The Cats Rats!

Rats and Cats - I don't get it.  I am, and have been for a while now, seeing rats the size of cats.  Well, I might be exaggerating.  Large kittens at least.   And they run right under foot of the cats.  I have a sneaking suspicion that the rats come and chow on the food as soon as I leave.  The dishes are sometimes scattered and turned over.  You can tell if it was a raccoon because they are very messy eaters and will leave bugs and worms and rocks in the dishes.  How come the cats are not chasing away the rats?  Its getting harder and harder at some of my spots to keep clean, and make sure its the cats that are eating the food.  Does anyone know the psyche of these creatures, and how they live together peacefully?  I thought cats hated rats!?!

I had to let Spencer back out onto the streets yesterday after I had him at the clinic for neuter.  It was very sad.  He stayed overnight in a very large carrier and I am sure was scared to death.  One day I will find him a home.  Please help me find him a home, and the five kittens and their mom that are in our care.

A few houses down from Crazy Lisa's house on Parsells, I feed a few kitties on the porch of a vacant house.  Its a duplex.  After Lisa had begun to throw the food I was leaving under a tree outside her house a year or so ago, I looked around and found this porch.  One day a young black girl, school age, was standing to the right of the house, on her porch.  I told her about what I was doing and was trying to find a spot to feed the kitties, and she said it was ok to put the food on the porch next door because her grandmother had died and no one lived there.  So I've been feeding there since.  Have trapped a lot of kitties, and rescued a lot.  Most recent, I think, was Patches.  Before Patches it was my Skinny Minnie, the pregnant kitty.  This morning I pulled up, and its garbage day for the city, and I saw some furniture put out by the family next door.  Looks like a faux leather couch and chair.  The arm of the chair is very wide - looks like it was comfortable back in its day - it was wrapped in duct tape.  Not just one piece, but the whole arm.  I thought to myself - this is poverty.  This family, this young school girl, they could not afford another chair, and had wrapped this chair up so many times, they just couldn't do it anymore, and off it went to the side of the road.  I immediately thought, oh, I would love to get someone to donate a used chair for them.  But then realized this might be an insult to them, and it would also bring attention to the feeding next door.  So I let it go.  But how sad is that.  There are people living in extreme poverty right under our noses.

So today, I will be thankful for the little I have.  Everyone is fighting some battle, so be kind, and be generous.  Do something kind for someone today.  No matter how big or how small.   The young, the old, the innocent, the poor.  Everyone and everything matters.

"We are not rich by what we possess but by what we can do without."