Cody’s blog

When my heart kitty, Spot, died in July 2013, I was devastated. I wanted another orange cat, but I still had two cats, Socks and Jerry, and Socks in particular didn’t like other cats, so I decided not to get another cat as long as she was around. When Socks died in November 2015, Jerry seemed lonely, so I started looking for a cat to adopt.

I spotted Mister, called Simba by the shelter, on the Best Friends LA website in December 2015, and his little orange face really tugged at my heart. But it was three more months and another cat (Davey) later before I finally adopted him. In my “gotcha” post, I wrote:

I’d called about him, but found out he’d been sick from not eating, and was waffling about going to see him. On the one hand, I didn’t want to get caught up in yet another series of endless vet visits and treatments, after spending several years dealing with Socks’ and Spot’s slow declines. On the other hand, it was possible he was just not dealing well with being in a shelter and he might be just fine in a home. I waited a week or two and finally said, heck with it, I’m going to at least go and see him! So I drove all the way to Mission Hills (1hr 40min from here), only to find when I got there that Simba was in the clinic again, very sick, and it was not even sure he’d survive. I visited a few other cats, but came home empty-handed.

I kind of gave up on him after that, and eventually got Davey the kitten instead. But things were not ideal. Jerry never really got to like the kitten, and Davey is such a handful! He wants to play all the time, and pesters Jerry (and me) endlessly. I started to think that maybe a third cat — one that was playful enough to keep the kitten busy but not so wild that Jerry would be further upset — might help the situation.

And then, on St Patrick’s Day, I got an email from Best Friends with news of their March adoption specials. Not really expecting anything to come from it, I decided to take a look at their adoptable cats. And there was Simba! He’d gone into foster care and was doing really well. So I immediately thought, THERE IS MY CAT I MUST HAVE THIS CAT! and emailed them and set up a time to come and see him, which was this afternoon, and brought him home.

He walked around the house a bit and looked at the other cats. Hissed a bit but didn’t seem aggressive, just wary. Jerry ignored him. Davey immediately wanted to play, but I didn’t let them get together just yet. His foster mom said he got along well with all of her cats, played with the youngest, and cuddled with the ones that wanted to cuddle. So I expect he’ll get along with my guys once he gets used to them, and them to him.

I totally love him already.

Mister was always kind of a strange guy. He meowed a lot for no apparent reason, was anxious and nervous, hissed when most cats would howl. He either ate too much or not enough. His health problems — which I was hoping to avoid when I originally passed on him — were endless and varied. He tried to be friends with Jerry, but she wouldn’t have anything to do with him. Davey tried to play with him, but he hissed and growled and ran away. Eventually, they learned to get along, but there were always spats.

Mister loved his food, and would eat anything you gave him, but he had a sensitive stomach and couldn’t eat too much dry food or it would give him diarrhea. He had urinary crystals, bladder stones, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, assorted UTIs and stomach upsets. Seemed we were constantly treating him for something. He was on meds for his anxiety and prescription foods for most of the time I had him.

Despite his health issues and oddities, he was a sweet, friendly cat, who would sit in my lap for hours on end and let me give him his various meds without much fuss. When he was diagnosed with HCM, I thought I wouldn’t have him much longer, since that was what ended Spot’s life, but it turned out to be less of an issue than his other conditions. I worried about taking him across the country in a trailer when I moved, but he survived the trip in good health, his only problem being that he hated riding in the travel carrier while we were on the move. I eventually had to leave the carrier unzipped so he didn’t feel trapped.

I noticed after we’d moved and I took him to his new vet for an exam that he was gradually losing weight, although he’d been eating fine and having no other problems. He continued to lose weight, and have increasing issues with diarrhea and vomiting. We tried numerous different medications and prescription foods, but nothing worked for long, and eventually he just got so skinny his body began to fail him. We were never sure exactly what the underlying condition was, but we think it was probably lymphoma, which would have been fatal eventually no matter what we did. He was down to 3.8 pounds (from his healthy weight of 11.5 pounds) when I finally had to let him go.

He was a good kitty and I miss him.

Our first family cat was Snap. Technically, I think he was my brother’s cat, but we all loved him. He was a sturdy black tabby tomcat. In those days, we didn’t think about neutering our pets or keeping them indoors. He would go out every spring and be gone for about a week, romancing all the lady cats he could find and fighting with other toms.

Here I am with Snap, in a photo dated May, 1963. I would have been around 11. I have no idea how old Snap would have been. I can’t really remember when or how we got him, it just seems like he was always there.

Whiskers was my first cat. This picture was also taken in May, 1963. Yes, that is a poodle skirt I’m wearing.

I got Kitty somewhere around 6th to 8th grade, I don’t remember exactly. A classmate asked if anyone wanted a kitten. I said I did. Presumably there was some conversation between our parents. All I remember is my friend and her mother driving up to our house, handing me a kitten, saying, “Here’s your cat,” and driving away. She told us the kitten was purebred Siamese, but not registered. Presumably not show quality, or she wouldn’t have been free, but I never cared about that. I loved her to bits! She was a fussy little diva, typical Siamese, very opinionated and talkative. She was my best friend throughout junior high and high school and beyond.

She always had to be the center of attention.

After I graduated from high school, I bummed around for about a year before returning home to go to community college. Somewhere along the way, someone gave me a tiny little orange ball of energy we named O.J. He grew up to be this behemoth, sixteen pounds of muscle and fur. Note how broad his chest is.

O.J. was the sweetest, friendliest cat ever. He loved everything and everybody: people, other cats, rabbits, dogs, horses. He had a purr you could hear from across the room, and a tiny, squeaky little meow. When I moved back home I brought O.J. with me. Kitty was appalled and offended. He ran right up to her to try to make friends. She hissed and growled and retreated under the bed and wouldn’t come out until O.J. had been banished to the garage. He was content to be the outdoor kitty while she ruled the house.

When I moved away to go to university, I left Kitty and O.J. at home with my parents. O.J. died a year or so later, the victim of someone who was poisoning neighborhood cats. Kitty lived on to be around 16 years old, always happy to see me when I came home on breaks. My mom said Kitty would start waiting by the door a couple of days before I arrived, somehow knowing I would be home soon. She always greeted me like the old friend she was.

Living cat-free at university, I discovered that the constant runny nose and cough I’d been suffering for years was a severe allergy to cats I’d developed. I didn’t have another cat until I moved to Tehachapi over twenty years later, and found that a cat came with the house I’d bought on the mountain. My allergies had gotten better over the years, and I was very happy to be able to have cats again.

Star Wars Half Marathon – The Light Side

January 15, 2017

We arrived at Disneyland on Friday afternoon and settled into our lovely hotel room at the Paradise Pier Hotel. The best thing about the hotel was the cute beach ball pillow on each bed! I wanted to take mine home with me, but the card warned that there would be a $65 charge for any beach ball pillow that made its way into a traveler’s suitcase. Cute, but not $65 cute!

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