Farewell, Dakota

Thanks to Zoolatry for the beautiful graphic. Dakota was a beautiful white Siberian Husky with ice-blue eyes. She was a kind and gentle dog with a big heart. She welcomed Phantom and Thunder when they were added to her family and, before she got sick with Cushing's Disease, romped with them and had loads of fun. She was a little sensitive about her tail and would get just a little ticked off if either of them tried to play with it, but other than that, it was all good playtime. Dakota also loved it when the grandkids came over, especially when it was time to eat. The little ones drop a lot of food and Dakota was always willing to clean it up. Every type of dog has their own special sound. With Siberian Huskies it is a sort of soft howl, called a woo. Dakota was the best woo-er of the family. The Cushing's Disease was making Dakota sicker and sicker and for the last few months, she mostly rested, though she still went for a short walk every day. The end came when she went out to do her business and apparently lost her footing and rolled down a shallow incline. This would have been nothing at all to a healthy dog, but the disease had caused her muscles to atrophy and she tore up a muscle. It would not heal without surgery, but the surgery itself would be very traumatic and painful to a dog in her condition and it would not buy her any more time, so her family made the incredibly painful, but merciful decision to help her to the Rainbow Bridge. She had almost twelve wonderful years with them. Dakota had lots and lots of friends in both the Cat Blogosphere and the Dog Blogosphere and is being missed terribly.

                                             Dakota was a husky with loads of charm.
                                             She was kind and gentle and never did harm.
                                                     When she went to the Bridge
                                                     There was a college
                                             Of Siberian Huskies who woo-ed their alarm.

Farewell, Dexter Two

Yes, I know that Dakota should be next, but although I was aware of Dakota through comments and mentions, I never read her blog and need to read up on her before I can do a good tribute to her.

Whimpurr had decided that she needed to really cut down on her rescue work because it was so draining, both emotionally and financially. She still helps when she can and when she found out about Mr. Kitty, she just had to step in. The family had kept Mr. Kitty as an outside only cat and basically just gave him food and water, with minimal vet care, for two years. I guess they decided that they really didn't want him any more when Whimpurr offered to take him in. She did this because he reminded her so strongly of Dexter, a kitty who came before. Whimpurr named him Dexter Two and whisked him off to the vet for a checkup and treated him for fleas and ticks, as he had been outside his whole life. Things looked great for a week, then he got very sick. Off he went to the vet again and this time he was diagnosed with a tick-bourne disease that had basically destroyed his liver. He must have been suffering from the disease when Whimpurr took him in, but he appeared healthy and the vet missed it. It doesn't really matter, because it would have been to late to save him anyway. All this could have been prevented if his previous family had given him his monthly flea and tick prevention treatment. It is really heart-breaking, especially because he had been taken to the vet for tick problems before and I am sure that the vet told them about his needing regular treatments to prevent tick bites.

                                    Dexter Two was sent to the Bridge by a tick.
                                    It bit him and bit him and made him so sick.
                                              He could have been spared
                                              If his "owner" had cared.
                                    Now he is gone and we are all heartsick.

Farewell, Siri

This is Siri's happy face. Siri was the woofie brother of Piglet and Grover. He moved in with them in December of 2004 when the Mom fell in love and got married to Siri's Dad. Siri and Grover really liked each other, but this was Piglet's reaction to Siri:

As you can imagine, Siri was not too pleased with this reaction and it was decided that the cats and dog needed to be kept separated. The dog got the three front rooms and the cats got the back three rooms. Siri was happy because the front rooms have the doors that lead outside. Grover and Piglet were happy because their part of the house includes the bedroom with all the great napping spots. Siri loved the Mom, but he loved the Dad even more. Siri also adored eating, well, anything really, but he loved French fries best. Siri also liked to bite. He offered to bite Piglet in two after Piglet swatted him in the face a couple of times, but the Mom managed to stop him in time. I don't know how many people Siri bit, but he did bite his Mom at least once. Despite the biting, Siri was basically a happy dog and quite a character. He is really being missed.

                                 Siri was a dog who loved to bite.
                                 He could really clamp down tight.
                                       Now he's running free
                                       At the Bridge and we
                                 Mourn the dog who loved to bite.

Farewell, Waffles

Steffie adopted Waffles and her sister Dandelion a little over two years ago to be company for her first rat, Molly. Waffles made her personality known while she was still quite young. She loved to be held and petted. She loved heights and adored riding on Steffie's shoulder and playing with her hair. She would also climb up to the top of her cage to see what she could see. If there was anything new in the neighborhood, Waffles just had to investigate it. Knowing that rats and mice are very susceptible to cancer, Steffie does everything she can to keep her house carcinogen-free and gives her rodents very healthy diets with lots of anti-oxidants, but Waffles got cancer anyway. She had two tumors successfully removed, but the cancer was an aggressive one and came back, this time in Waffles' bones. There was little to be done, but to give Waffles pain medication and keep her as comfortable as possible until she let Steffie know that she had had enough, which she did last week.

                                  Waffles was an adventuresome rat.
                                  She always wanted to know, "What is that?"
                                          She liked being up high --
                                          Now she has reached the sky.
                                  Have fun at the Bridge, you adventuresome rat!

Farewell, Percy

Here is Percy doing his favorite thing -- eating. Percy, full name Sir Percival Sniffsalot, loved to eat and he did it every chance he got. He also liked to chew and would chew on anything he could get his teeth into -- cloth, plastic, wire, metal, wood. In November 2007 the Mom found him in the feeder cage at a pet store. That's the cage where they keep the rats or mice that are intended to be food for snakes or other big reptiles that people keep as pets. He was pretty banged up, missing a finger and a toe and with a broken tail. He had been returned as inedible. I guess he gave as good as he got to whatever tried to eat him. The Mom took him home, treated his wounds and put him in a small cage by himself to heal. He promptly chewed a hole in the cage big enough for him to escape through and showed it to the Mom, as if to say, "I can get out of here whenever I choose, so treat me right." Percy must have felt that he was being treated well because he stayed right up until last month when a bout of myco made him too miserable to stay any longer. He disliked being held, but loved pets and scritches. He had a very coarse coat that would never lie down flat. The Mom said she never saw another rat with a coat like his. He was truly unique and is being missed a lot.

                                   There isn't anything Percy won't chew.
                                   He could bite a wire right in two.
                                          His life here is done;
                                          He'll eat food by the ton
                                   At the Rainbow Bridge, so we bid him adieu.

Grendel

There is a sad situation going on in the Alaska woods where the House of Many Cats is. Callous people dump their unwanted cats off in the woods to fend for themselves. The husband and wife who live in the house have taken in as many of these cats as they can persuade to come inside and then they take care of them for the rest of their lives. During the summer months, they put out food and water for the cats, who get used to hanging around the house. When the cold weather comes, they put out humane traps and take in any cats they catch. They now have 28 of them. Grendel was caught just this way in the autumn of 1996. She was pregnant and gave birth to two black kittens. Grendel was, and still is, very feral, so the Mom took her kittens at a few weeks old and put them with another litter belonging to a more socialized cat, so they could have a better life. Shortly after that, Grendel was spayed. She didn't take too well to being an inside cat and escaped. The Mom and Dad looked for her, but didn't find her and resigned themselves to never seeing her again. Then in 1998, they found her again in the trap and brought her in once again. This time she stayed. She spooks very easily and mostly hides when any human comes near her, though she does socialize quite a bit with the other cats. Just within the last year, she has finally become used enough to her humans that she doesn't always run when she sees them. She has even come out to watch her food being put in her bowl and even lets the Mom pat her once in a while. She will sit in a cat bed and watch the Mom work on her computer, only a few feet away. She may turn into a friendly cat yet.

                                    Grendel is more than a little bit shy.
                                    She mostly hides when humans go by.
                                           She'll accept a pat,
                                           But no more than that.
                                    Maybe she'll yet come 'round, bye and bye.

Farewell, Cece

When Cece first started hanging around Mog's house, he was so dirty and hungry that Mog thought he must be a stray and was thinking about adopting him, but soon found out that he belonged to a neighbor just across the street. Cece was a mostly outdoor cat by his own choice, possibly because there were a bunch of dogs in his house. Apparently he was hungry all the time because he didn't like the cat food he was served at home and even tried the dog food. He loved what Mog was serving and darted into the house every chance he got to scarf up whatever was in the bowl. Eventually, Mog started giving him food and water outside and feeding him treats. He absolutely adored Temptations and would demand them in a loud voice whenever he saw Mog. He never gave up trying to get inside Mog's house. Cece walked with a limp, but no one ever found out why. He had been taken to the vet for it, but the vet had no answers. The limp didn't slow him down any when he saw Mog's door open, that's for sure. Cece loved to hang out with Meowza. The touched noses whenever they met and often kitty wrestled in the dirt. Cece was over at Mog's house almost every day. The only things that kept him away were very hot weather and pouring rain. When Mog realized that she hadn't seen Cece in a very long time, she asked her neighbors about him and found out that he had been killed by a car. By this time Mog considered Cece to be part of her family and she and Meowza are very sad that he has gone to the Rainbow Bridge.

                                       Cece went to the Bridge by car.
                                       It made Mog weep 'cause he went so far.
                                             Now he's so fleet,
                                             With plenty to eat.
                                        He downs Temptations by the jar.

Sweets

Here is Sweets being calm and collected, not his usual style. Sweets started out life as a feral kitty and lived on his own for almost two years, before he was caught and sent to a shelter. During that time he became a formidable hunter and those instincts are still very strong in him. His Mom found him in the shelter and Sweets has been much happier, though a bit frustrated, as an indoor cat. He loves to watch the wildlife of rural Pennsylvania out the window and talks to the birds and animals he sees. He really wants to get outside and pounce on them. These days he takes out his hunting cravings on catnip mice, which he bats around the house with great abandon, then calls for Servant #1, as he calls his Mom, to fetch them out from under the furniture when he can't reach them. In his spare time, he plots world domination. I wonder if he knows Anita. He has moved around quite a bit in his time with Servant #1, from where she was going to college to out in the woods in Pennsylvania to Seattle and back again to the Pennsylvania woods. I think he likes the woods best, as there is more wildlife to watch and talk to. Servant #1 has a busy life, so Sweets doesn't blog much, but it is worth reading when he does.

                                             Sweets is a hunter of great renown.
                                             There isn't a critter he wouldn't chow down.
                                                         Squirrels and birds,
                                                         Even mice in herds,
                                             All must beware when Sweets is aroun'.

Farewell, Blackie

My apologies for being so late with this. I am enjoying my vacation, but I was so tired that I just loafed around for a couple of days and creativity has been rather low. It does look like my work problems will get ironed out soon, though.

Nobody really knows how old Blackie was, but the best guess is around 20 years old. Her Mom and Dad knew that her kidneys were failing, but when they took her in to see if it was time to help her to the Rainbow Bridge, the vet also found a mass in her abdomen that was most likely cancer. They sent her on, as that was the best thing that they could do for her. Blackie was adopted as an adult. Her Aunt Leona found her hanging around her house and thought she had found a home for her, but took her back when she found out that the person who had taken her in just put her outside and wasn't even feeding her regularly. Leona was taking her to the shelter, when she decided to see if her sister would take her in. She did and Blackie lived a long, happy life in her new home. She liked being on the enclosed patio most of all and only went inside to eat and use the litter box. There is a big cage with a very comfy quilt on it and that was her favorite spot. She would share it with Pumpkin, but wouldn't allow Tiger up there at all. Tiger used to chase Blackie and she never forgave him for it. Blackie was a very playful cat and used to have lots of fun with catnip mice right up until she got so sick. Pumpkin now rests on top of the cage and is comforted by the smells that Blackie left behind. Everyone is missing her terribly.

                                        Though of love and care she had no lackie
                                        To the Bridge went dear Blackie.
                                              Now she can climb and run
                                              And have lots of fun,
                                         But all of us here will miss sweet Blackie.

Farewell, Oscar

I am way behind in my posting. I have found out that I can write limericks when I am happy and when I am sad, but I can't seem to do it when I am worried. My Mother and I are both in good health, but my working life seems to be going down the tubes. I will try to write a farewell limerick for Oscar, but I haven't been able to yet.

Here is Oscar with his laser eyes. Oscar started the blog Cats Who Twitter, which is a great resource for twittering cats to meet and find out about each other. Because of the nature of the blog, I didn't find out a whole lot about Oscar himself. I did learn that he was an old cat and only had three legs. That didn't slow him down at all and he held his own when his brother Henry pounced him, which was often. He had quite a hairball problem until his Mom got him a FURminator, which he learned to love. When he got spooked or scared, he would hide under the couch or under the bed. He would run away whenever the doorbell rang.

There was a big fight between "I'm so worried about work" and "Yay, my vacation starts tomorrow" and "Yay" must have won, because this limerick popped into my head.

                                        Oscar went to the Bridge because he was old.
                                         Now he will never be sick or cold.
                                                  He'll have all four paws
                                                  And plenty of claws
                                         For climbing trees in a manner so bold.