So this weirdo showed up at my back door

@sammydog01 probably. After the growling stops. Kinda hoping she’s chipped and some one lost her and she just got disoriented

@unksol That would be the best outcome. Fingers crossed.

@sammydog01 once upon a time… some asshole left a door and a window open in winter that they had no business doing and a cat disappeared… Sometimes it’s not the owners fault one gets out despite explaining things to your guests. Shit/people happen

I mean she’s definitely stuck in here now if she doesn’t have a responsible owner.

@narfcake there are only 4 houses right near me
Theyy have outside cats sometimes. We are out in the country. I keep mine inside but whatever. There’s not really a reason to abandon/stop feeding one or a reason she’d show up here. It’s probably a mile from a tiny town or other houses. Just weird normal outside cats are fine winter usually

@narfcake @unksol Unfortunately sometimes people dump cats in places that they think are far enough from home that the cat won’t find it’s way back. I found a 6 week old kitten on the median strip of a highway on a long bridge no less! There is no way that kitten got there by accident.

@bobby555 lol. I was wondering what to put in the vet forms but I might get in trouble with that. Plus they all get called weirdo amoung other more explicit things.

@bobby555 @unksol
All mine get called fluff. I think Weirdo is a great name. She is so pretty with so much personality in her face. Love her!

@bobby555 I’m kinda thinking Twix. I accidentally stumbled into a theme at some point. OG is KitKat. Had summer and bambi inbetween. But now it’s just KitKat and Coco. Twix are kinda dark/light striped. although it’s really only prominent on her head.

Coco might know what her name is. I never use KitKat. He just gets called with kitty but he’s the OG so… Other than hey stop that you fucker

I have always named my cats and dogs either people names (or food names). Then I register shit in their names and sign them up for spam emails. I can’t wait for the day when I get a phone call asking for one of them by name.

@RiotDemon Watch out! I’ve heard cat scans are expensive!

@RiotDemon other cat had to go to the vet to get the last few stiches out of his ear today and they let her tag along. No chip. Obviously too skinny. Older than she looks I guess and she’s missing quite a few teeth which figures. She was eating but it just looked a little weird. She won’t leave my office really, Spent the day in my lap at work, or her nose buried in the space heater, and finally went to sleep on my desk.

She’s definitely got a… Scent to her that I hope is just from being outside and the other 2 are still miffed about the whole thing but oh well.

@RiotDemon @unksol When she has had enough food long enough, groomed more, etc. likely her fur will clean up if the smell is from her fur. It if it her breath it might be tooth decay and cats with kidney disease can have breath that smells “off”. She may have parasites and so poop can smell really foul and if she has some caught on her butt that can add to the ‘aroma’.

@Kidsandliz @RiotDemon it’s definitely pungent and a little funky but not the worst thing ever. I doubt it’s her breath cause you could definitely smell it walking into the basement this morning. More concerned with playing cat mediator at the moment since she SEEMS to be more or less ok. Well that and I hope she knows what a litter box is.

@RiotDemon @unksol that’s a very sweet picture. I hope it works out for all of you, she’s a member of the household now.

This is like those Facebook threads of “my house, not my cat”!

@Kidsandliz @RiotDemon her breath is definitely… Not awesome even though that wasn’t it. Again missing teeth. Vet knocked off two big pieces of tartar just taking a look. Probably need to get her in for a full checkup. She also likes to go number 2 on the floor in front of the litter box. But it’s unfinished concrete and not peeing on stuff so. Meh. Better then picking up warm dog shit lol. Could still be used to it.

EVERYTHING IS AWESOME!

@RiotDemon @unksol Might try one more dirt box. I had one who mostly pooped next to the box her whole entire life (she is the one who died the week before last at 3 weeks shy of 20 and that is the only thing I don’t miss). She always pee’d one the box, then move to the other to poop. She just didn’t want to do both in the same box. That being said she was also pretty picky about the box she’d poop in - it had to have almost nothing else in it (the pee box could have a ton of stuff - go figure). You might try adding a second box. If that doesn’t work then try scooping them both twice a day. Between doing the two that might stop the problem. Glad it is happening at the box and not in a corner on a rug or something.

@Kidsandliz @RiotDemon I’ve just started scooping before/after work. The other two will tolerate almost anything even if I’m a bad person/lazy but I should have been doing that anyway. She also doesn’t try and bury any of it.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯

@RiotDemon @unksol Mine wouldn’t bury it either. She also doesn’t bury her pee. I had presumed it was because she was bottle fed and I failed to adequately teach her to do this at just the right point in her development. I guess since your newbie is doing this too that isn’t the explanation.

She’d sniff all over the box to decide where to do her business but then just does it and leaves. Never never digs before going either. In her later years she’d pee along the edge of the box, sometimes she’d be in the box and the pee would go over the edge. I notice now I am no longer digging pee balls out that are stuck to the edge of the box so it was just her doing that.

Up until Tigger no one else would bury it. Tigger tears up the entire box burying anything he doesn’t think is appropriately covered in liter. In the process he gets litter all over the place. No height to put a covered box in there, although that still wouldn’t stop litter from flying out the entrance.

I did notice if I found her getting ready to poop next to the box if I picked her up and put her in there she’d poop in the box rather than leave to poop next to it. And then, out of the blue, she’d start to poop in the box for a while even if it wasn’t really cleaned out. Go figure. Two boxes next to each other helped. When I lived in a bigger place I had more boxes spread all over and she pooped outside of the box less than here. As a result I presumed it was: number of boxes, enough places to have privacy regardless of what the others were doing, and keeping them really, really clean well beyond what the others needed done.

Good luck figuring out something that will work.

Oh - check her for parasites. That sometimes causes cats to poop outside the box.

@Kidsandliz @RiotDemon I’m kinda ok with it. It’s not hurting anything. Have to be a little more proactive on cleaning but I need to do that in general. And yeah I thought about parasites… I need to get her a full checkup. Taking her for a ride along on getting his sutures out was a bit of a cheat to check for a chip. But the vet said it was ok and checked her out a little

@RiotDemon @unksol Yeah the cement floor makes clean up easier. Mine was on a tile floor so same thing there. It as nice though when I added a box and it cut back on that kind of behavior (well as long as I also kept the box super clean). Two others went through that each time they had parasites. Got rid of the parasites and got rid of them doing it.

@moonhat or just some pet wipes.

@moonhat @RiotDemon she only has a little matted fur in one or two spots and she was grooming herself so I think she’ll be fine. Seemed to be better today although I might just be used to it.

Only time I’ve given a cat a bath was when kitkat snuck in the pantry and got shut in, climbed the shelves, and put his claws through a bottle of Canola and then got an oil shower. The first attempt did about nothing. And I had to go to work. The second attempt was better but not enjoyed by anyone. Somewhere I have pictures of an oil and water soaked miserable cat. Then him looking almost white cause it took dumping corn starch all over him to soak up the oil to get it out. Bathroom was a mess.he was not pleased with the water either time.

@RiotDemon @unksol oh my gosh, that sounds like a lot of trauma for everyone involved. I only had mentioned a bath because years back I would occasionally give my Trudy (she passed years back- I miss her a lot) baths when she was older and chubby and didn’t/couldn’t clean her back end very well. She always started out screaming a few times but then once the warm water started to make her old arthritic legs feel a bit better she didn’t mind so much.

@moonhat @RiotDemon lol it’s not not an option but in my experience cats don’t like water. It was doable. But I’m not sure it’s needed at the point. Yet. If she had heavily matted fur or was just straight up dirty I’d try trimming her claws and then cleaning her up. But I’d prefer not to stress her out too much right at the start.

@RiotDemon @unksol I agree, sounds like the best idea for sure.

@moonhat @RiotDemon @unksol I had a cat that loved water. He’d walk in it, walk in the bathtub while in use. He’d curl up in the bathroom sink, do the boneless velcro cat act when I’d try to nudge him out. So a couple of times I turned the tap on gently. He wouldn’t jump out and down until the sink was ready to overflow. Then, and only then, he’d do the wet cat dance. His buddy would have a total freak out when even a drop of water looked like it might might drip on her.

@Kidsandliz @RiotDemon @unksol the wet cat dance. Love it

@unksol Well it can take 3 weeks or so for cats to find a new pecking order, etc. when new cat is introduced into a household. That you have having spats this early in the game is not unexpected even though they are miserable for everyone. Almost always they eventually learn to live in peace… good luck.

@Kidsandliz we’ve played this game several times. And I’ve had three before. Them suddenly turing on each other was a new twist.

Cats growling are slightly terrifying anyway cause it’s so abnormal and you don’t know if they are going to let you pick them up and relocate them or just go claws out and mess you up.

If I’m upstairs they are almost always upstairs. She stays downstairs for whatever reason. So usually I am there/can keep them apart if they follow me down but I was just checking email for a minute and turned around in my chair and holy helll

@unksol Maybe temporarily shut the newcomer in one room until your original cats settle down a bit?

@Kidsandliz they are staying separate sort of. As long as I stay upstairs away from her lol

@Kidsandliz she’s fine. Has only tried to come upstairs twice. Once following me with my lunch cause I went to get her a plate for some chicken so she’d leave me alone so I could eat. Then last night at 3AM growling at the top of the stairs and yay cat fight to break up. But she’s with me all day at work so.

Despite that they are slowly getting better… Ish. Coco likes to stalk her/sneak around and peer under things at her. Queue growling/hissing/moaning. I’ll have to get her up here tomorrow and Sunday when I have time to keep them from killing each other.

And the other two are back to behaving normally/laying on the couch making out. So.

@unksol Well good. Progress.

@Kidsandliz this is what I get on the way back for daring to extract my legs from under them so I can go to the bathroom.

@Kidsandliz @unksol
Oh, they’re so pretty. But that is a mighty accusatory glare!

@Kidsandliz @Kyeh heaven forbid you move on them. Just got to get twixy to join the club

@Kidsandliz @unksol At least they provide warmth!

@Kidsandliz @Kyeh or they know what I did and are plotting/blackmailing

@Kyeh @unksol You do know that you only exist as their servant for their comfort. Right?

@Kidsandliz @Kyeh I just don’t usually get the whole perched gargoyle judgey thing. Never mind a cordinated effort. Came around the corner and just wham. “What do you think you are doing?”

@Kidsandliz carried her up three times so far. NO witch kitty in sight. She took a look around then back down stairs. Last two she just wanted to go down and the way she handles stairs doesn’t look awesome. She can jump up but usually she paws and waits for me too pick her up. Maybe arthritis?

Idk. Need to get a vet appointment I guess but with no history…

Cats are shit at showing pain

VAN GOGH! MANGO! TANGO! AWESOME!

@Kidsandliz @Kyeh she is snoozing on the back of the couch and the witch kitty has been up and down and laying 10 feet away. Trying to get the witch on the couch.

Twixy just doesn’t seem to want to move which fits if she’s old. And hates the cold.

@Kidsandliz
No flat out outrage yet and Coco has been through although I couldn’t call her up.

@unksol I kind of wonder what goes though their minds in situations like what this cat finds itself in. She looks very relaxed for a stray that wandered up underweight, likely hungry and cold. Is she turning into a grateful cat? I have one of those. Had been abused and then dumped at graduation on campus. I took her home. Considering all she had been through, the surgeries she needed for rotten teeth broken off at the gum line and bone chips loose in her jaw, she forgives me for everything and is a big cuddle cat.

@Kidsandliz idk what she is up to it anything but she is growling at the OG like she is king of the couch and that won’t work. There is plenty of room.

@Kidsandliz and she was cold/wanted in/has to have been a normal house cat from the start? That I can tell. Which is weird. The stress is the new cat bit. And the shifting dynamics. Getting them all to stop looking for an attack.

@Kidsandliz got all three in one shot and 2 on the couch. Coco is the problem child/full on ninja. She’s over there on the rug

@Kidsandliz @unksol this picture is so cute. She looks like she totally belongs there. ( the one with her paws crossed as she lounges on the couch)

@cf1 @unksol I agree. She just looks so at home in that photo. Also something about that photo makes me think she is a little old lady as well.

@Kidsandliz @unksol She looks a bit uncertain, too, which breaks my heart.

@cf1 @unksol Yeah - like she realizes she has lucked in where she landed, but a “will it last?” worry.

@cf1 @Kidsandliz she’s fine. Unfortunately she’s the one starting the growling. She was sitting on my desk today and KitKat is used to being with me at work and wanted in my lap despite the growling/whining so I told him to hop up cause I thought we were out of reach. She promptly hissed and leaned over and started smacking him which made me yank him out of reach as they both flail and hiss. Still better than it was so. Eh.

@cf1 @unksol Well at least no blood… that is encouraging even though the hissy stuff is a PITA

@cf1 @Kidsandliz she has been in bed the last couple nights and he usually come with when I go. There’s growling as long as they see each other but he just walks around to the other side to get up then they are fine. Personal space issues I guess. Which is natural if she’s been outside and defensive. She starts the warning and whining but basically stays put during. Cat drama

@cf1 @Kidsandliz better? She’s full on passed out. The crossed paws idk. Just her I guess

@joelmw I unfortunately don’t have a wife or anyone to veto and I’ve kept every stray so far so. If I found a woman there is plenty till we get to basement cat. I have had them swipe at kids before but their mom was kinda an asshole and didn’t deal with intro to lonely cats. Or getting to know you/don’t throw shit at the cat/learn the house. Etc etc.

Screaming kid running at cat <> end well

@joelmw @unksol In my dating life, I’d gotten to the point my cats came first. The guy didn’t understand? Okay, bye, go date someone else. No problem.

Then someone came into my life who wasn’t intimidated by them. We’ve been together since 1985. I was 31.

Your new little girl reminds me of our Bernadette. She came to us via our vet. A skinny old lady, deaf, and fiesty. We were mostly hospice for her, we just didn’t know it.

She’s a beautiful feline. She sounds wonderful.

@joelmw @lisaviolet I don’t think there is a senario a where you junk someone already there even if it is a pet. Just complicates the senario.

“Hey by the way we have to deal with this cat that shits on the floor” is not the greatest pickup line. Lol

Or maybe for some girls it is.

Not that I was trying to date in the first place. Just saying

@joelmw @lisaviolet hey buy the way I was planning on having kids so if you have an issue with pet poop just wait. Do you want kids?

@joelmw I’m also very interested how you have a 16 year old cat the other cat people don’t like. Very odd senario

@joelmw @lisaviolet @unksol Wonder which is worse-cat or bird poop. Never looks the same. Always disgusting. And when he climbs down from the cage to make his nightly trip through the house to the master bath, he always leaves one deposit somewhere along the way.

@Felton10 @joelmw @unksol I hand raised a little bird in our extra room when we had a major tree trimming done (there were nests, I was sad). One of the workers brought this baby bird to me and s/he didn’t die under my care.

I named it Boyd.

When it was flying around the room without a problem, I took him/her outside and released him/her to go be with his/her people.

I’m still cleaning crap off of things in that room. (Even off of a speaker dock! The horrors!)

I vote bird poop is worse.

@unksol Re the cat people not liking him.

1. It’s not actually that they don’t like him. It’s that he didn’t take to them the way he took to me, which was dismaying. My daughter has identified herself as a cat from infancy; and she without question invested more in his early care (though I also bottle fed him etc.; and, maybe the thing he and I did more was just hanging out–including when I slept and when I was at my laptop looking for a job). We adopted him in part because within a few years, our three previous family cats (and themselves related: the daughter of the first, and her son; the first wife thought it important that the females had one litter before being spayed–and that was a while back) had died and my then wife really really missed having a cat, and–don’t hate me–I was done with cats and their litter boxes (which was always my responsibility). So they were committed cat people, while I was practically a cat hater; they wanted a cat and I didn’t; but I’m the one the little fucker bonded with. They didn’t/don’t hate him; they were just dismayed at the outcome.
2. He’s not altogether likable. Everyone acknowledges that he’s maddeningly adorable. Which may be part of the problem: he’s so damned cute, but even I have to admit that he’s a bit of an asshole. He’s bitey (breaking flesh, drawing blood–and sometimes with little or no apparent provocation), and mostly reserves his positive affection for me. Since his kittenhood, he’s done this thing where he rolls over and shows is soft fluffy belly, that you just have to rub, but he quickly gets violent when most people even show signs of touching his belly. It’s gotten to the point that I can rub it a little and he maybe even begrudgingly enjoys it; I’ve been surreptitiously working toward that goal for years.
3. The extent to which he is my cat is kinda crazy. He probably loves the woman who first took him in as much as he does me. But he really doesn’t get in anyone else’s lap, doesn’t let anyone else pick him up or hold him. And from the beginning he’s sort of followed me around like a puppy dog. I see how that can be hard to take for those who have to put up with him and are clearly far more committed to his species than I am. Speaking of which . . .
4. Several of us (my daughter, first wife and I, in particular) have identified that he’s always been a little less like a cat and more like a dog. In hindsight, I think that was a misjudgment. Moreover he seems to have become more cat-like in his old age. But to me his resemblance to dogs was always a plus; while it clearly argued against him in their eyes. Dog-like or not, his behavior has been atypically cat-like in our experience–in ways that were mostly off-putting to others and endearing to me (I grew up with a German Shepherd). Some of his “quirks” seem to be common among Norwegian Forest cats, which we’re pretty sure he is.
5. I don’t know if this belongs in this particular list, but it’s worth noting that he has one of two reactions to other men. He either attacks (see above, about the blood) or, especially if he senses that they’re freaked out by cats, will not stay away from them, rubbing against them in an almost affectionate way (but sometimes also hisses and bites, if they make a sudden move). The cat generally doesn’t like strangers. He tends to be more forgiving and even-keeled with women, but doesn’t warm to them readily (just attacks them somewhat less). He is however bizarrely tolerant and gentle with kids. He seems to have a clear sense of the male pecking order and where he fits in it; and I suppose I’m the one guy he trusts and is willing to submit to. My stepson wore him down–and partly was simply able to manage the biting–but even they have a dodgy relationship; it’s just that our son rolls with it.

@Felton10 @lisaviolet @unksol I once took in a bird that had apparently been hit and stunned in the middle of the road. I just had an immediate visceral response when I saw it there, and slammed on the brakes. I almost got myself run over getting it (I don’t like them in this context and he and she don’t really work either) off the pavement. In hindsight, I maybe should have just set it in an adjacent field, for lots of reasons. But I took the poor thing home, gave it water, and some kind of food, but it was unresponsive. Seemed likely it was going to die. All of a sudden after a couple of days, it just flew up like nothing was wrong–aside from being in an enclosed space–and thankfully we were able to direct it to a door.

@joelmw @lisaviolet @unksol If you get the bird poop before it dries it is manageable. That is the way Walter looked gobbling his pablum from a syringe when I first got him at 10 weeks old. Had to come home from work and feed him in the middle of the day in addition to the evening. That lasted for a month.

@Felton10 @joelmw @unksol He was in a room with the door shut. And, honestly, that’s the room where I put all of the Meh junk I bought and it was kinda hard to get to all of the spots before they were dry.

But I vote bird poop is harder to clean than cat poop. As long as the cats use their boxes or the great outdoors.

@Felton10 @joelmw @lisaviolet even cat poop right outside the box isn’t that bad… However. Cats also like to gag and puke in random places in the middle of the night. So. That might as well just be a much larger bird poop.

@Felton10 @joelmw @lisaviolet @unksol Yeah cat puke… ugh. Last night someone was puking who knows where and I chose to ignore it. Later I found it in the dark barefooted while headed to the bathroom. Sigh.

@Felton10 @joelmw @Kidsandliz @lisaviolet well they at least put it where you’d find it

@joelmw @Kidsandliz @lisaviolet @unksol I think stepping in it would be a deal breaker for me.

@Felton10 @joelmw @Kidsandliz @lisaviolet eh. You kinda have your gross momment, peel your sock off maybe wipe your foot dry with the ankle and go back to bed and deal with it later. You don’t step in it very often and they don’t throw up that much.

But that gagging sound can definitely wake you up
. But if you have hard flooring it’s kinda a “aw fuck it” . If you have carpet it might be an oh shit relocate cat asap

@Felton10 @Kidsandliz @lisaviolet @unksol I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve stepped in cat puke. And I’m starting to lose track of how many times I’ve stepped in cat shit. I’m torn whether it’s worse with or without socks; each is shitty its own special way. I don’t like the puke, but at least it doesn’t smell, yaknow, like shit.

My cat has reached the point that he pretty much poops anywhere except the litter box; we’re happy if it’s inside the litter room (where the floor and about three feet up the walls are covered in plastic–like a kill room, à la Dexter–and we lay down puppy pads; he at least pees in there) or on the hard floors–and especially if it’s more-or-less solid. Actually, though I didn’t realize it would be their eventual use, I’d purchased a bundle of those cheap meh throws, and we cycle through them with a couple of actual couch covers.

When we lost water and power (living as we do in the lone star land of gas oil and particularly dumbass politicians and deregulators), one of my greatest anxieties was wondering how long I could go without needing to do the cat poop laundry. I happily figured out that I could cover one couch and most of another with some boxes (including a few from meh) we had lying around–so as to make it difficult for him to soil those places. It might not seem like much, but it’s a nice luxury being able to sit on a couch that hasn’t been recently shat upon. He did somewhat impressively manage to find a small corner I’d left uncovered; it was actually early on, so I spot cleaned it and set it to the side, in case I got desperate. I’m not even sure how he positioned his ass to do it. Ornery fucker.

And, yes, we’ve had him to the vet. We’ve tried various things. Partly he’s just getting old. I think of him (both of our cats, in fact) as just being at that hospice, palliative care stage. Neither moves around much. He sometimes seems agile, but he doesn’t have much sustained energy and his steps on unstable surfaces are increasingly slow and uncertain. In the last year, he’s turned into a complete lap cat; yeah, almost exclusively my lap.

My work desk is in the kitchen and often these days when I’m on the job, he just sits pathetically on a kitchen mat, waiting for me to take my next break (and head to the living room to be his furniture). I always feel like a jerk when I make him get up, and if I can take a meeting from the couch after lunch, I will.

@Felton10 @joelmw @Kidsandliz @lisaviolet poor guy.

Idk how old twixy is but she has either found a creative place to shit or is using the litter box. Once they start going every where I don’t think you can stop it cause learned behavior…

The known aged KitKat is only 13ish. But he messed up his ear. And knew girl is messing with him. And he has this cat tree up on a ledge to the 20 foot ceiling he likes to sleep in and a platform gave out and he took a 10+ foot drop thankfully to the couch. He just bounced I think while I was screaming.

Not looking forward to it cat issues