The number of people I've met and the friends I’ve made through this blog is truly amazing - some of my very best friends. Some I've never even met, but I feel so incredibly lucky to have you all in my life. People across the country, and across the world, from as far east as Florida to the west - California and even across the Pacific, to Australia!
I’ve seen such incredible acts of kindness from you all. Everything from bags of straw, plastic tote shelters, wooden hut shelters, laundry detergent, food, bowls, tarps, tablecloths, to financial donations. What I do, you can never ever have enough of any of these. In the good weather months, you have your meanies that want to come tear your stuff up, steal, and destroy. So things need to be replaced constantly. And I can’t stress enough, I go through 16 POUNDS of food a DAY – and that’s not leaving a lot for the kitties at each of the 16 or so stops I make. At the most I fill up to medium sized plates or bowls. The bowls are almost always empty at 90% of the locations I go to daily. I try to give each of them a little scoop from four large plastic containers of wet food that I bring with me each morning – that is their favorite. But wet food on top of dry food is very expensive, so that’s all I can give them – just a scoop. That is 8-10 large cans of wet food a day. And in weather like this, if they don’t eat it right away, like the ferals peeking around the corner waiting for me to leave, that food freezes almost instantly. I got off on a different subject, sort of, there… I just wanted you all to know, as much as I’ve thanked you over and over, I can never thank you enough for all you’ve done for me. For the cats.
Yesterday, at one of my spots near Pennsylvania and Fourth Streets, I removed a dead rat from a shelter. I had been noticing an odor for quite some time, and I finally got a very long stick and dragged it out from way back inside, and got rid of it. What a stench. I am sure it was hindering these cats to cozying up in the straw with this dead smelly rat stuck in there. There is another hut shelter I’ve made with a large plastic tarp and rocks holding it down on Short Street, actually a very very nice shelter, but the same thing. There is a terrible odor coming from inside, so I’ve decided that tomorrow I am going to take it apart as little as possible, and open it up to figure out the stench. I have it set up perfectly, so I’ve been dreading doing it for fear I won’t be able to get it back securely like I had it. A person could live inside and be comfortable, somewhat! :)
I miss showing you pictures, I wish Google would fix the problem – actually wish I could change this blog to another site. Any ideas anybody?
All in all, I continue to remain optimistic about life – despite what I see and do each day out there feeding these cats, and I know this cold snap will end soon, and I know Mr. Whiskers will be in someone’s home soon, someone that will love him, and want to get him off the street. He is a good boy and every morning craves my warm hand to pet him. Please spread the word about Mr. Whiskers. Thanks and have a great day!
I feel so bad for people that have to sleep almost literally outdoors and the homeless who do sleep outside in this weather. Here I was upset because we had no heat for 4 hours last night! RG&E had to change the meter at 11 pm because it had gotten water in it that froze and no gas was coming into our house. I am thankful for a warm house.
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