Kitten Watch 2016, part 3

Here's Callie, my expectant mother.

Tonight may be the night, or it may be another false alarm. Callie released a little more fluid (on my clean sheets, no less), and she rapidly went from purring and cuddly to growling and antsy. I dragged her little cat bed back here into the bedroom and now she's settled down some. Time to play the waiting game again, I guess.  I wonder if I should turn my ceiling fan off?  Newborn kittens don't like it drafty.  As an added little haw-haw, my uncle has already called dibs on any black kittens she may have.

Yours truly,

RagingMoon1987

Kitten Watch 2016, part 2

As of 7:30 p.m. CDT Callie has had no kittens.  I wonder now what on Earth it was that came out of her body, whether she'd had some digestive problems or if she hadn't gotten around to cleaning herself.  Either way Callie has not given birth.  However, I am still positive that she is pregnant.  Cat bellies don't get big and hard like hers unless something is seriously wrong, and apart from a few stray fleas Callie appears to be in excellent health.

Sick animals seem to have been the norm with us here lately.  Three weeks ago we had to have Lucy to the vet.

You can probably see the growth on her hip.  Lucy had been away for awhile visiting a family member, and when she came back, she came back with that damn thing on.  Pardon the language.  The vet took one look at it and said "Yep, that's cancer.  It has to come off."  Due to the size of the tumor I thought "That's it, it's in her bone and she's done for."  But that wasn't the way it turned out.  It was all soft tissue, and Lucy was home the day after surgery.

The incision looks bad in that picture, but it really wasn't.  My camera's flash messed up.  Anyway, Lucy didn't bother her stitches once.  No chewing, no licking, she was good as gold.  Her stitches are out now, and we know where her road will lead.  The diagnosis was bad; it turned out to be some sort of cancer that can be very aggressive.  The prognosis, however, is great.  The cancer she had removed tends not to spread, and the vet thinks he got it all.  He told us to watch for regrowth and bring her back if anything comes up.

Unfortunately that's not the end of our little sickies.  We've had Annabelle, one of our cats, at the vet too.  Annabelle suddenly fell ill at the end of July.  She wouldn't eat, wouldn't wash herself, wouldn't come out for head rubs, nothing.  When she finally did come out of hiding, I was horrified to see every bone in my little girl's body!  We rushed her to the vet who ended up keeping her.  Long story short, Annabelle has kidney failure.  She's not going to die, thank God, but she'll have to be on special food for the rest of her life, and she may have occasional crises that the vet will have to deal with.  I was warned that one day I may have to give her fluids on a daily basis, but right now that aspect of Annabelle's life is good to go.  Now we're waiting for her to fight off a sinus infection (she's seen the vet for that too, no worries).  So we could do with some prayers for our little sickies.  I'll keep y'all posted!

Best wishes,

RagingMoon1987

Kitten Watch 2016, part 1

Curtain up on what may be a frustrating and ultimately futile wait.  I have no guarantees that Callie is pregnant, though she certainly does show the classic symptoms.  Her belly is big, her nipples are losing hair, her breathing is heavy, and I could've sworn I saw fluid coming from her vulva last night.  Okay, that's TMI, but it's what it looked like to me.  Fourteen hours have passed and her symptoms haven't changed much.  Callie is still hungry and suspicious of my presence around her, and her breathing has calmed some but it's still heavy.  She won't let me peep under the hood to make any assessments of her condition, so I'm just going to leave her to her devices and pray all goes well.  We've had pregnant cats before and they all had their babies on their own, no difficulties or complications.  If my guess is correct and Lily truly is Callie's daughter then Callie should have no problems.

Since the last post had no pictures, here's a random picture of Lily.  She's a brown torbie and she's adorable.

Stay tuned for updates!

Yours truly,

RagingMoon1987

A purr-fectly weird predicament

Heavenly Father help me, for I am in a situation. The rest of my earthbound friends can read this. For those of you who are unaware, I work at the library in Campbell, Missouri. I have a regular who comes in and is...well, something of an old SOB. He has cats, and he recently fed Mama and me this big load of hogjaw about getting a girlfriend, moving to Charleston, and having to get rid of two of his four cats. In the past I made the folly of admitting that I love calico cats, and so I ended up agreeing to take his calico plus a small torbie kitten that she supposedly has adopted. Said calico was extremely rotund, but her erstwhile owner insisted that she wasn't pregnant.
Joke's on me. Callie (as I named her) is now barricaded in the laundry room with everything a cat needs to survive for an evening on her own. It has become clear that despite her previous owner's prior claims, Callie is indeed pregnant and apparently in the early stages of labor. The last time I dealt with a cat in labor was fourteen years ago, and all I did was make the diagnosis. There's nothing I can really do now but make sure Callie is comfortable and wait for morning. I am positive now that everything this man told me is a lie; that he isn't really moving and just wanted a pregnant cat out of his hair. I am also certain that the smaller cat Lily is indeed Callie's baby, as they share similar patches of calico fur. I have unfortunately had to separate Callie from Lily for the night, so Lily is now behind my ear behaving herself. I can only pray that all will go well for poor Callie, and I humbly ask y'all to do the same. As frustrated as I am right now I'm glad Callie has a warm place to deliver these kittens, and not some run-down joint that reeks of cigarette smoke. PLEASE SPAY AND NEUTER YOUR ANIMALS!!!

Love always,
RagingMoon1987

Sleeping cuties

Pablo (left) and Mittens.

No further comment.  Just furry cuteness!

On Snuffy and Leia

Since I asked for prayers for Snuffy yesterday I figured I owed y'all an update.  Snuffy kept us awake most of the night with his random yelping, but he is going to be fine.  He slipped a disc in his lower back, which needless to say was interfering with his movement.  The vet gave him a shot, and we're going to have to trick him into eating pills for the next couple of weeks, but other than that he's okay.

Princess Leia is living up to the title of "princess."  She loves to chew on fingers (and ears), and she loves to explore.  She DOESN'T love being given medicine (she was given some for the minor infection she's got), and she doesn't love being made to wait for her food.  She also doesn't like being held up for her picture!

 She's REALLY going to hate being given a bath.  She's got fleas, and since we lost Punkin to flea anemia I'm taking no chances.

Princess Leia, plus some info on one of our dogs

We've already got one cat named Chewbacca, so we decided to in the Star Wars direction again with our newest bundle of joy.  Meet Princess Leia.

The vet says she's about six weeks old, and I think she may be in the process of teething because she wants to chew on everything.  My necklaces, my fingers, my ears, you name it!  Otherwise she's adorable.  I'm hoping and praying that nothing will happen to this one!

In other news, one of our dogs appears to be sick.  I don't usually post about our dogs here, but we love him so I'm sharing anyway.  His name is Snuffy.

Kindly ignore my smirking sister in the background.  Anywho, we've had Snuffy since 2011.  He was a stray, so we have no idea how old he is.  Last Sunday he started yelping at random intervals for reasons we haven't been able to identify.  He'll be lying perfectly still, and then he'll just start hollering.  We are taking him to the vet tomorrow, so some prayers will be appreciated.