Tag Archives: cat rescue

Here We Go Again – – –

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Jack’s Wednesday guest post just sneaks past the marriage counselor –

We’ve lived in five different houses in the seventeen years we’ve been married and, despite their very different ages and styles, there’s one thing they all have in common – – the length of time it takes us to work out where things should be located and which rooms should be for what (usually anything from two to five years). The process involves setting things up one way, then completely changing them on an annual basis!

This habit has, of course, continued into our current location and now seems to be co-incidental with my yearly Scottish tour. Most years the bookshelves get shifted around while I’m away and I have to re-learn where everything is as well as help with any remaining outstanding moves.

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But this year was a bit different. Wendy had spent my absence not so much moving things as planning how we would together move things upon my return. The focus would be the ‘Mystery Room’ (the room that houses the mystery and detective novels). This also just happens to be the room that houses the littlest foster kittens. Did I mention that there are always more kittens when I return than when I left? We agreed a maximum of six at any one time, so naturally I came back to nine, and I have no idea how many there were while I was away.

Down the center of the mystery room were the two biggest, heaviest and most solid bookcases in the shop. They took up more space than was needed and cut down on the natural light from the windows. So the plan was to move them to the garage where the current narrower shelves had been passed along to our good friends David and Felicia. Then we would re-position some ‘Jack-builts’ in place of the heavyweights while afixing a couple of cheap store-bought shelf units against the walls (still with me?).

Of course this had to be done immediately I returned, was still seriously jet-lagged and re-adjusting to temperatures around 25 degrees higher than Scotland. There’s no half measures with Wendy and once you start there’s no going back or stopping until it’s done!

As we were fixing the last wall mounted shelf unit in place she said “do you think this works”? “Why of course dear – it’s a great improvement” I responded (I sure as h*ll wasn’t going to say anything else)!

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But the kittens thought the whole exercise was great fun – particularly helping to identify all the new places they could get trapped or just hide from us!

“Welcome home, Honey”

The Monday Rant: Fed up with Starvation

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jessie 6The Monday Book will return next week.

Dear ____:

You asked me for a cat, but on learning you’d have to put $20 toward her spay, went to a yard sale site and got a “free kitten” instead. Then you posted on Facebook that you were “all for rescues but I can’t afford to help with the costs.”

I see.

Via Facebook, you also complain about welfare recipients taking this country apart with their demands for free services and refusal to contribute to the common good. This week, four of my friends are trying to feed, foster, and find homes for: 14 kittens and 5 adult cats; 18 kittens and 7 adult cats; 6 kittens and 4 adult cats; and a feral family of five. Most have some form of infection from lack of care.

We live within ten miles of each other.

In each case, we are paying–from our own pockets, from crowdsource begging, from crafts we make–to get them all spayed and neutered. Because we know if we don’t, five months from now we will be bottle feeding another sick, starving family of neglected cats.

This doesn’t count the litters that go to the shelters because their owners “couldn’t afford” to spay Mom.

Here is some information on what it costs taxpayers to run an animal shelter:

 In 1972, American shelters spent approximately $800 million on animal welfare versus around $2,400 million in 2007.…there is a direct correlation between the dollars spent per capita on shelters and the decrease in shelter populations/euthanasia. (http://www.humanesociety.org/animal_community/resources/timelines/animal_sheltering_trends.html)

In other words, it is cheaper to kill than to adopt. It is understandable that you need to live a frugal lifestyle, but does that mean you euthanize the unsold Doberman puppies from your backyard breeding business? $900 as the going price seems like it might offer a little bit of discretionary income, but hey, it’s your money.

None of us object to you living on what you can afford; we object to you leaving us to clean up your messes. What you refuse to pay for, my friends and I are covering in sweat, tears, and cold hard cash: sick cats whose suffering could have been prevented with a $16 vaccination package; unweaned kittens left in roadside boxes where it takes them two days to die of starvation; 6 of 10 cats entering our shelter euthanized at taxpayer expense because $67 on the Margaret Mitchell van was “too much.”

The cost of refusing to spay/neuter is exponential, but if I have understood you correctly, so long as you don’t pay, you don’t care. Let bleeding hearts like me pick up the tab and the kittens. It’s a kind of legal blackmail based on personalities: we care; you don’t. La-la-la-la.

Not taking responsibility for your actions does not remove the problem, just passes it to someone else. Sorta like those welfare people you complain about.

You are not despicable. You are evil.