My long life cut short

Hello friends of the feline variety,
I am greeting you from cloud 7. I can tell you the last weeks have not been great for me, but I am feeling better now. I am missing my human and I guess that's why I tried so hard not to go where I am now.
Since the last blog I have been trying to get my arthritis under control but unfortunately that is the bane of getting older. It is not getting better, only more painful. My human gave her best to alleviate the pain. I noticed that it took me longer each time to settle down and even the softer cushions didn't help much. The injections I received from the vet once a month were less and less helpful and I felt restless and had memory lapses. I also noticed that my human and her partner tried not to yell at me too much even when I created a bit of a mess after leaving my litter box. They were cleaning up behind me and soothed me with soft words.
Although I had seen the vet on a very regular basis I did not have another Thyroid test done as I seemed to deal well with the medication that was rubbed into my ears twice a day. But when my human ran out of medication and fell back to the tablets I did not like that at all. I felt sick and lo and behold I vomited them up again with or without food I had just eaten.
I am glad though that my humans gave me pain killers which relieved my pain temporarily. Noticing all the changes that went on inside me, I tried to be as close as possible to my human and took every chance I had to climb on her chest and headbutt her and enjoy the scratching and petting she administered to my very skinny body. That seemed to be another side effect of my ailment. I was continuously losing weight although I was ravenously eating and drinking. My human could hardly keep up with cleaning my litter box.
I enjoyed to go outside in the backyard and just lay in the high grass and sleep the day away. I guess that's when I felt less pain.
The pain got the better of me in the end. I gave my best but it wasn't enough. The last few days my human noticed that my poo had turned almost black (which seems to be an indication for internal bleeding) and the day before yesterday I started vomiting right after I had eaten. My body was giving away noices that even I had never heard before and I felt really crappy. My human sensed that something was wrong with me because I alienated myself into the darkest corner of the library. She and her partner were conversing in hushed tones and yesterday he took me to the vet again. I could feel he was very upset and then he called my human who had dutifully gone to work (as she always does). A short time later she came into the vet as well and though she tried to hide it very hard she was upset as well. I felt shitty and that made it even worse. She wispered endearments into my ear but I was having trouble listening. I am pretty sure she told me how much she loved me but I only wanted to have the pain go away. My body was burning and after a while the nice vet lady took me into the back room and attached a needle with a plastic thing in my front leg. Then she brought me back to my human and while my human had tears in her eyes she hugged me and then the vet injected some green fluid into that plastic thing. I turned around and looked but all of the sudden my head went light and my legs gave way. After that came darkness and the pain went away.

Now I am in a very interesting place but that I will tell you about later.
Your beloved Feline
Fluser

What do I do with my spare time? part two

Well, here I am again, friends of the furry felines,
where was I? Ah, yes, my human leaves in her metal box and I miss her... for about 5 seconds. Then I climb into her bed and curl up right where I can still feel her warmth and smell her scent. And I sleep and dream of all the adventures I could have... I wake up and check the parameter, I have a name to defend and I know that there is this tiny little creature behind the bookshelves (my human calls it a mouse), but I leave it be as I have a full food bowl and fresh water and some dry kibble which I am not really fussed on since my last visit to the vet. My teeth are not getting younger either... I am an old and wise cat!!! I look out into the backyard as my human leaves the noisy screens open a bit so I have some light in the house during the day. Nothing much going on out there, the weeds are growing and the wind is blowing gently. Sometimes I see some feathered brethren, but they fly away as soon as I scratch on the window glass. Then I walk back into the bedroom and curl up on a big padded envelope my human left there for me when I was having back pain and could not climb my stairs. I fall into a deep slumber and spend a short but intense time in dreamland.
I have to get up to get to my litter box, I should not have had that much water before, but I was so thirsty chasing that spider all over the hallway... my human likes all kind of animals so she has quite a few arachnoids living with us. They don't bother me, I usually don't bother them unless they are running right in front of me along the floor. That has ruffled my fur a bit so I have to sit down and give it a good grooming. I am very thorough with it and I try to stick to my routine, first the left paw then the right one, then over the face and over the ears and then the paws again. I have to turn around and lean against the wall to stretch out my leg and clean the under side of it. Trust me, with back pain that is not an easy task, but I am good in everything I do so I accomplish that as well. But my day is not over yet, so till the next time I will tell you more...
Your feline Fluser

What do I do with my spare time? Part one

Cats do sleep 16 hours a day, well that's a myth. I dose quite a bit but sleeping is not big in my busy schedule.
In the early morning hours I am bright awake, listen to all the noises that seep through doors and windows and of cause the rumbling of my tummy. I climb up the stairs my human has next to her bed (for me as I am too old to jump up on it) and start the task of getting her out of bed to feed me. I have a quick bite and then I settle down for a first of many naps. When the first light tickles my eyes I get up again and start to get vocal. A quiet meow is followed by a louder one and an even louder one. If that isn't getting my human out of bed I will climb up the stairs again and pull her arm with my paw. Usually I am pretty successful with that but sometimes she is really fast asleep and I have to use tougher measures like climbing on my human and using some pressure points that get her up quickly. If that fails there is always her husband who yells at me which wakes my human up and to keep the peace she gets up and we go outside.
There I will check who trespassed on my land, read the news and relief myself (mainly to warn others off not to step on my property). I watch the neighbours leave in their metal boxes and sometimes I get a rub along my spine from my human. I like that, it loosens itchy hair and my toes curl while the rest of my body relaxes. Then she yells at me too as I flopped down "in the middle of ant traffic", not that I really understand what she means by that. Well by that time I have enough of being outside (I am an indoor cat by trade but an adventurous outdoor cat by heart) and choose to go back inside. While my human is getting changed in what she calls "work clothes" I check my bowl, find it empty and come down the hallway complaining. I find my human in the bathroom and get told to wait. Me? Waiting? Who does she think she is? Nothing is more important than my belly and my wellbeing. to be continued...
More next time when I am between my naps, your feline
Fluser

Happy Australia Day!!!

Hi Feline lovers,
it all started this morning when I tried to get my human up to feed me. She absolutely ignored me, it did not matter what I did, meowing softly in her ear, walking over her, walking into the hallway as my voice echoes in there beautifully. All it did was arrousing my human's husband's ire. I know he wants to wring my neck (figuratively, as he would get into trouble with my human) and I guess I sometimes try my best to irritate him. Anyway, I probably did not think about both of them having what they call headaches and therefore ignored all the warning signs. My human slept in like till too long and her husband spent hours on end in front of the moving picture box (he says it relaxes him) while I tried to get some decent food and a way out into either the backyard or the frontyard. When she finally made an appearance, she went straight on that flip thing, then she got the usual "we go out" procedure and packed a bag and off they went. They left the light on, that means only one thing!!! They expect to return after sunset. How uncool. I am left to my own devices, with a bowl of food and (thank Bastet) a fresh water bottle. I haven't seen the mouse that lives behind the furniture but I can hear it. Not that it really bothers me because if I caught it they would expect me to do that all the time, "No thank you, not interested in that job...!" So I waited and eventually they rocked up again, even before the sun set. I am not a spiteful cat but my human should never have left me for she came home looking like a lobster, her back all red and radiating heat. It looks painful and I think we are in for a restless night. She usually knows better and is aware of the consequences but hey, I am only the cat and I could have told her so...
So have a feline Australia Day
yours Fluser

Can I take off my fur in this heat?

Hi there friends,
it turns out to be a summer after all. The heat is ruling our life and the way the humans are dealing with it shows a great deal how they cherish the people around them. Well, to be telling the truth I give a whisker how my humans husband feels. But my human does and she suffers for it. Don't get me wrong, I cannot stand the heat but I like it warm and so does my human. She spends most of these days indoors to get away from the sun. Her skin is usually pale but since we arrived on these foreign shores her arms are covered in freckles and her face looks always flushed. She calls it "sunburn" which sounds pretty painful to me. When she leaves the house she covers up and I can imagine that it would be quite strange in this heat to put on more clothes rather than less. I sometimes wish I could take my coat off in this heat but then I am grateful that I have it because it gets awefully cold in my house. When noone is here but me I am quite comfortable, sometimes maybe a tad warm but I can stretch myself out and lay on the tiles to cool down. When my humans husband is here there is this cold air coming out of holes in the ceiling and I have to look for a place out of the draft.
Since the last weekend we have been living in an ice box and thanks to my human I can thaw outside for a while as she opens the backdoor for me. Unfortunately she suffers from pain in her head and blames the constant in and out of "airconditioned rooms" for it. See and that is the crux of it. Only out of love for her husband she keeps the cold air on as he prefers it and after long hours driving outside in that heat (did I mention he is driving giant metal boxes for earning my catfood?) he is insisting that he needs it to cool down. I love my human too and that is why I cuddle up with her under the blanket and keep her warm. It just annoys me that she suffers that terrible pain in the head. Neither sleep nor pills seem to help, so I blame it on the heat as well and hope that it will cool down soon.
Your feline furball Fluser

Oh weekend, why did you leave me?

Hello furball lovers,
how did you spent your holidays? Did you do the same as my human did? She had three weeks off work and spent almost all of those days at home. Some days she did not even get out of her pj. We cuddled on the couch or in bed and I was happy and content. I have to admit, she read a lot and I had my moments where I could have jumped out of my fur for I could not get her to get up and feed me or let me out when I felt like it, but just having her around was a delight. Most of the time my training her has paid off and I need only a soft "meow" to get her going. She also has kind of an understanding of my different sounds and realizes pretty quick what I want (not that I get it all the time).
Today though and mind you it is a saturday and weekend so to say, she and him went in the morning I don't know where and came home with a lot of stuff and it wasn't even for me. All things for her and his metal boxes! Well, I assume since they are using them all the time the metal boxes should be comfortable.
I was quite put out about it but she comforted me with bits of lamb from her lunch. Then, I had just cuddled up to her, settled down and fallen asleep, she was gone. What the..., I checked the bed room and here they were fast asleep in their own bed. How dare they leave me alone in the lounge room!!! Anyway, I calmed myself and settled with her again. She slept and slept and I needed to go outside and my food bowl did not have food in it (at least not some that I liked...), so I tried to wake her up. No chance, buddy. Happily snoring she totally ignored me! Aaaarggghh. Then her alarm went off. Still she did not get up, so I had to fork my claws out and gently oh so gently pull her blanket away and stretch the sleave of her shirt. Finally she got up and fed me. And then oh horror, shock and dismay she started a ritual that I terribly hate. Shower, good clothes and perfume can mean only one thing: she is going out!!! No, don't leave me. After all those lovely days and weekends, how can you?
Now I lay here in the dark on her bed and wait for her return. She will have all these different smells on her and will be chatting with him and then she will sit again for hours and hours in front of that flip thing. But I know deep down in my kitty heart that she belongs to me, just like I belong to her...
Your "waiting furball" Fluser

Visit to the Vet

Hello cat lovers,
today kind of sucked, big time. Since my human stayed up too long again, waiting for "him" to come home and have a very late dinner, she had only a few hours of her beauty sleep and therefore I had a hard time to get her out of bed this morning to feed me my early breakfast. I raised her like a zombie about a quarter to 7 to take me outside, front preferable. Thank Bastet, the bedroom is to the front, so her sleepy mind decided it was easier and faster to go that way. I took my time to have a sniff to see who passed by (there is a black and white cat living two or three houses down the road) and then to have a little pee on the front weed. Trust me, my toilet was only for emergencies and she had promised me the last few days that she would clean it. Then I had my second breakfast, but I wasn't really hungry. My second tour outside was declined as she was (as usual running late) and then she left and I was by myself again - her husband wasn't worth noting. He usually hangs around the house not doing much. Anyway in the afternoon the house was getting a bit warm and I was waiting for my humans return, so I laid stretched out on the bedroom floor and listened for the sound of her metal box. Finally, she arrived, came in, gave me a pat on my head and went straight to that flip thing on the table, she calls it lap top. I thought, 'yeah, she has forgotten. If I make myself invisible and do not bother her we won't go.' I should have left the thinking to someone else! I was dozing off when she sneeked up on me with that terrible plastic box. She always pulls it out when I have to get into her metal box. And how do I hate that!!! It makes me sick, literally. I complain from the moment on the door shuts behind me. To no avail...
I had to go, she told me so. Don't get me wrong, I like the people there, at my local vet clinic. Dr. Ian is a really nice guy and Dr. Erina checks my vitals with soft hands so that I do not get scared to much. Liz, Kerry and Leah may prod me with needles sometimes "but only when I need it" says my human. They are called "nurses". The only one that is always nice to me is Jaci, she asks how I have been and how I do and smiles at me when I get carried in. She sits in the front room and has it easy, she does not have to go into the examination room. I don't have a choice in it. I am an old cat. I may not have had the adventures of a stray, but I flew!!! (this is another story I will tell you another time). Now my bones are old and crunchy and I noticed the last couple of weeks that I had severe issues in settling down. It hurts anyway I turn and that can't be good. To help me they give me a needle in my neck. This will get repeated now for the next four weeks and then I will feel young again. Till the next time... it sucks to go to the Vet.
your ailing feline Fluser

Don't I love my human...

Hello friends of the felines,
what do cats do all day when they are on themselves? Well, I do sleep a lot and groom myself (nothing is better than a fur in order and all clean) and then there are the regular visits to the feed bowl and the water bowl. I do inspect my territory but apart from mice and spiders and other creepy crawlies there is not much going on. So, mainly I sleep a lot. Today would have been not much different. I graziously allow my human's husband to use my house, he usually sleeps a lot or is sitting in front of the moving picture box and not really disturbing my daily routine. He will get himself ready to go somewhere in the afternoon (my human says he has to go and earn my cat food!!!) and usually I ignore him and continue dozing on the bed. But not today! I heard a noise that was so familiar to me but not at this time of the day. That metal smelly thing that my human uses when she leaves me in the morning makes some really distinctive noises and has its own smell as well and it was coming down the road, around the corner and up the drive way. My human? Home at that time of the day? Yeah, I was doing summersaults (at least inside of me!!), as you have to know that I am going to be 18 in May and do suffer from Arthritis which makes it sometimes hard to get up or lay down and after a long sleep I am all stiff and sore. I got up and used my stairs to get off the bed to greet my human at the door. She was already talking to her partner, so I joined the conversation and asked all kind of questions. Where were you? Why are you here? Now!? She sees her husband only once or twice daily, so she crammed a lot in the conversation with him and I couldn't really get her focused on me, but then he had to go and I finally had my human to myself. She did our afternoon routine -just a few hours earlier-, she let me out the back, I wanted to go out in the front, she put food in my bowl, I had a few bits and a quick drink and then we curled up on bed happy together and fell asleep. An afternoon nap with my human and I felt like being in heaven. And guess what!? Even now, hours later she is so content with me that without any comment or yelling she opens the back door for me as soon as I feel like checking out the backyard. Don't I love my human...
Your feline Fluser

Wednesday is Radio Night...

Hello friends,
my human is such a sweetheart, when she comes home, first thing she offers me is going outside in the front yard. Well she doesn't really trust me so she supervises me most of the time. Sometimes though she leaves me by myself if only for a few minutes to put her bags inside or whatever and then it is like Russian Roulette. Either I am off to check out the neighbourhood or I lay on my little green spot (she calls it lawn) and pretend I am a good boy. She never knows. It all depends on my mood and how bored I have been at home while she was off to work. If I don't want to go outside, and trust me friends, I will tell her loud and clear, she heads straight for the kitchen and serves me up some nice catfood. I promoted her recently to head can opener with two stars. Well, she still has a stellar career in front of her... she will shortly head off to the radio, as she is volunteering at a local radio station, so I will probably curl up and go to sleep again. I have to rest so that I can get up nice and early tomorrow morning (let's say about 4:15am) to keep her on her toes and to get my first serve of the day, meow!!

Your feline Fluser

Never too old to learn something new...

Great, while I just wanted to participate to win something I now am the more or less proud owner of a blogger page. I have absolutely no idea what I am doing here, but if there are friendly and helpful people out there or cats or dogs who own their own blog space, feel free to lend me a hand, paw, hoof or whatever you have to ease my way in this new medium. Your feline Fluser