Blackie, parkour cat.

On 6-February, we trapped our associate cat, Blackie.  A day we're never gonna forget, I promise you.  

He'd hurt his paw; I suspect he'd got frostbite, and/or sprained his paw, which dangled unhappily for a few days.  I consulted our vet, explaining that he was partly tame, not a purely feral cat.  We set an appointment for Tuesday.  

Monday night, we trapped him, not knowing what we were in for.  

Years ago: Pontiac, Mich.

I was a college undergrad for years. So I moved around quite a lot, up to 0-4 times a year. Most of my roomies liked having me around; alas, that doesn't pay the bills. 

Usually I couldn't afford to not live with my parents, not until the mid-1990s. Paying for a car and food and rent, let alone utilities, was just too much. 

~ Income ~

For years, I earned Michigan's minimum wage, which was $3.35/hour from 1986 onward. I want to say until the 90s; FRED says it went up to $5.15 by 1998! 

Not a living wage, most certainly. 

(I'd been doing temp jobs from 1988-91, and in 1993, so my wages would've been higher. Probably as much as double. I clearly recall my final assignment in 2001 for Kelly Services. I said I could not afford to make only $9.00/hour for more than the fortnight* they claimed it'd last.) 

2022 feline update.

It has been a crazy year in many ways. For one, our cat Jack elected to adopt more tomcats! 

No, really. First he'd mentored Little Guy, back in March 2022. Jack decided he liked it -- so after we trapped LG and adopted him ourselves, Jack found Cheeto, a fluffy-tailed ginger tabby, and then His Own Doppelganger cat, Blackie, another panther. 

Months ago, possibly last year, Blackie got accidentally let into the house, when my roomie realized the black cat present wasn't Jack. 

Little Guy...

As I said on Twitter: 

"This is Little Guy. We trapped him 1-April-22. He was clearly abused or neglected when he appeared in our yard. 

"Next month he has his neuter appt. My SO has been socializing LG, who rarely hisses at me any more." And today, even though I got my SO to take this picture of LG -- still no hisses!

Sneaky muscle spasm. -_-

I am so tired. Makes sense, I had a major system shock. Muscle spasms are awful.

Apparently this was a slow spasm, so I didn't figure it out until the nausea hit. A really slow one. I hate those. They're all bad, but some spasms are worse'n others.


This morning putting on a hair tie hurt, and that didn't clue me either. Just thought I'd a really bad headache. I was also really congested, which I put down to not sleeping so well.

A couple weeks ago, I popped part of my left knee somehow. Hyperextended maybe? Last night, I'd had to put a lot of Tiger Balm (the arthritis version) on my knee to sleep. Once that wore off, I knew I'd be restless if I stayed asleep.

Apparently I did stay asleep overnight...

Monday, O Monday...

Monday was an exciting day. First, the furnace guy returned. From last Thursday [starting sometime Wed. evening] through Monday, we had no heat. Again. 

Furnace got repaired maybe 2 weeks ago?

The kittens and I got shut into our BR so he could work. HRM was upset; the heat came on near instantly, but the imprisonment didn't end!

Queen Misty wanted to dig her way out from under the door. This was also the opposite of fun.

The plus was that I wasn't sitting there, sans socks, in a cold room in a cold house, trying to calm two kittens. Unlike the previous furnace repair!

Hanging by a thread

-- Ahhh, and Blogger decided to eat the post's title, fun fun! Grrr. --


Most people who are mentally ill aren't in a good way. Not collectively. We treat our mentally ill poorly overall. Closing American mental hospitals was a rotten start to this century.

From NPR's review about The Great Pretender; the review concludes:

' The Great Pretender is an essential book, and a plea for the world to come to terms with the way we're treating some of our most vulnerable people. "We are all hanging on by a very thin thread," she writes, "and some of us won't survive our fall." '

She's right. :(

In 1992, I was in one of the last mental institutions that got closed: Clinton Valley Center in Pontiac, Michigan.

October-2: kitten update.

Queen Misty and Digger/Pocito are just rocketing around the house lately. Let alone yesterday, when I looked up to roomie saying: "The kittens, they're both outside." Just like that moment in Jurassic Park when they find the raptors are inside the room with them -- that's how I'm sure Jack and Sweetpea felt!

Amazingly, we got 'em back into the house. Pocito seemed a little shell-shocked by the yard; Queenie acted like it was no big deal. As she stalked Jack. Who looked appalled, frankly.


Annnnnnnnnnnd the kittens climbed the blinds on this night.

Her Majesty was the primary perp, and I got her off the blinds. She was upset, not just to have her fun wrecked, but that I was clearly Not Happy.

::  But the cords, such temptations, such a grand toy!  The texture of the blinds! ::

No matter that I've put the frickin' cords behind the blinds, they can be SEEN, and lusted after, if one is a kitten. =rolls eyes=

Kittens today.

Cheetah is still very snuffly, and sleeps more than his sister, likely due to his awful sinus infection. :/

He likes to cuddle up with people, and/or onto a Soft Place to sleep. To his great delight, I have set up plush throws for him to sleep on the LR couch and the basement futon.

Double cat trouble.

Today my roomie [SL] and I went ostensibly to drop off stuff -- for the barn cats of Saved By Zade, our local cat rescue.

Little Cheetah began smooching my fingers. I thought I was lost, and then some little girls took an interest in his cuddliness. I stepped back, but no... their mom backed out.

Yeah, we came home with two kittens. How did you know? :P :P :P

October relaxacon and onward...

Last week, because apparently I cannot control my hypomanic* impulses, I suggested twice that I create a FAQ page for Fiasco 2019... which I keep typing today as Fiascon.  Urm.  Clearly "con" is meant to be part of any con name in my lizard brain.  Figures.

This relaxacon is just Friday and Saturday, 18-October and 19-October, held by Metro Airport.

NOT a weekend-long three-day con.

Jack's new vet adventure.

Jack's terrible awful no-good morning last Friday* went like this:

Sweetpea stayed inside all night. Didn't stir til nearly 8am, when I rose. Swapped her for one unsuspecting Jack.

Jack was fine, friendly and affectionate, happy to chow down. Third time this week he's just sat down by door and purred. He clearly hasn't been sleeping well.

Heck, Sweetpea decided to stay inside and sleep all morning! She hasn't done that in a while. So maybe he felt the same -- not feeling well, wanting not to be disturbed -- but hasn't wanted to waste the Great Outside, the playground, what if it rains again, can't miss out--

O Jack, you are still a kitten and will be for nearly another year. :D

July 2018 to now.

It's been nearly a year since I posted last. With four posts last year, and this the first posted in 2019--

The short version of the past year is this: Tiny Cat chose to live inside with us; six months later, he vanished; his family nearly all vanished; I've been struggling with depression for many months...

I did get a new shrink. So that worked out. :) Except for the other problem, which is that I appear to be speeding BACK into effin' hypomania. Again. Not my current doctor's fault, he is very good at working with me, unlike the previous few doctors.

More on my health later...


Looking back, I posted about the cats and our cat colony, so I'm glad I documented it at least. :/ Having one beloved cat disappear, and then not just one more cat, but four more--! It takes a toll on you.

Gatito was just a couple days away from his first birthday, dammit!

I tried not to get close to his cousins -- Shadow had her second litter two years after her first -- but I failed.

I loved Cali, little scamp that she was.  She somehow projected an aura of "small human girl in a pinafore" as she rocketed around.  You could feel her determination as she did whatever she wanted, all the time, and focused intensely on those things. Beautiful little bratling, Cali was. Dammit...

From kittens to kitten.

FYI: Like Tiny Cat, these are feral kittens.

Last week Nixie went missing, on 25-July-18. After breakfast. This seems to be the time the kittens vanish, sometime after the kibble comes back out.

Can't leave the kibble out overnight, since local coons -- anywhere from 3-7 a night! -- come by, along with a couple skunks, and maybe a possum.

Nix is a dilute calico male. A timid cat. He and Jack had just started purring together at us...

Then Sunday (29-July) Cali went missing. She's a female calico. After I fed her and her brother Jack breakfast.

Status of kittens: variable.

Shadow brought back the kittens after that first road trip.

 [ETA: Nearly that entire link is about Smoky's loss, beware! :( "Smoky's grandmother brought us new feral kittens the following week, 18-April. They're gone now -- probably she decided to abandon them/lead them off to new territory."] 

Mother and kittens went away 2-4 more times since then for the day... then returned.

Twice this week they've all gone missing. Granted, it's idiot season -- where half the neighborhood blows up firecrackers day and night, a horrible experience for cats and dogs alike. Let alone lawn mowers.


Friday all the kittens came back late. I fed them wet food, knowing they'd be starving and thirsty.

Last night we got Nixie, hoarsely mewing, and Jack, at 11pm -- same time as Friday. But not their sister Cali.

Sunday I'd seen Nix at 9am, who then fled, but not his sibs. Back towards the far corner of yard. Shadow must've taught her feral kittens to climb fences... or to try to. Whenever the kittens vanish, I tell Shadow "bring back the kittens" and she realized that means I'll feed them wet food when they're home.

Last night, oddly, Shadow didn't want any wet food. The boys and her adult daughter Vee happily ate it.

Spring update...

Tiny Cat went missing 13-April-18. Three days before his birthday.

I have a couple blog posts started about Gatito, our Smoky, who was almost a year old.  Short version, we're positive he was rescued by someone who figured he was a cute polite young cat, and that's why there's been no sign of him. He'd always come home before. * 

I hope that person has other cats for him to play with, and takes good care of my baby. I miss him terribly -- we all do.

A horrible and vicious tomcat had been attacking Smoky, and Vee, and pretty much every cat here who wasn't Shadow. The only cat who the Orange Monster could mate with; I call him that rather than constantly cuss, okay?

Smoky update: pica.

Months ago, in late October, we took Smoky to the vet. Twice. The first visit went well.

After the second visit, I wasn't happy with that vet, for she insisted he was "eating something from outside" and that Gatito be kept indoors.

What she didn't make clear is that "you can mix in his old food when he's better" was not really what she meant. Um, be clear. I'm not a vet, if you tell me it's okay, and then it's not--! Because on his second visit, the vet was upset that I'd fed him his old kibble.

Just like she said. So her premise was that I'd messed up his stomach bacteria. Even though she couldn't figure out what was giving him loose stools.

Cat spay the second.

Short version: In the last five days [back in July] that seemed like aeons... we hosted another mostly tame/semi-feral cat during her post-op recovery.


{ Written 21-July-2017 }

We got Sweetpea fixed this past Monday.

Hell, once inside carrier Monday morning, Sweetpea methodically shredded every piece of paper I'd put in there. Not the towel nor the shirt, though.

Friday night we loosed Sweetpea back out into her kingdom.  My grey cat of friendliness still loved us, and proved affectionate -- but her trust in her humans was decreasing.

=-=

Recent kitten news.

We got Smoky fixed on 31-August.

He bounced back quickly [of course, being a male cat] and wanted out out OUT. I'd meant to keep him indoors 48 hours, maybe more... but after a full day of kitten-sitting, loosed him two mornings after his surgery. I think Gatito and I were both tired of his temporary imprisonment by then!

Or as SL put it, "Kitten says to other cats through doorwall: 'My humans are broken, I don't know why they aren't letting me out.' " { And he makes a sad face. }

Dingdong pawed the doorwall several times during the kitten's imprisonment; DD had missed his playmate just as much as Smoky missed his Buddy. Awwwww.

Cat: Jekyll and Hyde.

Yesterday [?] I introduced Smoky to the fish toy. At first he wasn't too sure about this odd thing. What was it? Why was it on a string?

The fish seemed like a toy, but it resisted. Smokepuff could smell that Mommy had gnawed on it, and his aunt Vee too. Hmm!

Then Sweetpea played with the toy right there: Mommy liked it, oh, it must be fun then. 8) He was enthralled.

Smoky played like any cat does with a pole toy, and he clearly enjoyed himself.