LESTER AND 'BABY'

Baby

Lester

Last weekend we were contacted by a couple from Hull who needed someone to look after, and probably re-home, the husband's mother's cat as she'd been in hospital (in Sunderland, in case you were thinking we'd extended the base of our operations) and was likely to end up not being able to return home. Needless to say we were willing to help. They came up the following day and brought the cat -Lester- to our house. He's 15 and friendly and very loud when ignored or locked in a cat carrier. They were a nice genuine couple and it was a pleasure to meet them. By a strange coincidence, one of my retired friends from work (whom I meet for coffee once a week with another ex-colleague) was old friend of the elderly lady's daughter who lives in the States.

Anyway, I took Lester to Carol's and began to think that he might be suitable for Lilian, the special needs person we tried with a different cat (see recent posts). I arranged for Lester to have a health check on Friday morning at Vets4Pets and pretty much talked Susan into letting Lilian have Lester. He was an old house cat who just wanted food, litter tray, sleep and lots of affection and until we actually got to the vets I was still thinking that.

Problem turns out to be that he might have either kidney or thyroid problems. He was obviously a big cat who had lost a lot of weight. Now while this might have been due to erratic feeding by a neighbour, some kind of illness seems more likely. It wouldn't be fair to Lilian to give her a sick cat and she wouldn't be capable of medicating him.

Carol, however, knew some one who would take him and had experience with cats in general and also cats with thyroid problems. This was Rachel who lives at South Shields and already has five rescued adult cats. I took him there this morning and it's looking very good. Lester was unphased about being somewhere new and started casing the joint immediately. Here's a photo of him with Rachel.

Meanwhile the blood test proved negative for kidney problems so samples have been sent away for thyroid tests. If he needs medication we can pay for that but we don't want to put an elderly cat through an expensive operation. Hopefully we won't have to make that choice.

Now, as for Baby, she is a friendly 8 year old who has been with Carol a few weeks. She's a nice adaptable cat and Carol and I agreed that I'd take her to Lilian instead of Lester. Unluckily she didn't have the best start.

I'd barely set off in the van before I smelled something poo-ey. Yes, she'd had an accident. Then she had another one as the carrier rolled over and she got smeared in the stuff. When I got her out of the box I had to take her to the abathroom to clean her up which was neither easy nor pleasant for me, involved some bloodletting (mine, not hers) and a little traumatising for Baby. She calmed down though and when I left she was sitting on the couch being stroked by Lilian.

A few hours later Lilian rang to say the cat was missing. How long for? I asked. Ten minutes, she replied. Showing great restraint, I did not slam the phone down but quietly said that the cat was just exploring. When I rang back ninety minutes later all was well. I'll call in tomorrow to see for myself, but I'm hopeful.

Here are pictures of some more cats wanting homes.

These two are in the same small shed together. The top cat (actually underneath the bottom cat, if you see what I mean) is friendly but nervous. The long haired tortoiseshell is a lovely friendly 6-year old. I picked him up and he started rubbing his face against my cheek and purring loudly. He has a nervous brother who is out of sight and hiding on a shelf underneath the top cat and they have to be rehomed together (but not with the top cat).