Shaggy's Gotcha Day

Brotherly Love

Today is my Gotcha Day!
Mom brought me and my littermate brother Scooby home 6 years ago today!
We were already 6 years old when we came to live here.
Mom is emotional today because Scooby went to the Bridge April 1st and we miss him very much.  She still has a hole in her heart. She misses his quiet presence every day.

Patches Speaks

Nip Nanner

Pot 'O Nip

Meow.  I'm Patches. I'm a Geezer Cat and proud of it. I've been snatched from my home of 18 years by my catsitter and now I live at her house. Think it over.  I'm cranky and you would be too.    I'm not ashamed to ask for what I want in new house of mine, and I do...loudly! What I want is FOOD! Here's my tactic: every time The Lady or The Man goes into the kitchen, I run to them and demand chow.  It's demeaning, at 18, to have to beg like this but, by Cod, I'm hungry and it works, most of the time.  My other lady was nice and all, but she was chintzy with the food. I gotta lot of catching up to do.
Since I have a voice the Lady says I can do this thing called Blogging.  It's newfangled to me but I'll try.   She said I have to share this blog that belongs to the Two Hissy Cats that live here.
We're getting to know each other.  We like to rumble at dark o'clock in the hallway outside the people's sleeping room.  I spend most of my day in a hideout I discovered there.  It's a crawl space under the waterbed thing.  I come out to demand food, explore the territory, imbibe in the primo nip they have here and scratch myself.  For a retirement home, it's not too bad. 
Nice ta meetcha.  -Patches

I found the toys

Mom is Down & Out

Table surfing

Mom's been sick since Sunday so I'm doing my best to take care of her.  I stayed with her on the bed all day Sunday.  She's been in & out of the house this week, but her head is full and it's going into her chest. It's very tiring to try to do things.  She even gets winded walking up the basement steps.   She's feeling all dragged out.  We haven't been able to visit all our kitty friends blogs either.  Scout & I are helping with the physical therapy for the shoulder.  She doesn't feel like doing the stretches but must keep the progress she's already made.   We make sure to get right in there with her on the floor, but for some reason she keeps pushing us away.  -Shaggy

Paws

This is NOT what it looks like!  I am not to be held accountable for things I do in my sleep.
-Scout
I must have stretched my leg when I yawned.
-Shaggy

Exploring and Hiding

The gargoyle

Here I am snoopervising the house atop the kitchen counter.  It's pretty much centrally located.  I can see all the main floor, and who ever comes down the hall as well as who comes up or goes downstairs to the basement. 
The "who" in this case is the new boarder, Patches.    I just sit up here and watch him as he moves about the house exploring.   He just pads around on his feet, going from room to room to room to room.   Then he hides behind the mom & dad's bed for most of the day, sleeping on account of he's an old dood.    -Scout

He's a nip head too.

More About Patches

 We will let our Mom borrow the blog today........
 Hi kitty friends and Pawrents......

Patches & our son, John get acquainted

Patch meets Toby

Patches looks like a big cat, but looks can be deceiving.  Mary Kay could only afford to feed him half of a small can of Fancy Feast per day.  He is skin and bones under that shaggy coat. This is not just the ramblings of a woman with two overweight cats.  His bony hips protrude. His spine is quite alarming as you feel each vertebrae when you stroke him.  Same with his ribs.

He constantly begs for food.  I've been feeding him two cans a day spread out over morning, midday, late afternoon, bedtime.   He just inhales it.  I hesitate to call him "starving" out of fondness for my friend, but he is. Make that 'was' now that I have him. The vet said feed him what he seems to need, in small portions throughout the day but keep an eye on the scale. He has a lot of making up to do before the scale gets to be an issue.

I've known Mary Kay for 8 years and have been catsitting Patches for about 6 years. He he's always been on the lean side, never fat, these last few years I put it down to his aging.  He is about 18 years old.  The last time I took care of him was 8 months ago when Mary Kay fell and broke her pelvis.  She was in the hospital and then rehab center, for 3 weeks.  He begged for more food all the time and I'd feed him a full can instead of half, then fill in from my own cupboard to make up the difference.     I'd told her my concerns, even bought food to help out but she insisted 1/2 small can was all he needed.   She had kibble for him, but he'd only nibble  it....She's had that same container of Iams for the last 6 years!   God only knows how long before that!  It is horribly stale and, I suppose, possibly contaminated. I should have bought a fresh bag when she was gone, thrown out the old, scrubbed out the plastic Tupperware it was in and refilled with new.  I never realized it.... until she was giving me his food the day I brought him home.  Always the same amount in the container, and when I cat-sit I never had to fill his bowl. I should have caught on.
He is adjusting well.  Our son, John came home from Chicago to run the Twin Cities Marathon and they hit it off.  Patches was comfortable enough to do some grooming in the middle of the sunroom.  And there isn't as much hissing & growling going on.   -Mom Lynne

Moms Helper

Mom has plenty of snoopervision  as she goes about her physical therapy routine.

The shoulder hurts less, but she still can't lift more than 2 pounds.
-Scout

Get Away From My Teeth

There oughta be a law against taking pictures like this

I should have figured something evil was being planned last night when I heard mom say "no food after 8 pm" and the dishes disappeared.
This morning I was crammed into the ptu and whisked away to the v-e-t.  She never listens to my protesting from the back seat but I had to try anyway.   Then... mom left without me!  That never happens!  Kitties, I went into a deep sleep and I think they messed with my mouth.  Yes...Mom confirmed it....the v-e-t  and his hench-women cleaned my teeth!   My choppers were just fine thankyouverymuch.  Now they hurt and Shaggy's growling at me like I'm the introoder instead of Patches!  -Scout

Sticking Together

Scout & I are doing a lot more of this ever since that Introoder cat Patches arrived here 2 weeks ago. 
 I had an "encounter" this morning with Patches.  We did the slappy-slappy swat-swat  with yowling.  Dad broke it up.   Then a few hours later a yowl came from the basement.  Patches and Scout were in a standoff.  Scout was cornered with his ears back. Mom put Patches back into his "solitary room" so we all could relax. 
-Shaggy

Exploring

I've been busy exploring my new home.  There is way more space here than at my first mom Mary Kay's place.
This is the sun room.  Shaggy and Scout are in here a lot so I steer clear of it unless they are napping elsewhere.
I'm also a very vocal cat.  Shaggy is vocal when he wants food and Scout rarely says anything, but I meow & meow.  Mom says it's really different having a cat who expresses himself like I do.
-Patches

Hello! My Name is Patches

Meow!  My name is Patches and I'm just discovering there is a world of others like me out there.

I'm living at this new house now.  10 days ago I was relaxing on the bed in the home I've lived in as an only cat for 15 years.  My cat-sitter came over and before I knew it I was stuffed in my carrier, put in a car and driven to her house.  Now she's my Mom.  I've been in this room for 10 days, but after 3 days I started jumping the gate and exploring this new place.  My first mom, Mary Kay adopted me when I was 3 years old.  I am 18 years old but I'm really spry.  Mary Kay and I were growing old together.  But she has financial problems & health problems and her daughters say she can't live on her own anymore. The place she is moving to doesn't allow pets. I'm not a pet!  I'm a family member but that didn't matter.  My new mom said if there was no other place for me to go, she would adopt me.  And she has!  I know her very well.  She's been my cat sitter for years when Mom Mary Kay would leave on trips.   There are two really big kitties here at this house that keep hissing and spitting at me.  I'm not used to other cats so I keep my distance.  But I did have to chase them once to let them know I'm no pushover.   I am a man cat, by the way. -Patches

What's Behind Door #1?

Garden Thursday

Looking down our street

We don't usually post for Garden Thursday because we really don't have gardens at our house.

There is one raised bed along the east side of the house that Shaggy likes to poop in.    Mom collects the seeds from the previous years flowers every fall and tosses them in that garden every spring and says "grow if you want to."  She has orange cosmos that she got from Uncle Al over 20 years ago.  She's managed to keep them going all this time.   A few years ago she bought some seed for short purple hollyhocks and they  seem to like it here.  So she collects their seeds too.  

Brilliant Red

The fall color is great this week.  It's been so nice, upper 70's.  It is changing now with temps going into the low 40's - 50's so it won't be so nice to sit outside with her and we'll be stuck inside. 

Here's a look at our trees and flowers.

Our front porch area

Purple Hollyhocks

Orange Cosmos going to seed