It's Apollo!

Hi! Remember me? I'm Apollo!

This was me when you first met me. My foster mum said I was light as a feather!Did you know it has rained every day for 23 days straight?! Our foster mum said she is going to go troppo very soon. One of the roads to the shelter is washed away! It's not there anymore! We know we are lucky though, because our home and and the shelter are safe, and we are safe. We are sending our purrs and our prayers to our countrymen, women, kitties, woofies and everybody affected by the horrible fires and floods. We hope this cosmic joke will right itself soon, and our friends down south will get the water that they need.

The shelter vet couldn't get to the shelter for a few days because of the cyclone we had last week. Because of this, a lot of kitties are caught up in the desexing backlog. Thor and Loki are stuck there, but I was lucky to get through. Mum was going to bring them home yesterday until things settle back down, but the entire kittens were having a ball in their section, so she decided to leave them. Mum's friend at the shelter is going to keep a close eye on them, but she thinks they are continuing to thrive. If that changes, they'll come home with Mum.

This was me when she came to the shelter yesterday! I'm almost looking mancatly! I am up for adoption now at the shelter.

I am picking on kitties my own size now! My foster mum was giggling at how tough I was trying to be. Before I left, I was bashing my sisters, and they started to wee outside the box. Now things have settled down for them again, and I have other kitties happy to wrassle with me all day if I wanted!

Polly went home yesterday! My foster mum was shocked when she saw her. She is SO skinny. Foster mum could feel every individual bone in her spine and chest, and thought it was a little bit scary. Polly has also broken her tail. It's up at the tip though, so it wont bother her. It's been a bit of a struggle getting her to eat- she just doesn't want to. Foster mum has been forcing kitten formula into her, and late last night she got some Whiskas gravy into her. Today foster Mum learned that if she puts Polly infront of a dish with one of the other kittens, and Polly can watch the other kitten, Polly will start eating on her own! That makes it much easier than trying to force the food into her, especially because Polly might be very weak, but she is one fiesty little girl kitten! She has put on a little bit of weight today, and her eyes are brighter, so that is good. The other girls are cuddling with her, and being good big sisters.

Have a super week, dudes and dudettes!

Hello there!

Right, that's it. It's high time we got some blog time around here! So I am taking it upon myself to tell you a little bit about us.We were brought in to the shelter with our mumcat when we were still in her tummy. Our mumcat is very sweet, so the shelter made the decision that she should be allowed to have the kittens, and then go through to adoption when we were ready to be seperated from her. As it was the busiest time of the year for the shelter, we were very lucky that our mum was such a lovebug, or it would have been a different story.

We stayed in a special area with our mumcat for several weeks after we were born. Then, on the day our foster-mum-to-be brought Odin and Thor in to be desexed, the shelter decided it was time to seperate us from our mumcat. We were driving her loopy, and had learned how to clean ourselves and use the litter box.

So we came home to meet our foster brother Fui and sister Suey (through the door, foster-mum is obsessively cautious after the Blossoms), and our new sisters Athena and Freja, and brothers Loki and Apollo. After a hiccup with super ear mites, we are settling in nicely.

This is my sister Sally. She is the biggest of our litter, but is also the biggest scaredy cat. When we first came to our foster home, she spent a lot of time hissing at shadows and growling at gusts of wind, but is getting better. She is getting better though, and even comes over to say hi to our foster mum when she comes into our room to visit. She likes playing rough and tumble with Apollo.

This is my sister Penny. She is the friendliest of the three of us, and loves to climb into laps. She has a monster purr, too! Her ears are pretty froot batty, don't you think?

We are getting along well with our two new sisters. This is me and Penny with Athena, who also loves to play games. We have learned that Freja is good for cuddles. Loki was the best big brother ever, he took such great care of us. He would even clean our faces after dinner!

It is great having brothers around, as we are a litter of just girls. We have fun with them. And since we're not related, I can say they are both pretty spunkalicious!

Loki and Thor will probably have his hoohaectomy at the same time as our mumcat, tomorrow. We are purring for them all to have speedy recoveries and find fabulous families.

I hope you are having a lovely week:)

From Polly Smitten-Kitten.

Eeeewwwww!

I heard something very funny! Really really very funny! Before my foster daddy went away, he and my foster mum went to a place called the Hervey's Range Heritage Tea Rooms. It is about an hours drive from where we are living. It's quite a pretty place.

This is my foster daddy making friends with their horse. He was an old boy, and very friendly.

But that's not the funny thing. Do you know what the Tea Room specialty is? It is a drink called
Kopi Luwak. See this animal? It is a Civet Cat.See this? It is a preserved Civet Cat poop.

Do you know what that is in the poop? Coffee beans!!!

Civet Cats eat coffee berries as part of their natural diet. The beans pass through their system undigested. These beans are then harvested, and made into coffee!! And it's expensive coffee, too. One cup at the Tea Rooms was AU$50 (US$32.83 as of Saturday night). It is thought that the digestive enzymes break down some of the proteins in the bean, making it less bitter. If you or your humans saw The Bucket List, you would have seen that they had trying a cup on their list of things to do.

Did you read that!? People pay to drink pooped out coffee beans! Humans are bananas, kitties. Bananas! The tea rooms sell 4 cups a week!

By the way, my foster mum had a strawberry milkshake, and my foster dad had a chocolate milkshake. They are not brave:)

My big ginger foster brother Odin has found his Forever Home!!!! He found his yesterday. Thor was held back last week, and will be desexed this Wednesday. Loki went back today, and will also be desexed on Wednesday. Hooray for the Big Litter Boys!:)

LOLed at you by Athena the pretty kitten (see how pretty I'm getting now that my face is filling out?).

We've Been Playing!

And having oodles of fun doing so! We've been biting toesies,


Bunnykicking heads,
Then bunnykicking other heads,Bopping each other on the noses,

Bobbing each other on the conks,

And playing Thundering Herds of Elephants all over the room!

It is such fun! We hope your weekend has been fun too, and you have an even funner week. It wont be too much fun for two ginger boys though, who are so ready for their hoohaectomies that they stand to lose half their body weight on Tuesday. MOL!!! (don't tell our foster mum we made that joke, we might get in trouble!).

By Athena and Apollo.

PAPARAZZI!

Hey there. How's it going?

Come here and give us smoochies!

You know you want to!

Guess what! We are about ready to go back for our hoohaectomies already! We are very big strong mancats-in-training.

Did you see our silly foster mum post Suey's PhotoHunt yesterday, instead of tomorrow? Crazy lady. MOL!

Love from Odin and Thor (the big strong ginger boys).

We Have Another Correction!

Hey there! Guess what! As is the tradition, not all of us had our genders correctly identified. I am a GIRL! And I am now known as Athena. This has meant a name change for my brother, too. We are no longer Cosmo and Kramer, we are now Apollo and Athena. Our cool tuxie friend formerly known as Willy Wagtail has jumped on the mythylogical name bandwagon, and now goes by Loki.

So, in our Little Litter, we are now Athena, Apollo and Freja. The Big Litter now go by Odin, Thor and Loki.

Goodness, all this confuzlement!

My foster mum reports that Fui was a very good boy at the vet. They put anaesthetic eye drops in and had a good look in under his third eyelid. There was no sign of any foreign object or trauma, and he has no clinical signs of anything viral. There is no discolouration to the eyeball, no discharge, and he allowed the vet to firmly palpate around the socket. So we are a bit stumped. The eye specialist will be up here in 6 weeks- the joy of living out of the way, I guess. For now, the humans are pretty stumped. There is a little bit or redness, and a little bit of swelling. The vet called his symptoms 'blephoraspasms', which is the squinting and excessive blinking from one eye.

I asked about whether it could be anything to do with his brain or nerves, and the vet said this was extremely unlikely, especially given he is not presenting with any other symptoms.

For now, we are taking a wait and see approach. Our vet believed it was likely there will be improvement naturally, without any intervention. If there is any worsening, we will have him back at the vet immediately. If the symptoms continue as is, there is really nothing we can do until the specialist comes up from Brisbane. For us to take him there would be a 2 hour flight (and he would have to travel cargo), otherwise it is approximately 20 hours in the car. Given that he sooks on the 10 minute trip to the vet, this would be good to avoid unless it is really necessary.

The vet recommended giving Fui a break from the eye ointment for the next 24 hours, incase that is causing additional irritation. So hopefully, that is the case and this time tomorrow he will be looking at us bright eyed and happy!