If a cat won't sit on a freshly typed page.........

Jason, in his corner

.....It's not worth much.

It’s been two months since Taz died and I think of him all of the time. It’s especially hard in the evenings. That was usually when he sat next to me as long as I was in my chair watching TV or reading.

Jason, one of the twins, is trying very hard to fill the void, bless his heart. He's so sweet. He's different than Taz because he really doesn't want to be held and petted. He does have his moods though, when he comes up and lays down next to me, but not on my lap. He purrs and puts his paws behind me. I pet him, but he doesn't stay long. Sometimes he looks like he wants to sit next to me, but then, he decides to go to the corner of the couch. That seems to be a favorite place for all of them.

I don’t really have a cat who wants to take Taz's place. Since none of them were allowed near me when Taz was around, I would have thought that by now I'd have all kinds of suitors.

Here's Mr. Creme
Looks so innocent, doesn't he?

Mr. Creme would definitely want more attention, but there’s a problem........he sprays when he is loose in the house......that’s why he spends more time in the garage and back yard.

He is the most lovable cat of all of the cats we have now. He wants to be held and petted and he makes this little sound that I just love. It’s a cross between a purr and a meow. You’d just have to hear it to know what I mean.

Mr. Creme is our goodwill ambassador. Our neighbor, Bridget, just loves him. He likes to sit under the bush in her side yard. If she's out working in her yard, he keeps her company. From his bush, he can see us come and go. He walks Bridget to her mailbox. If I go to the mailbox, he's right there. He always wants me to pick him up and take him back to the house. Bridget calls him "Krispy Creme". She might even be giving him treats because he looks like he's gained some weight.

Usually when I get up, I go out into the garage about 7:00 am and let Mr. Creme out into the back yard. Then when Sheila and I go for a walk at 7:30 or 8:00am, I let Mr. Creme back in. He goes back into the garage, gets something to eat and then goes to sleep in the recliner out there or on top of the dryer. My dryer rack for shoes, etc. is up there and it has a blanket on it for him. Quite the bed. He stays in the garage until we let him back out a few hours later.

So he comes and goes several times a day. We check on him during the day and we always make sure he’s in before dark. It would be nice to have him in the house. He'd probably be on my lap most of the time.

We do have “pants” for him to wear. These are pants that have a pantie liner (Poise pad) which he wets if he sprays. It does allow him to be in the house unsupervised and our walls or furniture are not damaged. It works well, but Mr. Creme hates wearing the pants.

Sometimes when he comes to the patio door wanting in, I get his pants and when he sees them, he runs away. And then sometimes I guess he wants to come in worse than he hates wearing the pants.

When he's in, he walks around and lounges for awhile, before deciding he wants back out either in the garage or backyard.

I always check his pants to see if he has wet them, and sometimes he has not sprayed. But, if he has sprayed and they are wet, I feel good, kind of like he's being punished for spraying. But, I know it’s not really teaching him anything because he still sprays and we started making him wear these pants 6 years ago!

Ironically, as sweet as Mr. Creme is and Taz was, they hated each other. We had to make sure we kept them apart. Mr. Creme goes out first thing in the morning and stays in the backyard for awhile and then goes to the front yard. We always tried to wait until Mr. Creme was back inside before letting the other cats out.

Last May they saw each other and got into a really bad fight. I didn’t see it, but Charlie told me about it.

The next day I noticed that Mr. Creme’s ear was swollen and smelled bad. When I rubbed it, it was full of pus and it hurt Mr. Creme, but I squeezed it. I put peroxide on it. We called the vet and they said that that was what they would have done too. It healed up after a few days. Taz seemed okay, and I didn’t check him.

The fight between Mr. Creme and Taz was on May 1. We noticed that Taz seemed to be losing weight soon after. Then on July 9 we took him to the vet to see why. He was diagnosed with intestinal lymphoma on the 12th.

I've researched and asked vets about what causes feline lymphoma. No one seems to know. They have theories like "Cigarette smoke in the home has been found to double a cat's risk though genetic issues; environmental chemicals and unknown factors remain under consideration. Lymphoma can occur anywhere in the body where there is lymph tissue....". Bottom line is, they don't know. Some have said that cats who are outside or fight with other cats have a high risk. There can be injuries which will cause inflammation and/or infection.

I could drive myself crazy wondering if we could have avoided Taz's illness. We always thought he would probably have thyroid problems when he got older. Unlike Rowdy, who was overweight and contracted diabetes, Taz was never overweight. Calvin, also never overweight, developed hyper thyroid problems when he got older.

I certainly don't think the fight between Mr. Creme and Taz caused Taz's illness. That would be far fetched. But, I can't help but wish I'd checked to see if Taz was injured after that fight. His tummy may have caught Mr. Creme's back claws and caused some inflammation inside. Who knows? No one.

The Baby, Taz

We love Mr. Creme and all of our other babies. We have no more fighters. They snarl or hiss at each other, but that's it.

More later.........