That’s the name I have given to Alaska’s 3 month old kitty who has decided (after his neuter) that the miller place is quite scary; what with a wheelchair that sometimes bangs into walls, countless kitties skittering about and humans GASP two humans (on good days) and then there was just one human left! Too much to deal with!

So, this beautiful long-haired semi-feral boy has decided to live under the kitchen cupboards. His mission in life, I have decided is to provide a heart attack to the one human left for now, so he can have undeclared domination of the house. He waits until the still of the night and then he plays tag among my pots and pans- blowing open the cupboard doors and flinging pots and pans all over the floor! Makes the most unholy of noises in the middle of the night.

He also delights in scaring the scrud out of me by leaping on me from his vantage point under the sink. He generally waits until I have a glass of water in my hand, he gets more points if he can spill the water on the floor. Plus, he gets to lap up the water while I go for a bit of a stiffer drink once he startles me.

One of his favorite games comes when I am washing the dishes. He waits until I am fully involved in this lovely chore and then he bats at my waist from underneath the counter. There is shelf down there (barely large enough for my hand to get through) but he is a skinny boy under all that hair and he can lay there and just bat the devil out of me with his claws.

I figure one day in the future, this gorgeous boy will figure out that life here isn’t really all that scary and he will come out and join the others. I do see him at feeding time and using the litterpans (thank God he’s not taking bathroom breaks in my cupboards!

So I admire him from afar and I do get to startle him from time to time when he decides to come out from hiding and join the group. He stays with the cats until I walk close to him and then ZOOM off he goes leaping into that narrow space that he calls “home.”

Early this morning, I woke up to very heavy, raspy breathing. I rushed out of bed and went over the cage Maxwell has occupied since arriving here. He was lying on his side, open mouth panting, taking fairly rapid shallow breaths. I called his name and he turned to me but his eyes looked like he had checked out. I called my old vet- he does farm calls and after hour appointments. He said he would meet me at his clinic in Albany. 45 minutes away. I bundled up Maxwell carefully and hustled him into the truck. Before I could get halfway there, he had gone on to a better life.

Dr. Ridgeway said that chances are he had a stroke and his heart wasn’t strong enough for him to survive it. Short of having a necropsy performed, it was his best guess scenario for this cat who didn’t live a normal life.

So now Maxwell is reunited with his previous owner and chances are where they are now, the food is much better for both of them.  Bye Max, I am so sorry you weren’t given a chance to know what it was like to be owned by someone who understood what cats needed in order to thrive. We shall meet again one day-

Yesterday, he had an appointment in Portland and the physical therapist told us it was “too soon” for Mike to be able to get into the truck and go to the doctors. He said we should plan on a medical transport (which our insurance company won’t cover).  Well Mike showed them all and he got in and out of his truck four times before we left the rehab center! YAY Mike!

We didn’t get good news at the hospital though. Of course Mike isn’t healing correctly. The stitches which were supposed to come out a week after the surgery are still intact.. The skin is infected around the incision so they have put him on an antibiotic and probiotic round of meds. He gets C-Diff quite easily.

I had to go past the scene of my accident yesterday because I refuse to go on the freeway. I stopped and showed Mike where it all happened. He was just quiet and said he was glad I hadn’t been seriously injured. I got a little short of breath when I passed it- but hopefully in time those and the shakes I experience will pass.

Maxwell ate cat food this morning! He likes this horrible brand of cat food called BFF- it smells nasty and none of my other cats will even eat it. It is supposed to be “all natural”  and the label stands for Best Feline Friend. Regardless, he did eat it- so hopefully in a few weeks he will start eating the normal cat food that is here.  He did swipe a piece of my pizza last night when I left it unattended on the table to go answer the phone. Silly kitty!

Mr. Maxwell is indeed a bit of a mess. He has severe nonregenerative anemia more than likely due to poor nutrition. It is suspected he is diabetic, the vet said probably diabetes mellitus because he is so skinny. Silly me, I thought only fat cats got diabetes. Turns out I was wong. The bloodwork won’t be back until Weds to confirm this though. He was loaded with parasites. He has a fairly strong heart murmur, they took films just to see if his internal organs have withstood all the junk food and he has cloudy lungs which for his age they should be fairly clear. I wonder if this homeless man smoked and he might have asthma? I don’t know but the funds aren’t there to run another test to find out what this cloudiness is for now.

So we did flea-treat him, he is on supplements and a strictly cat food diet. I told him on the way home, he has to at least pretend to like cat food! We de-wormed him and will just do the best we can to repair the damage done to his body and go from there.

He;s just such a lover though. He was head-bumping and purring up a storm and patting the vet’s hand with his paw (with his claws still sheathed). He may have been fed wrong, but he certainly shows evidence of being loved.

I have a new cat here. I am calling him Maxwell. He belonged to a homeless man who fed this cat Cheetos, peanut butter and canned beans. To say this cat is a mess is an understatement. He looks at cat food fare as if to say to me “What the devil is that?” Then he turns to a saucer of chopped up hot dogs and scarfs it down. He is very loving- but he is also very thin and very sick. The litterpan is full of his sick and come Monday, we will go to the vet and start to unravel what all is wrong with him. His owner has passed away and his friends gave me this cat yesterday late in the afternoon.

I don’t want to deworm or deflea him as I don’t think adding chemicals to the mix is a good idea at this time. His old name was “TC” stands for “The Cat.” I think Maxwell is a better fit for this cat who is now presented with a new life. A life where he will finally find out that he is a cat. I understand that he also likes M&M’s hopefully not the dark chocolate kind as those are toxic to cats and dogs too.

The couple who are interested in adopting Glacie stopped by today to visit with her. They questioned why the calico girls were still here and I shared a bit of the story (leaving out my editorial comments). They played with all three kittens and even Pumpkin came out of her funk and came over to investigate the two new humans in her room. Pumpkin is doing so much better today. I gave her 1/4 tab of Benedryl to fight off the effects of the vaccine and she is almost back to her normal self again.

Okay, so the couple leave and a bit later my phone rings. They want to adopt all THREE of the kittens- the calicos and Glacie! I couldn’t be more thrilled as all the kittens are so close and bonded. They were especially attracted to London and Paris, because they are such outgoing kittens. All they want to do is get in your business and stay there. And Glacie, her best trick which she revealed to her future parents today- is to hop on my back and settle down and wrap her paws around my neck and fall asleep! She does this when I am kneeling down and scooping litter pans. I have to crawl across the room and lightly bump the cat condo to wake her up so she can hop off my back without her or I coming to harm.

So this leaves Autumn and Pumpkin still available and they will probably just be signed over to the shelter where the other kittens have found homes. I can’t do it until the ringworm is completely gone- so hopefully in a few weeks they can leave here and find their new forever home.

When you want a do-over and this day is one for me. I called the adoptive parents of the calicos and told them that under the circumstances, they can’t go to homes right now until the ringworm (which is at a dormant stage right now) is all gone. They asked me how long before it is erased? It’s to hard to pin down, it depends on the cat, the immune system, the strain of the ringworm. It’s not painful, but it is a pain in the butt to treat and finally get rid of. I told them all of that and asked if they wanted to go ahead and take the girls and treat them (I would show them how) or if they wanted me to treat them and deliver them when they are cured.

No, they said. We’re not interested now. we wanted “kittens” and by the time that they go through all their treatments they might just be cats, and oh, we want our money back that we paid you for the spays-vaccines-and microchipping. Total of $100.00 (which I don’t have because it went on the spay bill. I offered to send them a tax-deductible receipt for the donation, but they want the money back.

I guess the saving grace is the calicos probably wouldn’t have been happy in this home especially if they turned out not to be “perfect kittens.” If they couldn’t work with me through the days, weeks of treatments, what would have happened if one of the kittens had fallen ill? Now, I just have to figure out how to pay her back for her “donation’ because I have a feeling, she isn’t going to let that part of the deal drop.

I’m also worried about Pumpkin. She just doesn’t look right. She’s not eating much, and she is just so withdrawn which is not like her. Her temp is normal- she just looks off to me. Maybe it’s just the combination of the spay/vaccine and microchipping that she went through yesterday. I’m hoping she recovers over the weekend or it’s another vet visit for us to find out what is wrong.

Today, seven of the kittens went in to get spayed. I went to pick them up at around 3:00. When I got there, they were still doing other spays and had put my kittens into a hallway in their carriers. One of their new volunteers had put a small heater near the carriers- however, she forgot to engage the cooling fan or to put it on rotate. I noticed Glacie swaying back and forth in the front of her cage, fully agitated. At first I thought she was reacting to the anesthesia, but then I noticed her ears were bright bright red!

I reached down to scoop her out- the carrier was white hot- all the heat had been going into her cage. 🙁 Her temp was 106.8!) We put her in cooling towels, I was pouring water on her head while the vet techs were giving her cooling fluids and little by little she started to regain her normal temperature. I had her snuggled next to my chest on the ride home and she was shivering like crazy. When I got home her temp was sub-normal.

I called my feline specialist friend and she assured me that everything should be okay in time. The shivering she said is because the body was exposed to such heat that it shocked her system. I am going to keep a sharp eye on her tonight and regulate her temperature. She did eat a little bit which made me feel better. But it was such a scare. She was open-mouth panting and had I reacted quicker, her anguish wouldn’t have gone on that long. I was standing in the hallway watching the surgeries for quite awhile before I noticed her distress. I did notice her swaying back and forth when I arrived but all the kitties were swaying in response to the anesthesia and the procedure.

I called Kim and her husband and told them what happened and explained that I wanted to keep Glacie here a bit longer that just tomorrow morning. I want to be sure she doesn’t develop lung issues or brain damage.

Thank you to those of you who helped me make these spays possible. We were $50.00 short of making the entire bill- but they will work with me.

Also wanted to say to those of  you waiting for your donation letters for tax purposes. Please bear with me. I am going to get those done this weekend and they will either be emailed to you or direct-mailed if I have your physical address. Normally, I have them done by now, but these aren’t normal times for me. So please forgive me. They are top of my list to do this weekend.

Autumn and Pumpkin are back home with me as well. Turns out after their bellies were shaved- they were discovered to have small smatterings of ringworm still! Once I get it cleared up- they will be returned to the shelter for adoption. Two of my other kittens came back and are now sharing a cage. They were to shy for the family who wanted a romping, stomping kitten to play with. Hopefully, they will be adopted soon enough.

Sully, the semi-feral cat with the monster electrical burn in his mouth is now free of pain. He stopped eating a few days ago, the drool increased from his mouth and nothing we have done for him has worked in his favor. I couldn’t even imagine the pain he was under with such a massive burn. My vet wanted to keep trying, but Sully has taken to recently pulling huge tufts of hair from his paws and his back which is a clear indication he is in pain and I didn’t feel right about asking him to continue living like that. I took him to animal control this morning where they put him down with dignity.

I’m sorry Sully. I have no idea how a feral cat could have experienced such a burn in their mouth and I really wish we could have healed you and sent you off to a barn to live your life out. At least now, you can eat your share of Heaven’s bountiful mice and have no pain at all.

Today, Mike was supposed to go to OHSU for an appointment, but he still can’t transfer from his wheelchair to a bed or vice-versus. I cancelled his appointment and I could tell he is frustrated. But this has to be a safe journey or it doesn’t get made. Medical Transport to Portland is horribly expensive and his incision is clean, no drainage looks good according to his new doctor. I saw his face yesterday when Physical Therapy told him there was no way he could  make the transfer into the truck from the wheelchair. He insisted we try and he set his face in such anger. Everybody left us alone and I talked his anger away. Now, he is just frustrated. I think this will just make him work harder now to gain some independence.

This is my last day with the kittens. I shall miss them all. But tomorrow they get spayed and go off to lovely homes with their new owners who are chomping at the bit to get these babies in their homes. Aurora will take up residence in the bedroom for now as she still doesn’t get along well enough with the group here.