the pitter-patter of medium-sized paws
Mar. 4th, 2012 06:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
arduinnaAbout a month ago, I finally took the plunge and headed up to a local shelter, after months of waiting for the right moment and then weeks of dithering over the cats on their website. I dragged therienne along with me for moral support and drivingness (she'd been there a few months ago to get her new kitten), as well as the loan of one of her sleepypods.
She heroically stuck it out with me for about four hours as I wandered from room to room in an ever-deepening spiral of indecision, despite having pretty quickly narrowed my choices down to four sets of under-2-year-old pairs (I wanted a bonded pair to keep each other company).
But in the end, I went for a pair of 8(ish)-month-old brothers. <3 They'd caught my eye when they showed up on the website a few days earlier, and they were just as cute and appealing in person.
The adoption went relatively smoothly; they were swamped so I had to wait a while, then I got an adoption specialist who told me all the things I was supposed to do (almost none of which I intend to do), down to what brand and flavor of food to buy, and how to clean the litter. *eyeroll* But I nodded earnestly along, tried to clarify the slightly confusing medical records (which took a full month to sort out), and signed where she told me, and then a volunteer brought the boys out.
They were totally silent on the way home except for one forlorn meep from one of them about halfway home, and then were still totally silent at home.therienne and I figured that no one had talked to them when they were small. :( Poor boys. But they were happy to eat a meal, and explore my bedroom, and by that night were already escaping into the rest of the apartment any chance they got. By the next morning, I gave up; ~12 hours' confinement in one room to adapt to being out of a cage/in a new place was going to have to be enough.
I'm terrible at naming cats; my default is LOTR names, but none of the ones available to me really quite work (or I figure the vet staff would never be able to figure them out/spell them). It generally takes me weeks, and this time is no exception. There are still some alternatives that I may fall back on if these turn out not to stick*, but for now...
Meet Darien, the lanky, flirty, ladies' man, aka sun kitty:
(click to embiggen)
... okay, it's hard to see the lankiness there. But so cute. <3
(The Reverse Shatner flirt!)
He's a sweetie who's happy to be cuddled, but is more independent, and usually wants to sleep on his own in a wicker basket or on a chair. He's very very licky, though -- he's usually the one who instigates the head-washing, and if he can't get to his brother, he'll lick me or whatever else he can find. He's a little more delicate all around, and even when they're chasing the red dot together is more likely to lie down and take a breather, letting Hobbes do the work. (Seriously, all I can think of is that scene where during a big fight, Darien gets knocked down and lies there cheering Bobby on while Bobby does all the rest of the fighting.)
I think he's also still teething, as he gets into the basket and chews and chews and chews. *sigh*
Also he tried to eat my coffee table.
Meet Hobbes, the solid, affectionate, intrepid explorer, aka sink kitty:
(click to embiggen)
Seriously, he would live in the sink if he could. If he's not in it, he's next to it, staring into its depths longingly. He doesn't want me to run the water; he just wants the sink to already be wet, by preference.
... checking out the neighbors already, making sure it's safe.
He's the cuddly one of the two; he actively wants to be near someone, whether me or Darien. He keeps going alpha on Darien and biting him in the neck or back, but he grooms him, too. He's also the one who checks things out first: he's gone up to the highest point in the apartment and crawled his way over an open door and onto a bookcase in the next room (he gets very sad when the door isn't opened to exactly the right point so he can do that, and looks woefully at me from atop the wardrobe where he's stuck); he scaled the shovels in the pantry to see what might be at the top of them; he checked out the basket first and made sure it was safe to sleep in (before Darien completely hosied it for himself).
And he's the hunter; he's the one who figured out what toys are first, and started carrying them around the house in triumph, and when I brought home a Da Bird, he's the one who instantly said "OMG A BIRD!! *chase chase chase chase CHASE CHASE CHASE*" (where Darien said "OMG A BIRD *flee flee flee HIDE HIDE HIDE*")
He started all of the hunting by trying to take out the blind cords:
(The blinds won, safely tucked away behind plastic film; his claws had been cut too short at the shelter for him to do any damage. Heh.)
Together, They FightCrime Red Dots! And, you know. Each other. Also they cuddle a lot.
(click to embiggen...)
These were their website pictures, with their previous names; they were also up on a sign at the shelter, urging people to adopt them as a pair (which is where I got this shot):
And this is after they started settling in with me:
(Cooling off after a rousing tandem game of Chase the Red Dot.)
♥ ♥ ♥
Hobbes has found his voice, at least a little; he'll let out little cries now and then. Darien is almost entirely silent, although now he'll let himself grunt when he jumps off of something and lands hard. I know he has a voice, though, because he started wailing in the vet's office when they put drops in his ears in case of mites. (Also, for a skinny, wiry, underfed cat, my god he is strong.) (Ahaha I wrote that before I took them back to the vet for followup shots; he outweighs his brother by half a pound now, having gained about 14 ounces while Hobbesie gained... 2. I think he no longer counts as underfed.)
We had a bit of a health scare the first week that lasted quite a while; the shelter called a few days after I took them home to say they'd been exposed to panleukapenia, which is feline distemper, which is unbelievably contagious and dangerous to cats, especially kittens, who haven't been vaccinated. They'd had their first vaccine, but only a couple weeks before the exposure, so there's a chance it wasn't effective yet. I flashed straight back to Frodo's last few months, with the instant, constant worry and compulsively watching them for signs of distress / imminent disaster.
The incubation period can be anywhere from 2 to 15 days, which is maddening, and not helped by my vet deciding it was reasonably safe to give them their followup vaccine roughly a week after their potential exposure (if he hadn't, it would have meant starting over again from scratch - it really was a totally reasonable thing to do). If the first vaccine hadn't fully protected them, the second one would have acted as a double exposure and made the disease more likely to affect them. So then I got to be on watch for an additional 15 days.
But the extended incubation period is finally over, with both boys still active and hungry and therefore safe. \o/ So now it's also safe to post publicly about them.
So far, it's all working out pretty damn well.
♥
* Okay, so maybe Legolas and Gimli are still in the running, a bit; as are Vinnie and Sonny, and Benny and Ray. But all of those have issues; Hobbes is really too cuddly to be a Gimli; Darien is waaaay too sweet to be Sonny; and I would be forever explaining to people in fandom that no, it's for Ray Vecchio, which would get annoying. And I refuse to call him RayV. So. Darien and Hobbes! (And yeah, I know -- but "Bobby" wasn't working, and "Fawkes" wasn't, either, even though Darien has a foxy face and foxy fur, so Fawkesie would be sort of awesomely punny.) back to the rest of the story
therienne along with me for moral support and drivingness (she'd been there a few months ago to get her new kitten), as well as the loan of one of her sleepypods.She heroically stuck it out with me for about four hours as I wandered from room to room in an ever-deepening spiral of indecision, despite having pretty quickly narrowed my choices down to four sets of under-2-year-old pairs (I wanted a bonded pair to keep each other company).
But in the end, I went for a pair of 8(ish)-month-old brothers. <3 They'd caught my eye when they showed up on the website a few days earlier, and they were just as cute and appealing in person.
The adoption went relatively smoothly; they were swamped so I had to wait a while, then I got an adoption specialist who told me all the things I was supposed to do (almost none of which I intend to do), down to what brand and flavor of food to buy, and how to clean the litter. *eyeroll* But I nodded earnestly along, tried to clarify the slightly confusing medical records (which took a full month to sort out), and signed where she told me, and then a volunteer brought the boys out.
They were totally silent on the way home except for one forlorn meep from one of them about halfway home, and then were still totally silent at home.
therienne and I figured that no one had talked to them when they were small. :( Poor boys. But they were happy to eat a meal, and explore my bedroom, and by that night were already escaping into the rest of the apartment any chance they got. By the next morning, I gave up; ~12 hours' confinement in one room to adapt to being out of a cage/in a new place was going to have to be enough.I'm terrible at naming cats; my default is LOTR names, but none of the ones available to me really quite work (or I figure the vet staff would never be able to figure them out/spell them). It generally takes me weeks, and this time is no exception. There are still some alternatives that I may fall back on if these turn out not to stick*, but for now...
Meet Darien, the lanky, flirty, ladies' man, aka sun kitty:
(click to embiggen)
... okay, it's hard to see the lankiness there. But so cute. <3
(The Reverse Shatner flirt!)
He's a sweetie who's happy to be cuddled, but is more independent, and usually wants to sleep on his own in a wicker basket or on a chair. He's very very licky, though -- he's usually the one who instigates the head-washing, and if he can't get to his brother, he'll lick me or whatever else he can find. He's a little more delicate all around, and even when they're chasing the red dot together is more likely to lie down and take a breather, letting Hobbes do the work. (Seriously, all I can think of is that scene where during a big fight, Darien gets knocked down and lies there cheering Bobby on while Bobby does all the rest of the fighting.)
I think he's also still teething, as he gets into the basket and chews and chews and chews. *sigh*
Also he tried to eat my coffee table.
Meet Hobbes, the solid, affectionate, intrepid explorer, aka sink kitty:
(click to embiggen)
Seriously, he would live in the sink if he could. If he's not in it, he's next to it, staring into its depths longingly. He doesn't want me to run the water; he just wants the sink to already be wet, by preference.
... checking out the neighbors already, making sure it's safe.
He's the cuddly one of the two; he actively wants to be near someone, whether me or Darien. He keeps going alpha on Darien and biting him in the neck or back, but he grooms him, too. He's also the one who checks things out first: he's gone up to the highest point in the apartment and crawled his way over an open door and onto a bookcase in the next room (he gets very sad when the door isn't opened to exactly the right point so he can do that, and looks woefully at me from atop the wardrobe where he's stuck); he scaled the shovels in the pantry to see what might be at the top of them; he checked out the basket first and made sure it was safe to sleep in (before Darien completely hosied it for himself).
And he's the hunter; he's the one who figured out what toys are first, and started carrying them around the house in triumph, and when I brought home a Da Bird, he's the one who instantly said "OMG A BIRD!! *chase chase chase chase CHASE CHASE CHASE*" (where Darien said "OMG A BIRD *flee flee flee HIDE HIDE HIDE*")
He started all of the hunting by trying to take out the blind cords:
(The blinds won, safely tucked away behind plastic film; his claws had been cut too short at the shelter for him to do any damage. Heh.)
Together, They Fight
(click to embiggen...)
These were their website pictures, with their previous names; they were also up on a sign at the shelter, urging people to adopt them as a pair (which is where I got this shot):
And this is after they started settling in with me:
(Cooling off after a rousing tandem game of Chase the Red Dot.)
♥ ♥ ♥
Hobbes has found his voice, at least a little; he'll let out little cries now and then. Darien is almost entirely silent, although now he'll let himself grunt when he jumps off of something and lands hard. I know he has a voice, though, because he started wailing in the vet's office when they put drops in his ears in case of mites. (Also, for a skinny, wiry, underfed cat, my god he is strong.) (Ahaha I wrote that before I took them back to the vet for followup shots; he outweighs his brother by half a pound now, having gained about 14 ounces while Hobbesie gained... 2. I think he no longer counts as underfed.)
We had a bit of a health scare the first week that lasted quite a while; the shelter called a few days after I took them home to say they'd been exposed to panleukapenia, which is feline distemper, which is unbelievably contagious and dangerous to cats, especially kittens, who haven't been vaccinated. They'd had their first vaccine, but only a couple weeks before the exposure, so there's a chance it wasn't effective yet. I flashed straight back to Frodo's last few months, with the instant, constant worry and compulsively watching them for signs of distress / imminent disaster.
The incubation period can be anywhere from 2 to 15 days, which is maddening, and not helped by my vet deciding it was reasonably safe to give them their followup vaccine roughly a week after their potential exposure (if he hadn't, it would have meant starting over again from scratch - it really was a totally reasonable thing to do). If the first vaccine hadn't fully protected them, the second one would have acted as a double exposure and made the disease more likely to affect them. So then I got to be on watch for an additional 15 days.
But the extended incubation period is finally over, with both boys still active and hungry and therefore safe. \o/ So now it's also safe to post publicly about them.
So far, it's all working out pretty damn well.
♥
* Okay, so maybe Legolas and Gimli are still in the running, a bit; as are Vinnie and Sonny, and Benny and Ray. But all of those have issues; Hobbes is really too cuddly to be a Gimli; Darien is waaaay too sweet to be Sonny; and I would be forever explaining to people in fandom that no, it's for Ray Vecchio, which would get annoying. And I refuse to call him RayV. So. Darien and Hobbes! (And yeah, I know -- but "Bobby" wasn't working, and "Fawkes" wasn't, either, even though Darien has a foxy face and foxy fur, so Fawkesie would be sort of awesomely punny.) back to the rest of the story
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Date: 2012-03-04 11:59 pm (UTC)\o/
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Date: 2012-03-05 12:16 am (UTC)I have, like, 600 pictures of them already. They are SO CUTE.
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Date: 2012-03-05 12:58 am (UTC)Congrats on the successful adoption!
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Date: 2012-03-05 03:50 am (UTC)But totally cutest kitties ever <3 <3
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Date: 2012-03-05 06:37 am (UTC)kittiiiiiies ♥
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Date: 2012-03-05 05:08 pm (UTC)<3
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Date: 2012-03-05 03:35 am (UTC)Oh, the chewing. My Mister E started rampantly chewing All The Leather in the house a few months ago, and I don't know what to do. I bought him scraps of leather and he cares not for them.
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Date: 2012-03-05 03:57 am (UTC)Hee!
I bet it's teething; they go through two rounds of it, one to get their milk teeth when they're tiny, then again over several months as their baby teeth fall out and their adult teeth grow in. It can last till they're 8 or 9 months old, I think. I'm hoping Dari will outgrow it! Hopefully Mister E will, too. *fingers crossed*
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Date: 2012-03-05 03:59 am (UTC)Then again, I haven't caught him chewing on anything in a couple of weeks. :D
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Date: 2012-03-05 05:00 pm (UTC)Oh, they are so sweet looking. Congrats on the new additions! I'm also relieved to hear the health scare was just a scare.
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Date: 2012-03-06 02:25 am (UTC)I had a health scare when Blues came home, the first weekend, and I thought he'd actually died. I was terrified. Then he was all, like, What? Come feed me? after I woke up, expecting to take his little body out and bury it. Damn cats. They get you coming and going.
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Date: 2012-03-06 06:48 pm (UTC)Ack, on Blues's health scare! They really are such little bastards, aren't they? It's lucky for them they're so damn cute.
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Date: 2012-03-09 07:08 pm (UTC)teh cuteness
Date: 2012-03-17 02:10 pm (UTC)