Friday "My Town" Shoot Out - Domestic Animals

"I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals." ~ Winston Churchill


Since I have been on vacation for the past two weeks, if you could call it a vacation (time to go through files), and since we don't have any cows or sheep or pigs in our area, and since we have five cats that are very upset about never being including on my blog, because this is a blog to show off my city and county, I thought I would redeem myself with my cats by posting their lovely and handsome faces. Oh, and this for Elaine, Geoff and Gray, too. And of course, all you animal lovers out there.

So without further ado, meet the the cats who own us...

This is Czarina relaxing on one of the cat posts on the back porch. We found her two years ago trying to eat some clams shells that my husband had thrown in the driveway earlier that day. She was skin and bones and had a variety of aliments. She was around 7 months old when we found her, and she went into heat a week later. After many trips to the vet and a laser spay surgery, because she was still sick, we now call her our $1,600 cat - and that does not include the expensive cat food she eats. No more clam shells for her.

We have no idea where Czarina came from, but she had been abused. If she had not been starving, I would have never caught her. She woofed down 4 cans of Fancy Feast before I grabbed her. She was fearful of people, especially men. She also had a broken tooth, indicating someone may have kicked her. After a lot of loving, she settled in and now rules the roost. My husband caters to her, and she loves to boss him around. Payback!

This is Marie, a Maine Coon cat. Someone bought her from a breeder and decided they could not keep her and gave her to a friend of ours who gave her to us. We placed her in our home March 2, 2001. Marine was born on January 1, of the same year.

Princess loves boxes of all kinds. Every time we come home with a box she claims it, and we have to let it sit in the floor for a few days. Here she is stalking another cat, not at all interested in being a beauty queen for the day.

I saw Princess at my vet's office back in Georgia, as I passed a caged while taking a cat in for a checkup. She was about three weeks old. Someone had brought her in to have her put to sleep. That was in April 1997.

And here is her front side. Everyone loves this pillow on our futon in the studio.

Another Siamese? Yes. This is Nikko, born in 1996, another rescue who ended up with us when he was about eight weeks old. A friend working at a humane society called me when this baby came in. Nikko may look a little ragged for age, but he has always been, and still is, the boss of the house. He can still beat everyone up, and does so at least once a day. He also enjoys puffing up his tail and running up three levels of stairs just to prove he can. He has a mouth on him, too.

See that scar under his eye? When he was about six weeks old, we went camping on our river property about 300 feet from our home. Nikko met his first snake. It was around 10:00 PM on a holiday weekend. That was back in the days when your vet was always on call (at least mine was). The snake chomped down on Nikko's face - it was a big snake but we let it leave in peace. We rushed Nikko to the vet where he gave him a shot. It was touch and go all night because the vet said his throat could swell up, making it impossible for him to breathe. We kid about those long front teeth he has. They look like fangs to us.

Don't tell Nikko, but right before Czarina found our clam shells I was telling my husband that I sure would miss those baby blue eyes and loud mouth when Nikko passed on to the Great Beyond. It is almost like he cloned himself. As a matter of fact, he was out on the back porch bugged-eyed looking at something on the day we found Czarina; I peeked around the corner and saw what was a female version of Nikko. So I guess you could say that he found her. He has certainly trained her well because she is second in charge.

This is Skipper, found abandoned and brought to our house by a member of the local human society. He came to us at the age of three weeks in August of 2006.



Skipper has always had a thing about helping around the house. I think because, when we got him, we were undergoing a lot of remodeling. There were always people coming and going, and a flurry of construction activity going on at all hours. I grabbed this photo from my files of Skipper helping my husband caulk a tub last year (why is he wearing all that winter garb in the house? He looks like an old man - a really old man, but a "domesticated" old man -will that do GingerV?). This is a common site around our house. If you bend over to do something, Skipper wants to help. We let him ride along as long as we can. And, folks, he loves to be vacuumed. Seriously. Whenever you get out the vac, he is right under your feet demanding a back massage with either the hand vac or the monster vac that sends our other cats scurrying to some dark corner of the house.

Skipper enjoys watching birds from this old baby bed I converted into a two-seater for the porch. He is becoming a "Wide Load" these days.

I have a rule that I never put anyone's photos on this site but my own. However, this is the photo that was emailed to me when the humane society was looking for a home for Skipper.

To this. My he does need to go on a diet.

And to be fair to all you dog lovers (we love dogs, but when our last dog died we decided to stick with cats for awhile), here are some photos I took while on assignments:

Slipping and sliding on the Crisfield dock.

Running the dog.

Walking the dog.

Kissing the dog.

Working dogs.

Companion dogs.

“The great pleasure of a dog is that you may make a fool of yourself with him and not only will he not scold you, but he will make a fool of himself too.” ~ Samuel Butler

Please spay and neuter. And if you must have a companion animal, adopt one from a reputable humane society. Pets are a huge responsibility. Know what you are getting into before you become a pet owner. And if you love pets, and aren't ready for the plunge, give to your local humane society.



I almost forgot our domesticated crabs, "John John" Crabby Crab and Sookie.