Pee Yew!

Tully and I were chilling in the backyard on Saturday while Mom watered some potted plants. It was a beautiful day; the skies were blue, and the weather warm.

Mom spotted a little skunk in our backyard digging in back of the shed. She didn’t spray him directly with the hose, but tried to spray near him so she could steer him towards the gate and out towards the front yard. Well, it worked out as planned but she didn’t realize that he would suddenly make a run directly towards me and Tully who were sitting on the lawn. He came within inches of us but then ran quickly to the gate and out towards the front yard. All of a sudden Mom smelled that telltale sign of a skunk, and unfortunately he skunked me on his way out!

Pee yew! Mom has been using waterless shampoo on me every day to get rid of the smell. She went to the Pet Store and found some special shampoo she could have used for de-skunking, but the directions said it had to be left on for at least 5 minutes and then a regular shampoo applied, so she knew that wouldn’t work. I hate baths and get really upset if my fur is soaked with water, so she tried the waterless shampoo instead. It does seem to be working and the smell is almost gone.

Beware of skunks – they stink!

Love, Sammy

My Great Escape

Last Sunday my sisfur Natasha and I celebrated our third birthday. Let me tell ya, it was a very exciting day! We got some special chicken treats in the morning with our breakfast and got to spend a little time outside in the backyard with Mom while she raked the leaves. Afterwards Mom decided to run some errands and grocery shop while Dad took his motorcycle out for a ride.

When Mom came home and was unloading bags from the car, she saw an orange cat that looked a lot like me sitting on our next door neighbor’s driveway. We know for a fact that those neighbors don’t own a cat, and we’re not even sure they like cats, so Mom got suspicious and walked over to get a closer look. That’s when I took off and ran and she could identify fur sure that it was me - MOL. The tip of my tail is almost all white, so when she saw me run off she was pretty certain that it was me. She chased me around the front yard for a couple of minutes until she finally herded me over towards our front porch. Once she got me on the porch, she opened the front door and chased me inside – I love being chased, it’s so much fun! It’s good for Mommy, too, she needs the exercise, hehehe!

Mom thinks that when Dad got his motorcycle out of the garage earlier that morning I must have snuck out under the garage door. Dad is usually pretty careful when he opens the garage and makes sure that we don’t get out accidentally, but this time I was too sneaky and he didn’t see me escape. The best part is that I didn’t even get in any trouble with Mom – but Dad did. It was his fault for opening the door and letting me out and Mom let him know this when he got home – hehehe.

It was the best birthday ever. Natasha and I appurrciate all the birthday wishes, gifts, and birthday pictures – thank you everybuddy!

Love, Sammy

Lazy Days of Summer

It’s been such a long time since I pawed anything in my diary. I have to get on Mom to be timelier with my diary entries, sheesh. Summer is almost half over, if you can believe it.

We’ve been spending a lot of time outdoors in our backyard. Mom has it cat-proofed so we can’t escape. At least us boys can’t escape. Natasha is still able to climb up the bushes and hop over the fence, so she is not allowed to go outside anymore. Mom made her a nice sunny spot in one of the front windows, so she has been hanging out there a lot. We're kind of sad that Natasha can’t play outside with us, but it’s better to be safe than sorry. Mom tried to harness train her so she could still go outside, but Natasha will have nothing to do with it. She runs away whenever she sees the harness. She seems to enjoy her quiet time in front of the window and she can still watch birds and squirrels in our front yard.

Tully and I have become very good pals. Mom says we are both such mellow, laid back kitty dudes that we get along with almost everyone. We like to hang out together on the patio or lawn and watch Mom tend to her garden. She planted catnip, cat grass, and catmint this summer so we are enjoying having a little fresh nip and cat grass to chew on. The rest of the time we watch birds and squirrels up in the big oak tree and enjoy these long lazy summer days.

Here’s a picture of Tully and I chillaxing in the backyard.

That’s about it for now. Hope everyfur is having a great summer and staying cool!

Love, Sammy

Awesome Pawsome Eggs

Meows and purrs to Catster HQ and to all our pawsome furiends who sent us piles and piles of Easter Egg gifties. Woohoo, what a bonanza of eggs! We are having so much fun rolling them all around the house and don’t those colorful eggs look so purrty on all of our pages? Look out Mom, you almost stepped on one! MOL. We enjoyed reading all the cute and funny messages inside, thank you for thinking of us and sending warm wishes our way.

We want to wish everyfur a purrtastic Easter, Passover, or whatever you may be celebrating this weekend. And if you’re not celebrating anything in particular, just have a great weekend!

Love, Sammy, Natasha, Luke, & Tully

Lucky #37

Hot dog, I just found out that Samoa named me as Dreamboat in Training #37! Thank you Samoa; I am truly honored to be in the company of all your other distinguished Dreamboats, Dreamboats in Training, and Angel Dreamboats. I was glad to see you chose my Cat in the Clover photo for one of your featured pics of me in your diary, that one is a purrsonal favorite of mine. And yes, I still love to shred paper!

In honor of Super Bowl Sunday, I decided to huddle with Luke, Tully, and Natasha this morning and run some patterns and plays in Mommy and Daddy’s bedroom in the wee hours of the morning. While it was still dark in the house, Mommy heard one of us zooming up and down the hallway, back and forth, back and forth. Yep, it was me. Soon after, Natasha, Tully, and Luke were all chasing me down the field and it sounded like a herd of elephants was running through the house. We took over the ball at the 20-yard line and I took the snap, passing to Natasha. She made a leap grab and went for the touchdown – SCORE!

Mom was not amused. She finally got out of bed and fixed us our breakfast. I can’t wait to watch the Super Bowl!

Love,
Sammy

Think Like a Cat

Last night we watched one of our fave shows on Animal Planet called “My Cat from Hell.” We love the host Jackson Galaxy and think it is so cool that a big guy with earrings and tattoos is so into cats. He worked for years at animal shelters and saw a lot of cats get euthanized because they were anti-social and “un-adoptable.” He really understands us felines and knows what we need.

If you’ve never seen the show, Jackson goes into people’s homes every week and gives them advice on how to manage bad cat behavior. Mean and snarly cats end up acting like love bugs once Jackson gets done retraining the cat’s family members. The cats are not really bad; they are just misunderstood by their humans.

Here are a few of Jackson’s basic rules of having a happy cat:

• Play with your cat often. Jackson reminds us that cats need to release energy through play. Aggressive behaviors are often a result of a kitty not being able to express their wild side which can cause stress. Stress can cause bad behavior.

• Cats need to scratch. We are always surprised when Jackson goes into a home and the people are upset that kitty scratches up all the furniture. Then we see that there are no cat scratchers or kitty furniture or anything for the cat to scratch on. HELLO! Kitties need their own scratch surfaces, otherwise they will go for the human furniture.

• The feline-human bond is very similar to the human-human bond. That relationship is based on love, respect, and compromise. Guess what? Since cats don’t understand compromise, it will need to come from the human. Thank you, Jackson, for pointing this out!

My idol Jackson Galaxy

Happy Sunday and remind your human to spend lots of time playing with you!

Love, Sammy

Purrs of Gratitude

Last weekend our Mom was looking through some of the newsletters she gets in the mail from the local Humane Society and rescue groups she donates money to. It reminded her of how fortunate all of us are who have found our forever homes. We eat healthy food, have a warm place to sleep, have lots of toys to play with, and families who love us very much. There are so many sweet and beautiful kitties out there still waiting for homes and we know we are very lucky to have found ours.

Mom saw me first when she was looking for a third kitty to adopt, and was originally going to adopt only me, but when she saw how protective I was of my little sisfur, Natasha, she didn’t see how she could possibly split us up. Natasha and I used to comfort and cuddle with each other, Mom thought it was so sweet. We sure are lucky kitties and we know it.

Thank you everyfur who helped us celebrate our Gotcha Day today. All the sweet comments, pawmails, gifts, and mementos are very much appreciated. We have the best pals in the world.

Love, Sammy

Naughty or Nice?

Hey kitties, is everyfur having fun getting ready for the holidays? I’ve been working on my list for Sandy Paws, but this morning Mommy informed us that Santa may not be coming to our house this year?!!!

You see one of us has been very naughty lately, especially this week. Mommy said to one of us this morning “_______, if you don’t change your naughty ways, there will be no treats or presents for you this Christmas!"

Who is she talking about? Surely, it’s not me? One of us is “The Master of Naughty” (#1), one of us is moderately naughty (#2), one of us is somewhat/a little bit naughty (#3), and one of us is hardly ever naughty/almost always nice (#4).

Do you kitties know who she is talking about? We’ll award a Christmas rosette to the first kitty who correctly rank orders our “naughtiness” using the #1-4 scale mentioned above.

Another rosette will be awarded to the kitty who can guess the top 3 reasons that “The Master of Naughty” earned his/her title.

Love, Sammy

Birthday Thanks

First, I want to meow my thanks from the bottom of my heart for all the birthday wishes and gifts our sweet furiends sent to me and Natasha. Also, much love and gratitude to my guardian angel Alfie and dear family, Pipo and Minko, and Simba and Kewlest Catster Kitties Group for the beautiful birthday mementos.

We are officially 2 years old now.

Mom has been hesitant to post anything in my diary about my health status and those yucky bladder crystals that have been bothering me. The first time she thought that I was getting better I had a relapse and had to go back to the vet for more fluids and shots. I didn’t start on prescription food right away, and that is what I needed to get these nasty things out of me. I’m drinking a lot more water because of the food and that is helping me get better. Thanks to everyfur who gave advice and shared their experiences with FLUTD with us, that helped us more than you’ll ever know.

I’m hoping that my worry wart Mom will stop spying on me while I’m in the litterbox. She watches me all the time and that makes me nervous, so now she’s trying to be sneaky about it. She thinks I can’t see her, but I know she’s there watching me. Can’t a kitty get a little privacy? Sheesh.

Mom and I appreciate all the purrs and support from our furiends, we don’t know what we’d do without you.

Love, Sammy

Update from My Mom

Hello friends. Since Sammy is not feeling well again, and I mentioned to a few people that I was taking him back to the vet yesterday, I thought I’d do an update here.

A week ago today I came home and found little puddles of blood tinged urine in various locations around the house. I found Sammy squatting and straining to pee in various places outside the litterbox, so I knew something was wrong. I took him to urgent care that evening since I could not get an appointment. The vet who saw Sammy was concerned that he had a fever and signs of infection, so that is what he was treated for.

After receiving fluids, pain medicine, and 5 days of antibiotics he appeared to be doing a lot better. Although he was using the litterbox, and did not appear to be in any distress, I was concerned that he was not urinating normally. He was going more often and only producing small amounts. In the back of my mind I knew that there had to be an underlying cause for his bacterial infection, but I was really hoping that the antibiotics would “cure” him.

Saturday he seemed a bit off to me, but since he had been running away and hiding from me when it was time for his medicine, I thought he was just stressed out about that. Sunday morning I noticed blood tinged urine in one of the cat beds again, so I knew Sammy was not “cured.” I was able to get an appointment in the late afternoon so I took him back in. The vet who we had the appointment with (not our regular vet) was called away to an emergency for a critically ill snake, so he and the ER/ICU vet, a young woman, ended up switching patients.

It was kind of funny because the ER vet told us when she walked in that she “didn’t really like snakes” and was happy to see a feline patient – LOL. She reviewed Sammy’s history then took us to a room with ultrasound so she could aspirate urine directly from his bladder. She came back a little while later and gave me the bad news I was already expecting – struvite crystals – ugh. I already knew a little bit about it from what I have read in the pet health forums and heard from friends with cats who have FLUTD (feline lower urinary tract disease).

He received more fluids, a pain shot, an injection of an anti-inflammatory drug, Cerenia, and some pills to take at home. A funny thing happened as we were leaving, after I paid the bill and was walking back to the car with Sammy in his carrier. The vet tech ran after us saying “Wait, I gave you the wrong medication.” I didn’t look at it closely, but I handed it back to her. She came back outside with the same medicine a few minutes later and handed it back to me. She said she had checked with the vet because the box was labeled “for canine use only.” The vet had explained to me that she was prescribing a medication that is labeled for canine nausea and vomiting, but has been used off label for cats and has shown some benefits for pain and bladder inflammation. I went home and looked it up just to make sure. Since I work in healthcare, I know that medical errors happen every day and I wanted to make sure it was a safe drug to give to Sammy.

I ended up buying some prescription wet food at the vet’s insistence which I know is very controversial and I have some reservations about it. I asked her if I could feed my own store bought wet foods and eliminate all dry food since I have 4 cats and didn’t really want to go the prescription food route. She believes that Sammy needs the prescription food to dissolve and get rid of the crystals so I will follow her advice for now, but I hope to transition back to regular wet food at some point. I’m not thrilled with the ingredients of the prescription food, but so far Sammy has been eating it, so I’m hoping that once his crystals have dissolved I can transition him to something healthier. My ultra picky cats who snub their noses at Wellness, EVO, and some of the better quality brands seem to like the prescription food so far. It’s supposed to increase thirst so they drink more water, but hopefully we won’t have to use it for very long.

Sorry for the long post, but I think writing all of this out makes me feel better. I don’t like seeing any of my cats sick, but what makes this especially distressing for me is that Sammy is so young, barely 2 years old. He is a very sensitive little guy and I do think that stress played a role in him getting sick in addition to his diet. I love all of my cats dearly, but Luke unfortunately can be a bully sometimes. Most of the time he is a real sweetheart, but he has a very dominant personality, loves to be the center of attention, and has a tendency to pick on the other cats. I ordered a calming collar for Luke this weekend, so paws crossed that it mellows him out and he doesn’t pick on Sammy. I might get one for Sammy too to reduce his stress.

I know a lot of people on Catster have dealt with FLUTD and problems with struvite crystals in their cats, so it’s been really helpful to read about how others have dealt with this problem. Thank you so much for all the purrs for Sammy, it's helped me get through a very rough week.

Love, Sammy and Mom Kelly