Daily Photo: Updates for the Boys
Yes, boys—plural, because in between Mr. Sunshine’s recent tour of veterinary emergency clinics Jelly Bean decided he needed one too. And I didn’t even have the time to let you know about it!
Jelly Bean
I’ve been concerned about some funny noises Jelly Bean has been making for a couple of years. I even found a note in his records from my former veterinarian that he had been coughing now and then and making noises as if he was clearing his throat. It wasn’t very often and I couldn’t find a pattern. But it came up again at the end of August. I had just had my last weekend of vendor events, my exhibit at Rock the Quarry Friday and Saturday and the farmers market Sunday. On Monday he started up with actual coughing, and coughing in cats is really not good. It can often indicate inflammation in the throat or upper respiratory area, including an enlarged heart or congestive heart failure. I have seen this in Namir and I was concerned at how often he was coughing. The possibility of congestive heart failure is not something to wait around with.
He didn’t eat much dinner, and that’s been a thing with him lately. It used to be I had to pull him out of everyone else’s dishes to stop him from grabbing bites. He had a slight fever but not worrisome. He chewed and swallowed his dental treats and he did eat some food, so rather than run him off to an emergency hospital, which would probably not have room for him, I decided first thing next day I’d take him to Rivers Veterinary. I did, and this was the first time I’d gone there, before Mr. Sunshine’s visit last week.
That day I had deadlines with articles, but I could leave him there with them and they would call me so I could get my work done. I went back when my articles were finished and the veterinarian was just about finished with his exam. She told me it didn’t seem like anything serious after listening to his chest, but she’d like to do an x-ray just to be sure. Nothing serious showed up on the x-ray, and he was diagnosed with needing a dental and having some tartar at the back of his mouth that had probably been irritating his throat, and that had been removed. And he was pronounced a really nice cat.
I was thrilled it was nothing more serious than that! No coughs since then or other funny sounds, and yes, I know, everyone needs a dental. That was August 30, and I hadn’t realized it was nearly a month ago! September really sped by.
Mr. Sunshine’s update since last Wednesday
“Good to see Mr Sunshine lining up for breakfast again! It’s the first time in a week.” From Instagram last Thursday. The combined effects of Dr. Michelle’s treatment on Monday that week and the antibiotic he’d received the day before along with fluids and some famotidine for acid reflux after not eating much. He’d mostly been eating squeezy treats, and not much of that. Even that morning I let him smell a pill pocket and he wasn’t really interested, and he didn’t eat much breakfast, though he did love his dental treat. I kept up with the fluids and B12 and whatever else he wanted to eat, and by Saturday he was fully back in business, and has been since then. He still needs an ultrasound. I’m working on that.
His brothers have been getting all the attention so Giuseppe has to take extraordinary measures just to get his picture taken, like posing with a box of pasta. Such boys!
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From the Garden and Beyond
Though Our Garments Be Tattered Still We Dance
What other photos did have I shared around this date?
Whiskers Alight, 2021
Mariposa isn’t the only one around who has whiskers! JB has always had a fine display, especially once they all turned white. But even before that they were all over the place, and his love for the sunny bathroom sink always makes for a good photo, albeit somewhat blurry.
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From Instagram
Mariposa is being a doorway troll this morning. Everyone who passes gets smacked with a big white mitten, including me.
Yes, #rescuedcats, a cool autumn morning, and you don’t need to worry about cold frosty mornings coming soon.
“Will you sit down?” Mimi is in her chair, so I guess so. I have two beat up wicker chairs in my front yard that I pulled out of the trash, mostly for decoration, though I’ll sit out there sometimes, with Mimi. She loves those chairs, it’s one of her favorite spots. She put on her momcat face, and who am I to disobey?
From the Garden and Beyond
Autumn Friends
Calico asters always find their way to the autumn joy sedum when it turns that rich shade of rose, and blooms there with it, the wild and the tame, the slow bloomer and the quick, the earth (stonecrop) and the sky (aster), combining their charms for the bees in their last meals, and the butterflies their journeys. It’s one of my favorite seasonal combinations.
What other photos did have I shared around this date?
When I Was a Kid, We Just Had Drawers for Toys
When I was a kid, all we had was drawers to play with. You had to make up your own fun, use your imagination. It was just basically a wooden box. Kids these days, with all these toys, they never learn how to use their brains.
So Basil gives it a try.
Basil looks like that all the time. It’s hard to tell what he’s thinking. If he’s thinking anything in particular. Here he’s doing his best to imitate a box of pasta. I’d say that’s pretty imaginative!
Bella joins him in the drawer, giving it a thorough sniff.
Mimi remembers Mr. Sunshine’s childhood quite differently. Still, she hops in too and was all kinds of cute but I couldn’t get a photo of her. When a drawer is opened in this house, it sucks Mimi right inside. She has no choice.
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We had a little cable internet fixup happening yesterday, so much for all the cool posts I’d been planning, but I can at least share what my fine felines were doing yesterday and today while I was trying to catch up with work. Their weekend schedule was not inconvenienced in the least, I’m happy to say.
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What other photos did have I shared around this date?
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Daily Photo: Who’s the Smallest of Them All?
It’s really not a trick of perspective, Mimi really is about half as big as her two largest children. Here she sits between Mewsette and Giuseppe, looking out the basement door into the back yard, probably watching the groundhog devouring everything in sight.
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The Big Plot, 2103
“You watch the stairs, Sunshine—Emeraude’s asleep and I’m going in!”
The never-ending scheming to get a few bites of Emeraude’s food. She’d been defending her territory pretty heartily, but lately she’s not so concerned and looks at them, then continues her bath. Or she’s asleep on the toilet lid, and she’s pretty deaf, and they know that.
Jelly Bean is getting rounder. So is Mr. Sunshine. I have to close the door…
But still they’re cute in their deviousness. Take a look at “Two Great Minds” to see an earlier effort.
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When I Awake, 2012
This is usually what I see, looking through my bedroom door to the landing: Mimi staring intently at me from the top of the wardrobe, beautifully silhouetted by golden morning sunlight. Nice to awaken and smile at beauty.
Her children are torturing me, though, energetically pulling back the covers, tickling my face with their whiskers, gnawing on my fingers and walking all over me. Perhaps Mimi is simply watching to see that they do what they’ve been told. A cat mom supersedes a human mom.
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Morning Kitties Are Like Morning Coffee, 2011
They don’t need to do anything, all they need to do is sit there and they awaken my creative senses and make me smile.
Mewsette, Giuseppe and Jelly Bean pose on one of the last warm mornings while the leaves are still green and bright. Something to remember until next year.
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Mr. Sunshine is on three out of these four dishtowels and JB is on two! Read more and purchase.
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And sometimes, I just throw my hands in the air and have fun!
Good for the boys! I think Jelly Bean has asthma, it doesn’t always show up on xrays, especially seasonal asthma.
I don’t know, I didn’t tie it to any season, weather condition or even time of day. Basil has mild asthma and Bean’s throat clearing isn’t at all like Basil’s or other cats I’ve known with asthma, and his lungs and chest sound great. Not that I’m looking forward to the dentals, but I can’t wait to see of a lot of these minor symptoms ease or disappear after that.
Glad the boys are doing well now.
They are, the ingrates.