Tag: pets

How To Torture Your Cat

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Home lifeLeave a comment

This weekend I noticed that the wound that Milo, our tuxedo cat, had on his lower spine was not healing as fast as I’d like it to. I had been doctoring it, but on Monday when I went to look at it I noticed it felt spongy. I was moving his hair around and it started oozing. I doctored it some more decided to give it a day to see if it was any better. By Tuesday I decided to call our vet. They asked for me to send in a picture so the vet could look at it and make a decision if we needed to come in or not.

Because his hair is thick and black it was hard to actually see what the wound looked like. The vet called and said it would be best to bring him in, especially with his wound history. (that’s how he became our cat. He wandered up with a horrible neck wound that almost killed him)

I got an appointment for 3:40 that afternoon. At 3 I got out our cat carrier. Because Milo is SO docile I thought, for sure, he would go right in with no problem. Boy, was I wrong. It was like trying to get a angry octopus in a bag. I had the kids try to help me. We took the lid off and put him in. Nope, he almost broke the carrier. Jackson suggested tipping it over and dropping his through the opening. That sure didn’t work. By this time it was 12 minutes until my appointment. I called the vet frantic because I didn’t know what to do. They said just put him in anything that I had. Say less. I remembered a Chik-fil-a catering bag that I had.

img_20251216_153424475_hdr8614086005774440610

To say he was not happy would be an understatement, but I got him there. He actually did so well at the vet. The vet and I agreed that he caught his back going under the chain link fence. The vet shaved the area, flushed it out and gave him an antibiotic shot.

He just chilled out the rest of the night.

Guess who did like the carrier?

I’m glad because after Christmas she’s going in to get spayed.

Day #60 – Slinky the Incontinent Skunk

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn 100 DaysLeave a comment

I feed the night critters (and the day ones also). We have a sweet little skunk that either got hit by a car or was born with a defect. He cannot walk so he slithers. It’s almost like he’s partially paralyzed. The problem with that is that it makes him incontinent. I was putting the food bowl on the patio until I realized that he cannot help it when his “stink” slips out. So now I feed him in the grass away from us.

We try to be mindful of him. It takes him almost an hour to eat. The other night I thought he was choking and could just see myself trying to dislodge the food. Luckily he did it on his own. We have two younger skunks that will come up and eat, but I have noticed that they treat Slinky with respect and let him eat without bothering him. They will fuss among themselves though. One night I want to follow him (he’s a slow slitherer) to see where he goes.

We have also started feeding more of the stray cats. Our neighbors across the street were feeding the ones living on their side (it’s like west side story turf war between the cats) but they have started all coming to eat around dusk. I have to keep O’malley inside because, although he too was street cat with them, he’s very protective of his home base now.

Tonight I finally got to touch the grey and white one who we call Fidget. She is getting braver and walking up to me. The two little black ones are newcomers.

This is Mr. Whiskers. He’s always let me love on him and is very protective of the other ferals. I need to get him fixed because I have a feeling he has fathered most of the ones that come to eat. Someone put a flea collar on him, but I’m pretty sure he doesn’t belong to anyone.

Oh and I colored my hair today and I’m posting it so I can remember when I did it. I didn’t have a hair bag so I just wrapped my head in Saran wrap.

I have been using the Wella color from Sally’s and I really like it. I use medium intense blond with a 30 developer. It’s so close to my natural color so I’ll take it.

The kids start college tomorrow. I think I’m more nervous than they are.

Day #15 – Polishing the Present

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn 100 DaysLeave a comment

The morning started off a bit rocky. I went outside to get the cat bowls to wash. A skunk had sprayed the day before and I couldn’t exactly figure out where it had sprayed. Oh, I found out, it had sprayed the bowls. So that was fun. My hands and the bowls had to get a good scrubbing.

I had to bathe the kitten because she is too young for flea medication. I had run her bath in a bowl and was putting her in when I got a call from my daughter who lives in the Hill Country. It scared the kitten so she scratched me trying to get away when I answered the phone. My daughter told me, “our house is flooded”. I immediately think it’s from the flooding in Kerr County. Nope. Her husband had hung up a heavy wood Astros sign on their house. It fell off and knocked the spigot off and water was shooting out like a fire hydrant. The water got into their living room. Luckily it wasn’t too bad.

Then I heard something that resonated with me. Polishing the present. It’s doing little things in the moment to make life better for you. This is what my 100 days is about and today I did just that. After tidying up the house I steam cleaned the carpets, which always make me feel better.

The bottom rug is woven leather and takes a while to dry but they look so much better even damp.

Then I lit my incense and read a book.

There is just something about incense that is so calming to me.

I have been wanting to read this book since I picked it up at the nickel book sale a few months ago. I decided that today was the perfect day. I’m almost finished and it’s so good. I highly recommend this author.

Oh and I had forgotten that I glued my Cole Haans soles back on. I could have taken them to a cobbler, but I had to glue so I thought I’d just give it a shot. The soles weren’t all the way off but were coming loose and this glue is amazing.

Hannah is coming home tomorrow and I cannot wait to see her. It seems like she’s been gone for months.

And just because they are best friends:

King Queso

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Home lifeLeave a comment

I HATE writing this post. Saturday night Queso and Monkey did not want to come in the house. It’s not unusual for them to be outside. Queso was my daughter’s cat that we took in when she moved to the Hill Country. Donny and I both fell asleep in the living room watching a movie. I got up about 1 am and since he looked so comfortable I let him sleep. He later told me that at about 3 am he heard a cat ruckus outside. This isn’t unusual because we have a very cat friendly street and there are a lot of strays that we feed. He went outside to look around to find Queso and Monkey to bring them in. He couldn’t find them.

Sunday morning Milo woke me up to go outside at 6:10. I always start the coffee and then go outside to make sure the cats have food and fresh water. When I walked out onto the patio I saw Queso laying under the big table. I called him but he didn’t respond. I got closer to him and realized that he wasn’t breathing. My heart broke. I went inside and woke Donny up. We picked up Queso’s body to see if we could see anything that would explain what happened to him. Nothing. Not a scratch that we could see. He had looked like he was just sleeping. We wrapped him in his blanket and buried him in the backyard.

This was the last picture I took of him. He was the coolest cat. He weighed 15 pounds and would not take no for an answer. He loved HARD. His favorite place to sleep was on my pillow with his arms wrapped around my neck. He loved to give kisses. He wanted all the other cats to be his friend. He would stand guard on our cars or the trash cans. His favorite place to nap outside was the plant shelf.

Taken during a thunderstorm.

His favorite napping spot.

Always wanting to help.

Late night snuggles.

Loving any basket, bag or box.

He and Milo were best friends. They always wanted to be near each other. Milo is having a hard time with Queso not being here. He wants to be in the same room as I’m in and if he’s not he will loudly meow. We are all going to miss Queso so much. He was definitely one of a kind and it felt like he was always more human than cat.

P.S.

We found some coyote tracks in the ditch mud so now we believe that he tried to fight off a coyote and when he howled he scared it off. There must have been damage that we couldn’t see.

Hangry Cat

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Medical stuffLeave a comment

I’ve mentioned the stray cat that found us who we named O’Malley. Well, O’Malley had really wanted to come in the house all the time. That was great, except that unless you watched him like a hawk, he would spray. I felt bad having to keep him outside so I made an appointment to get him neutered.

We kept him in the house the night before the appointment. Now the funny thing about this cat is that he stress eats. Whenever you pet him or even just talk to him, he has to run to the food bowl and eat. It’s like his comfort thing. We were told by the vet to take his food up at midnight. The morning of the surgery he came into the kitchen and I was petting him. He will always roll over on his back to have you scratch his belly. This particular morning, while I was doing just that, he identified as a gator and chomped down on my hand. I felt his teeth sink into my skin and blood started pouring out of the wounds. He, realizing what he had done, jumped up and ran to the now non existent food bowl.

I immediately washed the bites and sprayed hydrogen peroxide on them. My whole right hand was throbbing, but I couldn’t miss the appointment, so into the makeshift crate he went. I do actually have a cat carrier somewhere I just can’t find it. It had poured the day before and I had only a bit of time to search the stacked up with totes to the ceiling shed. I had to just make due with what I had which was two laundry baskets, a Bungie cord and hair clips.

It was a little embarrassing walking into the vet with so many people in line staring at my “carrier”, but you do what you have to do. Six and a half hours later Jackson and I went to pick him up. He was supposed to be crated for 2 days, but that wasn’t working. Milo was very curious about his friend.

After about 8 hours he seemed fine so I let him out. He ate and used the litter box. We did keep him in for about 2 days and he was fine with that. It seems like he has taken to house life because he now is in more than out. This was him today and now he’s curled up on the bed with me.

I, on the other hand, was not fine. I didn’t want to tell Donny about the bite, but my hand started swelling, getting red and was still oozing. There was no way in hell that I was going back to the bougie ER and luckily I had a doctor’s appointment the next day. It was just the twice a year appointment to go over my labs, but I was definitely going to ask for antibiotics.

The bite was Wednesday, the appointment was Thursday. He did give me a prescription for antibiotics, but by Friday I was so sick that I stayed in bed all day. I couldn’t eat anything, but Donny got me a vanilla shake so I could take my medicine.

img_20250509_1008567148974922406325212251

I felt lousy. We don’t know if it’s cat scratch fever or if I developed cellulitis but whatever it is it is taking its own sweet time healing. It’s not as swollen, but still has a hard area around both wounds. The antibiotics make me nauseous and give me zero appetite. Next pic is gross, but it was taken this morning.

I guess we’ll just take it one day at a time. Geesh, the things we go through for our pets.