Entries Tagged 'Humphrey' ↓

Now the weather is hot we’re seeing less of Humphrey.  Out all night he then disappears after breakfast to sleep off the night’s excitement… Continue reading →

Spring is my favourite season.  The new colours, the warmer weather (we hope) and the sense of expectation and energy.  Spring is my favourite season except when it comes to…

Humphrey and small furry things.  Whatever pleasureI have at the thought of new life and growth is reduced more than a little when I find piles of innards or bones around the garden.

Or even worse on the doorstep.  Monday morning last I opened the back door to let in the fresh air and a stop out cat to find innards over a radius.  Just as well I was careful where I stepped or I could have had field mouse on the bottom of my shoe.  Ugh.  And somehow the worst thing was that I found its little tail separated.

I know it’s nature and I shouldn’t mind and it’s a present to a beloved person from Humphrey but still… ugh.

Oh and he’s been fighting again.  Not long after I wrote last week’s blog he turned up in the kitchen his eye running.   This time it hasn’t worsened except for the patches of scar tissue I can feel above his eye.

More next week.

We’re seeing less and less of Humphrey now.  Since we’ve had him, he’s been an outdoor cat mostly.  During the week when it was hissing down with rain we couldn’t entice him in.

Maybe it comes from his early life about which we know nothing, but he can be very fidgety inside.  For the first few weeks after we officially adopted him, we had to feed him outside because he was too wary to come into the kitchen.  And during the summer, apart from him appearing for meals we can go for hours without a sighting.

He does like it when we’re in the garden though especially if we’re moving about.   He has a game he plays with us.  Not in a nasty way because I don’t think he has a nasty bone in his body, but he likes coming up behind us and nipping our legs.  Which is fine if you have thick trousers on in the winter but not so great on bare legs!

Still he doesn’t dig his teeth in which is a mercy.  Now if it was Portia, she would dig in and mean it.  I once got blood poisoning in my thumb because she bit me.  Since that event she’s been banned from sitting on laps.

We always give people a health warning about her when they visit.  She’s beautiful, and loves visitors, especially men.  But her favourite trick is to rub round your legs then bite the hand you put out to her.

More next week.

Hi there

Very short blog this week. Not because Humphrey hasn’t given me plenty to talk about this week but because I feel unwell. Came on me during the week and today I still feel fragile. Like after a good night out but without having the night out.

However I did meet up with the owner of one of the cats plaguing our garden recently. Apparently at the moment he is still a whole cat… but is scheduled for the chop soon. Not because of our Portia but because his owners have acquired two kittens and he’s trying to mate with both of them… one male and one female.

Once he’s done then that will be one less for Humphrey to worry about. At the moment he’s contenting himself with chasing next door’s tabby, about half Humphrey’s size, and the pigeons in the garden.

See you next week. Might feel better then!

I’ve just come in from the garden where I left Humphrey running round chasing bits of leaf!

Thank goodness he’s better.  It took till the middle of the week before he was back to normal and now he’s wanting food every time he comes into the kitchen.

When we were at the vets I was talking to him about Humphrey’s eating habits.  Because he attacks every meal as if it’s his last.  We’ve always put that down to him being a stray for a while and not knowing where his next meal might come from. The vet though said he’d noticed that it happens sometimes with cats in large litters where there isn’t enough milk for all the kittens.  Or in small litters but the mum can’t produce enough milk.

Whatever – Humphrey always eats like food is going out of fashion and will be taken off the market.  Which means he gobbles and sometimes he doesn’t give himself time to digest it.  So he ends up being sick.  Wonderful!

And then his stomach is empty so he’s looking for food again!

Now he’s better we have to be on guard in the garden.  It’s baby bird time isn’t it and that means…

Not that he stops at baby birds.  We’ve had many a full grown wood pigeon’s innards and feathers scattered round the garden.

Can’t stop nature ‘red in tooth and claw’ – I just wish it didn’t happen on my doorstep.

What a surprise this morning to wake up to snow – probably more than we’ve had here in Nottingham all winter.  Still it’s bright and shiny which is good.

But to get back to Humphrey – poor thing.  Just as I thought we’d got him nicely over his head injury, last Sunday evening he started to gag as if he couldn’t get his breath.  Monday morning he seemed better and he slept most of the day.  Which should have alerted me because he hates being in.

Tuesday he seemed no better so off to the vets… again.  This time to be told he probably had something stuck in his throat and since he wouldn’t let the vet look meant an anaesthetic and an x-ray.

When we picked him up in the evening the vet said they’d found nothing but that the throat seemed very sore.  An anti-inflammatory injection was given and we took him home.  By Thursday morning I was seriously concerned.  He’d eaten nothing since Tuesday evening, nor drunk any water and I was worried about him being dehydrated.    It was a long acting injection he’d received but I reasoned that it should have kicked in by then.

Different vet this time and the diagnosis was a chest infection.  Certainly that matched what I’d seen with him.  He couldn’t breathe easily, sounded wheezy and looked stuffed up around the eyes.  You know like we are with a cold.

So he had an anti-biotic injection this time and we went home.  Now this morning he’s much improved, is eating and of course wants to go out.  But he’s still wheezy and spluttery and has the occasional sneezing fit so I’m putting my foot down with a firm hand as they say and hardening myself against those soft eyes that tell meI’m treating him badly.

We’ll see tomorrow if it isn’t so cold and he isn’t so wheezy.  The vet told me to get him in the kitchen or the bathroom in the steam to help him breathe.  The thought of him in the shower with me doesn’t appeal!  So we’ve held  jugs of steaming water in front of him to see if that will help.

The things you do!

Let you know next week how he progresses

Hi – it’s a beautiful Sunday sunny morning though my internal clock is a bit out this morning.

We’ve already had a small skirmish on the doorstep between Humphrey and one of the intruders.  I think the activity is dying down… a little!  Though we never know when one of the outside cats is going to turn up…

Last night as we were watching TV I glanced through the living room window to see these two little ears rise up followed by a cheeky face!  Yesterday I had to scram one cat by remote control shouting through my bedroom window.

I’ve been watching Zoo Days on channel 5 at 6.30.  On Friday the little lion cub left to go to a new home in Besancon in France.  It was so funny watching the same behaviour as Humphrey shows.  A rather larger scale though.

I felt so sorry for the keeper who’d hand reared the cub.  He must have had to steel himself when he said goodbye.  My friend who had her cat put to sleep last month is still in pieces about it.  Since she lives alone, I guess that going home is more difficult now without that welcome. 

Ah well – didn’t mean to be gloomy but they get under our skin and into our hearts don’t they these cats.

We’ve had a fun week… with black and white cats.

Although I usually talk about Humphrey, we do have two cats, the other being a black she by the name of Portia. (named by my lawyer niece)

Portia is beautiful but temperaments.  Now 15 we discovered recently that she’s almost completely deaf.  Which accounts for the fact that her miaow has become very loud and rather harsh.  It’s like have the volume up high on the television!

I told you before about Humphrey fighting and over the last couple of months we’ve seen new cats around the garden.  All black and white.  We finally worked out there were 3 separate cats, all with collars who seem to belong to families down the other end of our street.

Well these 3 cats have been haunting us for the last week.  We finally decided that it was because of Portia.  Which is spectacularly stupid of them because she’s an OAP, skin and bone, deaf and she was neutered at 6 months.

At times we been chasing all 3 cats at the same time out of the garden so she can have a bit of peace under her favourite bush.  Humphrey meantime has taken to skulking in the middle of the thickest shrubs he can find.  No dashing out to save her!

Roll on the day when she supposedly no longer on heat!

It’s raining as I write this.  A lot.  As it did last night.

So what is it about cats and being wet?  Whenever I want Humphrey to give me a rub round the legs what I get is the cold shoulder.  Until he’s wet and then it’s a different story…

Continue reading →

Well we took Humphrey to the vet on Friday afternoon and thank goodness we got an okay that he didn’t need any more medication.  We had to admit that we hadn’t followed the vet’s instructions to keep him in for the week but all of us, Humphrey included would have been climbing up the walls if we’d stuck to that.

We acquired him as a stray about five years ago and whether it’s because he’s still a young cat or that he’d been living “rough” for a little while beforehand but he hates being indoors unless he chooses to be.  We managed to keep him in most of last weekend but even then it only worked because we were out of the house most of the time!

So now he just has a little scab on the top of his head which we’re hoping he won’t pick at until it’s ready to come off.  Any more problems with him would have topped off our week perfectly.  Our household had one of those weeks where the equipment all conspired against us.

First the washing machine overflowed.  The cause would you believe a slug in the outside pipe to the drain. Ugh.  Perhaps it’s revenge for all the salt we pour on them in the garden.

Then the wall heater in our sitting room.  And on the same day my computer decided to throw one of those wobblies that even the experts can’t explain.  One of those blips said the man.  A possible reaction to something in a Microsoft update!  Whatever.  Still it made me get on with my filing instead of ignoring the growing pile.