Cats – Page 5 – Spinor Info

Another cat

Jun 072013

This beautiful cat belonged to my mother-in-law. I last saw him just a few short weeks ago, when I visited her in the city of Pécs, Hungary.

Sadly, my use of the past tense is justified, as Frici (which was his name) is no more. He passed away today, from what appeared to be a severe urinary tract issue, I was told. He was only about four years old. He was a stray that ended up with my mother-in-law after she lost her previous cat.

Yes, we know that it’s just a cat. Yes, we know that cats who spent some time on the street as strays like Frici are much more likely to acquire an infection, or just suffer the consequences of prolonged malnutrition or dehydration that would eventually shorten their lives. Still… Frici was much too young to pass away, and did not deserve to pass away in pain.

Life, I guess. Cherish every day of it, who knows how many are left.

Cats on Google Street View

Cats, Internet, Personal No Responses »

May 262013

I noticed that the pictures on Google Street View for our neighborhood were updated recently. Much to my delight, I noticed that two cats from the neighborhood, cats that we have known for at least seven years, were photographed by Google’s cameras:

Yes, my wife and I are both fond of cats. Not just our own four cats but also cats from the neighborhood.

Animals in War and other memorials

Cats, History, Personal No Responses »

May 072013

With four cats in our house, it’s easy to guess that my wife and I are both animal lovers. To be sure, we are partial to felines, but we love most other animals (with obvious exceptions such as flies or mosquitoes) and we are especially troubled when we see animal suffering.

And animals suffer a lot. Especially in wars. Which is why I find the Animals in War Memorial especially poignant.

I happened upon this memorial when I made an unplanned detour on my way to Leicester Square, where I was to meet with Richard Bartle, who was kind enough to come to London to see me. We were supposed to meet under the Shakespeare statue at Leicester Square. When I arrived, there was no Shakespeare statue. Fortunately, I eventually realized that the cordoned off area in the center of the square does, in fact, hide the statue which is currently being renovated. Shortly thereafter, I spotted Richard.

Kifli the cat

Cats, Computers, Personal No Responses »

Mar 242013

Here is one of our four cats, Kifli. (Literally, his name means croissant in Hungarian. How did he get this name, you ask? Well, when we got him back in 2001, he was only a few weeks old and he and his brother Szürke actually fit on the palm of my hand, both of them together. Szürke is a gray tabby and perhaps somewhat unimaginatively, that’s exactly what his name means in Hungarian; gray, that is. Kifli has the color of a freshly baked bun, but when he was little, Kifli was very thin and did not look like a bun at all. In Hungarian bakeries, the two most common small bakery products are buns and croissants; not the puffy French type made from leavened dough, but croissants baked from the same dough that is used to make white bread and, well, buns. These croissants are long and thin, just like Kifli. Hence, his name.)

Anyhow, I was testing out an Android photo editing app (PicsArt, in case you’re wondering; seems like an excellent app, by the way) tonight when I snapped this picture of Kifli and applied one of the app’s effects. I think it’s real nice. And while it’s not so nice that Kifli jumped onto a table that he’s not supposed to be on, I certainly approve of his reading choices.

End of an era

Canada, Cats, Politics No Responses »

Jan 052013

Alas, the cat sanctuary on Parliament Hill is no more.

Now all we have there is politicians. This depresses me greatly.

Loaner cat

Cats, Personal No Responses »

Feb 012012

Once again, we have a feline visitor in our house: Poppy, the cat of a friend of ours, has been spending the past two weeks here while her owner is out of town. Poppy is a 20th century cat, but she is in good health and as playful as ever. I am looking forward to many more of her visits in the years to come.

Happy 2012!

Cats, History, Politics, Society No Responses »

Dec 312011

For me, 2011 was not a particularly good year. In fact, business-wise it has been the worst in, literally, decades. We also lost our oldest cat, and indeed, cats all around us did not fare well: two strays, taken to the shelter on two separate occasions (once by us, once by neighbors of us) were killed by the Humane Society, another cat that belonged to a neighbor, one that we knew since 1997, succumbed to old age, as did the oldest cat of an American friend of mine just a few days ago. Yes, we’ve had happier years than 2011. But then again, we remain healthy, safe and secure, so we do count our blessings still.

What will 2012 bring? The collapse of the Euro? A major war in the Middle East, perhaps over the issue of the Strait of Hormuz? A Chinese economic meltdown, precipitating a worldwide crisis? More wars and suffering?

Or a strengthening of the Eurozone, with new institutions that will prevent similar crises in the future? Peaceful resolution of the issue with Iran, perhaps an end to the ayatollahs’ regime? Finally, full recovery from the economic woes of the past few years?

I remain cautiously hopeful.

Another ‘humane’ society

Cats, Society No Responses »

Dec 302011

Looks like our experience with the Ottawa Humane Society is indeed not an outlier. There appears to be some outrage over the Arizona Humane Society’s decision to euthanize a recovering addict’s 9-month old injured cat, after he was unable to come up with $400 on the spot. (Ironically, the same Humane Society had no trouble finding the money to hire a professional publicist to deal specifically with this case.)

I understand that shelters, especially municipal shelters, must make unpleasant decisions every day about animals that cannot be rescued or are unadoptable. But these decisions should not be made callously and heartlessly. What is appalling is that in all these cases, there were people able and willing to care for the animal that was killed, but the humane society in question never gave them, or the cat, a chance.

Humane(?) Society

Cats, Local Ottawa 1 Response »

Nov 032011

The Ottawa Humane Society runs the municipal animal shelter, which is where responsible citizens are supposed to take animals that they find. As a municipal shelter, they sometimes have to accept animals that are in bad shape and, unless their owner claims them, must be euthanized. But, they assure us, they only do so as a last resort; their priority is to find the animals a new home, not to kill them.

This January, we took a lovely cat there. We believed he would be adopted quickly, as he was young, friendly, and beautiful. Instead, he supposedly caught a respiratory infection at the shelter, and he was euthanized.

So this autumn, when a friendly little calico cat showed up, we were in no rush to take her there. Indeed, one of our neighbors eventually decided to adopt the cat, but that same day, the cat disappeared. A few days later, we found that another neighbor took the cat to the Humane Society, who assured our neighbor that the cat will be well taken care of and if not claimed by her owner, she will soon be up for adoption.

Except that she wasn’t. Instead, the cat was killed due to a supposedly severe health problem: gingivitis.

I don’t think I’ll ever be wanting to hear the name “Humane Society” again.

Squeak

Cats, Health, Personal No Responses »

Jul 192011

I found out that I am less squeamish than I thought.

I went out for a walk this morning, and in the middle of a sidewalk, I suddenly spotted a mouse. First I thought it was a small furry mouse toy, as it looked like a perfect little mouse, completely motionless. But then I realized it was the real thing, probably dead… but no, wait, it was still kicking. When I touched it with the toe of my shoe, it squeaked loudly and tried to crawl away… but even though I was trying to steer it towards the grass with my shoe, it didn’t get very far. I think it was badly injured, probably a broken leg or something. Eventually, fears of hantavirus and whatnot notwithstanding, I just grabbed it by the tail (loud squeaks followed) and threw it in the grass.

I mean, what was I supposed to do, step on the poor thing? Yes, I know, too much empathy is bad for your health, but apart from their size, mice are not that different from other mammals… they have hearts, lungs, a sizable brain, and the ability to feel fear and pain. In all likelihood, this poor critter has since been found by a cat, but at least it’s not expiring in the middle of a sidewalk half crushed to death when someone steps on it.

Yes, I avoided touching my face afterwards and washed my hands as soon as I got back home.

Vigilant cats

Cats, Personal No Responses »

Jun 042011

I am an atheist. To the best of my knowledge, there is no such thing as heaven, not even kitty heaven. That means that when a cat dies, it is truly dead.

That does not stop me from imagining, though, that in a sense, our two cats Marzipan and Tarka are still with us, perhaps watching our house while we sleep, as these cats do in a wonderful New Yorker cartoon titled Vigil:

Four

Cats, Personal 3 Responses »

May 232011

And then, there were only four. Cats, that is… our oldest cat, Tarka, our last 20th century cat and the last cat that actually knew our first cat, is no longer with us.

We adopted Tarka over 11 years ago, during the winter of 1999-2000. Shortly thereafter, she settled in a cardboard box that was already a few sizes too small for her. We still have that box.

Good bye.

Tarka

Cats, Personal 2 Responses »

May 072011

Tarka is our oldest cat and she is not doing very well. Her kidneys are failing.

The day before yesterday, her appetite suddenly vanished, and she became lethargic, urinating outside the litter box. I became rather worried, so yesterday I took her to the vet, who determined that in addition to the ailing kidneys, she may also be suffering from hyperthyroidism. They took a blood sample (we’re still waiting for the results), gave her some fluids, and some new medication, and sent her home.

What can you do? In an ailing organism, as one subsystem after another begins to fail, they struggle to keep up and compensate for the failures of one another. It’s like the ever narrowing flight envelope of a high altitude airplane; if you’re a little faster, the airplane breaks apart, if you’re a little slower, it falls out of the sky, and the difference between the two velocities becomes more marginal the higher the airplane flies. (This, combined with a faulty airspeed indicator, may have been one of the causes of the Air France tragedy two years ago.) So how do we keep Tarka flying true for at least a while longer?

I don’t know… yesterday, after I got her back home, she was doing better, eating more than the day before. But today, she hasn’t eaten anything yet and she’s even more lethargic. Is it time to get seriously worried yet? Another visit to the vet may accomplish little beyond exposing her to yet more stress.

Blue eyes no more

Cats, Personal 1 Response »

Feb 012011

Two weeks ago, I took a stray cat to the Humane Society. I thought it was the right thing to do; we already have five of them, no friend of ours wanted a cat, and this stray was obviously not going to do well outdoors (when we first saw him, he was eating some scraps off the pavement in the middle of a street frequented by city buses.) He was also young, healthy, and friendly, so we had every hope that he would be adopted.

Our hopes were in vain. Today, I found out that he was put down after contracting a viral respiratory infection and some secondary bacterial infection that did not respond to antibiotics.

All we have now is this last picture, courtesy of the Humane Society:

Well, that’s the end of one little life. Wasn’t worth much, I guess.

Not sure what to do next time. Would he have had a better chance outside in -30 Centigrade weather?

Damn.

Uptime

Cats, Computers, Personal No Responses »

Jan 252011

I just ran this on my main server:

$ uptime
 08:13:32 up 365 days, 19:56,  4 users,  load average: 0.07, 0.05, 0.06

Yes, this means I last rebooted this server one year and 20 hours ago. (What was I doing, rebooting at 4 in the morning?)

Mind you, it won’t run uninterrupted much longer. An updated server is waiting to take its place, so that I can then take this guy down, thoroughly clean it (removing one year’s worth of accumulated dust and cat hair) and upgrade it as well.

Blue eyes

Cats, Personal 1 Response »

Jan 152011

This morning, I took this little guy to the Humane Society:

This young, unneutered tomcat showed up at our doorstep during the holidays, obviously homeless and hungry, but otherwise in good shape and friendly. We took care of him but the weather is getting colder, and spending much of his day in our tiny entry hall isn’t exactly a solution. We already have five cats, so adopting him was not a good idea.

On the way to the Humane Society, as the sun shone into the car, I noticed that he had blue-ish eyes. He was obviously part Siamese, but the blue eyes were news to me.

I hope he finds a good owner soon and lives a long and happy life.