Last night, Randy and I were trying valiantly to read while Pippin and Opal were deconstructing the living room around us. We kept having to say things along the lines of "No, Pippin, get down from there!" or "No, Opal, bad girl!" It culminated in Pippin surfing to the floor on top of the dictionary, magazine and dayrunner I had on the table. We finally had to put them to bed in their own room so we could concentrate for more than five minutes at a stretch.

"Who, us? We're innocent!"

Opal also thinks it's great fun to whack her mousie under the fridge or oven. She pretends it's getting away and just as it vanishes from sight, she lunges for it and hauls it back out...at least some of the time. In her enthusiasm, however, the mousie often goes waaaaay under the fridge. Then Opal looks up expectantly at us with big, innocent golden eyes. That is why you can ofen come into our kitchen and find a grown adult down on the floor with a flashlight and a long-handled wooden spoon "fishing" the mousie back out again.

As you might guess, having 14 cats in my office means it becomes a disgusting mess. The floor becomes awash in scattered litter, shreds of half-eaten paper, vomit residue, bits of cat food, cat hair, whiskers, shed cat claws, puffs of cat hair, hairballs, and more cat hair. It had reached critical mass this morning, so I went around gathering up the cat toys, balls and strings. I hauled out my trusty, ancient Kenmore vacuum cleaner, the one which has the hose now entirely made of duct tape. I went to work only to immediately discover that something was clogging the hose. I tried everything I could to unblock it, with no luck.

This is why Randy and I ended up at Ace Hardware in search of solution. I bought six feet of reinforced plastic tubing, flexible enough to go around the bends in the connectors, but stiff enough to push the blockage out of the hose. While we were there, we thought about how to create a shelter for the feral cats for the winter. We bought a square, sturdy Rubbermaid container, some polyurethane expanding foam to coat it for insulation, a mat for the inside, and a utility knife to cut a cat door into the entire thing. We'll have to figure out something for a flap for the cat door. We spent a ridiculous amount of money on something that will hold maybe one or two cats and with no idea whether any cat will go near it. Sigh...

However, the plastic tubing worked perfectly, the vacuum was restored to operation and my office looks a thousand times better. For about two days.

Is your moggy worth a trip to France?

It's proof of just how much we love a cat when it destroys something valuable and walks away scott-free. Pippin was playing in his usual enthusiastic way when he knocked over a broom which fell onto and shattered a glass keepsake of the Apollo moon mission that I've had since 1971. All I did was sigh and clean up the pieces.

He still wants to get that other black cat that lives in the mirror. He took a large graceful leap off the bedroom floor with an ungraceful THUNK into the mirror. He was undeterred, however, and next tried to dig his way to the cat-in-the-mirror.

Jetta played fetch with me! She actually brought me a toy to have me throw it and brought it back a couple of times. She must have learned this from Sapphire. Jetta's not quite as dedicated to it as Saffy, but I think it's cool that she learned to do it.

I came into my office and found a jar of baby food lying by the door. A few weeks ago, when I was having so much trouble getting Tribble to eat, Lolette suggested baby food. Now I give a dollop of baby food every morning to my problem babies, Querida, Tribble and Owl, to whet their appetites. They're addicted to baby food now, I think, but the kittens are also rabidly enthusiastic about it because they rush in to lick up whatever bits the old ones leave behind. I suspect it was Zoe, who was trying to work out how to get the jar open. I wouldn't put it past her to figure it out.

Another batch of cute kitty photos: Ariel, Pippin, Sapphire, Jetta, Zoe.

The cats have kept me busy with a vomit marathon. Tribble won in the Quantity category, requiring a lot of clean-up. Querida went for frequency. Owl's was more like haiku -- brief and mysterious. Even Puck got into it. I should invest in the company that makes paper towels, given how many I go through.

Zoe has been dominating my lap so much lately, that a couple of times I've had to move her so that Tribble or Owl can have a turn. Barring the unforeseen, she has a lot more future to look forward to in my lap than they do.

Nothing can get two people off a sofa faster than the sound of the house being brought down around our ears. Or so it sounded. In reality, it wasn't that bad. As I jumped up and began to run around the sofa, Pippin collided with my legs at warp 10 and nearly bowled me over. He was fleeing the scene of the crime. He had knocked my ceramic cat-headed lamp off the nightstand and knocked over a wastebasket in the process.

Later, he joyously tipped over a laundry basket and romped in freshly-washed underwear. He looks so cute in a pair of BVDs, we didn't care.

Jetta is annoyed with me. The other night when I was giving her scritches, I noticed a small lump on the right side of her throat under the jaw, about where I would guess a lymph node would be. She seems perfectly fine otherwise, no signs of infections or problems and she's as active as ever. I keep checking it trying to decide whether it calls for a trip to the vet, and that's why she's annoyed. "Quick poking around my neck, already!"

Pippin has an amusing habit of lying next to the water bowl with one paw dangling at the water's surface. He does something I often see cats do -- he bats at the surface of the water, presumably to determine exactly where the surface is.

I'm uncertain about how Owl is doing on the thyroid regimen. As the vet suggested, we started with an extremely low dose and increased it only slightly after a week. It seems like he's showing less interest in his food, which would be a bad thing. Yesterday he threw up a hairball, probably because he pulled a bunch of fur off his back again, and he tried to throw up again a few minutes ago. I'll give it another week or so, then take him in for tests, unless I see something more worrisome develop.

I haven't seen a hair of Junior since I set him free weeks ago. Can't say that I'm surprised, but I thought he might get over it and show up for food now and then. Bowie's eye has recovered, though he tends to squint ever so slightly with it. Bowie is a regular and shows up for food nearly every day. He'll take naps on the rail of the front porch or hang out on the back steps. The other TNR "victims" have shown up occasionally, though nowhere near as often as Bowie. I sure wish we could tame him, but alas, no chance of that.

Poor Owl has been trying to get some time in my lap recently. He hasn't done this for a long time, so I'm happy to have settle in. But then along comes Zoe who has nearly taken up permanent residence in my lap. When she sees Owl there, she simply climbs on top of him. Owl immediately goes off in a huff, muttering about the rudeness of kittens.

Randy and I have a living cartoon moment last night when we were relaxing on the living room sofa while Pippin and Opal ran around and around the sofa in circles at a gazillion miles an hour.

For some reason, Opal's stitches aren't going away as her sister's have, and she has a sore spot where a stitch down in the skin is badly irritating her. I have heavy deadlines for the next few weeks, so we talked about Randy taking her to our vet (who didn't do the actual spaying) to have the rest of the stitches removed and deal with the sore spot.

Seeing some improvement. Owl's eye is better. Tribble's URI is doing better. Sapphire has stopped sneezing. The lysine seems to have stopped Jetta from getting the sneezies.

Seeing some backsliding. I tried cutting Owl back to one anti-histamine tablet a day and he's already pulled a bare patch on his back. He's going back to two tablets a day.

I didn't have my camera earlier and missed an adorable photo of Puck cuddling up with Jetta with his leg around her. But here's one of Puck and Zoe which shows how big Zoe is getting. And she's only 6 months old!

I have a two-headed kitten on my lap because Saffy has piled on top of Zoe. Both heads of the two-headed kitten are resting on my right arm, which makes typing this entry very difficult.

Well, crap, Tribble was doing so well on the Baytril, that the vet agreed I could try him on the steroids again. I started giving him steroids (along with the Baytril) on Friday and by this morning he was pouring snot from his nose. It looks like he simply can't tolerate the steroids, which means we can't treat his nonspecific cystitis. I'm stymied for a way to get weight back on him given these conditions.

Querida has been throwing up every time I give her pills. This is also not a good thing. And some cat, I don't know who, has thrown up huge quantities during the day, but I was gone all day and so am in the dark. It's not the same as Querida's and there are a number of possible candidates. I suspect Tribble who is throwing up right at this very moment, damn it, but must have an empty stomach because nothing else is coming up. Sigh...

I am worried about a change in Kate's personality. She has always been such a quiet, passive cat, never caused a problem with any other cat. Now she has become short-tempered She growls and strikes out at her brother, Knobby, or at the kittens or whoever happens to annoy her at the moment. It's totally unlike her. She's getting up there in age, around 14, and it could be that she can't take the agitation caused by the kittens. Whatever it is, she's not being herself.

The Dowager Empress had a tough day. Querida went to the vet yesterday to have the growth on her lip examined and biopsied. The vet decided to go ahead and remove it. We discussed it and opted not to go for an expensive biopsy because even if it came back as cancerous, it would change nothing. I'm certainly not going to subject a nearly 19-year-old cat to chemo and radiation. All I can really do for her at this age is help her have the best quality of life I can manage.

She has one stitch in her lip, not too bad. But she voiced many, many complaints to me on the way home. She was not a happy moggy.

My vet is such a terrific person. While I was there with Querida, he told me that he'd just gotten back from a conference and while there he had discussed Owl's situation with a specialist. To paraphrase roughly, the suspicion is that Owl might have "silent" hyperthyroid. Meaning his tests may not show the kind of usual results expected, but his symptoms point in that direction anyway. It's possible for a hyperthyroid cat, or person, to actually suppress the T4 level that would be a clear giveaway, but other readings in Owl's case were suspicious, along with his condition.

Consequently, we're trying Owl on an extremely low initial dosage of thyroid medication and I'll keep a close eye on him to see what happens. I mentioned to my vet that I need to invest in a weight scale at home in order to track how my low-weight cats are doing. He said he has a cat scale at home gathering dust in his garage and he'll let me have it!

Vets like him are true gems.

I'm glad to say that Sapphire is much better and full of her usual vim. My left hand is covered with scratches to prove it after a morning session of playing fetch-the-fishie.

I had a talk with the vet by phone today. Whatever Querida has on her lip is getting worse and I really don't like the look of it. We're continuing to call it an ulcer for now (I forget the specific term the vet used), but she's going to the vet's tomorrow to have it biopsied. She's also not kicking her current URI, even though she's been on Baytril for about 2 weeks now.

While I had the vet on the line, I also discussed Owl and Pippin, who haven't shown much change after getting the parasite-killing treatment. I need to get a fresh stool sample from Pippin, if I can manage it. We agreed I could try Owl on the steroids, which I was all set to do tonight, when I realized he has a slight infection in one eye. He may have gotten nicked in a spat with Puck, or gotten something irritating in there. At any rate, I'll have to start with some ointment and get that cleared up before I can risk the steroids.

This morning, Ariel actually let me reach up and lightly touch her on the paw without jumping up and running away! She was on top of a high shelf looking down at me, so she may have felt more secure about it. She let me do it twice. A few minutes later, I tried it a third time. Then she sat up and gave me one of her patented Ariel-looks: "Just what do you think you're doing?" But she didn't run away either. I take it as a tiny victory.

My office floor is littered with an excess of cat toys. I keep stepping on them.

It suddenly occurred to me this morning where some of the missing cat toys might be. I have a row of cat boxes, but they're not regular cat boxes. They're big, black utility tubs (the kind you get at the hardware store) and much bigger than regular cat boxes. They have a rounded overhanging lip and sloping sides, which makes them easy to clean, but also means there's a tunnel-like space between each box even when they pushed together.

I moved one box away from the wall and found an entire stash of missing toys. After moving all the boxes out, I found: 10 balls, 5 catnip toys, and a handful of other kinds of toys. Every missing toy I ever gave them was there. A cornucopia of cat toys!

Unfortunately, it also revealed a lot of toughly compacted cat litter adhered to the concrete floor. I set to work cleaning it up. The new metal scoop proved useful for this, though some of the compacted litter had nearly become one with the concrete and I seriously thought I'd have to dig through the tool box and find a chisel. It was disgusting job, but it had to be done. Afterwards, I stuffed packing paper into the spaces between the boxes to prevent them from becoming black holes again.

Of course, before I made this discovery, I'd made an on-line order for more of the anti-allergy liquid (Nature's Miracle) and ordered another batch of cat toys. My spoiled moggies will have toys coming out of their ears.

There is cat snot on my monitor. Someone has sneezed all over it.

Sapphire seems to be feeling marginally better and she's not sneezing as much, though she made sure to sneeze on me as usual. However, I've heard Zoe sneeze a couple of times. I really hope she's not coming down with it.

I had to give Puck another time-out in the Cave today when he got into a bullying mood this morning. I suspect it's caused by boredom from having to be inside all the time, but there's not much I can do about it. At the moment, he's in my lap, something he hasn't done for a long time. This makes life difficult given that he's matured into a big, hefty moggy who takes up a lot of room, but I want him to feel loved, so I'm doing my best to literally work around him.

The kittens have managed to lose five of their catnip toys. I did a search around the office, but this place is one big black hole and nary a toy did I find. Zoe still has her mousie and there's one other catnip mouse around. I need psychic powers.

Speaking of Zoe, she just jumped onto my desk and blasted me with her Cute Rays. I am helpless in the face of her raw Cuteness Power. Even Puck has fallen prey to her power. He's abandoned my lap so that Zoe could take over. And just think, she's only five months old. When she's fully grown, she'll be lethal.

I received a fun little book from Workman Publishing (who put out quite a few cat books and some great cat calendars). The title is Your Cat's Just Not That Into You, subtitle "What part of meow don't you understand?" Written by Richard Smith, illustrations by David Sipress. It's a joke book, of course, with kernels of genuine advice hidden here and there. It's designed for those moments when you want something to make you laugh and you only have five minutes to spare. This is for the cat person who doesn't take cats too seriously and doesn't mind a bit of edgy humor about cats.

What I notice the most is that the cat on the cover reminds me so much of Ariel...right down to the attitude.

Tribble seems to be doing better today, meaning I haven't caught him throwing up. Saffy continues to have ferocious sneezing fits, and has made sure to sneeze all over me as often as she could. I think I've gotten the knack of using the Lysine gel syringe thingie, so I'm less peeved about that.

Speaking of peeves and solutions to them, I get tired of buying plastic litter scoops that always end up breaking. I was thinking that someone needed to make one of these large scoops in metal so it would last. A couple of days ago, I went to Petsmart and I actually found one. It's called DuraScoop with a New! Patented Design! Made in China! Earth-friendly! Anyway, it's BIG and shiny silver with a padded handle and makes a cool metallic schlangy sound. Best of all, it works great, though my wrist is getting a workout because it's heavier than plastic. I'll end up with my right wrist twice the size of my left.

Look at that. I just wrote an entire paragraph about a poop scoop. Is that pathetic or what?

I suddenly find myself inundated with sick cats. I took Owl to the vet yesterday because of the continued blood on his stools. He's lost more weight, is a little over 9 lbs., so that's worrisome. The vet is having me treat him for parasites, on the off chance it might help and probably we're going to put him on some kind of steroids if we don't see an improvement.

I discussed a host of other cats with the vet while I was there. Pippin has bad diarrhea now. The vet doesn't think a kitten that young needs special diet food, so we're treating Pippin for parasites, too. And Opal along with him, since they share the litterbox, food, water, etc.

The vet is somewhat stymied over Tribble and Querida, though. Right now the plan is to try and get their URI problems under control, then keep them on anti-biotics while we try the steroid regimen again. However, Tribble had at least two major vomiting sessions this afternoon and I'm deeply worried about him, and I don't like the look of the ulcer on Querida's lip. It's frustrating not being able to do more for them.

Sapphire continues to sneeze. She had a protracted sneezing fit a few minutes ago. And I can tell that Theseus doesn't feel well. At one time in the past, the entire Horde got sick at once with one of these URI things and it was sheer hell.

The vet also had me bring home some Lysine in a gel form. It comes in a plastic tube/syringe with a notched plunger. There's a ring on the plunger and you "dial" the ring up to the dose and the ring stops the plunger at that dose amount.

I hate it. It's messy, difficult and a PITA to use. The dose is too much to get into a cat's mouth all at once and the gel is thick enough that they can spit it out. The cat that mugs me and chews my fingers off to get it is Zoe, and she doesn't have any need for it! The vet wanted me to give it to any cat that is having the URI problem, but once I get rid of this tube, I'm going back to the capsules. I'd much rather pop a capsule down a cat's throat than muck around with this stuff.

The vet shook his head and laughed when he brought out an entire handful of bottles and tubes to take home. "You must have a huge medicine cabinet," he said. No kidding. Not to mention how long it takes me to do pills and medicines twice a day.

I would like an epidemic of health to break out, thank you, Bast.

Yesterday, Jetta came back. My friends' cat, Missy, is one of those female cats that simply cannot tolerate having another cat around. Missy became a trifle psychotic. She didn't hurt Jetta, but she did hurt her people! B. showed me the scratches on his arm when he returned Jetta. It's a shame because he liked Jetta a lot and she had taken to him, but Missy was there first.

I've had a couple of cats like Missy. Nefreet was one, though she was tolerating Opal and Pippin better than I expected.

Back in the early 80s, my late husband, Peter, and I had gone out for a walk when a lovely long-haired, pastel tortie jumped out of the bushes and instantly adopted us. She followed us home and promptly moved in. We named her Sheba. Yes, I know, not the most original name in the world, but when the Queen of Sheba moves in, you don't argue with her about the name.

She was a delightful cat. She would fetch balls the same way Saffy and Opal fetch their toys. Everything was wonderful with Sheba until we took in a second cat, Bast. Bast was a small black cat rather like a black Siamese. Sheba hated her. Sheba hated having any other cat around. Then Bast became pregnant and gifted us with four kittens: four tuxedo males and one calico female. Longtime readers of Tales of the Moggy Horde know two of those tuxedo boys as Zorro and Achilles.

At any rate, I think the addition of the kittens was the final straw. Sheba and Bast would have fights outside in the wilderness. We lived in the mountains where coyotes were accustomed to snacking on cats. Sheba and Bast both disappeared on the same night. I suspect they were involved in fighting one another and didn't see the coyotes that got them. Cats become oblivous to everything when they fight.

Here is a picture of Sheba, expressing her displeasure with us.

But back in the present, Jetta was happy to be back and Sapphire was happy to see her. The energy level has gone up ten notches. I don't know whether three kittens is the tipping point, or it's Jetta herself, but it was calmer and quieter around here for the couple of days she was gone. They were back to bouncing off the walls in no time.

Pippin threw up once more, in spite of the new food, but this time we found bits of plant material in it. It could be blades of grass. I grew a pot of oak grass for Nefreet and it's still in the bedroom. I've seen Opal snacking on it, so Pippin easily could be. Or he may have gotten hold of the spider-plant. We can't be sure this is the cause of his throwing up, though, since this is the first time we've found anything like that. We'll have to wait and see.

Poor Saffy is sneezing. In fact, she's lying in my lap sneezing on me right now. She must have picked it up from Tribble, who has been sneezing a lot. He hasn't gotten over his URI yet.

There was a serious fight late this morning. I heard the screaming and yowling and ran to break it up. It was Puck attacking Owl. This was no casual fight either. They were rolling around tearing out fur. When I split them up, Owl ran off, but Puck pursued him and jumped him again. I broke it up, then followed Puck around the office until I was able to get hold of him. He knew he was in trouble. I locked him in the Cave for an hour or so. I thought he needed an extended time-out to fully get across to him how pissed off I was.

I spent a long time soothing Owl and checking him carefully for bites. I couldn't see blood or find bite wounds, though he would growl when I touched certain spots. I'm hoping not to be surprised with an abscess in a few days. He was terribly freaked out. He held his own pretty well, considering that he's a lot older that Puck, isn't in the best health and has a bum leg.

As it happens, Owl is going to the vet tomorrow because I've seen blood on his stool three times now, and I don't think he's put on much weight. I know the vet would ideally like me to put Owl on a special diet and not let him eat anything else. Unfortunately, it's impossible for me to do that because of all the other cats. Owl gets to spend the night in the Cave in the hopes of getting a sample to take with me. Not one of the most exciting things in life to hope for, but there you go. The joys of being owned by cats. ;)

We were finishing up dinner when some friends called. They have a young black cat, about a year old, and a lot of parrots and are dedicated animal lovers. Rather unexpectedly, they asked if they could come over and adopt one of my kittens as a playmate for their lone cat. And that is how, a mere half-hour later, Jetta was off to her new home. I wish I would see how she reacts to the parrots!

Oddly enough, I'd been thinking a lot lately of trying to get Jetta adopted out. Bast must have been listening. I feel the strain of having so many cats, especially when they need vet visits, and I thought Jetta in particular would do better if she had more one-on-one attention. It's hard to give enough attention to every cat when I have this many.

I look forward to hearing how it goes. Keeping my fingers crossed. This brings the number of the Horde down to 15.

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