise to find the trays were completely empty and tossed about this morning.
What was alarming was the remarkable amount of blood, inside the kibble house!
I was able to get a photo after I’d straightened things out and the cats had a chance to eat. This is the largest patch of blood, but there was blood all across to the other side, too.
You can even see spots of blood around – and in! – the water bowls!
None of the cats looked injured. I was worried when I couldn’t see Potato Beetle right away, but then he came running and went into the sun room to eat.
I noticed that the heated water bowls water was frozen, so I checked through the opening in the cat’s house, confirming that it’s still plugged in. I knew the extension cord into the house was still plugged in, which left one more place to check.
That required some digging.
We have the plug ends in a waterproof cord protector. While clearing the snow from along the sun room, so the sump pump hose could be put back where it belonged, the extension cord running under the door got snagged a bit. The door kept the cord from being pulled from that direction, so this cord protector got pulled, instead. I thought perhaps it might have been enough to unplug the cords a bit, inside.
They were fine.
I did, however, find this.
More blood drops, next to the deer poop.
There was a very small blood trail up the shoveled cat path to the storage house, then it continued down the path the cats made in the snow, along the side of the building. The cat’s path then splits, with one going around the back of the building, and the other continuing across the yard towards the collapsing log building. The snow was too deep for me to follow it, but I could see a few spots of red towards the collapsing building.
I don’t hear anything on that side of the house from my office/bedroom, but the girls never heard anything either, and they usually hear all of the cat fights. My husband’s window is closest, but he sleeps with a CPAP, so he doesn’t hear anything. It’s not loud, but enough to make a difference.
For the amount of blood in the kibble house, I would expect it to be really obvious if one of the yard cats was injured, but they all look fine, running around in the sun and enjoying themselves. I stayed out to do a burn, and had plenty of time to watch them as they checked me out. No visible signs of injury.
Which is both alarming and perplexing.
Since I was outside, anyhow, I left the door to the sun room open.
Which Rolando Moon appreciated!
They all like that box with the old pillow in it best. 😀
They will be most upset, when this corner gets converted to a greenhouse again!
I’ve left the doors open slightly, and let Rolando Moon continue to enjoy her sun spot. 🙂
Meanwhile…
I’m still waiting to hear from the mechanic about our van. When that’s ready, I’ll drive my mother’s car over and switch vehicles, so it can be checked again. The codes that came up for my mother’s car were not particularly informative. On the one hand, it could simply be that work was done, and the check engine like would turn off on its own after a few days. On the other, it could be transmission troubles. I’d been messaging with my brother as well as the mechanic, yesterday. My mother has had troubles with this car, with my brother getting things taken care of for her until we took that job over, for a long time. She’s told me to sell the car a few times. I mentioned this to the mechanic; he knows what budget I have left, the last of which is going towards the van right now, and that we are on a fixed income. He told me he would do a complete safety check and see what comes up, as well as looking up the value of the car. If it does end up needing more work than it’s worth, he said he’d be willing to buy it off of us for his lot. It turns out he has a few cars he sells, too. I had no idea until yesterday! I mentioned that we do need a small car for my mother, since it’s dangerous for her to struggle in and out of our van, he said he has a few smaller cars, and would be willing to take my mother’s car in as a trade.
That takes a load off. I would, of course, still talk to my mother and brother about it, if it came to that point. My brother is already up to date on the situation, but I’m not going to try to explain it to my mother, just yet. It’s entirely possible there’s no major problem at all, and all we’ll need is for the mechanic to reset the codes.
In other things, today is the first day of Lent. For the last few years, the thing I’ve given up for Lent has been Facebook. As I’ve been signing up on a number of platforms to try and move away from Facebook, I’ll be giving them all up for Lent. Even on platforms like Messenger, Signal and Telegram, I’ll be staying off groups and just using them for direct communication, and my video platforms will be reduced to research and learning videos only. Blogging will continue as usual, of course.
It’s not going to be easy. I spend way too much time online, though, so this will be a good thing. Besides, if it was easy, it wouldn’t mean much to give it up for Lent!
As I write this, it’s -7C/19F. I think it was about -9C/16F while I was outside this morning, and we’re still expected to warm up to -5C/23F.
It’s gloriously warm out there!
Funny how acclimatization works. 😀
Before I go on, however, I just have to share this horribly low quality picture of Nosencrantz.
Our cat is broken.
I didn’t want to disturb her with a flash.
Baby girl is enjoying life! She is the most chill cat, ever. Gosh, I’m going to miss her when she gets adopted out!!
We’re still keeping her and Butterscotch in my office/bedroom. Or should I say, we are mostly keeping the other cats out, letting them in only under supervision. Nosentrantz has shown little interest in leaving, though we take her out and carry her around. Most of the other cats are okay with her, but some are not. Beep Beep, Tissue and Turmeric, in particular, are not happy to see her. Mind you, Beep Beep is just a b*** and will randomly go after other cats anyhow, but Tissue and Turmeric will try to go after Nosencrantz, specifically. Which is a bit funny at times. Nosencrantz will be sitting on the red blanket, watching the other cats mill about, un-phased. Turmeric will see her, stand up by the bed and start batting and hissing at her, and Nosencrantz will just look at her, like she’s nuts.
Which she is.
Butterscotch, on the other hand, hardly ever comes out of her favourite corners. She’ll move from one corner to the other, come out to eat, drink or use the litter box, and if no other cats are around, she’ll come out for pets. She especially likes my husband. But she wants nothing to do with other cats! Even if they’re completely ignoring her, if she sees any, she starts snarling. She’s even started to snarl at Nosencrantz, sometimes! She just wants people. No cats.
As for the outside cats, they are quite enjoying the warmer weather!
They are very active outside, and we see them running and climbing all over the place.
With so much packed down snow, it’s become difficult to clean out the heated water bowl. The cord is completely buried, so all I can do is tip out the water into the snow.
Nice to see Ghost Baby making an appearance. I do wish we could convince her to come closer. She’s the most feral of all the yard cats.
I’m amused by the spot on the roof of the cat’s house. Even with snow on it, they’ll sit in the spot above the heat lamp inside. 😀
I took advantage of the warmth and got the burn barrel going, which required digging it out again, digging out the path the the electric meter, then started working on clearing snow away from the house.
Some of it was quite hard packed, and needed to be broken up with the ice chipper.
I think I got about a half dozen wheelbarrow loads hauled away, before the burn barrel was done and it was time to go inside. Not a lot of snow can fit in the wheelbarrow before it all just starts sliding down the sides.
Agnoos really likes it when I’m tending the burn barrel, for some reason!
It’s going to take many trips to clear the corner out. The girls and I will chip away at it over the next couple of weeks, while the temperatures are warmer, but not yet melting. We’ll need to clear away the well cap, too, which is going to be the most difficult part. We did try to keep it clear, but there was just too much snow.
While we have several snow shovels, the ergonomic one in the photos is our best one, and we prefer to wait until it’s free instead of using one of the others. Once I was done, my daughter used it to clear parts of the roof, so we don’t end up with water leaking into the house again.
Unfortunately, she noticed the shovel is starting to crack in the middle.
Crud.
Looks like we’ll have to find a new one sooner rather than later. The other shovels we have are not as strong as this one, and are far more likely to break with the packed snow we have to clear. Except for the one steel one we found, and that one is just too heavy for a job this big!
My husband’s disability pay came in today, instead of Monday. We weren’t sure if they would do that again, and my plan had been to do at least part of the big shop today, if it did. Unfortunately, I was not feeling well this morning. The deli pizzas I picked up as a treat yesterday apparently did not agree with me! So that will have to wait until tomorrow, depending on how I’m feeling. I would have at least liked to make the closer trip to a Walmart. With the paw paw and tulip tree seeds, we’re going to need more soil, soon.
It was another bitterly cold morning today BUT this should be the last day of it. We’ve already warmed up considerably (it’s late afternoon as I write this), and it should keep warming up and stay very mild, well into March.
That will be nice!
I topped up the kibble inside the sun room – then took a hammer to break the layer of ice that had formed at the top of the heated water bowl! Yes, it was on and working, but it is warmed from below. It got so cold last night, the top froze over.
Chadiccus is so done with this cold!
I got some updates on the kitties the Cat Lady took.
Nicco and Saffron are doing very well after their visit to the vet. They were found to be quite healthy, for all their tiny size.
The two of them are getting along well, and they are looking to adopt them out together. Which is interesting, since Saffron has been one of the more aggressive ones responsible for the scratches on Nicco’s nose. It’s just the two of them, though, which changes things dramatically.
I let the Cat Lady know that the two of them are only a day apart in age, and that Nicco is Cabbages’ older sister, by a few months. 🙂
Cabbages, meanwhile, as discovered how to open up drawers! I’m not too surprised, as most of the cats here have figured out how to open most of our cupboards, but we don’t have many drawers they could get into. They’ve shown no interest.
I did warn her about Cabbages’ love of digging in dirt.
They’ve already discovered that, apparently, and have had to lock their spider plant in another room!
I should send her a picture of the cage we had to build around the smaller jade tree.
Gosh, Cabbages is looking so great!! Hard to believe she came so close to dying, and all the other vets were recommending euthanasia!
If you would like to contribute to our fundraiser to reimburse the cat lady for Cabbages’ vet bills, click on the button below, or click here. If you would like to read more about it, click here.
This afternoon, I got a phone call from the Cat Lady. She had just gotten off the phone with the organization that’s helping with the cat vet visits and adoptions, and wanted to call me about it right away.
Things are going to be set back for a while.
The vet clinic/hospital we’ve been using is off the list for about a month. Apparently, they’ve been taking in an unusual number of sick cats, and the vet expenses are getting too much. (They run entirely by donations and adoption fees, so the money is always tight.) So no appointments are going to be made there in March, though the Cat Lady is going to look at other towns as possibilities for our cats.
There has also been an issue with one of their fosters. They had taken in kittens that turned out to be sick with something I can’t remember the name of. The kittens were lost, and how the foster has to disinfect their entire home, and the home cannot have any cats in it for at least 30 days, to ensure no other cats catch this. This was one of the fosters lined up to take cats from our place, which obviously is not going to happen for a while.
So it looks like things will be set back at least a month before the next pair of cats goes out.
Which just means nothing much changes for us. As it is, by the time we would be starting on the outside cats… well, the males would be going, but from the activity I’m already seeing outside, there are already new litters on the way. Usually, they start giving birth around the end of April, early May. I don’t even know how many females we have out there anymore, though there are now two fewer, with Butterscotch and Nosencrantz now spayed and indoors.
In other things, I cleared it with the garage, then arranged to have my mother’s car towed in. Much to my surprise, I was asked if I needed a ride in, too! Some drivers are taking passengers now, though masks are still required. I mentioned I have a medical exemption, so I was put on hold while that was looked into. It took so long, she finally just made a note of it on file and left it to the driver.
They don’t wear masks themselves, so I’m not worried about it.
Of course, they had to ask the usual questions, and I just had to laugh out loud when I was asked if I had to isolate. No, I don’t have to isolate. That’s our normal state out here!
After an hour or so, I got an automated call assuring me that no, they had not forgotten about us. Things were just that backed up.
Then I got a call from one of the two companies, telling me that they still hadn’t found an available driver in our area. I reassured them that we were in no hurry; it could even wait until tomorrow. I had just been messaging our mechanic and, while he had the part, he was so busy, he couldn’t be sure when he’d be able to get to the van today.
After updating the garage about the tow, he suggested doing it tomorrow afternoon, instead. So I called CAA back and ended up cancelling the tow for today, and will book it again tomorrow.
I’m glad I double checked with the garage. Otherwise, I might have gone into town with the tow truck, only to have no way to get home again, if the van wasn’t ready today!
I’m actually happier with the switch to tomorrow. It’s supposed to be much warmer than today, and warmer still, on the day after! This should make it safer to drive, and do at least a smaller trip to the city. Thanks to the Cat Lady swinging by yesterday, we have enough dry kibble to last us. She even gave us more canned cat food and some treats! Cat food was the only thing we’ve been running out of, partly due to the stores being out of stock so much.
So that’s more or less worked out.
Not what was planned for the day, but that’s okay. We’re good!
The bitter cold is still hanging in there. Even with the sun shining so bright and clear, we don’t reach our high of the day until late in the afternoon. Thankfully, the deep freeze is supposed to end today and tomorrow, and then keep warming up as we head into March. I’m not holding my breath on that, since the cold has already been sticking around longer than forecast.
The outside cats have handled things well, with their shelters all over the place, plenty of food and access to warm water.
The winter sown seeds are still buried, though. I just cleared them a bit; any more than that will be done when we’re hauling snow away with the wheelbarrow, so we don’t end up with melted snow draining into the basement.
We ended up leaving the doors to the sun room partly open all night, when we saw cats using the swing bench as a bed. Potato Beetle prefers to eat in here, well away from the main crowd of cats – and an aggressive Distinguished Guest. Agnoos has a liking for the sun room, too.
Plus, sitting on rigid insulation instead of snow must be much nicer on the butt!
The heated water bowl was frozen over, though I’d made sure to turn on the power bar, so I topped it up with some warm water, too.
It wasn’t until I uploaded this picture of Broccoli, peaking at me, that I suddenly remembered something.
When I took the set up on the mini-greenhouse frame off, I had unplugged the power bar.
I never plugged it back in.
Yeah, that might explain the heated water bowl not working!
It’s plugged in now. 😀
Meanwhile, I’ve heard from the Cat Lady today. She sent me pictures of a very roly poly and healthy looking Cabbages, snuggled up with her daughter.
They watch cat videos together.
*melt*
Yeah, I’m thinking Cabbages might not be going anywhere else. She is quite bonded with Tiny Human!
At the time I’m writing this, both Nicco and Saffron should be recovering from surgery. The cat lady promised to let me know how they did. She’ll be swinging by here today to drop off kibble for us, so we’ll probably get updated then.
If you would like to contribute to our fundraiser to reimburse the cat lady for Cabbages’ vet bills, click on the button below, or click here. If you would like to read more about it, click here.
This morning turned out to be a busy phone morning. At least by our standards. 😀 My husband had phoned in a prescription refill to be delivered today, so I called for my own refill, only to discover they had no refills left on file. Just last month, they’d had to fax my doctor to get more refills, and for some reason, he’d only added another 30 days.
So while they faxed the clinic again, I called them up. The receptionist figured my doctor wanted me to come in, and could I do that this morning?
Uhm. No. Even if we had transportation, they’re a 45 minute drive away.
When I explained we had no transportation, she set up a phone appointment for me, for late this morning.
That done, I tried to move on to other things, only to have the phone ring again.
It was a Jehovah’s Witness lady that calls every now and then. Normally, I don’t have any problem chatting with her, but had to cut it short this time.
Then my mother phoned, just 10 minutes before the doctor was supposed to call me!
Normally, our phone rings maybe once every week or two. 😀
The call with the doctor went well. He did want me to get some blood work done. I told him we have no transportation right now, so I wasn’t sure when I’d be able to come in. They no longer fax requisitions to other labs, so no chance of getting it done closer. Which is fine. Whenever we have wheels again, I can go in at any time, pick the requisition up at the reception desk, then turn around to the lab across the room.
I think I’ll wait until after March 15, when our province is supposed to finally open up completely.
Which has nothing at all to do with the trucker protests. Nope. Not at all…
We’ll see if it actually happens or not.
Hopefully, our van will be ready for pick up tomorrow. I want to contact the garage again to make sure they have the space for my mother’s car before I arrange a tow. Then I have to figure out how to get there myself, to pick up our van.
I really look forward to having transportation again!!
Oh, man. What a day this turned out to be. Talk about topsy turvy!
It started out normal enough.
The deer were visiting the feeding station before seed was even put out. Tissue was enjoying watching them. We had several come by today, including the piebald.
Nutmeg was waiting his turn in the cat path as I put the kibble out.
So many cats! I count 13 in the photo.
While outside, I shoveled out the last two paths that were left to do. One was the path to the feeding station. The other was the cat path from the kibble and cat house, to the storage house.
We had cleared around the cat’s house, since we needed to open the roof up to get inside, and had tried to maintain most of it. We’ve pretty much given up on the back, though. There’s no room for the snow anymore.
The cats have taken advantage of our being able to keep the side of it clear, and have managed to still access the space under the cat house. Only the smaller cats can fit into there!
This is the opening they’ve managed to keep clear to get under the storage house. With the lilac bush there, we can only shovel their path so far, but they’ve packed down their own trail to the opening.
I’m not happy with The Distinguished Guest. She went after Creamsicle Baby today. Hard. I had to break them apart. Poor Creamsicle Baby was bleeding at the neck a bit, though from all the black fur on the snow after they battled, he defended himself pretty well.
Since we no longer have cats convalescing in the sun room, I went ahead and cleared the frame for the mini-greenhouse and brought it inside. The cover had a couple of tears in the back, so that had to be fixed.
While trying to figure out how to secure the mini-greenhouse, I got a message from the cat lady. She was in town and we worked out that she would leave her carriers in the donation bin at the shelter, and I would pick them up later.
She also let me know that she’d left Cabbages behind, snoring with their 5 other cats. !!
As soon as I could, after it was confirmed the carriers were dropped off, I headed out to start my mother’s car to go get them.
I turned the key, there was a loud POP, and it died.
I have no clue what happened.
I opened the hood, but there was nothing visible that was out of the ordinary.
We now have zero transporation.
Crud. We’re hooped!
The first thing I did was send a message to the garage about our van. It’s booked for a new alternator on the 28th, which is when my husband’s disability payment comes in (last business day of the month. However, he does get a smaller CPP Disability payment 3 business days before the end of the month, which falls on the 24th. Normally, that would have been our day to do a big shop but, obviously, that’s not going to happen anymore! It is enough to cover the cost of the repair, though. I haven’t heard back from him yet, and just left a phone message, too. Hopefully, I’ll connect with him soon. I did mention in my message to him, that we now have no way to pick up the van anymore! I’ll also have to get my mother’s car towed to him, but I’ll arrange that after we get things worked out about the van. We moved my mother’s car into where we normally park the van, so we’ll have to get it out of the garage, anyhow.
*sigh*
My mother’s car may have the block heater, battery warmer and trickle charger, but there’s still a lot under the hood that can freeze. My suspicion is that it has something to do with the starter.
I then messaged the cat lady.
Not only could we no longer pick up her carriers, but there’s no way we’d have the van back early enough to bring the cats in to the vet.
Also, just this morning, we had decided to make a change on which cats were going in. The cats have been after Nicco again, and my daughter asked if we could have her go, instead, for her own protection. So we decided on Nicco and Saffron, instead of Turmeric and Saffron.
The cat lady responded almost right away, asking if we could get them if she came over with the carriers.
!!!!
Yup. She just took it upon herself to take in two more cats for a couple of days, then bring them in to the vet herself on the 23rd.
What an amazing woman!
After giving directions on how to find us, a daughter and I started working on patching the cover for the mini-greenhouse. We didn’t get very far, when I got a call to confirm our location. She was at the intersection, but there was a misunderstanding in my instructions, and she turned the wrong way. She was already here!
So one of my daughters snagged Nicco while I grabbed Saffron, and we brought them to the sun room for her.
Not only did she come with her two carriers, but she also brought us some canned cat food! It was left over from Cabbages, who is now turning her nose up at Tuna.
!!!
We had a chance to talk for a while, and she updated us with some surprising information.
When the vet first saw Cabbages, he thought she had ingested the poison from something like a flea and tick collar. We don’t use those. All her bloodwork had come back healthy, yet she struggled to stay alive. She’d even had a seizure after the cat lady had picked her up from us. The eventual conclusion was the toxoplasmosis somehow getting into her brain. The treatment was the same, either way, for her condition.
Well, they’ve done another blood test. This time, a toxicology test at a different, specialized lab – a $400 test!
The test confirmed this compound was in her blood. She was poisoned. The vet thinks she got into fertilizer.
We don’t have fertilizer in the house.
Somehow, the vet thinks she was getting miniscule amounts of fertilizer over a long period of time, it built up in her brain until she finally became so very ill. Our force feeding her and keeping her hydrated with the syringe kept her alive long enough for the cat lady to get her to the vet.
We are absolutely flummoxed. The only thing we’ve got is Miracle Gro, it’s kept in the sun room, and the cats can’t get at it. Cabbages has never been in the sun room, anyhow.
While she was updating us on the mystery that is Cabbages, we also talked about Nicco and Saffron. She expects Saffron to be adopted out quickly; female orange tabbies get snapped up quickly right now. Calicos, however, are very hard to adopt out for some reason.
We also found out that she doesn’t like calico’s herself, nor female cats. However, her 5 yr old daughter has informed her that if they adopt out Cabbages, she’s moving out. 😀
I know they already have someone lined up to adopt her, but it’s starting to sound like they might be keeping her themselves. Now that Cabbages is healthy, she won’t have anything to do with the cat lady or the other adults, but she and their daughter are inseparable. She gets along with their other cats – and even their blind dog! Cabbages had never seen a dog before, but not only do they get along, she even went for a ride on him! She had climbed onto him while he was lying down, and when he got up and walked away, she stayed!
Cabbages may already be in her forever home!
Meanwhile, Saffron and Nicco will be staying with the cat lady for the next couple of days, make their trip to the vet, then stay with her for 2 more weeks. At that point, they will be ready for adoption and will stay with a foster until new, permanent homes are found.
We also talked about the next vet appointments in March. It will be worked out as we get closer to the date, but the vet is saying they would prefer to have one male and one female. We have no males indoors that need to be fixed, but we do have outdoor males that we can catch. So next time we may be bringing in one indoor female and one outdoor male.
It’s a shame we can’t catch any of the outdoor females. The only ones we could were Butterscotch and Nosencrantz who are now indoor cats, and Rolando Moon, who is already spayed and not going anywhere.
Oh, wow. As I was writing this, I just got sent a couple of photos. Saffron and Nicco have arrived at the cat lady’s home, safe and sound, and are now sharing the cat cage Cabbages had been recovering in. Saffron was comfortably eating already. Nicco has her usual stressed out expression. 😀
Cabbages, meanwhile, is helping the cat lady’s daughter colour, after giving the cat lady her “equivalent to the middle finger” then went on her way. 😀 What an attitude!
I knew the cat lady had already spent $1200 of her own money on vet bills a while ago, while still having weekly vet visits. Now I found out they did that really expensive toxicology test. She has easily spent over $2000 on Cabbages! That’s just in vet bills. She’s also been feeding Cabbages a special, nutrient dense, high calorie diet as she recovers.
All the more reason we started the fund raiser to help cover the costs. At $1500, it won’t cover everything, but it’ll at least cover a substantial amount!
If you would like to contribute to our fundraiser to reimburse the cat lady for Cabbages’ vet bills, click on the button below, or click here. If you would like to read more about it, click here.
Now we’ve got to figure out what Cabbages got into that caused this. We don’t have flea or tick collars. We don’t have fertilizer. I asked what else might have this compound, and she didn’t know.
Whatever it is, none of the other cats are showing signs of being sick, which makes it even more confusing. What was she getting into, that none of the other cats are getting into?
I’m at such a loss.
Meanwhile, we are now down two more indoor cats. Since we’ve brought in Nosencrantz and Butterscotch, that brings us back to 15.
The cat lady not only brought us the canned cat food Cabbages will no longer eat, but has promised to bring us more donated dry cat food, too.
What an amazing woman!
This takes a weight off our shoulders, as we can now focus on getting transportation again. I’ve let my mother know about the status of her car – reassuring her that all I was doing was keeping her informed, and not expecting her to do anything about it. She started telling me my brother will come out and fix it. No. I’m not expecting my brother to drive all the way out here to try and fix her car. Even if we did know what happened to it! But men always know more about cars than women, so I should at least talk to him.
*sigh*
Well, whatever we end up doing will depend on what the mechanic finds, after we get it towed out to him. Hopefully, it’ll be something we can afford to fix out of April’s budget. The van is already taking up every bit of wiggle room in March’s budget.
Not having a vehicle is just not a good thing out here. Yes, we’re okay as far as basic necessities. It’s more about if there’s some sort of emergency, like if my husband suddenly has to go to the hospital.
The Re-Farmer 