Boo Boo: The Best Little Old Man Cat

"If having a soul means being able to feel love and loyalty and gratitude, then animals are better off than a lot of humans." --James Herriot

Alright ladies and gentlemen, get the tissues out now. It’s going to be hard for me to write this so I can imagine it’s going to be an emotional, bitter sweet read. From day 1 Boo Boo was the most annoying cat in the world and by that I mean the sweetest, loudest, most snuggly, bony pawed, skinny, sleepy, happy, and caring cat I’ve ever met. 

Let’s back it up a minute. Boo Boo has a sob story beginning, which leads up to his adoption into the house of happy fluffs (our house/family) by us. Boo Boo obtained his unfortunate and extreme non-manly name from his previous owners, you guessed it,  an elderly couple. He was apparently the husband’s cat and up until his passing he was taken care of extremely well. His death lead to his wife’s slow decline and dementia. After a week of forgetting about the pets she owned her daughter came to visit, realized the situation and went to work. She contacted Will’s Mom to see if we could foster the cat, which of course we did. Sadly, he came to us with a whole list of problems:

1. SERIOUS gum disease and rotten teeth
2. Malnutrition
3. Nails growing into his paw pads
4. Neglect  
5. Aloof and doesn’t like people….supposedly

He immediately went to the vet before we even got him and went on meds and got his nails trimmed and paw pads cauterized. After pain meds and a tooth surgery he was deemed super fit or as fit as a 14 year old cat could be after all that. Now this cat was skinny… and I mean skinny. His favorite thing to do was walk on our faces in the middle of the night and scream with his extremely stinky breath in our faces. Needless to say I was not a fan and didn’t see us adopting him. Meanwhile, Will had fallen in love with him. The surgery also helped clear up that gross breath so it was slightly better. He had blood work done as well and the vet told us he had the blood work of a cat half his age. Good for that old man :). Such a trooper.

The second this cat walked in to our house we knew whoever said he was aloof must have be delusional. He ran up to everyone, yelled until he was pet and snuggled for hours on end. He was hands down the sweetest thing in the world and he won both of our hearts. It didn’t even take 2 days and he was officially adopted into our family. There he received an insane amount of love and food and finally became a healthy weight and pretty dang handsome. 

His favorite thing to do? Sleep. He could sleep anywhere…especially on hard surfaces in awkward positions. For example: upside down with one leg on the table bar and his face rammed in between the floor and the bar, halfway on the cat scratcher and halfway upside down, fully upside down, etc.  He also liked jumping on the bedside table, skidding across it and shoving everything on top on the floor in the process. He was a mess, but he was our mess. It just made him more endearing. Other than sleeping his favorite thing to do was purr. If you looked at this car he would start to purr. I don’t mean normal cat purrs. I mean purring so loudly you could hear him across the room. He was permanently happy the second we brought him home and demanded pets so he could start purring even harder. If purring were an olympic sport Boo Boo would hold the world record for the most gold medals won. He’s pretty incredible. 

Boo Boo always loved men more and Will became his favorite person on Earth. You could also find him curled up next to him on the couch, sitting on his chest while Will tried to play video games or smacking and yelling Will demanding attention. I eventually became his second favorite and he always visited me while I was sitting on the floor after dinner working on something or reading. 

Around Thanksgiving things started to go downhill. He had 3 seizures in 2 days and after 5 hours at the emergency vet, tears, and extreme anxiety we got to take him home with some medication that would hopefully help. The seizures are super rare in cats, especially so many and we ruled out everything but brain issues as the cause. During his seizures Atlas, our dog, brought Boo Boo every toy he could find and was deeply concerned the whole time. Boo Boo even won over all the pets in the house. He was the coolest little guy ever. 

His meds helped, but he started to lose weight. By the week before Christmas he had lost 2 pounds, and his muscles started to deteriorate in his hind legs, plus he slept more and just wasn’t quite the same. What made us call it was when he started not using the litter box. We would put him in and he would jump right out and pee or poop on the floor. He just wasn’t living the quality of life he deserved and we knew it was time. We had one last day with him and cried pretty much the entire time while non-stop loving on Boo Boo. 

The day of we took Boo Boo to Petsmart and brought Atlas along for support. We were wrecks. The Petsmart crew was super sweet and understanding. We spent a few more minutes with him and they gave him an injection and made sure he didn’t feel any pain. We were there until the end and a little after. I’ve never had to put a pet down before and it pretty much ripped my heart out. I can only imagine what it would be like for a pet that I’ve had longer than 1.5 years. 

After 1.5 years this cat left a huge imprint on both of our lives. Everyone who came over always told us how cool of a cat he was. We tried to give him the best life possible and loved every second we had with him. We just wish we could’ve had more. Boo Boo was really something special and a cat who I will never forget. Rest In Peace buddy. I hope you are up there drinking from all the water bowls and toilets you can find and are sleeping on all the weird, hard surfaces. Make sure you yell at everyone to pet you. You deserve it. 

A week after we put Boo Boo to sleep we baked cookies and brought it to the staff for being so sweet. They looked at us like we had grown 2 heads, but were super happy about it. I doubt anyone else baked them cookies for something like that. A few days later I got a letter in the mail from them. I opened it assuming that it was a thank you note. I was not prepared at all for what it really was. It was a “sorry for your loss note” and everyone in the clinic had signed it. I immediately burst into tears on my front porch, walked inside, showed Will and we ended up hugging it out and crying together. 

Pets made the world a better place. Boo Boo absolutely changed my life for the better and I hope he felt the same about us. We love you Boo Boo. 

"Until one has loved an animal, a part of one's soul remains unawakened."--Anatole France

Bathing Our Cat

Natasha is our very fluffy, very opinionated, mostly super sweet long hair domestic cat. She's 11 years old and knows EXACTLY what she likes and doesn't like. Her list of likes is much shorter than the dislikes, but she's a cat so that's pretty much expected.

Natasha likes:
Food
Belly rubs (a set amount..the number changes daily so watch out)
Food
Snuggling with your hip at night (only at night)
Food
Chewing on plastic bags
Food
Taking naps
Looking glorious

Natasha painstakingly grooms herself all the time. She looks like a fluffy princess 90% of the day, with the exception of when she wakes up from a nap looking like she went through a wind storm. She also hates it when you call her scraggly. She's a proud woman of color and doesn't like her imperfections being pointed out. I guess when you're 65 years old in cat years you can loudly state your opinion on whatever you want.

That being said, Natasha was not originally adopted by Will and me. She came to us via Will's aunt, then Will's mother. She was never abused, but she is a one family kind of cat and got super sad at being moved from one house to another. Will's mom had 2 dogs, one of which Natasha would always snuggle with and nap on, and 2 other cats as well. One cat weighs about as much as a horse and obviously he's pretty complacent and doesn't care about much, but food. They got along just fine. Sam on the other hand was a complete @$$ hat. He would bully her and she would spend all her days underneath one bed in one room. Not exactly the life of luxury cats deserve/are entitled to.

We adopted her into our pet free home.. which now has 1 other cat and the best puppy ever, but that's a different story. Long story short, she's been extremely happy ever since. That was only the beginning...

A few weeks ago we noticed she wasn't feeling well. As a result, she didn't really bathe herself for about 3 days. After checking with the vet we decided it was time to give her a bath. If you regularly bathe yourself about 3 times a day to 0 times in 3 days...well you have one greasy looking kitty.

Will and I had both seen horror clips from youtube videos of other suckers bathing their cats who then turned into raging monster ball of fluff, teeth, and nails. We knew she did okay when we clipped her nails, but she has a pretty mean growl that we didn't want her to actually act upon.

This is pretty much how it went:

W&E: Nataaaasha! Where are you pretty lady? We've got treats!
N: No response
W&E:  *shakes treat bag*
N: No response
W&E: Dang it! I think she's under the bed. You grab her. No you do it.

Will eventually caved and grabbed her from the bed. The yelling that could only possibly have said "you hate me. why do you hate me. what did I ever do to you. Please don't take me to my death" started shortly after that.

We took her into the bathroom, locked the overly curious dog out, and made sure she couldn't get out. We then, being the awesome pet parents we are, ran her a luxurious, warm bath just for her. Did she appreciate it? No.

When we take her to the vet in her crate we usually have to trick her or chase her down and do some pretty impressive acrobatics in order to grab her and not get scratched and then actually get her in the cage when she has all 4 paws outside the opening and is pushing with all her furry might. We thought this was exactly how the bath would go.

She went fully in the opposite direction. Natasha went full deer in the headlights and stood absolutely still. I'm pretty sure she thought we couldn't see her if she stood still. We always make fun of how much she eats since she is constantly screaming for more food even though her bowl is full. We didn't realize just how big her gut was until we washed her.

Cats are super pitiful looking when you get them wet no matter what, especially when they are really fluffy to begin with. Natasha has extremely skinny limbs, tail and face. Her tummy....not so skinny. It looks like a very skinny cat swallowed a softball.

During her bath she made weird chirping noises that sounded like Beeker from the Muppets.. we were expecting incessant screams of protest and grumpiness like we get on the way to the vet, but we were pleasantly surprised. She did really really well. After the bath was over we dried her off and pampered her to her delight and even gave her treats.

Just remember, bathing your cat might not be the safest idea you've ever had, but your cats might decide to just sit there and be nice...for once. Or it's a tactic to lull you into a false sense of security so they can further their plans of world domination. Either one.