Sorcha's Scribblings

When a Cat is Sick, Everyone Cries

When I came downstairs this morning, I found more cat vomit than I've ever seen, strewn all over the house. First I cleaned it up, wondering if this was one cat being violently ill or more cats with some kind of mob disease. Without going into details, I can tell you it wasn't ordinary cat vomit.

Eventually I tracked down what looked like one unhappy cat, who was clearly running a fever. I packed him into a cat carrier and hauled him off to the vet. He has some kind of cat flu. She said "Keep him warm and make sure he drinks a lot".

Well.

Have you ever tried to make sure a CAT drinks a lot? Not a lot of options there.

When we got back, his brother and littermate freaked out about how he smelled. We had some serious cat unpleasantness while the sick one wanted to cuddle up with his brother for comfort and his brother was all "YOU ARE AN IMPOSTER!!! I CAN TELL BY HOW YOU SMELL!!!!"

More cat puke. This time in the water bowl. Also a good way to get cats to drink more: make sure one of them vomits in the water bowl.

I'm an expert on cat puke right now. At least he's asleep. He ran around a little, chasing a ball, an hour or so ago, so I hope this means he's better. Because then he can be responsible for his own water intake.

Friday cat blog

Loganberry (on the right) and Conundrum sleeping as close to the sun as they can get on a Seattle winter day....

Friday cat blog

Another picture of Akasha.

In this one, you can actually see that her tail is very short, about 3" long when fully extended. She has about half as many vertebrae in her tail as a normal cat, but they are all crumpled together, sort of like an accordion. Her fur is thick and fluffy, so you can't see that she has so many bones there. However, she treats it as a full tail, which is very cute, twitching the end of it when she's on the edge of being annoyed, slashing the whole thing around when she is angry, and even trying to chase it.

Friday cat blog, memorial version

This is a picture of Lady Jane Grey, taken when she was a grand old dame of 18 years.

She may be the only cat I will ever know who thought the best way to celebrate her 18th birthday was to simultaneously take down two grocery bags and a feather toy.

Friday cat blog

Loganberry and Conundrum hoping something better is going to happen than just having their picture taken.

Friday Cat Blog

Conundrum, Loganberry, and Mozart enjoying a catnap.

Friday cat blog

Here's the latest photo of Conundrum, also taken with a phone camera.

I have no idea why this cat thinks that crawling under a blanket is reasonable cat behavior, but it certainly amuses me. Maybe that's why he does it.

It's Friday!

This is an oldish picture of Akasha:

Here is a more recent photo of the same cat:

These pictures don't show her most salient feature: a little puffy tail. I believe that if you were able to stretch her tail out, it would be about 1/3 as long as most cat tails. However, the bones of her tail are all crumpled up. Luckily, her fur is quite thick, so she ends up looking like she has the same kind of tail as a large rabbit. Since it has a goodly number of bones in it, she treats it as if it were a full-length tail, twitching just the tip, or waving the whole thing back and forth, for example.

Sometimes a phone is just a phone...

...and sometimes it is also a camera. I've had a cell phone that is also a camera for a good long while now, for reasons unrelated to the camera. At some point, I decided to see whether the camera was just for show, or if it could actually take recognizable pictures. Since it was pouring rain outside, I needed subjects in the house. I found two.

This is Loganberry, taking a nap in front of a pile of books I have to read for school.

This is his littermate, Conundrum, taking a nap in a box.

These cats were adopted from the local no-kill cat shelter. At the time, I was imagining either a pair of tuxedo cats or else a pair of classic silver tabby cats. What I got was a cow kitty and his faded brother, who turned out to be excellent cats.

On the whole, I am pleased with the phone camera pictures. Sure, I could have done better with a purpose-made camera, but this was handy. And now that I know it works, who knows what else I might shoot with it?