Pets – Got the Jimmy Legs

Pets

For the ghost and the storm outside

Hubcap, originally uploaded by Jimmy Legs.

My cat for the past 11 years, Hubcap, died last night at the Animal Clinic in Ridgewood. I don't know how old he was, but estimates put him around 15, so kidney failure is not perhaps that much of a surprise. I guess I'm glad I took him to the vet, but I wish that hadn't been his last stop.

I don't know what time he died exactly, but I woke up abruptly at 2:40 this morning to the sounds of plastic rustling: it was the sound of cat paws touching a bag of cat food. Every time I brought home a new bag, Hubcap would immediately start pawing at it, trying to get at what surely was superior food to what he already had in his bowl. He did it every time.

Of course, the sound was probably just one of the other cats rubbing up on the bag of Tidy Cat I left on the kitchen table (a souvenir from the kittens), but I like believing it was Hubcap, doing what he loved most: eating and annoying the hell out of me.

Maybe we'll be haunted by his ghost.

Long haired freaky people need not apply

Taking a break from kittens for a moment, let's look at the evolution of guinea pigs over the past years. Maybe these breeds were around when I was growing up, but I sure don't remember them. I had plain guinea pigs, my favorite being an agouti (like the one pictured on the left), whose markings kind of resemble what wild guinea pigs look like. Sorta looks like a groundhog.

Besides that, I knew of a couple of odd breeds, such as the Peruvian, whose hair grows long and straight and basically turns them into a living toupee. Then there's the Abyssinians, with the cowlicks all over, permanent bed-head. I thought that was pretty much it, but science has been working to increase guinea pig exoticness to unheard-of degrees.

For instance, you can now get a "sphinx" guinea pig, a mostly-hairless pig that reveals just how hippo-like they really are. Some also like sharpeis, all wrinkled and rubbery looking. There are several other newish breeds, some are cute, some less so.

What in god's name were they thinking when they came up with the "Coronet" breed? It's basically a long-hair bred with a crested pig so you end up with an embarrassing rodent sporting a mullet. Is this animal cruelty at its worst?

No, actually this is:

The little feet of tadpoles

Just some kitten video I shot this morning. They're doing stuff, but they're not nearly as active here as they are, say, when we're trying to go to sleep. That's when they are in full-scamper mode, when they attack your toes and find ways to crawl inside the lining under the armchair. In these videos, they just sort of scurry around the pile of boxes we have in the room.


Littleface took a spill over the weekend and strained his left foreleg. He was limping around at first, but he seems to have recovered quickly. Speaking of recovery, El Jefe the Amazing Ball-less Cat seems completely fine. I ended up taking the collar off Friday night, he was just so pathetic, bumping into everything and not being able to reach the food at the bottom of the bowl. I've been checking the incision site and it seems fine in any case. Now if we could only get him to stop stressing out Decatur, then we'd really have something.

Great balls of fire

Why did you do this to me, originally uploaded by Jimmy Legs.

It's a curse of some cats, that they look sweet and happy even when they are clearly miserable. Jefe's a gelding now, and they talked me into the damn collar thing. I thought about skipping it, but he immediately started licking, um, the incision area when we got home.

Yes, that's right: we made it to the ASPCA Mobile Spay Unit! I got up extra early this morning, even though my name was supposedly on a waiting list. I got over to Saratoga Park just after 7AM. The spaymobile was nowhere in sight; nor were any people with pets (aside from dogwalkers). The site clearly states you should arrive before 7 to make sure everything goes smoothly, so I immediately thought it wasn't coming. I stood around like a doofus (and I'm even more out of place there than in my part of the neighborhood, if that's possible).

Finally at 7:30, the truck showed up and parked alongside the park. We then did a whole lot of waiting around, during which time a woman got angry because she had been on the list but didn't get a form to fill out, and a little girl's tooth was loose and was plucked out, causing her to scream like she herself was being spayed. Fun times!

At least the park is relatively nice, and the shade of the sycamores made the wait in the already-awful heat tolerable. At 9AM I got to take Jefe into the truck, where he was placed into a cage next to a darling little kitten whose cage was marked "FERAL," she was hissing at everything.

If you're not on assistance, they ask for a $25 donation, small change when you consider it can cost more than 10 times that if you pay 'retail' at some vets. Additionally they were offering free rabies vaccines, and vaccines for the main cat ailments. With the purchase of the e-collar, the grand total was $30! What a deal. Except for all the waiting around and such, but one could argue you'd have to do the same waiting at a regular vet.

I picked him up around 2:30, he was reportedly an angel for the duration (the doc had trouble listening for his heartbeat because he was purring too loudly). He's still woozy, but this really came out when I put the collar on. He's now under the coffee table trying to pull his own head off, lolling around like a drunk. I can't believe I'm supposed to keep the collar on for 7 to 10 days!

Also, there's all this stuff I'm supposed to do I don't remember doing for any other cats I've had fixed, like replacing cat litter with shredded paper. I understand it's to avoid infection, but I've got 4 litterboxes (and I plan on getting another tomorrow), there is no way I'm shredding that much paper! I do have some of that World's Best Cat Litter, which is mostly dust-free, I might try that on him.

Next up will be Lucy! I dunno when the spaymobile will be back in the neighborhood, but I'll probably just take her to the vet's. I'm not sure I'll be able to get away with being out of the office twice in one week just to get a cat snipped.

Now I've got you in my sights

Crazee Eyes, originally uploaded by Jimmy Legs.

The kitten formerly know as Liza has moved uptown to an apartment just off the park. Not bad for the spawn of an alley from the southside of the Shwick! We hope she'll be very happy, she'll have another cat and a dog as siblings. Things may be tense at first, but she has become very friendly and adventurous, so she should be in a good position to meet new animals and people.

It was tough giving her away, but it always is I guess. She's in good hands though, we tried to stick a few more kittens into the outgoing cat carrier but were unsuccessful. Hopefully, we'll get a similar caliber of adopter for the fellas who remain.

I wish I knew the situation with the several other mama cats on the block. Marbles and Gladys have had their litters, but we've seen no sign of them (Gladys' should be big enough to eat solid food now). Bunny (or Mildred) is still very pregnant, but she doesn't seem to want to stay in the house. I'm not sure if we should try to force her to stay in to have her kittens or what. I'm sure I'd feel better about it, but raising kittens is pretty disruptive to the household, maybe it would work better if I had a cat nursery in the cellar. But right there I already feel creepy; what kind of guy builds a cat nursery in his basement?

Anyway, congrats to the new parents of Liza (or whatever she'll actually be called)!!! We expect regular updates, dammit!