Clean up on aisle 4!
Pets add so much to one’s life. When I come through the door at the end of a long, hard day, I know our cat, Beeby, will be there to greet me – with a fresh pile of cat-gack.
Beeby threw up just about every day last week. She anointed the basement stairs, a dining room chair, the dining room floor (twice), and another chair. I found her coming out of the depths of my closet late one night and, frankly, I’m afraid to look. I’ll deal with it tomorrow.
We’re playing a fun game of vomit hide-and-seek. Where will she strike next?
Of course I’m sorry she’s sick, but she’s bringing it on herself. Our sweet little cat is an addict. Her drug of choice? She’s hooked on the demon palm frond.
Well, not the demon palm frond; it’s actually the holy palm frond.
On Palm Sunday, the week before Easter, Christians remember Jesus’ triumphant entrance into Jerusalem. In our church, the priest blesses palm fronds and we wave them in a joyful halleluiah procession around the church.
When we got home from church, we put the fronds on the kitchen counter and forgot about them. Beeby found them. For several days in a row, I found slightly mangled palm fronds lying about and put them back up on the counter. I thought she was just playing with them.
Maybe I just didn’t want to see the truth. I knew she had a problem. That’s why we can never have fresh flowers in the house. And ears of corn still in the husk? Forget it! It would be like waving a red flag before a bull.
But as God as my witness, I never suspected Beeby was hooked on fronds!
Until I took a really good look at the gack. That’s when it hit me – we had a feline frond addict, and we were living in a sanctified vomitorium.
Once we figured it out, we put them up high. When we got home we found she’d jumped up 7 feet to get her fix. Addicts are wily that way. We finally just removed the temptation from the house.
Beeby has been in detox for days. I won’t lie – it was rough. But I think the junk has finally worked itself out of her system. She seems calmer and the gack-attacks have stopped.
Sure, I blame myself. I wonder whether she will stay clean, or if she will move on to the really hard stuff: brooms, straw hats, silk flowers. In the end, only Beeby can make that choice.
Peg-o-Leg's Ramblings 
Uh, Peg, I’m afraid I can’t come over to play today. I’m, um, busy. Something came up (and up and up).
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No, it’s safe now. She’s not gacking anymore. Just wear your high boots because she’s peeing everywhere.
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Really busy…maybe some other time…
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Darn! I was hoping you could come to the shelter with me to pick out 10 more cats to complete my descent into “that-crazy-old lady-with-the cat-pee-house.”
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lol awww poor Beeby. My cats are wild about anything green or straw-like. I can’t keep plants in the house because I have to put them so far out of reach that I can’t ever look at them. I constantly have to keep an eye on my straw brooms, and if I ever leave raffia or other enticing craft supplies out, I might as well strap in for a “pull the strings out of the esophagus” game. Nice pet detective work. I hope your kitty feels better – and perhaps develops some divine powers?
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I didn’t know that was a cat fetish – good to know. Actually, I’m at my wits end with her. She’s started peeing on the floor 1 foot away from the litter box. GAAAAAAGGGGHHH!!!!!!!
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If she’s the only cat you have and the box is clean, you might want to take her to the vet. I don’t want to sound like a crazy cat lady or anything, but when my cats pee outside the box , I take them to the vet because there’s usually something up. But maybe once she gets the Holy Ghost out of her body, she’ll go back to normal. Ugh – good luck with the mess, Peg. Cats are great but when they act up it’s so frustrating to deal with.
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Do you think changing the litter might help? I always buy what’s on sale, but do cats have some brands they don’t like? Great to think Beeby has such brand-loyalty she’d rather pee, than switch.
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Don’t know why I can’t reply to yours, but this will do. Yes, the litter is definitely a possibility. When my parents had my cats for a week last summer, one of them kept peeing outside the box until she switched to the litter I use. Fickle little buggers. Try the litter – it’s cheaper than the vet and it might be an easy fix!
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Beeby associates the litter box with pain (upon urination) so she is doing the best she can by getting close to it, but she won’t get in it. It is a clear sign of a painful UTI, FUS or FLUTD. Get her checked immediately.
No charge this time for advice from Dr. Mollie
But seriously, I happen to be an authority on all things cat pee (don’t ask).
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I have to ask. Why?
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Wellll, I had a male cat Blackie jr. who suffered from chronic FUS/FLUTD. That prompted me to learning everything I could about it. Which led to learning everything I could about commercial pet food. I’m kind of obsessive, but in a good way. That led to my blog Poisoned Pets on WP.
The other reason I am an certified Cat Pee Specialist is I have this cat, Chubby Cheeks (his face, not his butt) who insists on marking everything in the house that is within range of his butt. Needless to say, had I bought stock in Nature’s Miracle, I would be a rich woman by now. But the reality is, my house smells like a barn and I don’t have the heart to get rid of poor Chubbers. Two common symptom of Crazy Cat Lady Disorder (CCLD).
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I think CCLD is more common than we think. Sounds like you’ve learned to cope admirably, though.
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How lovely to have your home so consistently blessed with the Mystery of the Resurr-ack-tion.
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Good one! (giggle, giggle)
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Very good.
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Funny, but remember, cats are only one step removed from their jungle counterparts so sleep with one eye open. Without the fronds she’ll be looking for a new food source.
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I keep the bedroom door closed. And locked.
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Usually animals eat grass and such, to get sick for reason and on purpose. I’d have to investigate further to find the reason behind it…. How bout just needing some fresh air and greens? I’ve always thought it hard on any animal to be left inside all day, with nothing to do…. What do they do with the energy and life force that nature gave them. Personally, I think the few minutes people spend with their animals, for the lifestyle the animal leads, is cruel. Have you ever looked a little deeper at the quality of life your pet actually leads. Not a popular comment, although I’m sure you feel you are giving your cat a good life, this is the intention anyway.
Food for thought. C*
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That is food for thought. I agree with you to a certain extent, but what is the alternative for the pet?
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I’m a freelance writer and a housewife, and I spend all day in the same house with my cats. I can assure you that they don’t do much of anything in the daytime when their owners are away. Their pent up energy (built up by sleeping twenty hours a day) is spent by rip-roaring through the house in the middle of the night, knocking things down, slamming cabinet doors, and bouncing on sleeping people. Then they find a windowsill and snooze for hours until someone fills the food bowl.
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Hey, your cats are living my retirement plan!
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Hilarious.
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Thanks!
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You could Beeby’s divine gifts Holy Crap, but technically it is Holy Barf. But who want to quibble over Beebe’s failed attempt to honor Jesus’ return to Jerusalem when she mistakenly thought eating the fronds would bring her closer to God.
But the real miracle is that when you looked really closely at her barf, you could almost make out the image of…OMG…could it be – JESUS? Holy crap!
This makes the image of Jesus burned on the tortilla look like, well, a burned tortilla.
Have you checked Beeby’s paws for signs of blood? She could be channeling Jesus’ injuries from when he was nailed to the cross. I tell you, if my cat bled on my early 19th Century couch covered in Schumacher ivory silk, I think I’d nail it to a cross.
Lord, forgive me for my blasphemy.
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I just don’t want to be standing too close to you when you get hit by lightning. Just sayin’…
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Typo: You could think of Beeby’s divine gifts as Holy Crap….
What a dope. Proofread your posts Mollie
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I hope Beeby’s feeling better soon…I would opt for the vet too…I’ve had male cats with FUS…not fun for anybody!
We once had a cat who enjoyed eating human hair…it had belonged to my oldest daughter’s babysitter. One morning, she woke up to discover the cat had chewed her bangs off during the night! Needless to say, we didn’t let it sleep with anyone at our house!
Wendy
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That sounds like the plot of a teen horror flick – eew!
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You must be saddened by Beeby’s lack of respect for your religious beliefs. She could eat anything she wanted, but she insisted on eating your blessed palm fronds.
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Maybe it’s her way of joining in the celebration. Or else she’s just psycho.
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My friend adopted a cat that constantly did its thing on the kitchen rug. She switched to that Arm and Hammer clumping litter a couple of weeks ago, and the cat immediately stopped messing on the floor. It’s worth a try.
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Arm & Hammer has baking soda in it which is highly toxic for cats. They groom themselves constantly, so if it’s in there that ain’t good: http://pets.webmd.com/cats/slideshow-foods-your-cat-should-never-eat#
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Only in huge amounts. Cleaning themselves isn’t enough to produce any sort of reaction. I know a lot of happy cat owners that swear by this litter and that link is the only one I’ve found that suggests baking soda is toxic to cats. And it is – in enormous doses. So just don’t dump a box on their face or anything.
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Oh, that’s a relief! I swear, you have to triple check info on the net. I remember reading it somewhere a while back, so I Googled it and just grabbed the first decent link I could find. Who knew WebMD for pets wasn’t reliable? Thanks Jackie for clearing that up! God, I was all paranoid about cleaning with baking soda. Whew!
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Thanks, all, for the advice. I’m going to buy some today. In addition to peeing 2 feet from the litter box, she’s picked out a spot on the basement floor. And I can’t let her into the living room anymore because she goes on a spot under the window.
I keep cleaning all these spots with carpet cleaners or bleach. I don’t know what else to do. I’m kind of at the end of my rope.
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Litter, then vet. 🙂 It will work out – I can’t imagine how out of patience you must be at this point. Be strong!
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I know, right?! It’s so hard to weed through things to be worried about and things not to be worried about. As if being paranoid about what we put in our bodies isn’t enough, we’ve gotta look out for out critters as well 🙂 So glad for that link though – definitely learned some other things while I was checking it out!
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