Where's the Girl? (IX)

"Basket, I like too! Box, Bin and Basket. And my name is Braun. 'B' has got to be my favourite alphapet!!"

P/S: I like the photo on the lower left-hand very much. It presents a soulful side of Braun.

Where is the Girl? (VIII)

"The bin or the box? I like them both..."

1,000 (Green) Origami Cranes (XVII)

Skoda had a review done on Sat, 15 Aug where her urinalysis report fared quite badly, with high levels of protein and Leukocytes, as well as crystals in her urine. It wasn't a surprise because then she was wearing an Elizabethan collar while waiting for her claw to heal. The collar kept getting in the way so she was not eating and drinking much.

In view of her report results, Dr K requested for us to bring Skoda back for a urine culture test. We brought her in to the veterinary clinic yesterday, 12 Sept. Her urinalysis results turned out to be the best so far, even better than the one in June. Dr K also remarked on her medical record it was a good urine report :) There were no traces of protein, a low level of Leukocytes and nil crystals in her urine. Yay, hurray!!! There was nothing different nor extra that we did, except that Grimlock played laser pointer with Skoda for the whole week prior to the test date for the past 2-3 urinalyses. It seems the exercising may be of help. Skoda's next urinalysis will be in a month's time.

Skoda's urinalysis results to-date:

This is OUT Too

When C came to catsit for us in July, I found out from her Waltham Urinary S/O wet food (pouch) is available at the James Tan Veterinary Centre. Wet food is made up of 70% water so I've been trying to get her to take more of this (her urine level is concentrated). I enquired with our regular veterinary clinic, Mount Pleasant Springside and found out they have the Waltham Urinary S/O wet food too but the order has to be one carton. Now, Skoda is a dry food junkie so I wasn't keen to get so many pouches at one go. Fortunately the clinic could help to get us two pouches for sampling (yah, only two pouches since these are free-of-charged). And we ended up waiting for close to one month before the supplier finally dropped off the samples at the clinic.

The packaging:


The contents:

Alas, Her Royal Highness wouldn't take to the food at all. So, end of story. I still have one unopened pouch.

One Claw Less - S Version

One morning last month (Fri, 7 Aug), I stepped into the kitchen to see the top door of the refrigerator ajar. Skoda and Braun were nearby. A couple of minutes later, I was going to leave for work so I went into the kitchen again to do a final check. This time, I saw some blood on the counter-top. Braun was the only one at the 'crime scene'. I scooped her into my lap and did a thorough inspection of her but didn't find any injury on her.

I went looking for Skoda and saw some blood droplets on the floor outside the girls' room. Skoda ran off when she saw me. I managed to catch hold of her and saw a claw that was half coming off on her right paw. She refused to let me attend to it so I couldn't treat the wound on my own. I took half-day urgent leave, shoved Skoda into the pet carrier (this girl put up a big fight) and off we went to the vet's clinic. I found the claw on the floor and took it along with me.

The clinic was crowded so we waited for quite a while. Dr K's slots were fully taken up so Dr D attended to Skoda instead. She showed me the wound which looked quite deep (with the whole claw missing). She cleaned up the wound and applied some potassium medication (blackish stuff) on it to stop the bleeding and gave her an injection. I requested for her not to bandage the paw because I doubted Skoda would tolerate it. Grimlock was at work so I wouldn't be able to remove the bandage on my own if Skoda struggled with it. Dr D put an Elizabethan collar on her and to wear it for at least a day. By the time we got home, it was already 12noon. I took leave for the other half-day as well. She kept knocking into things and experienced difficulty in eating and drinking. The immobility did not damper her spirits though.

We took the cone off on Mon, 10 Aug night. We were afraid Skoda might keep licking her paw. Tried to put on a mitten for her but she shoke it off. On Wed, 12 Aug morning - again when I was getting ready to leave for work, I saw a small trail of blood on the floor. Skoda's wound was bleeding a little. This time round, I couldn't take leave. Grimlock took leave in the afternoon and brought her to the vet. She had to put on the E-collar again. Dr K prescribed an anti-inflammatory medication for her. We tried to put on a baby bootie on her paw but she wouldn't stand for this as well. When we brought her back to the vet's clinic on Sat, 15 Aug for her urinalysis, Dr K told us her wound was healing well. We could remove the E-collar but to stop her from licking her paw. The latter proved to be a feat - she couldn't understand why we stopped her from doing so and on our part, it was difficult to keep an eye on her, so we kind of let nature to take its own course.

During this time, Braun and Mikki were not much of a friend to Skoda. Braun, for whatever reason, was fearful of Skoda with 'that thing' around her head; she steered clear of her path. Mikki was fearful too but expressed it through aggression; she scrowled at her whenever their paths crossed. Maybe there is a price to pay for being the Alpha :p

Back to Basics

I'm finally done with putting together a new addition to my travel blogs. This one titled Idyllic Lombok is about a vacation Grimlock and I went on, a month ago, in Lombok which is located in the western part of Indonesia. A local staff from Grimlock's client in Indonesia recommended the place to him and this turned out to be a very pleasant surprise. Enjoy the read, photos and video clips!

Where is the Girl? (VII)

I went around the Cove looking for Braun one day. Initially she was nowhere to be found. Guess where I found her finally? This girl was having her beauty nap in the box of Fussie Cat cans (these are for the cats at Site X). She doesn't seem to run out of creative places to snooze in.

The Chrysantaneum Throne

The girls used to have their Cosy Corner in the space behind the desktop on the study table. After we disposed of the desktop, there was quite a bit of space. The Cosy Corner was one of the girls' favourite snuggling spots so I wanted to reinstate the space.

I bought a storage box from Ikea and threw in a cushion - none of them used it. Two months ago, I was running an errand at Raffles City and saw the pets' bed on sale at the Anthropology store. They were of the fabric that I was looking for; a light nylon fabric instead of the cotton ones which can be hard to wash and a long while to sun dry. The colour is nice, the size is just right and the 30% discount was hard to resist. I bought the small-sized one (it comes with a name "GOD"). The store has some other nice stuff too for the home.

I've nicknamed the pet bed as "The Chrysantaneum Throne" (after its colour). Well, it is a throne of some sort :) which this time, has won the trio's paw of approval. The Chrysanthemum Throne is the common name given to the Imperial throne of Japan, the oldest monarchy in the world.

Anyone with a Home to Offer?

I'm putting this post up to help a colleague find an adopter for a 6-month old black kitten. This female kitten is of local breed; litter-trained; is on dry food; and has a long tail. Colleague is willing to sponsor her sterilisation. Urgent adoption because colleague can't keep her for any much longer (strong family objection). If you've a permanent home to offer this kitten, please email me at: mycatscove@gmail.com, or help me to spread the word around (thanks!).

Beauty Bloom (IV)

My Puppy found a good spot to take a respite from the hot weather, on my kitchen counter-top. I think my mom and eldest bro will faint if they ever find out my cats are allowed to get onto the kitchen counter-top. I've an open kitchen and cats are natural jumpers and they've a liking for heights. As long as I keep them off when I'm preparing food, I'm not going to split hairs over this.

My Little One, now 2.5 years old, has grown up...

Candy Candy

Found someone who has the same fond memories of Candy Candy as I. I had the honour of meeting the producer, Mr Yasuo Yamaguchi back in September 2006. I had tried in vain to get a DVD copy of this Japanese anime. Now I know where to be looking - Youtube, here I come!

(Lianhe Zaobao Fukan, 25 June 09)

"Call My Name"

When Skoda is perched on top of the fridge and we call her by her name, Skoda would respond by letting out a "meow". Note: she meows to the calling of her name only when she is perched on top of the fridge. We've tried calling her at other spots in the Cove; she would look in our direction or come to us but she doesn't let out any "meow". She also tends to "meow" more when it is Grimlock calling her, as compared to when I call her. Told you she holds the strings to his heart.

It is so delightful to hear her "meow" to her name being called that we would give her chin rubs and praise her, and she too enjoys the attention. The other two do not respond to their name, as is the case with most cats. With the camera pointing at her for the filming of this video clip, she is less responsive.



Afternote - from my desktop cat calendar:
"Meow" is rarely heard between cats; rather, cats use it to communicate with humans. They've learned that meowing brings attention, contact, food, and play from their human companions.

1,000 (Green) Origami Cranes (XVI)

I scheduled an appointment for Skoda for her Urinalysis and her first X-ray of her abdominal area yesterday, 20 June. The Urinalysis is now done once in every two months, while the X-ray will be done half-yearly.

In the morning itself, I had to coax and wait for Her Royal Highness to pass urine so that I could collect a sample for the Urinalysis. We kept the litter trays from her when we went to bed. Usually once we "release" the litter tray, she'd get in and pass urine quite quickly. This time, Skoda walked here and there, sat down and peeked under the door and repeated this routine for like 20 minutes. She sniffed at the litter box, dug a little but stopped at urinating. We had to move her to another room, we waited some more for her to pass urine but still she didn't do so.

Here I was, waiting anxiously for Skoda to pass urine. There she was, completely nonchalant...

Grimlock brought Skoda to the veterinary clinic (I couldn't make it for the morning). We didn't manage to harvest a sample of her urine so a Cystocentesis was done on her. Small black specks had been surfacing in one of her ears quite often recently so she had a ear mite test done too. We put her on a fast the day before, lest they couldn't restrain her and need to sedate her for the X-ray to be carried out. She was cooperative so they didn't need to sedate her. Grimlock brought her home after the tests were done (she was the only cat and there were four other dogs). I didn't want to miss this important review so we returned together to the clinic in the afternoon for the consultation.

Grimlock was stroking Skoda when they got home and noticed she was shredding quite a bit so he brushed her. Look at the amount of loose fur. The morning must had been an adventure for her...

The Cystocentesis yielded her best urinary results so far. There were no cystals in her urine (yay!) and most of the indicators came down (hurray!) except that her urine is still concentrated (USG>1.050). From the X-ray, her bladder (no signs of uroliths) and kidney are looking fine. A small substance showed up though in her intestines - Dr K said she probably swallowed something hard but told us she would be able to pass it out. In addition, her ear was clear of ear mites.

Dr K updated us on Skoda's weight, ie 6.5kg (she maintained her weight). He stopped short of saying she is overweight but we got the drift. They will track her weight in her future visits. I've coined a new nick for her, Sumo Skoda :)

In the past two months, we've been feeding her Waltham feline urinary S/O kibbles and Prescription Hill's C/D wet food. We didn't do anything extra or differently so her urinalysis results were a pleasant surprise. Now the challenge is to maintain/keep the indicators down, and the crystals at bay. If her next Urinalysis yield similar results, the Urinalysis frequency can be reduced to once in every four or six months. Her next Urinalysis will be in one to two months' time. Fingers crossed...

Face-Off (II)

Watch how the battam-weight Mikki (3.7kg) takes on heavyweight Skoda (6.5kg) in this video clip. In the prelude to the unevitable clash, the two long-tailed 妹妹 (girls) were frantically fanning their tails. If using body proportions as a basis, Mikki has a longer tail than Skoda. This confrontation was considered mild, ie no fur went a-flying nor were they at each other's neck.

Project S (XI)

The population at Site X has more or less stabilised. I may soon arrange to trap two cats (one white/grey girl and one old tuxedo tom) for sterilisation. I now gather there is a total of four white/grey cats. I'm undecided whether to proceed to trap and neuter the old tom, exactly because of he is old and he looks worn-out. He has a hearty appetite though. I read somewhere it is inadvisable to sterilise senior cats because they may not survive the surgery. I'll observe him further. I also reckon if all the female cats at Site X are fixed, I may not need to target him.

The scrawny tortiseshell and ginger newbie have vanished. On our last visit on 15 June, I saw the Siamese cat again after such a long time. I saw him making a dash across. He is unneutered. With the old tom and this Siamese male hanging out at Site X, I'll need to have the white/grey newbie I mentioned above, fixed soon.

Here are some of the cats that we regularly see at Site X. The white used to be very timid, she still is cautious but she is now more visible.

Joy of Toys (II)

Grimlock's latest Transformers acquisition - Grimlock
:)

"Despite his strength and prowess, Grimlock continually struggles with his pronouns."
"Grimlock was a powerful and arrogant warrior who believed he knew best."
"He chooses to talk dumb rather than be thought of as being weak."

From the beginning (left) to the end product (right)


In the process of transformation...

8 Signs Your Cat is Up to Something

Saw the page below in 8 Days (14 May issue). Quite funny, right?

Speak Mandarin Campaign

Saw this poster at a bus stop for The Chinese Challenge by the Promote Mandarin Council:

Intruder Sighted!

One early morning, Grimlock woke up to see Skoda and Braun very intrigued with an insect on the ceiling. Mikki didn't have a clue what the older two were up to. She eventually figured it out and joined Skoda and Braun in the staring match. We seldom catch all three in a common activity (except for napping).

"I Think Yours Taste More Yummy"

The girls get boiled chicken once in a while as a treat. I don't give this to them regularly because Skoda's receptivity varies from time to time. Braun used to like it quite a bit but that has changed, she didn't take much of it the last time. Mikki loves it all the time. Here is a video clip on them enjoying the boiled chicken. Mikki is one funny gal...