Kitty in a basket

I couldn't resist taking a picture of this kitty in a basket. This was my Mom's kitten right before she passed away. This is one of the favorite places the kitty liked to sleep. It would curl up the best that it could in this tiny basket on my Mom's dining room table and just sleep there. It sure doesn't look very comfortable, but for a cat - maybe so.

Not to worry. We quit eating at the dining room table years ago. My Mom just got too old to cook and she preferred to stay in the 1950 time zone as far as kitchen gadgets go, so we always had family dinners elsewhere. My Mom ate in the kitchen.

My three cats are doing well. I have one who has a problem with hair balls. Something I am not at all used to. Every cat I ever had in my life never had a problem with hair balls. I am trying the petroleum jelly on a treat every day. He eats it. He doesn't care for the petroleum jelly, but he wants the treat pretty bad. I don't see the other cats having a problem hacking.

I have had cats and dogs all my life. My favorite dog was a little, gray terrier that we found running as a stray with her pup. My brother-in-law found them when he was working in a strip mining area. (Coal mining). I took the the female mother dog right away, someone else took the little black pup. It was years later that I found out my little shadow was a Dandie Dinmont Terrier breed. If only I had the Internet 25 years ago. I moved to Texas and my Mom kept her. I moved to Virginia years later and my sister kept her. It was while I was in Virginia that my little dog died. I have been looking for her replacement ever since. It has been 17 years now.

I will post one of her pictures when I come across them in the family albums. I am still scanning them into the computer as I have time. We had many dogs while I was growing up. Mostly hunting dogs such as beagles. One was a Rottweiler, although we didn't know it at the time. He was a found puppy on a paper route. He was probably registered or a purebred, but the owners never came forward. He grew huge - had docked tail, so we called him Stubby. We had him for over 14 years.

Our two German Shepherds were Frosty and Nicky. Two polar opposites. Frosty was black and skinny and mean - like a wild wolf. Nicky was tan, thick and gentle as a lamb. A big baby. Our beagles were Clem (short for Clem Kadiddlehopper - Red Skelton's character), Grandpa, Barksalot (guess how he got that name), Pepi, Starbuck, and Apollo. My brother was into Battlestar Gallactica at the time, I guess. I never watched the show. For all you sci-fi fans out there, there is a new series starting in January 2005.

Now that I am older, I only get animals that I can take care of properly. That means I only take on as many as I can reasonably afford to take to the vet's office and do right by. Back then we took in all the strays. With that many kids in the house, my Mom was very tolerant of all the pets that we would bring home. No purebreds for us, it was the neighborhood mutts.