Trevor Von Stinkypants would like to know

Excuse me Lady, might you have some food for a wee little kitteh?

Kind sir, might you have some food for a wee little kitteh?

no?  no food?

What is a wee kitteh supposed to do now?

The (guilt) force is strong with this one.. Excuse me, must go now..

Playing Catchup

Well I think I have finally caught up from going to BlogPaws.  I had nearly 200 blog posts to read at one point, it was a little disheartening.  I considered not reading them and just letting it go, but I couldn't do it.  I'm also nearly caught up at work, and I'm hoping to be by the time the week is out.

Fleurp - still doing well in terms of her anemia.  Her gums are still pink and she is holding her weight.  Oddly enough she has started losing fur on her ears.  It doesn't seem to be bothering her at all in that it is not red nor does it seem itchy.  I contacted her holistic vet and she suggested I stop giving the holistic remedy and see what happens, so that is what we will do.

Jack - is doing well.  He didn't need all of the pain meds I got for him.  He's not a fan of being pilled any more, and I can't say I blame him.  He is currently on my chest, head on my hand as I am typing, purring away.  the 24 hour culture came back with no growth - which scares the living daylights out of me.  if it isn't crystals and it isn't an infection, why on earth was he peeing blood??  Since starting him back on antibiotics he hasn't had any inappropriate urination, so I am hoping against hope that the 48 hour culture shows something.. (Am I gonna get more cookies out of this??? ~Jack)

The Crew in general.. yup, other then my two problem children everything seems to be going well.  The warmth of spring / summer is here and the sun room is open for them to sit in and smell the outdoors and they are loving that.

"Elvis"... doing well.  Someone vomited yesterday and I am assuming it is him.  He was also a bit more sedate then I would have liked, but so was Odilia when she was five days past deworming too.. so I'm not worrying.    He also has a new name.. Trevor Von Stinkypants.  Rene suggested Trevor and it seemed to fit. I tried Elvis (I liked it cause he is a lover) and Trevor and Odin.. Trevor won.  DH said I should name him Mr. Stinkypants because he is still having issues and is a little smelly.. and after some discussion he turned into Von Stinkypants. :)   He doesn't seem to mind.  All Trevor wanted to do last night was sit on someone and or complain about the lack of 'good' food.. despite there being Wellness chicken and beef in the plate.

Trevor Von Stinkypants aka TVS

Odilia.. O.. M.. Goodness.. that girl has entered the wild and crazies.  she just did not stop the entire time we were visiting.  If I wanted to pat her, she was chewing on me.  If I wanted to hold her she was chewing on me.  If I wanted to lay on the ground and get photos of TVS she was on my back attacking my hair.  Not even whipping my pony tail at her made her back off.  At one point she ran onto my back, up my shoulder then threw herself into the air and landed on the ground only to turn around and do that two more times right in a row.    I could not stop laughing.

Lastly, I still have a slew of necklaces that I made for BlogPaws.  Mostly because I was just too chicken to hand them out.. If you would like one, all you need to do is send me your mailing address (see the sidebar on the right for my email address) and I'll get one out to you.

Wordless Wednesday - The Art and The Artist..

This Morning

well this morning is progressing nicely..

"Elvis" got to the bear first..

Odilia showed up

and she was a little fidgety. 

shortly after this photo she left the bear and I haven't seen  her since.  I think she is under the couch, where she had been spending her mornings prior to this.  I can't wait to see what happens when they wake up for their afternoon mayhem :)

For those of you who commented on their sizes, Elvis is 1lb 3 oz.  Odilia is 1lb 7.  She has been gaining weight quite regularly for the last week, which I'm so happy about.  I have a feeling that they will both be ready to go up for adoption at the same time which will probably be four weeks or so.

also as an FYI,  Bernadette over at The Creative Cat has a sketch of Odilia up for 'auction' on her blog.  She drew a sketch of her during BlogPaws and has offered to donate the proceeds from the sale to the shelter that Odilia comes from.  Even if you aren't interested, you should come check out how cute the drawing is.. 

(I'm considering asking for a high res scan of the image so I can have it printed on canvas)

Elvis has entered the building

I got a call from the shelter that another orphaned kitten had come into the shelter.  I went in and he was still there so I brought him home.

He is one hot mess.  He apparently was a craigslist kitty given at "eight weeks".  If this kitten is eight weeks old I know nothing about cats.. the shelter thinks and I agree he is about six.  He was also so full of worms that you could smell it from across the room.  He was also gassy beyond all get out, and to top it off he was eating like a hoover so his belly felt pretty much like a water balloon.

The shelter dewormed him and I brought him home and set him up in the cage.  I figured this would give his stomach time to settle down with out getting poop all over him, the room and Odilia and it would give him time to observe her.  She is a pretty typical kitten in may regards, but she also is blind so she can not see play signals so interactions aren't always easy for her.  When she hung out with Triscuit they pretty much ignored each other and stayed on their own side of the room.

Odilia knew he was there, but she pretended not to care.

After a while she felt the need to check him out a little closer..

So I decided to wait and do more formal introductions.  He sat in his cage being a good boy until Sunday night.  When I went to give him more food and clean up his cage he bolted and they came nose to nose.  There was no major issues at all, they ended up going their separate ways.  But I was tired and he was still a mess (smelled of urine and poop) and he still had his sharp and pointies, so my plan was to let them spend some time together on Monday.


Well I ended up going over to my folks house for a bit, so they got about two hours together last night.  For the most part they ignored each other.  "Elvis" (so called at the moment, I don't think this will stick) was not all that happy about his bath nor his claw clipping, but I felt better with him all clean and a little less pointy.  I did learn that he is very much a cuddler and he spent some time up on my chest or on my shoulder nuzzling.

I also learned that Odilia is one spoiled little girl.  She LOVES bitting and swatting at things, but she doesn't much like it when someone does it back to her.  Elvis was holding his own, so I'm mostly OK with letting them have full time together - which I will be doing today.  I am sure he will do her a world of good.

a little bit of their time together on Monday..

Jack was back at the vet..

So Thursday we got indications that Jack was feeling poorly again.  I was so hopeful that we had finally gotten this under control since it had been almost two weeks since he had gotten any supplements to help his bladder and urinary issues.

Then poof, we had a few pink urine drops in one of his favorite "I'm not feeling well" pee spots.  As soon as I saw them I had every intention of bringing him to the vet the very next day, and come morning he was obviously suffering.

Oh how it broke my heart to see him obviously hurting again, but I knew we could fix this.. so I called the vet and told them I wanted to do a cystocentesis (cysto) (see a video of a dog getting a cysto) and a culture and sensitivity (C&S) on the urine to see what was going on.  The vet allowed me to drop him off to do it when they could so I packed him up

and dropped him off

and went to work and attempted to get some work done..  I called to check in on him after lunch and was told the cysto was done and that the vet would call and talk to me when he had a minute.  He said the cysto showed a lot of blood in the urine and some bacteria but no crystals!  Now I am convinced that we are looking at a side effect from the catswell product I fed him, so I asked the vet if he could check Jack's liver and kidneys to make sure they were not damaged.

It was interesting talking to the vet, because since he is unaware of my history, he felt the need to start at the very beginning.. trying to explain why these things happen, he threw acronyms at me (FLUTD) and mentioned what foods he recommends and why (urinary food that has extra salt in it to promote water consumption), and that stress might be a part of it.. etc.  He also thought my boy was only 4 years old.. (he's 11ish) I explained he has had crystals in the past so I'm quite familiar with the current beliefs of FLUTD, and explained that raw food has kept him in check for a long time, and that I feared this was a side effect from treats I fed (hence the request for the blood work)  He too asked if they were recalled - which they aren't but all recalls start somewhere don't they?

I was told I could pick him up at 4, and I showed up at 4.  The blood work showed issues with his liver and kidneys.  The vet believed that it was just from Jack being dehydrated and when he saw the results he gave him fluids. When I called I had asked about fluids and he said he didn't feel the need because he wasn't dehydrated - so I can not help but be scared out of my gourd that this is damage despite what the vet thinks. He suggests a recheck in a couple of weeks and I will be redoing the blood work then and hope that it is just dehydration.

He also took an x-ray and almost everything looked good there.. no stone which is a relief.  I knew the chances of that were minimal, but I felt more comfortable ruling it out then not being 100% sure.  They took the x-ray after the cysto.  After the cysto Jack vomited - which isn't uncommon.  The x-ray showed that Jack's stomach was pushed off to the right.  He didn't think it was anything to worry about that it probably happened during the vomiting or when they manipulated him for the x-ray.  He said it could be an issue, but he didn't think it was since he didn't have any symptoms of it prior to coming in - which is mainly vomiting.

I spent a good deal of time talking to him about the blood values and the xrays and what I should be worried about and watching for if these things were actual issues that I did not stop to think about Jack's immediate situation.  He had a very long needle inserted in him, had his urine stolen directly from his bladder.  He vomited despite not haven eaten in quite some time and had his stomach shifted to the wrong side of his body.  If I had used a few extra brain cells I would have asked about pain medication and anti-nausea medications.  I guess I simply assumed the vet would have thought about it - especially since he walked in the door in pain and the last time he gave me buprenorphine to take home for him.

When I got home Jack was absolutely miserable. For some reason I thought I should give him the antibiotics that were prescribed to him - I guess I didn't realize just how miserable he was.  A few minutes after giving them to him he vomited them up and was drooling something fierce.  I offered him his ultra favorite things in the world (canned food and freeze dried meat treats) and he was interested when the can popped open, but he couldn't even bring himself to go sniff it.  I put a little food gravy on my fingers and he wouldn't lick it.  My heart broke into a million pieces.  And sadly by this time the vet's office was closed so I couldn't get any injectable famotidine.  I have pepcid at the house, but I doubt he could have kept it down long enough to do him any good, so I did my best to just be with him but not bother him.   As we sat there, he peed himself.. it was only a little so when he eventually got up and went to sit back in the carrier I saw a slight wetness on the floor and his 'pants' were wet.  I did my best to clean him up with out bothering him, but left most of it in his fur.

We kept him alone with us in the bedroom with us while he recovered (Muffin sat at the door banging it for quite some time, she is so not used to not being able to sleep with me)  He sat in his carrier most of the night.  He would purr a little when I patted him, but would stop pretty quickly - like it hurt to even purr.  Some how I went to sleep and was awoken at 4am to the sound of Jack eating.  It was the best sound I had heard in a long time.  I got up to check on him and he purred happily when I patted him and was much more interactive.  When morning came I went to the vet and got some pain meds for him.  When I called I was told they would be getting me five days worth but when I got into the vet to pick them up they said they only put up three days because it was expensive.  ($36 for 1.2 cc in six 0.2 doses) to which I could only roll my eyes and it took a lot of strength for me not to have words with them because I just spent $500 on him yesterday running tests.. money was not an issue for me when it comes to making Jack comfortable.  (to which I am beyond thankful!!)  the other part of their reasoning that this would take us to Tuesday when they open back up again and if he was still in pain he should probably be seen... which I agree with

I am so lucky that at this point he's doing well.  He hasn't urinated on the floor since Thursday (well except when he peed himself, but I don't count that) and there hasn't been any blood.  he is eating, purring, seeking out attention, and being his old self.  Now we just wait on the C&S to see if the bacteria in his urine needs different antibiotics to get rid of it.

BlogPaws in pictures

Well I am sad to admit that I do not have nearly as many photos as I would have liked.  I love my DSLR, but it is a little bulky to walk around with and as I wrote in yesterday's post there wasn't a whole heck of a lot of free time.

The pool at the Sheraton where BlogPaws was.
See that staircase?  It does NOT lead to the pool

The welcome sign

Amy loves on Odilia

Chick #1

Chick #2

How the Chicks got around BlogPaws

A Flemish Giant rabbit tours BlogPaws
(he also made a break for it in the dining area one day) 

Odilia trying to kill the rug in the hotel room

Odilia stretching her legs as we were out and about.. Yes, that is a ferret harness.. 

If you know anything about blind pets walking in open spaces, then you know I got pretty dizzy here..
If you don't, know they walk in circles.. 

Ingrid with Odilia

Four dogs with their owners during one of the sessions

Janiss with Odilia

Tamar with Odilia

Deb with Odilia

Debbie with Odilia

Janiss and Odilia (are you catching a trend here?)

Stephanie with Odilia

the beautiful outdoor atrium we couldn't get to.. the doors were locked.

Breakfast (with a lunch menu showing)

Triscuit sleeping in the room

Tex Cat's Staff and Odilia

Odilia dressed up in a ferret flower neck thing.. 

I told the ferret people I used a ferret harness on Odila,
and they gave me a few pieces of clothing to try on her.

Odi decided that sleeping in my luggage was the best place eva!

I had to run to the store and I saw these on sale.. how could I resist?

"Spirit Flats" in honor of pets that have passed.  They lined the stage during the awards.

the group of women I sat with

Yes, I got to pat the lion dog.. yes it made me smile, and I really have no idea why.. 

Lisa, Amy and Jeanne

Stephanie (front) and Mary

 Closing ceremony 

Triscuit at the closing ceremony in her own finery.

If you know who this is, I don't need to introduce him.  If you don't, then you really don't care :) 

Snotface sleeping

Snotface and Stephanie

and the side stop on the way home.

Tex Cat's Staff got some awesome photos of the Cat Lounge..

Odilia made the rounds, and was all over Twitter,  Facebook and Instagram while we were there.  She's also made in onto a bunch of blogs since..

Random Felines
Your Daily Cute
Sparkle
Island Cats
BJ Bangs
A Tonks Tail
CatLadyLand
Glogirly.com
Average Jane's picture on Flickr
The Creative Cat  - She is auctioning off a sketch of Odilia all proceeds go to the shelter I volunteer for
Twinkle Toe Tails

I am sure there are more out there, but this is what I have at the moment.