As we have mentioned, over and over again, Sylvester and Smokey make life hard for Chloe and Dusty. Often it’s just intimidation. Sometimes their very presence is enough. Friday evening we let Smokey, Sylvester and Chloe in for feeding. Chloe is not particularly comfortable with that.
Notice Sylvester’s tail — it’s pretty much upright now.
Chloe and Zeke faced off in a friendly way on the front walk last week.
Chloe isn’t afraid of the dogs, and especially not Zeke. Sometimes the dogs sniff her a little too enthusiastically and she backs away or swats at them, but usually it’s a pretty casual affair.
I’m adding another picture to what is usually a cat post because a bird trapped itself in our garage on Thursday.
This time it wasn’t a hummingbird, although it had the same problem figuring out how to escape that the hummingbirds have. At first I thought it might be a swift since we have one nesting under our deck, but the beak doesn’t look right to me, based on comparing to images I found online. I’m not a bird expert so I can’t really identify this one. It’s small, dark on top and gray below.
It couldn’t find its way out for quite a while. We were worried that Sylvester would sit around waiting for it to tire out and then pounce, but apparently that did not happen. The bird was gone after while and we didn’t find any sign of it.
Sylvester’s tail seems to be making a comeback. I chased him around the house Wednesday night trying to get a good picture of how he’s holding his tail now, and this was the best I got.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, he seemed unable to hold his tail up in a normal position. We were afraid he had broken it, but our vet said he might have only a sprain. That was about two weeks ago. He can now hold his tail almost upright. That’s an encouraging sign.
I suppose we’ll never know how he sprained it.
Can you see him?
Dusty and Chloe often hide in plain sight, but when they set their minds to it, they can be really hard to spot.
In case you’re having trouble finding him, here he is.
Most of the yard was in shadow, but the setting sun somehow found a path to illuminate the grass fronds around Dusty. It was a nice effect.
I haven’t posted for a while on the house progress. The floors are complete throughout the house. The hardwood and tile are a surprisingly good match. I haven’t been able to take any photographs because of the cardboard and paper that the flooring guys laid out. The entire house needs to be vacuumed, too.
The painter is working off and on. He has completed what we’re calling the hall bathroom. The vanity for that bathroom arrived at Home Depot about a week ago. They were hinting at sending it back if I didn’t pick it up, so I did that on Saturday. It’s sitting on the trailer in the garage. It’s a little heavy for one person (at least this one person), so I’m waiting for the painter to help me unload it. The painter has a real job and is working at our house only on weekends and some evenings, so it’s taking longer than I had hoped to complete the painting. Just like pretty much everything else associated with the house.
I have completed one task that was looming over me — attic insulation. It took three sessions and 25 percent more insulation than the manufacturer recommends. The first day was the worst. It was hot even outside the attic. I finished the day with cellulose dust covering my arms and clotted in my hair. Little nubs of cellulose stuck to my arm hairs even after showering. The dust was so thick that my dust mask clogged. I literally could not breathe through it. The second session was not very productive because the blower didn’t work properly. The machines are so old and poorly maintained that this particular one just did’t work. The third third time was the charm. The blower worked, and I blew insulation right up to the attic access hatch just as we finished the last bag.
I had hoped that painting would be done by the end of the weekend, but it won’t. That means a delay in picking up and installing the master bathroom vanity. In the meantime, all the interior doors have arrived; they’ll also have to wait for painting to be completed. Once the painting is done, I can start on trim. I think that will mean a production line for painting the baseboards, which will be (at least for now) plain 1×8 boards, possibly with a little decorative trim on top, possibly not. I like Mission style trim, which is plain; that’s good because it makes it much easier to install — no coping required.
In the other meantime, I am almost at the same point on the downstairs at our current house. The doors are up and baseboards are next. Once that’s done, the downstairs will be essentially complete, and we can let our buyers’ lender send out an appraiser. There is a little more work to be done here before we close, but little has a way of turning into not-so-little. If I were prone to getting stressed out, I might consider doing that about now.
Friday evening I walked the dogs up to the new house to make sure the air conditioning was working (it was). On the way back down the drive, Zeke saw a fox cross Lavender Trail. He lunged, and I slipped on the loose gravel. Rather than fall, I let him go, so he tore off across the road and into the woods, dragging his orange leash behind.
As usual, he stayed gone for a while. I found him an hour or so later laid out on his side on our neighbor’s grass. When I leaned down to pet him, I noticed that the dewclaw on his left leg looked odd. I checked closer; it was twisted 180 degrees from normal.
I grabbed this blurred shot of his claw Saturday morning before I took him to the vet.
The claw is supposed to curl backwards, towards his belly. It’s now curved forwards, towards his chin. I was afraid he had wrenched the dewclaw completely around.
The vet we use now doesn’t make appointments, so I just took him in as close to 8 am as I could manage. The waiting area was full. As we stood there, the nail came off his thumb, leaving a little bloody stub of quick. So his dewclaw was not dislocated; he had just torn the nail away from the quick. You can actually see the quick in the photo above if you know what to look for. I shudder to think of how that would feel to a human.
The vet was not too concerned. She stanched the slow dripping of blood and wrapped his foot. The bandage can come off Sunday.
The dewclaw is high enough on Zeke’s leg that it doesn’t actually touch the ground when he walks, but he’s still limping. That may be partly because of how tightly the bandage is wrapped around his toes. We’re giving him pain medication. We’re sure it’s painful. He did almost the same thing a few months ago. Unfortunatley, I don’t think he will learn anything from this.
He has been acting just slightly lethargic and needy lately. He plays fairly actively with Sam, although he usually spends a significant amount of play time lying on his back pushing Sam around with his legs. A pet owner waiting with us at the vet’s asked if Zeke had a few years on him. He does – we’ve had him for 10 years and he was at least a year old when we got him. I was a little surprised that his age was that obvious. It doesn’t seem that way to us. I suppose part of Zeke’s somewhat different behavior could be at least partly due to age.
And now, a Sylvester report. I told the vet about Sylvester’s drooping tail. She said it might be just a sprain (a sprained tail?). She said to give it a month, and if it doesn’t get better to bring him in.
The worst-case scenario is a dead tail. In that case, she might have to amputate. We have been considering renaming him if that happens. My suggestion is Bobtail Catthwait.