I'm doing fine! Well, sorta...

Thanks to every fur who sent me a zealie! Thanks a bunch! I'm sure you're wondering how I'm doing since the big shooting attack....

I'm fine! No sign that the pellet hit anything important and I just finished my antibiotic this morning. I have a funny shaved spot on my side where the pellet entered but otherwise I'm good as new! I'm playing and spending my days avoiding my annoying sister, Ceci, who apparently has nothing else to do besides bother ME!

The bad news.... I'm trapped inside. This is much worse than being shot at. I want OUT so badly that its all I think about. I don't know if mom is going to budge but I'm trying to make her life as miserable as possible to encourage the door to OPEN. OPEN NOW! Sid is trying to help, he's a master door opener if its left even a little bit not securely closed, but despite hours of work on the deck door, he can't get it to budge. I think she locked it.

Ceci doesn't really care. She's running all over and doing lots of playing, that's what nearly kittens do I guess. Sid is trying to teach her to do the run from the top of the stairs down to the cat tree and back up the cat tree (8 feet tall!) but she is more interested in playing than running. Mom's trying to play with us much more and I'll admit that I like that part. Except, of course, the little rat runs in and wants to play with my toys! Luckily Aunty Marion sent some treats, so those are yummy and welcome. Mom got me a new mousie and that's pretty fun as well. But most of my time is spent looking longingly out the window at the outdoors. Can't I go OUT???

Pete's home

Hi everyone, right before Pete crashed on his thermal pad (thanks Mumtatz & Jolan's mom, Marion!) he asked me to update his diary. Pete got to come today and he was very glad about that. He used up quite a bit of energy meowing and making a fuss on the way home. Normally our trips to the vet are very long and he gets to roam about the car so he was quite torked that he was trapped in the carrier. I think he's been holding it, too, as he peed the carrier which is quite out of character for him.

When we got home he learned that the unjustness wasn't about to stop - the back door was closed and I didn't come open it when he stood there looking sadly outside. Ceci must have told him the scoop because he gave up pretty easily and headed down stairs for some piece and quite in the basement bedroom. Its cooler and quieter there.

I was quite discouraged to see his condition. At the vet he'd been all vim and vinegar but at home trying to settle himself on the pad he is very clearly in pain. I gave him some Metacam and an assortment of his beds and he finally found a position to lie that he could tolerate. He's not interested in food and his breathing seems labored.

Ceci is lying near him watching him and I've moved my computer work for the day down to the bed. Sarah could smell my lunch preparations and decided to join us taking the best bed for herself. Pete is finally sleeping and Sarah & Ceci are taking naps as well. We'll see how he's doing later.

There is a good chance that the pellet nicked organs on its way through his body. For the next few days I'm charged with watching for lethargy, poor appetite, fever, swelling at the site, and other signs that he's not doing okay.

I'm also going to make a flyer for the neighborhood hoping that it will either stop whoever shot him or someone will turn him in. While we have a bit of property around us we're still in town and its illegal to discharge any weapon in city limits, even a sling shot.

Thank you for your purrs and good wishes,
Pete's human, Jill

Shot again

Hi there everyone. I'm writing this from my room at Alpine Animal Hospital. It turns out that they have laptops for everyfur! I'm here because I was hurt this morning and mom brought me in. Here's the scoop...

We've been having a rough summer here in Pullman. Four kitties who live within 2 blocks of us have either been killed or disappeared. Mom talked to the police and they told her that the coyotes pick a new hill every year. Last year it was the SW hill, this year its us on the NW hill. The kitty bodies that have been found have been mostly eaten up but two of the kitties were never found.

As all of the kitties who have disappeared have done so in the middle of the night, mom has been letting us go play outside during the day, but making us come in at night. We don't think much of this plan as the best hunting is after dark but mom is very insistent and stays up late to get us in.

About a week ago I refused to come in. There is a family of rabbits nearby and I have been eating each and every one of them. Delicious! I especially enjoy bringing them into the house and taking them to my secret room (the downstairs shower) but the downside is that sometimes mom or Sophia catch me on the way down and rescue the bunnies. Three times they outwitted me so I'm trying to be more stealthful now. But I digress...

I wouldn't come in, mom stayed up until 2am calling and rattling kitty treats but I wouldn't come so she had to go to bed. In the morning she found me waiting on the deck and as soon as she opened the door I RACED in! I was so scared that I couldn't tell her why I was scared but an hour later when dad found me I was still jumpy and frightened.

Ever since I haven't been out as much. I'm sticking closer to home, I'm coming when mom calls, I'm being careful. Mom can see a difference in me and has been worried that I found the kitty-killer and had a near miss but I'm not telling. I can't bear to relive the memories.

This morning I was anxious to get out. 8:30am is VERY LATE and it wasn't my fault that mom was up until after 1am. I came in at 12:59. I did take a few seconds to google some Fancy Feast but I was in too big of a hurry to eat my serving and raced outside. Mom leaves the door open during the day and a couple hours later she was downstairs and found me sitting on the bed looking uncomfortable. She stopped to look at me and I howled at her that I was hurting then took off before she could catch me. You know how humans are - she's going to want to touch me and see why I hurt. Ouch!

I jumped off the bed and ran upstairs and I could see mom noticing that I was walking funny. Rats. I kept yowling at her to leave me alone and went to the upstairs bedroom so that I could lie next to Sarah. Sarah wouldn't poke me and she'd make me feel better. Sarah was up on the table under the window and mom was coming up behind me. My side hurt so much but mom would get me if I didn't get curled up fast, so after I thought about it a bit I jumped up. OUCH! Mom raced in and tried to pet me. NO MOM DON'T TOUCH ME I yowled at her. She was gentle but anything she did hurt and I told her. Since it was clear she wasn't going to leave me alone I looked over at the floor and thought about jumping down. It was really going to hurt and I thought about it a while. Mom moved Sarah's step over for me and left the bedroom closing the door behind her. Oh no. I'm trapped.

It turned out that mom was calling our secondary vet, Alpine Animal Hospital, to see if she could bring me in. Normally mom calls Dr. Tammy but mom thought she worked at the Lewiston Humane Society on Tuesdays. Mom caught me (she's pretty sneaky, I was under the bed by now, but she pretended to open the door and when I made my mom she grabbed me!) and locked me in my carrier for the long drive to Alpine. I sure wish she'd called Dr. Tammy but mom guessed we'd need x-rays and Dr. T can't do that in her truck.

Dr. Nichols checked me out and thought it might be a bite. Mom had found a hole in my side that was bleeding. Later Dr. Nichols called mom to tell her they'd found a pellet in my chest on the opposite side of the entry wound. She didn't think it was from today and wanted to know the vet I went to in Clarkston when I was shot in the leg at 6months. Maybe the pellet was there then and Riverview forgot to tell mom.

Mom stopped to see me in the afternoon and I was sure glad to see her but not very happy when she left. Dr. Robinette had taken over my case and she's a very good vet with 32 years experience. She did Sarah's ACL knee surgery 5 years ago and you can't tell that Sarah was ever hurt. She showed mom my x-rays and told mom that she thought the pellet caused the puncture wound. Its exactly the same size as the hole and it doesn't look like a bite. She was planning to sedate me next and poke around in the hole to see if anything was damaged. They couldn't see any damage in the xray but its hard to see tissue damage in an xray. It would seem that I should be really hurt if the pellet went all the way through my body to the other side.

I'm about to go to sleep now for the procedure but the last I heard I had to spend the night. Rats!. I spent 3 weeks in a vet clinic and already did my time. I would be okay if I wasn't trapped in my room. Sure its nice, with a box, water, and a blankie, but I want to roam FREE! I'd write more but the drugs are startttingggg tttooo wooorrkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk.

Cecil

If you've read Bear's diary you know that mom rescued a little kitten yesterday. It was living under her favorite print shop and had been abandoned by its mother.

Cecil has only been here a few hours but he's eaten some food, a lot of food, and took away mom's voice so that she had to stay home sick today. We haven't seen him a lot, but I can smell him, he's very interesting.

The latest news is that mom put on her inventorying the freezer gloves and caught him. He was very good and even let her pet him. He's also very smart and pretends like he's not thinking every second of escape. Of course he is. She set him down and he had the dignity not to run away, but hissed at her as she got close to pick him up again. But again was a good kitten in her hand. I sniffed him and mom was proud that I didn't hiss or thwack him. Neither did the kit. I did puff up my fur nicely to make myself bigger. Not that it would take much to be bigger than this bundle of brown & gray tabby fluff! Unfortunately that's when mom noticed a big chunk of missing fur on my tail. Rats! There went the phone and she called Dr. T to come look at the kitten and ME!

Now mom and I are giving the kitten a break. Mom is sick, her head hurts, her throat is starting to get sore, shes very tired. This is the Swine Flue capital of the US afterall. Mom's back in bad and I'm cleaning myself up - kitten stalking is hard work! Read Bear's page if you want to know more.

Petes
ps. Popcorn and Feather - you cuties! Thanks for the skeleton!

Oh no! Comments are lost!

Hello all our dear furriends,
First we want to thank Edgar for bringing this problem to our attention. Thank goodness he assumed there was a glitch at headquarters instead of something worse!!

Mom likes the comment on diaries feature, but asked headquarters if there was a way to see comments left from the home page so that she didn't have to go back and look at our diary entries to find them. She loves catster, but this all can take a lot of time, I'm sure you know.

Headquarters wrote back telling mom to change her preferences so that our diary comments had to be approved by her. That way she would always get to read them. That sounded good, so mom did that. Suddenly we stopped getting comments! Since we haven't been getting very many pawmails either mom guessed that maybe our furiends were busy as well and weren't leaving any. But just in case, mom changed our preferences back to automatically posting a week or so ago.

Today Edgar wrote and told us that he'd tried to leave comments several times. Each time he'd gotten a message saying mom had to approve the comment, but the comment never ever appeared on our diary page. Oh no!! We never got those emails!! We want Edgar's comments and all of yours, too! We have nice furiends, we know you would never say anything that would hurt our feelings.

We sent another message to headquarters today. Of course we haven't heard back yet, but we did want to let our furiends know we love them all and we hope we didn't accidentally hurt your feelings. If you've figured out any good ways for managing those diary comments we'd like to know them!

Purrs, the Freuden Cats

Mom's gone! :(

It's that time. Sarah says it happens every year. My mom and dad packed up there stuff, kissed us goodbye, and drove away in the car. It's just us, though Sarah tells me Viktor will come and play with us and give us wet food twice a day. That's cool! I like to play with Viktor!

Mom comes home on Sunday 6/21 so we won't post much while she's gone. Sarah has to type and she's pretty slow given that she never took a typing class. And she's a cat. Purrs to all our furriends. Bear will be busy, too, he has to look out for the family while they travel. I hope everyfur is purring for Thorgal, Jolan, and Mumtatz's mom. Her daddy died last week. We're very sad for them.

Purrs and loves,
Pete the Perfect (from Sarah: I can't believe he made me type that)

Mom's leaving me

Okay, I'll admit I didn't catch on myself, but once Sarah pointed out the signs, extra clothes washing and cleaning, it has to be true, mom is leaving me! What will I do?? With evil Scruffy out there, I just want to hang out with mom. Will Sarah hang out with me when mom's gone?? I know Sid won't, he'll be spending his time trying to outsmart Viktor and Igor and get outside. Mom doesn't want to leave the deck door open for us because of Scruffy.

They thought he was gone. Mom and Dad hadn't seen Scruffy for several days and though they don't want to wish this on any cat, they thought maybe a coyote had gotten him. They have been very brave about coming into town this summer in broad daylight. Mom's friend saw one killing a bird yesterday. We knew the truth. He now comes in the dark of night and tries to kill us through the windows. Sid's so scared he won't sleep in his private jungle garden Morgan Pirate bed. Mom put it where the windows join and he could see EVERYTHING there. Scruffy tried to get me while I was sitting on the back of the sofa with mom. He tried to get me through the glass deck door. Mom jumped up and turned on the light and saw him leaving on the deck rail almost like a ghost.

Sarah only protects me if Scruffy comes in the house. She tries to tell me that he can't come through the glass, but he still scares me. I want my house and deck back!!

Meanwhile they think an alien possessed me. Without all that outside time I have to fill my time with playing with ribbons, chasing Sid, and mostly with loving my mom. I've been quite the lover, not quite getting the snuggle with arms around me thing, but definitely wanted to be touching. Last night I let her hold me a while, in an approved way, and was actually purring. Melissa was over and said she'd never heard me purr. She was quite impressed! I have a quiet purr.

Mom keeps opening the guest room door. Dad keeps closing it. Sarah says we move into the guest room when it's hot. I wonder if mom wants me to sleep down there while she's gone...? The curtains are closed so Scruffy couldn't get me there and its really cool. I hope she moves my bed down. Sarah tells me Bear wouldn't sleep down there when mom was gone, he stayed on the bed upstairs so that he wouldn't miss her coming home. I miss him. He would take care of Scruffy and Scruffy wouldn't dare come around our house any more. He was my best pal, I'm lonely. Any fur want to come stay with me when mom's gone?

I'm a lover Cat!

Mom thinks there is an alien who has taken over my body because I was a super lover this morning, again this afternoon, and now this evening. I'm not normally like that, you know. I love my mom and all but all that kissy face lovey lovey stuff really bugs me. Occasionally, you know in the middle of the night, I'm a snuggly boy who likes to knead and give kisses. Mostly I want to be near mom and be part of things but without all that annoying petting that messes up my fur.

I'm not telling what's up. It's hot, so mom really doesn't get it. Suffice it to say that Bear told me mom might need some extra loves, so I'm doing my part. That and evil Scruffy has moved into the carport and I'm afraid of him. Mom's stopped feeding him but even if he's mean to us mom still feels sorry for him. Not Dad! He wants to catch Scruffy and take him to the pound. Mom worries because she doesn't think he's adoptable, or would take a special home.

I do like CC (collar cat) who by the way is a GIRL! Wow, she's one big girl and I'm not talking like Sarah either. She stands taller than me and isn't a bit overweight. Mom thinks she's very pretty and I do to. I like sniffing her nose and following her around outside. She likes hanging out by the deck door hoping to score some wet food from mom. Mom would adopt CC except that it's clear she's got a good home, she's in beautiful condition, except for the hanging out at our house all night part. She must get out when her humans come home and run to our place! She has lost her pretty collar, too, but she doesn't seem to need it. Flop2 still comes around sometimes but he's just interested in food. He doesn't let mom pick him up or pet him.

No catnip yet. I'm hoping we get another 6 foot tall tree like last year.

Time to give mom more kisses!
Purrs, Petes

Mom's HOME!

Yippee, Mom's home and we're outside playing in the sun! This is so great! I have already rolled in the driveway and completely covered my beautiful fur in dirt, I'm so HAPPY!! Even Sarah's got some twigs and things sticking out of her fur! Gotta run, Sid isn't covered in dirt yet and I'm seeing an opportunity!

Purrs! Petes

Wow! I'm a diary pick!

Hey thanks Headquarters! Bear was a pick several times and this is super cool! Of course the timing is a bit rough since mom is in Portland with dad and the kids, but I made Sarah type this for me. She's not very fast but we have all day!

Life is good here, except the being trapped inside for the three days part. Melissa comes over to feed us and Sid & I are making it a game to try to escape. We heard mom tell Mel that if we escape she can leave the deck door open for us, so this is clearly our goal. Unfortunately that means Scruffy could come inside, but so could Collar Cat! I like him! Though yesterday he showed up without his collar.... what should we call him now???

It's going to be nice and hot this weekend, 80-85. Mom tells me that means we're really not likely to get snow but you can never tell around here. We had snow on June 10 last year! Dad's been afraid to plant the tomatoes, mom bought 86!!!! but I think he'll do it when he gets home.

Mom's still limping around. She's been trying to work more but that isn't helping her leg much. That's why she decided to take the weekend off with dad. It was very funny when they left, mom was in the backseat with her leg on a pillow! It's a very long drive to get the kids, 6.5 hours, then back up 2 hours to get to Portland. They'll do it all again on Monday to come home. Bear was checking on mom, he was pretty worried that she went but the girls begged, and he said she did pretty good. She's in her hotel propped up with a pillow recouperating now. But back to me....

Sid's pal and Bear's little guardian angel prospect Montoya made to his new home. We're all so excited for him. Sid met him at the big wedding, you might remember the kittens taking over when Quinn and Sadie got hitched? Sid and Montoya had quite a time and became good furiends. Bear and Montoya have a connection because Bear was blind for a while, Bear worries about Montoya but not too much anymore. He flew the whole trip and helped keep Montoya calm in the airplane. Not much work though, Montoya's a trouper! What good mom's he's got, both his foster and his forever!

Gotta run, Sarah's paws are getting tired and it's time to chase Sid around the house. He's lost his twist tie again, so it's up to me to keep him busy. Purrs & loves and thanks to everyone who congratulated me!
Petes