Month: June 2013

Two weeks ago, Mister went back to the vet and the vet confirmed what we already knew…Mister is in the early stages of kidney failure.  It’s not like he’s going to die tomorrow or anything, but we’re having to make some changes.  We’ve switched all of the buddies to senior cat food (let’s face it, we probably don’t have a cat whose age is in single-digits anymore), and we’re giving him his kidney drops religiously now.  And I’m loving on him.  A lot.  Not that I didn’t before, but I’m definitely making sure Mister gets his fair share.

So today, something interesting happened that was both fantastic and kind of bittersweet at the same time.  For the first time, Mister let me put one of the new MetPet cat harnesses on him.  He borrowed Wanda’s because he’s the smallest of the boys in terms of weight.  

He did an amazing job.  I couldn’t believe it.  It was like he’d been walking on a harness his entire life, and yet he never has.  He barely seemed to register it was on him, unlike Wanda who always tries to Houdini her way out of it and Reggie who walks around like he’s trying to lay an egg.  Mister walked confidently and purposefully anywhere he wanted to.  I was flabbergasted.

And the best part was, when I put him on the swing set to see what he would do, he walked around for a while, then when he wanted to get down, he very casually went to the wavy yellow slide and slid gracefully down.  Like he’d done it every day for his entire life.  He hit the ground and bounded toward the patio, but I couldn’t get down the slide after him fast enough and the retractable leash ran out right as he reached the wall.  It’s a good thing he was in a harness rather than just a collar because that could have been a very bad ending for a very nice outing.  

We walked around the house once, then he wanted to do it again.  Finally, when we got half-way around the house, I decided we probably should quit while we’re ahead and make him excited to do it another time, so we went inside.  Mister was not particularly thrilled about going inside, because this was the most fun he’d had in ages.

Afterward, I had a few minutes of intense sadness, probably brought on by his diagnosis.  It bothers me that I’d never tried hard enough to get a harness on him before.  He always ran away from me when I’d tried in the past, so I just stopped chasing him.  But now I wish I’d tried a little harder.  Here Mister is at 16, and he’s walking on a harness the first time out like a cat one-sixteenth his age.  I wish I had started doing this sooner.

It’s all the more motivation to make sure we do everything right to make sure that Mister continues to live a long, healthy life.  I’d like to see him get another 16 years.  It’s become abundantly apparent that Mister needs all the happy time on the harness he can get.

Otto, as Sean sometimes tells him affectionately, is crazy.  Not in a bad way.  Just in a daredevil-ish, “I’m-going-to-do-whatever-I-want-and-you-can’t-stop-me” kind of way.  So Otto was the first one down the stairs to the basement when the basement was still strictly off-limits.  (Elroy did follow him, but I’m certain Otto was the instigator.)  

Otto was the first one to get to go outside, both on- and off-harness.  Since Otto was trained since an adolescent to only stay on concrete (see http://dabuddies.blogspot.com/2010/08/where-sidewalk-ends.html for an explanation), he can be trusted to walk off-leash with supervision from his big-buddies, except when there’s a turkey around (see previous post).  Otto leaves the front door, makes a left, and goes all the way around the house, checking everything out.  It’s one of his favorite things to do now.  When he’s done walking, Sean sits in a chair and Otto gets in his lap and takes a nap.  It would be hard to describe the utter contentment on his face after one of these walk-outside-and-then-nap-in-the-sun combos.  

Otto was also the first one on the swing set.  Yes, we have a swing set and no kids–it came with the house.  But it doubles as a really nice kitty play set.  Otto has been on the play set, and Reggie actually slid down the slide on it by accident.  (Okay, with a little nudge from me.  He went down it sideways kind of fast, but he landed on his feet, so all’s well that ends well, right?!)  Wanda has been on it, too, but she rode down the slide on my lap.  Let me just say that this slide was not created for adult-sized hips.  

I think next on the agenda is Otto learning how to walk on his new harness down at Creekside Taphouse.  We’ll post pictures if that happens…

Buddies come in all shapes and sizes.  Some have fur, some have scales, and some have feathers.  And sometimes, the ones with the feathers come in size XL.  

Take our turkeys, for example.  When we bought our new house, we had a whole family of turkeys that came with the neighborhood–no extra charge!  They provide daily entertainment for us (and the cats) by walking by and in our yard, en masse, on a virtually daily basis.  In the morning, they come walking off the mountain, gobbling and squawking.  In the afternoon, they head back up the mountain, a bit quieter this time.  (Maybe they get tired during the day?)  Here’s a sample:

That’s just a few of them, but it gives you an idea.  It’s hard to tell from the pictures, but these guys are huge.  Bigger than Otto.  Bigger than Reggie, even.  And the crazy thing was, that at first the buddies didn’t seem to see them.  It was almost like they didn’t have a frame of reference for birds that were bigger than they are, so they just looked right through them.  

Finally, one day Sean had Otto outside (more about Otto’s adventures later), and for the first time, Otto actually saw the turkeys.  So he lunged.  And Sean lunged.  Luckily, there was no blood spilled, and all feathers stayed intact.  But Otto finally figured out that here was his favorite mush treat, walking around in the yard as if to provide that extra little bit of challenge that Otto’s always looking for.  (As Sean noticed when we had to do an impromptu turkey rescue in our driveway, before we bought the house, turkeys in the wild smell exactly like turkeys in the can.  Weird.)

These turkeys, however, will continue to be the “show” part in the “dinner and a show” combination that I’m sure the cats would appreciate.

This is just a little post, but I feel like I should post it before I forget it.  A couple of weeks ago, I had an epic weekend morning snuggle with Reggie.  He’d never been as cuddly as this before, and Reggie can be pretty cuddly.  Towards the end of the cuddle, when Reggie had worked his way up to right beside my face, sleeping on my arm, I felt a tiny paw on my forehead.  His claws were in (which is pretty unusual for Reggie), and when I opened my eyes, Reggie was lying there with his eyes closed and his paw outstretched above my two eyes, almost as if he were giving me a blessing.  I don’t know why, but I found that amusing and touching all at the same time.  I’m so lucky to get to live with all my buddies.  One might even say I’m blessed.

I haven’t talked about him before in this blog, but until Monday night, the Buddies had a cousin.  Their cousin was a beautiful brown and white Boxer named Brinkley, or “B” for short.  Brinkley lived with my sister and brother-in-law and nephew, Max, and B was every bit as much my nephew as Max is.  And just because our Buddies never met him doesn’t make him any less their cousin.  

I will never forget staying overnight with him on the couch at their house nine years ago, when my sister, Mary Jane, was in the hospital delivering Max.  B was nearly beside himself with joy that he was having a sleepover on his couch.  I had a bad habit of letting B lick me all over my face with his generous Boxer tongue, and B took full advantage of it.  B would get so excited that his entire body would wag, not just his adorable little stump of a tail, although that was moving pretty furiously, too.

B seemed to never meet a stranger (not unlike his mom), and charmed everyone from his family and friends to his vet and the folks at the kennel.  One look from his soulful “Louis Armstrong” eyes and you were completely hooked.  

In his later years, B was plagued with seizures, paralysis, infections and other symptoms, but he endured his many physical ailments with a courage and dignity that most of us would find challenging, if not impossible.  His vet suspected B probably had a brain tumor, which presented no other possible outcome except to get worse over time.   

B was helped over the Rainbow Bridge on Monday night by his vet.  He was assisted on his journey by my sister and my brother-in-law Wayne, who fed him popcorn, his favorite treat, right up until his final moments.  B passed peacefully to the other side, leaving a wake of sadness and a hole in the hearts of many.  According to my sister, B did not seem frightened by his final journey, and regarded this experience with the same quiet dignity he had brought to so much of the rest of his life.

B will be remembered as a loving, playful, strong and gentle fellow, who touched the lives of many just by his sweet existence.  Somewhere, B is catching popcorn out of the air, chasing balls and squeaky toys, and experiencing the freedom of being shed of the body that had begun to betray him as he stretched into old age. 

Goodbye, Sweet B.  I hope you and Leon are somewhere playing together.  Something tells me the two of you would have a lot to talk about.  

                            Brinkley Bernard, b. 6/20/01, d. 6/3/13  Rest in Peace, Sweet Buddy.