Thursday

 A former adopter sent me the following pics to share with everyone.  This is Claus, who was a polydactl cat that my foster Sue took in.  He was the cutest little kitten, and has turned into a very cute older kitten!  Thanks Steve for adopting Claus!  

The adult tux on 7th and Central that I was able to rescue maybe three weeks ago has been adopted by the woman that wanted to pay for her vetting, and then turn over to another foster, wound up being adopted before he could even go to foster care.  The woman that wanted to vet adopted him!  I called him Gabi, because he was so vocal each time I pulled up to him on Central to feed him on the porch of this vacant house there.  I am sure 'Debbie' has renamed him, as most adopters do.  He is a lucky little boy.  No more struggling on the streets for you Gabi.  

I am getting tons of updates from two batches of kittens I've last rescued, and I need to upload their pics and I will post them.  Just the cutest little things.  Costly and destructive to start with, but they turn the corner when adopted.  People just don't realize the cost of getting them to the point of adoption, and how time consuming it is, not to mention the price you pay.  Especially when you have SEVEN at once!

We now need to get the mommy of the last seven kittens adopted.  Felicity.  She is the sweetest little female.  Petite, and loving and follows you around like a dog.  In fact, she also is compatible with dogs, thanks to Foster Mom Sue who has Rose, loud barking dog whenever I step foot in her house.  :)  But Rose is very sweet and I am sure if I were there enough, she would come to love and trust me.  :)

Huey the kitten is still available.  His brothers Dewey and Louie went to their new homes, but poor baby Huey has not had anyone asking about him.  Lets get him adopted!  He is tinier than he looks in this picture!  Thanks to Sheryl for fostering him!

The cats I feed under a tree on Parsells, due to the very nasty man that lives in the back apartment of this house that tore up my shelter that I tried to build on the city lot in back of it, I found a dead black one, one of the ones that I was feeding.  It was just laying under the tree.  If I didn't notice its face that looked like it got hit, I would have sworn the man poisoned it.  In fact I have not seen the sweet red tabby in weeks either.  I am keeping my eye on this situation, but in the meantime, I must find a kind person in that vicinity that I can place some shelters and a feeding station for when the weather turns bad.  I've met someone recently that lives in the next block down, but too far down to coax the cats to go there.  In fact this morning, as I got in my car to leave after placing food under the tree (that is removed and thrown away after the nasty man gets up in the morning), I saw a fat rat waddle its way over and sat there WITH the cats and eat the food.  

Have a great day!

Tuesday Trials

 

Its been a while.  Life is busy.  A week ago this past Saturday, I was able to rescue ‘Gabi’, the black and white kitty that ‘gabs’ a lot, each time I pulled up to this boarded up house on Central and 7^th.  He was due for rescue.  Just a sweet boy, and come to find out already neutered.  I was only able to make this happen thanks to a woman named Deb, who offered to come get him, keep him, and get him to the vet sometime that week.  It was also due to the fact that Kristin offered up her mom to foster after the vet visit.  Deb would be delivering Gabi and Kristin would bring him to Sue’s house.  He was brought to the vet last Friday, clean bill of health, and is up for adoption to the right person.  He is a very sweet cat.

Yesterday I picked up the SEVEN kittens from Sue’s house to bring for a check up and deworming at the vet.  Sue asked me to keep them after that, and I agreed, reluctantly.  I am so sick of kittens, as adorable as they are, they are so much work.  And Sue --- I don’t know how she has done it over the years for me.  She is a true angel on this earth.  I completely understand her ‘kitten burnout’.  They are messy little things, and I am not much for messes.  But thankfully, they are all adopted, and will be going to their new homes.  Sheryl will have one left out of the three she has fostered for me, one going to its new home tomorrow, the other was delivered last week to its new home.  Hopefully he will not be too lonely without his siblings, and gets adopted quickly.  They are all totally adorable and in all honesty, I am enjoying them (knowing they won't be with me next week!)  Pics above of some of them.

This is mom Felicity, that is also up for adoption.  She is the SWEETEST!

I am not sure if I mentioned this, but there is a man on Parsells, who lives in Lisa’s old apartment (remember Crazy Lisa?), who keeps throwing away the food I leave under the tree next door to the CITY LOT near the curb for the 8+ cats that have been left ‘double homeless’ due to the people a few houses down that placed their huts to the curb for trash a month or two prior.  When we went to rebuild the huts on the CITY OWNED property, the man trashed them, and put the huts down a few houses down for trash day on Wednesday, which I spotted and was able to take before the trash collectors came along.  Let’s call the #@$@% “sneaky Pete’.  JERK.  Luckily the weather has been mild enough that I am not too worried about the cats yet, but I must find an alternative.   I just can’t understand how mean people can be when it comes to animals suffering right under their nose.  Not even leave a bowl of water.  I am grateful I’ve had a large supply thanks to donations years ago, of paper plates and bowls.  The guy even put a note on the tree weeks ago, not to feed the cats.  I’ll be damned before I allow a cat to starve.  So they get to eat between 5 am., when I leave the food, until the $@%@#$ wakes up, goes out and throws it all away.  Mean Mean Mean.  Just let him confront me some morning.  I have every right to feed them on this CITY OWNED property.

I need adult fosters!  You will never know gratitude once you foster an adult cat, and see them change from scrawny and frightened, to a sleek and loving cat.  Try it!  All you need is a room, and patience and love.

Have a great day!

Happy Monday

 Well it was an interesting Saturday.  Sheryl and I were out in the am. doing our thing, and while on Grand and Stout, I  hear a gunshot.  It was about 5:30 am.  I asked Sheryl, did you hear that, and she responded no.  I said, well I did.  So we finished up feeding the cats there, and went off to the next location on Garson.  This spot is on the side of someone's porch in front, and they've allowed me to do this for years.  As I was finishing up - and I am bending down with my butt flashing the street - in my peripheral site I could see a light shining at me.  I finished up, stood up, turned around and there was a cop standing with his car parked in the street, and gun drawn and pointed toward me.  Whoa! HELLo.  He asked what are you doing?  I said as I walked toward him, I am feeding cats, I have permission to do it by the homeowner.  Now, obviously I must look suspicious to cars going by.  I know that.  But draw your gun?  Geez...  can't he see my beautiful ass in my sugar skull leggings with that flashlight?  ha ha.   Anyways, he then went on to ask if I heard a gunshot.  I said yes, and I thought you guys would have been around sooner.  He asked when I heard it.  I said five minutes or so.  Maybe I should have said 10.   Anyways, he asked where I heard it coming from, I pointed and told him northeast way.  He said thanks, and then said, you've been doing this a long time haven't you?  I said yes, and then I said too long.  He told me to be careful and I thanked him and drove off.  Then there were five more police cars and they were there for a while.  It was not where the gunshot came from.  Hmmm.

The shelter I had built on Parsells, just a ways down from where they used to be until someone put them to the curb and cut down the bush that protected them, and the spot where Willie said I could put them because it was city property, was trashed.  The shelters were put to the curb.  Obviously, I was upset about this, and they took my board and heavy pallet we carried to that spot in the dark one morning a week or two after meeting Willie on his porch.  Knowing that there are at least 8 cats that depended on me feeding them, I said to hell with that, and I placed three paper plates under the tree there in front of the CITY OWNED lot, and fed the poor things. The next morning there was a note on the tree there not to feed the cats.  I ripped it down and threw it away.  I know I need to go door to door again and find someone with some compassion in that area, but I don't think I am going to find that person.  There is a very sweet red tabby that needs to be rescued.  The others shy away from me.  The red is very sweet and friendly.  Anybody?  Foster?  I have lots of people that want red tabbies to adopt!  This situation has really upset me.  I think about it constantly, especially leaving the food there on a morning that its pouring rain.  Rain for now, then snow?

The black and white kitty that cries and cries each morning that I pull up to Seventh and Central is still on the street.  We are waiting for a spot at the clinic to have him looked at and then will possibly be  fostered.  He has a monkey tail, and I wish I had named him Monkey - actually, that is what I will name him and I will have the clinic change it to that when I get the appointment.  I initially called him Lucky Seven.

The kittens that Sue is fostering are slowly being adopted.  We've had a flurry of applications for them.  We call them the Yellowstone kids.  All named after the characters in the series Yellowstone.  They are ADORABLE.  So is Momma Felicity, picture above.  

Sheryl's batch are the cutest ever.  All black, and two have multi toes.  I went to deworm them this weekend and they are just too adorable.  One is being adopted already.  

Spread the word!  And please consider foster for the adults out there.  They really need our help before the winter arrives.  Thank you, and have a great day!

"Compassion is to look beyond your own pain,

to see the pain of others."

Memories...

 

Dear Diary… woops, I mean dear Blog.  Its been a long time.  Where do I begin?

Lets start with my memory.  And what I actually can remember.  A few weeks back, my shelters on Parsells were moved to the street and the bushes that they were hidden in were cut down.  A sign posted said don’t feed cats, we have a rat problem.  I, of course, could understand, but what to do about all those cats that are starving every day?  I have been feeding a few houses down the street under a tree since.  I knew I had to figure out a solution, so I enlisted Kristin’s help and we went a’knockin on doors on Labor Day morning.  As we drove up to the spot, there was a man on his porch having his coffee.  We got out and slowly approached him, explained what we were there for, and we got to talking.  His name was Willie, and after a long conversation, we finally were able to figure out where we could build another shelter – the city lot next door.  Now, mind you, this is where CRAZY LISA used to live.  That was one of the first things I had asked him when I walked up, was if she still lived there. He said no, she was in a hospital somewhere.  Lisa had severe mental problems.  If you did a search in my blog, you would read about the many encounters that myself and the police have had with her.  Anyhow, this man was very kind, even though he picks up the dishes I leave there in the dark in the morning, because the rats and raccoons come out and he doesn’t want them fed.  I can understand.  So in a few weekends, Kristin can help me build, I hope! Oh, and by the way, the man had tried to grow tomatoes in a pot on his porch, but he didn't realize that the pots needed holes and the plants were waterlogged, so the next morning, I left him a bag of Dunkin Donuts coffee and a few tomatoes from my garden.  I hope he liked it!  :) 

We also took in a mother and seven kittens, thanks to Sue offering to foster.  God knows I can’t do it, and never want to again.  Kittens are so destructive and I’ve had about enough.  I can’t begin to count the number of kittens I’ve had under my wing this year.  Ugh. We are thinking of naming them after Yellowstone series characters.  Ya gotta get creative when you have to name SEVEN kittens, and you’ve already named a gazillion kittens and cats in your lifetime before.  Mom's name is Felicity.

This weekend we may be able to rescue the black and white kitty from Seventh and Central thanks to Kristin’s mom offering to foster.  We just need then to wait for his neuter clinic date.  Then we put him up for adoption.  Thank God we have people that want an adult cat and not a kitten!  We really need more fosters for adults.  

UPDATED:  A fellow feeder/rescuer? that I have never met reached out to me and told me about a red tabby she had picked up near one of my spots on Grand Avenue because he looked sick or injured, and she had him vetted and treated, and asked if I could post him around for adoption.  I did, and voila, a former co-worker from the law firm I used to work for reached out to ask about him, Oakley.  She had lost her husband recently and her old cat had passed away, and she saw Oakley and felt a connection with him.  She went to visit him yesterday, and he is now going to be adopted by her on Saturday.  See?  Give the older cats a try.  There are at least 10 cats I can count on the street just as sweet as this one.  Please consider.

Otherwise, I am still out there doing this, and its crazy.  Thanks so much to June and Sheryl, my only helpers at this point.  I know they can’t do it forever.  Neither can I.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention others in this post.  I used to do daily blogs and tried always to remember to thank those that help me, but now I can only write once a week if I am lucky (work!), and sometimes, when I think about it, there are SO many that help me.  Esther has been doing four of my spots, and Danielle and Chuck feed on Parsells in the back parking lot of Chuck's job site.  All of you are invaluable to me!  And there is Kim who fills cat food into bags for me most of the time, and carries them to the truck.  Couldn't do it without you peeps!  

Have a great day!

"All we have is now."

Hump Day!

 

Yes, it was pedicure day.  I was also shucking corn and stuck a piece of silk in my toe.  I know, I am nuts.

Crazy week.  Lots of cats out there.  Its so sad.  At my first location on Parsells, they cut down the bush there and placed all my shelters that were hidden behind there out to the curb.  Remember this was the spot last winter where I found a guy huddled in 20 degrees with no coat on asking me to call an ambulance.  He was laying on top of the shelters behind this huge bush.  Granted, I know there are rats, I see them scurrying a lot, but there is also a lot of trash on this property and its surrounding.  I’ve counted up to 8 cats there.  There is one sweet precious red tabby, very thin, and friendly, that comes up when I am pouring the food (yes, this has not stopped me from setting plates on the side of the house with a bowl of water for those starving cats).  At least they can eat until whoever throws it all away.  Just so sad.  I have no idea what I will do come the dreaded cold and nasty weather.

The cats on Grand Avenue are out of control.  They are all precious and friendly there, and I would love to have more fosters to take in adult cats – there are so many people out there that will adopt them once we can get them into a home and get some pictures, and obviously I would get them vetted first.

I’ve got all the kittens I had under my care adopted except for one.  Sue got her Claus, Odie and Lola adopted (Lola was adopted by my cousin’s son, and that is going to be one spoiled kitty!).  The kittens she was fostering, Rue and Squeaker, were adopted together by a woman that has horses out in Mendon.  Nice couple she and her boyfriend.  They are totally in love with these two little kittens.  Caesar and Katniss, the black kittens left with Sheryl, will be delivered to their new home on Friday!  And my six- GOD are they destructive! – are all adopted but one.  Lotus will go to her new home with new brother and sister adult cats – Chevy and Catalina are going together to their new home with their new adult brother Sprocket, and Camaro and Shelby will go to their new home together at the end of September – their new adopters are going on vacation mid-September. 

So all is good, I am so glad to know that we saved all these kitties, and none will ever reproduce because they will all be spayed and neutered.

Random pic:  This dead guinea pig was spotted on the corner of Second Street and Central Park.  How would a guinea pig wind up there?  So sad to think about.

 

This cat on Seventh Street and Central really needs a home.  So lonely, and you could easily trip when you pull up to this abandoned house where he sits and waits for someone to come along, every day.  Poor thing.  Very sweet and friendly, and very homeless.

 

Summer is winding down, and I need to start thinking about reinsulating some of the shelters out there.  Even if I never go out to feed again, the cats will at least have something to crawl into during inclement weather.  Its sad to think that I wouldn’t be able to feed them – but its reality.  I have no successor, and the funds are dwindling.  I can’t go on forever. 

Have a great day!

"Hope is the last thing ever lost."

The Weekly Chronicle

To answer the question on my last post...  My Ralphie died.  It took only 1 month and a few weeks before pancreatic cancer took its deathly toll on him.  I think of him each time I see woods, country fields, as I look up into the trees, when I see wildlife, when I look up into the sky and watch the clouds go by...  I miss him terribly.  Thanks for asking.  I hope you are well.  💓

Here I am again, and feeling so guilty.  I have not written, but have not had the time it seems.  But so many funny things happening!  Not to mention my yard, keeping it up is hard, and my garden...  my tomatoes never do well anymore, not sure why -- I did get a few nice ones, from the pic above, but mostly my cucumbers are going bananas.  I got two nice green peppers, and my carrots are still tiny balls of orange, and I got a ton of small onions which I haven't harvested yet either.  Not sure what to do with those.  My thyme is going bonkers, and my chives are doing well also.  I did some canning last week -- well you can call them refrigerator pickles....  I did cukes, red peppers, green beans, garlic, cauliflower, onions....  tastee!

So I snapped this picture the other morning...  I pulled up to spot on 2nd and Central, and there was something in the road.  I got out and it was a HUGE rat.  I picked it up by the tail because I didn't want it to get smushed.  It was so big I put my boot in the picture to show its true size, and I have size 9 feet!  I know, gross, right?

Speaking of that corner, across the way, I could smell a fire this morning, and as I drove slowly by the source of the smoke, I could see flames, but couldn't be sure.  But I called 911 anyway, and told them it could be just a wood pile in someone's back yard, but the smoke was dense and you can never be too sure unless you actually go into the persons yard to really look.  They said it was a good call and they would have someone to check it out.  As I drove down to the end of Central, sure enough, there was the Goodman Street fire station fire truck coming around the corner and turning down Central.  No sirens, but I am sure they were checking out from my call.  HA.  At least you know they are there in a real situation.  I have no idea what happened, but I guess I am glad I called???

Last week I rescued 'Bayleigh', the grey tabby I have been feeding on Bay Street.  I got him into carrier and brought him to my porch, while we waited for his new mom to come pick him up.  Boy was I lucky to find this woman.  She owns a horse farm in Honeoye Falls, feeds 21 ferals in her barn (all fixed thanks to RCAC!) and she was looking for a cat to love as indoor only.  What a nice person.  Every day she sends me updates and I am so thankful. Most are videos that I have to learn to put on here, so maybe next blog post.

Also, guess what.  I have a new 'batch' of kittens.  A gentleman on Garson that allows me to shelter and feed cats on his property called me over a week ago and told me he was working on a vacant house and he found kittens.  Thankfully, I had someone I was able to call, who has helped me immensely in the past with so many other things, and ask if she could go get them.  She did and offered to house them until I could figure out something.  Well, right now I have no other fosters, so a few days later I took them in and they are ADORABLE.  Their names are LOTUS, SHELBY, CATALINA, CHEVY, CAMARO AND AUDI.  Two girls, four boys!  Six four-week old kittens they were, and weaned and potty trained already.  Now they are five weeks, and blue eyes not quite yet turned.  I have a ton of applications for them so who ever is reading this, don't even think about it!  :) 

Let's not forget these little ones that Kristina is 'fostering' for now.  They need to go together as they are bonded.  Little Ruby and Milo.

There are still so many others as you can see from the pics below.  Please consider fostering an adult cat.  They will be adopted quickly, I can promise you that!

Have a great day!

TGIF

Is it just me, or does it seem like the population has doubled in size since before the lockdown hit last year.  There is more traffic, more pedestrians, more lines, more everything.  I hate it.  Too many people.  I remember driving Route 104 last spring, and not a soul was on the road.  It was HEAVEN.

My britches are getting too busy for this blog, and I really wish I had more time to connect.  This used to be my diary of sorts, I recorded everything cats and I could refer back to it if I forgot something, a cat, a name... but time sort of slips away and then a week and a half has gone by, and I've forgotten what happened just yesterday.

I do, however, remember that one morning last week, there was something floundering in the street up ahead in the twilight (or is that dawn?  beginning of the morning when the sun is barely rising yet)...  anyway, I stopped after realizing it was a skunk with its head stuck in a container.  I got out and slowly crept up to it, and pulled the little yogurt cup off its head, and for a second, it looked bewildered and then slowly sauntered away off the road to the grass, as I backed away as fast as I could.  This is the SECOND time I've done this.  The first was an adult skunk, this was just a baby.  Thats what trash does folks, kills animals.  Stop littering.

I have five kittens left in my rescue, all being fostered, but going slowly.  That tells me that Rochester had a ton of kittens this year, and there aren't always enough people to adopt these innocent souls. 

There are a ton, well not a ton, but at least a dozen adult cats that are precious and sweet and worthy of a home, but not enough fosters.  Come on people.  Step up, foster, save a life.

That's all I have for now.

Have a great day!