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Answer to Joke of the Week: "Smell the peanuts on his breath".
09/20/09After much mental anguish and stress, I decided to put the blog right here in the web page rather than on a blogging site as I have been doing. After all, you are already here, why send you somewhere else?
For the most part, I have been talking about the trials and tribulations of having two gallery cats, (Roo and Squad Car, see below) in a gallery/studio. Just a gallery would have been a piece of cake, but a working studio with pastels and two very inquisitive puddy tats (as Tweety Bird would say) is an adventure in prevention of multi-colored cats and cat tracks in my paintings. To that end, this blog will describe how to live safely and sanely with two wonderful, curious, and loving cats while still being creative and actually finishing paintings without cat signatures.
But first, let me give you some background on the two felines that came into my life and made it infinitely better. Let us go back in time. Someone dumped a mother cat and three of her babies in back of my gallery last November ( 2008) and left no forwarding address. I saw the mother kitty wondering around looking for food and water but had no idea she had a family lurking in the bushes. I soon found out as the three kittens emerged from under the building to get some kitty milk from mom. At that moment I knew I had a small population explosion staring me in the face as two of the kittens were female and the other one was male. Wow, three females who would soon be ready to breed and a male whom I was sure would be able to find some willing female to start a family.
But, the plot thickens. Two days later, someone else drops off two more kittens (both female) and they of course take up with momma kitty and her three offspring. So now I have five females (counting momma) and a male that will be ready to populate the country side in about 4 or 5 months. I could be up to my hips in cats if something was not done.
Fate
stepped in just in time. My across-the-street neighbor (who wishes
to remain anonymous) was into cat trapping and releasing. She had
the traps and could teach me how to become the Daniel Boone of cat
trapping and she had the contacts for neutering and spaying of the
felines trapped. She taught me all she knew about cat ensnarement
and loaned two of her cat traps to me. The rest is history and
within two weeks I had all the kittens trapped, fixed, and released out
back of the gallery. Except the little black and white poop head
you see in the above picture. She would not get into the trap!
In the meantime, the male cat was adopted to a good family, I took one
of the kittens home with me (Lena - more on this special cat later) and
that left Momma Kitty and two of her kittens Squad Car and Lucy) along
with one late comer (Roo) that was dropped off.
Finally, success. After three weeks, the little black and white critter
(Squad Car) finally
succumbed to a can of sardines and she was trapped and spayed. Oh
happy days. Everyone was safe now and I did not have to worry
about a cat epidemic.
09/30/09 On with the story. During this three week period, Roo decided she would like to stay in the gallery and chose the life of luxury rather than rough it with Momma Kitty and Lucy out in the wilds behind the gallery. Roo and I hit it off right away and within a week we were best friends and confidants. She was still really untrusting of any one else, but we were working on that. Life went on.
Then the great cat hunt for Squad Car was successful. I took her into the gallery in a cage to wait for a vet appointment and she had to stay in the cage for two days until the vet could see her. During this time, Roo would come up to the cage and lay down beside Squad Car when she got upset or afraid and this helped a lot in calming Squad Car down to tolerable levels. She was a very upset little kitten and the hissing, tail fluffing, and cage banging were pretty darn impressive! Oh, by the way, Squad Car was the runt of the litter.
I figured the vet would have his hands full with this little hellion.
He did until he put her out for the
operation and everything progressed according to plan.
I picked her up at about 4:00 pm and she had to stay in the cage
and inside for two days until she was feeling better and could get
around without too much pain.
I brought her back to the gallery and found a nice warm, dark
spot and left her to heal.
She was still pretty groggy so I stayed until about 7:00 just to make
sure she was all right. Roo came and stood guard with me as little Squad Car came
back from la-la-land. I
thought she would be as feisty as before when she regained her senses,
but to our surprise, she started rubbing against Roo and purring like
there was no tomorrow. I
stuck my finger tentatively through the wire to scratch her thinking
claw marks would be my reward.
Nope – she just rubbed against my finger and purred even louder.
I opened the cage and she came out and let me pick her up and
cuddle her. The purr motor
went into overdrive and she went to sleep on my chest.
Roo got up on my lap and I became covered with cat.
10/3/09 I mentioned Lena above and promised you more about
this really special cat.
She was one of the two dropped off that was not part of Momma Kitty’s
litter. She is part Siamese
and part whatever. She has
blue eyes (not crossed) and is white, gray, brown, silver, tan, and
black in no particular pattern.
Lena has very small feet and does not have a girlish figure at
all. She has always been a
little plump and eats like two horses if I let her.
Here is a picture of her at about 6 months old.
The first time I encountered her she came up to me and rubbed
against my leg and purred.
I picked her up and she put up no fight, just laid back and enjoyed the
attention. Needless to say,
she was not difficult to trap.
I picked her up and put her in the trap and she purred and rubbed
against the trap the whole time.
After she had been spayed, I let her out in the gallery and there were no strangers to her from day one. Anyone that came into the gallery was greeted by her and made to feel very welcome by rubbing, purring, and trying to get into their lap. She was an instant hit with everyone. I had people coming back to the gallery just to see her. They liked the art all right, but Lena was the object of their attention. There was an architect next door that came over at least twice a day to play with Lena and she loved it. Such a big ham! She seemed to be the perfect gallery cat.
However, I noticed in the mornings after being alone in the gallery overnight, Lena was not a happy cat. It took her until about noon to get going and her appetite fell off and finally she stopped eating at all. I realized she was lonesome and hated being alone for the overnight hours. At the time, the other cats had not been trapped, so I could not offer her any company at this time. The only solution I could think of was to take her home and introduce her to the other four cats living at our house.
What a stroke of genius! I am not sure how many of you readers have tried to introduce a new cat into an environment with old kitties, but let me tell you, this process is fraught with dangers. Hissing, fighting, tail puffing, not eating, intimidation, pooping in strange places, and over all chaos are just a few of the many problems that can rear their ugly heads.