My Critter Herd

I’ve gotten a request to post pictures of my cats.  Unfortunately, I am not that proud of the quality of the photos and most of the photos are a couple of years old.  However, I shall proceed despite these shortcomings.

I thought I would do this in short, descriptive narratives on different groups of cats. Most came in together and so I’m going to do their “stories”.

My oldest cat is Cissy. 

I was already running out of “C” names when she and Carly came into my life.  Diane Jones, my mentor in the cat world & battling the Powers That Be (Orange County government in 1990 was when it began), asked me to take 2 kittens from her.  When I first saw Cissy, Diane had flea treated her with Vaseline, so the poor little kitten looked like a punk cat, with spiked hair.  Pitiful looking tiny thing.  

I wasn’t good about keeping records back then and, to the best of my knowledge, it was around 1995 that I brought home both Cissy and Carly.  Here is Carly: 

The two of them became “bedroom cats” because Chloe, one of my older cats, would constantly pick on them.  The kittens took to hiding behind the entertainment center and wouldn’t leave even to use the litter box.  Once moved into the bedroom and away from Chloe, there were no more problems.  Carly unexpectedly became sick one day and by the time we got to the vet, she was in such bad shape that I had no other option but to have her euthanized.  That was in May, 2008.  She was always such a sweet and loving cat.

Cissy is quite talkative and will answer you with a meow when you call her name.  When she wants attention, she won’t take no for an answer.  Pet her or suffer the consequences, trust me.  Her worst trait:  she LOVES to lick my nose and occasionally bite it.  She hasn’t drawn blood yet, probably because I do my best to keep my nose away from her!  She isn’t particularly patient about being brushed or having mats removed.  I found the greatest tool for mat removal at my vet’s office.  One evening, I was thinking that something similar to those compact, fits in your palm, plastic letter openers with an embedded razor blade would be great for removing mats.  Within a week I was at my vet’s office and THERE IT WAS!  It looks like a letter opener with a handle.  Cissy will tolerate longer sessions with this than anything else that I’ve tried and I don’t have to worry about accidentally cutting her or stabbing her with scissors.  It’s called Mat Magician, which it most certainly is!  Here is a link to their website:  http://matmagician.com/

Cissy still resides in the bedroom with many other cats now.  Most of them come rushing out when I go in to scoop litter boxes, vacuum, change the bed and feed them.  Tapping the cans together as I go back with food causes a stampede, with everyone (most of time) answering the “dinner bell” and diving into their canned cat food. 

Stay tuned for further ramblings on the rest of the herd……………….