Quiet Friday

 There were enough vollies and I got there early and coped with the poo bags. When you open the door to the verandah there are none left of the great pile that took up almost all of the floor space. But, that is deceptive. There are poo bags behind the door. They are the oldest ones from the bottom of the pile and should be taken away first, please.

We didn't have any visitors. Angel's person came yesterday to adopt her and will pick her up on Sunday as planned.

So I had time to let cats wander and to take photos of Katie's cats. . . . just in case Katie would like to see their happy faces.

Luna has the celestial condo where she happily hides

Nala is below her where she can chat to all passers-by

Frank is at knee level so when he looks up you can see he amazing blue eyes

Dolly and

Zane are next door

Mali used to have a boarding Burmese upstairs. It is quieter without the boarder.

Kimmy doesn't mind the noise. She makes enough of her own.

Cleo is regally quiet.

But Sundae is anybody's for a pat.

Josie's 2 kittens are fine. She is an attentive mum and has learned very quickly that mums get more food.

Sabrina's kittens were in the play place. The tabbies/white ones are friendly and playful.

Sabrina's tabbys

But the black and white ones are hiding. And in the Nursery/isolation they were the ones (or one of them was the one) who always screamed "FEED ME" at the window whenever somebody looked at him/her. Now look at them!

hiding

Sabrina has been separated from them to wean them. They are out of ringworm quarantine. 

Betty is struggling along with her seven and lack of appetite. Chicken helped this afternoon. So I left a bunch for her and some cats missed out (but not Lola who follows me around).

Betty polishing off chicken while her line of kittens snoozes

A Fall from Grace

 When I got to Grace's condo on this morning's food delivery, it was a mess. She had pulled up the grass from its pot and then tipped over the pot so that there was dirt everywhere. I may have said something that startled her because as she jumped up to her upper box she missed her footing and fell out of her condo. To the floor. And then scurried, screaming "I AM SCARED" which got the attention of every cat in the cattery. We proceeded to have a merry dance with me trying to direct her back to her condo and her trying to hide under any low furniture. Luckily she didn't take the high way. 

Eventually she hid under the new merchandise shelves. I cornered her with the duvet cover from Mini's stand alone, put her breakfast in a carry cage that was draped with the same duvet cover. With the help of a prod or two with a bit of stick, she allowed herself to be guided into the carry cage. And got carried back to her condo. Pretty exciting for before breakfast.

We have three new cats in Boarding: Sasha, Shadow and Ellie. They are not boarders with us. They have been surrendered to us. They are really friendly with people. Ellie is a long/ish haired cat who has been shaved. It will be interesting to see how long her hair grows. Her whiskers are enormous.

Ellie

 

I tried putting Sasha into the play place with her but got the distinct impression that it was not a good idea. Katie confirmed that although they came from the same household they are not friends with each other. They just love people.

Sasha

 

 

Shadow is the third member of this trio.

Shadow

Steph dropped off Autumn and Summer. Lovely to have tortie kittens again.

Summer and Autumn

Magnus has a bare tip of tail. A bit has been amputated. There is no bandage. Let's hope this fixes his problem. He is such a loving cat.

Laurie (aka Lasagne) wins the photo of the day 

Laurie

 

As Dolly got adopted on Tuesday, the mother and daughter who fell in love with her on Sunday came to meet Petal. They promptly fell in love with her and will be back when she has been desexed. 

And another lady came in at 3:30pm to adopt Meow Meow. But she didn't do it today. She decided to go home and set up everything, buy lots of food, etc, etc, and come back tomorrow at 1pm to adopt her. (Adoption hours have been limited to from 1pm to 3:30pm to limit our volunteers' exposure to members of the public. We are not admitting people who come from hotspot LGA's)

Looks like a shop

We have new shelves for merchandise. They look lovely when sparsely stocked. I took the rest of the items from on top of the condos where Billie was (no surprise that she was adopted on Monday at 10am!) As I dusted the top of those condos I was reminded of the cat who kept escaping from the condo he shared with his sister and retreating to the top of those condos. I cornered him there once and conned him into walking into a cat carrier. What was his name? I tried going back through the database but no names lept out at me. If I go back through this blog it will take hours. I moved all the cat beds there and they look more desirable now as a line of beds rather than a pile of beds.

Dolly and Mo were desexed yesterday. Dolly had one arm outside her collar when I arrived and she had spilt her water and rolled in the puddle so my shirt got wet when I picked her up to put her arm back where it belonged. Mo is her daughter (Why did I assume she was a boy? Was it the name? Could Mo be short for Maureen, Mouse, Monica? and not Moustache?) Mo wears her collar as a tutu. I think it will have to be cut off as she is such a skitty kitty (Mouse is a good name for her). I will take my good, sharp scissors with me on Friday. The scissors at Safe hardly cut paper).

Talking of changing names: Perhaps Sarah should be called Burrito. She wrapped herself tightly in her blanket and only came out at the end of the day. She was happy to be patted through the blankets.

Wilson has been moved to the play place because Harry and Harley were adopted on Saturday. (Well Done Terry). He is not a happy cat. When somebody goes to sit with him, he walks around growling and grumbling. I think he is telling us how unhappy he is to have been abandonned by his people. He loves pats and is very gentle. He even likes children. The bloke who works down the corridor and his daughter who lusts after a cat visited (again) this afternoon. I chucked her in with Wilson and he treated her just the same as the adults. . . . mutter, mutter, grumble, grumble, keep patting me, growl, complain . . . .

Last week Katie and I decided that Lasagne is a dreadful name for a cat and changed this ginger cat's name to Laurie on the assumption that he was a boy from a glimpse at his rear end.

But it turns out that s/he has some GI tract disease that will require 3 pills a day for a month, 2 pills for the next month and a pill a day for the last month. S/he will be with us for a while. Such a relief that s/he is such a nice cat.

What goes around. . . .

A beautiful cat was surrendered today because his people plan to go travelling around Australia. His name is Wilson. But his name was Merry. He was adopted, as a kitten, from AWL in January, 2017. Unfortunately I don't have a photo from then. But do you recognise him?

He arrived with a very tearful owner and a trolley load of litter and food. Other cats arrived to take our numbers above the 50 who were there when I arrived early. I came with a gift of 6 pots of grass from Catsie. As they were such tall pots of grass I gave them to our adult cats, like Red.

Coco chewed on her's and Mason's and had a gratifying upchuck (which is exactly what Catsie's cat did when she taste tested the pots.) The nice man who came on Wednesday and took a photo of Snowy came back with his wife. Snowy was gone but Patches was on display because before breakfast I took away her and George's squat box. She retreated upstairs to the comfy bed, he stayed downstairs in the corner. After breakfast I gave them a taller, shorter box into which I cut two windows. George moved in but Patches stayed upstairs in a comfy bed. She stayed there all day long being a sensible cat. The wife rather fancied Dolly (who doesn't!) mostly because she is mostly white and they have cream carpets. All our cats are shedding hair at the moment. The wife was worried about black hair on her carpet. She rather liked Petal.

The lovely Kristine who rescued Petal brought in Tabitha, another cat from the same colony.

She had spent a lot of time cuddling with Petal, so Petal was in a very mellow mood until she saw the nice man's hat. When he took it off she was fine. Everybody was wearing masks but none of the cats seem to be phased by masks. I moved Mini's stand alone to the corner where she was before. She is happy there. Sue came this afternoon and wanted character references for each cat for the web page. I went from cat to cat, patting and chatting. That was when I discovered that Max seemed to have trouble fitting through the porthole in the single condo. So I put him into a stand alone. He complained loudly for a while but soon settled down and by dinner time, was quite happy with his position by the front door. It must be good luck to have a black cat beside your front door.

New Faces

There were still only 52 cats at Safe Haven this morning but there are new faces to replace those adopted since last Friday: namely Santa Maria, Norma, Petite (separately) and Valentino yesterday. Plus Casper has disappeared --- into foster care, I assume. Her previous fosterer/rescuer rang today to ask how she was getting on. There are lots of new faces in the outer office. Can't call it quarrantine any more because all of the cats are healthy. Fawny is a particular delight. Her fur is extremely soft and she chirrups rather than meows (when she is not eating).

Thelma and Louise are together again and have been moved to the jewel condo (ie where Amber, Jet and Opal were)

Misty is a pretty girl, if a trifle confused.

And in the cat room we have Lasagne who is a bit smelly.

A man arrived to meet Honey. He and his wife had decided that they want to add a cat to their family and chose her from the web page. I asked who else was in the family. A 2 and a 5 year old. I did not recommend Honey with her history of biting. But suggested Snowy. He was delighted and took a photo and video to show his wife. He may be back tomorrow. A woman phoned to say that she had talked yesterday to Katie about Mixa and was OK with his FIV status but then thought that she would probably want to get another cat because she has always had two and hers had recently died. So could she come in and see Honey. I said "Of course" and that she had bitten a couple of vollies but with an experienced cat owner we agreed that wouldn't be an issue. She came. Mixa smiled at her. Honey was a little stand offish. For contrast I introduced her to Dolly and she agreed that she didn't want a cat that was that friendly perhaps. I showed her Lord Dudley and she thought he was lovely. She went away to think about it. She got as far as the car park and after 10 minutes rang back to say that she had decided on Lord Dudley. Then she came upstairs with the biggest cat carrier! Just made for Lord Dudley. After we did the paperwork, I hoisted him to his feet and he strolled into the carrier as though he had done in a hundred times before. I think she will be back for a friend for him because she works long hours as a nurse and feels that a single cat could get lonely. (My sister tells me that the Lord Dudley is a really nice pub in Paddington. Perhaps she trained at Crown Street at some time).

Last little one

Billie was desexed yesterday. She managed to get her leg through her collar while asleep in her igloo. She has potential adopters lined up being the smallest kitten until Christmas, probably. Opal was being adopted when I arrived this afternoon. I chatted to Sandy who was trying to engage Harry and Harley with the fuzzy three string interactive toy. Harley watched it. I found the last feather toy and Harley was much more interested in catching that. [I need more feathers. The birds around here don't seem to be loosing theirs. So if you have some, please may I have them to make more feather toys.] Opal did not enjoy being in a cat carrier. We could hear her next door. Her new owners were thrilled.

By the way, Jet is settling in beautifully to her new home. Other cats who were desexed include Dolly in incoming who is the mother of Socks, Mo and Tip. Mo is still very "don't touch me" while the other two are "Whatever". Rather like George who hides in the box clutching Patches while the rest of Santa Maria's kids are as friendly as she is. She rolled over to let me tickle her tummy this afternoon. What can I say. . . . . "cats!" A couple of sisters arrived to look at Charlie. One of them couldn't get away from him while I showed the other around. They changed places and Charlie liked the other sister too. Decision made. Adoption processed. Lucky them. I will miss Charlie.

The other cat with potential adopters is Valentino. He was more interested in MORE CHICKEN this afternoon.

So was Lucky. (Isn't she a pretty pus when she is not spitting?)

Of course, Harry and Harley were most interested in chicken. Somehow their door opened and Harry ventured out as far as the wheely trolley. All I had to do was to wave the chicken in the play place and he scurried back in. Such a relief.

Harley is in front with the black elbows and Harry is in the back with the white elbows.

I was going to clean the back windows . . .

I did a vet run with the tuxedo's in Incoming first thing. Tim told me to take Socks and Tip. Who is who? He said that Mo is the one who is hardest to catch and has the smallest moustache. But he did microchip Socks and Tip just in case I managed to catch Mo. (One of them is a girl, by the way)

I returned in the afternoon to clean windows but it got busy. A potential fosterer arrived and talked to/at Tim for at least an hour. He measured up for some more shelving. I put some cat carriers together. The first one took 20 minutes. The second one 7 minutes. The third one 4 minutes. And I had had enough and decided to share some chicken. A man brought in his daughter, when Katie was busy elsewhere, to check out Amber. I had just got to them with the chicken. They are not keen on chicken. They like hands touching them even less. The daughter is doing her HSC and has a 2 year old cat who is full of energy. The plan is to get a second cat to entertain the cat so that she can study/give her something to do while she studies from home. Amber really didn't cooperate. I introduced them to Silky who will take any amount of cuddles when there is chicken on offer. The daughter was interested even though Silky shrank away from her. And there are Santa Maria's brood who are very soft, friendly cats (except for George). They should be ready in a few days. They couldn't make up their minds so will bring Mum to help another day. I introduced them to Charlie on their way out because who can resist a Charlie. The one photo I took all afternoon was of Santa Maria standing up because this was the first time I had seen her on her feet.

(But I can share some of Joy's lovely photos from Wednesday.) Another man came in to look at Harry and Harley when Katie was busy elsewhere. He wants a pair of cats for his kids to grow up with. The kids are 4, 7 and 9. He had cats when he was a kid. I suspect that Harry and Harley would be better with older children. He agreed. I introduced Ginger and Lechusa who have just become available. He took videos of them (and Norma and Petite who will be ready really soon) and will be back after consultation with his wife. He loves cats and as soon as the kids go back to school and his shift changes at work he may come to volunteer with us.

Dolly liked her chicken but not as much as cuddles as Joy found out on Wednesday.

Charlie is a darling

I started off the day with 52 cats and finished it with 55! This is going the wrong way. Terry brought in a tabby girl. The cat that he was supposed to bring in made a mad dash for freedom over the roof and Terry could tell that if he tried to help catch that cat he would be torn to shreads. So another cat was snaffled instead. She is a pretty tabby and we called her Malabar because she was caught on Malabar Street. She is quite friendly, on that street, but a bit shocked in a condo.

Then Blacky was brought in by a woman who has to find homes for her deceased mother's cats. He is a sweet 7 and a half year old.

And finally a woman who has surrendered several cats to us that we have found homes for, had to give us her very own sweet Charlie who is only a year and a half old and who loves tummy rubs.

Blacky and Charlie have been moved straight into the Welfare area because we know that they have been vaccinated, desexed, flea'd, etc so they don't have to stay in Incoming for 10days. But in Incoming we have Red, who arrived last night after being desexed. He is not in a good mood. He got put into Quarantine because there wasn't another available condo but there is nothing wrong with him.

Moe, Tip and Sock are in the plastic condo of Incoming. I took a couple of blurry photos of them sitting on the shelf looking at me and then managed to drop my camera. I swore and when I looked up they all had horrified expressions. . . was it the noise or the language?

New in Welfare are Gingey who came from the same group as Blacky.

And there is Meow Meow. Don't know where this grey cat came from. But she/he comes with a special diet and is only 3 years old.

And there is Dolly in Incoming who is another darling, just like Charlie.

I did manage to rearrange the furniture a bit. Just in case we need to open the front doors and to give the stand alone cages a bit more separation just in case there are sneezes.