Calling All Cat Lovers

So I know there's gotta be a few incorrigible cat ladies (or cat guys) out there who are well-versed in the way of cat. The kind of cat people that, say, accidentally toss the corner of a cat-hair laden blanket over their peanut butter bagel and are so resigned to their cat persondom that instead of just throwing the hairy bagel away, they carefully hold it up to the sunlight and extract as much of the hair from the peanut butter as they can see and then proceed to eat it in a shaded area so that they at least won't have to SEE all the little glimmers of cat hair that they're consuming. Not that I'm saying *I* did that 20 minutes ago. With a glass of lemonade that was sitting next to a wobbly tumbleweed of accumulated cat hair. Oh no. But that YOU might be the kind of person to do that.

In which case: I need your help.

I have three lovely adorable wonderful cats. And I recently found out they have giardia. (Presumably the newest of the three brought it in with her, to my great joy.) They all have diarrhea (some of them bloody diarrhea), their stomachs are constantly and loudly churning away, and their coats are getting faded in color since (presumably) their nutrients are getting leached (I've been giving them vitamin treats in an attempt to help with this). So I've been (trying) to treat them all. I've done so, unsuccesfully, twice already. And I'm on my third attempt.

The problem is, the medication is horribly horribly bitter and cats hate it. (For those of you well-versed in cat meds, they've had two runs at the panacur with no luck and this is their second run at metronizadole.)

One of my cats I can pill. And she's easy-going enough that I can trick her.

The other cat, I could pill if I wanted, but she's a wee bit of an evil hellion, so I'm doing my best to work around it.

The third cat, bless her heart, is a little weirdo who is afraid of people and refuses to let me pick her up. Ever. Needless to say, pilling is not an option. She also apparently has the superheroic ability to discern even something SLIGHTLY out of place in her food. I have had the medicine COMPOUNDED into a mothereffing a) treat, b) ear-ointment, and c) flavorless liquid for her, and a) she hates the treat, b) she let me put the ear ointment on twice and then refused to let me touch her ears ever again, and c) somehow has the ability to discern that there is a strange flavorless, tasteless liquid in her food.

She is a mad fricking genius.

So: does anyone have other suggestions?

I have to pill her twice a day, or somehow get her to consume the treats twice a day.

Things I've tried so far:

Mixing the treats and/or meds in with her moist food.

Mixing the treats and/or meds in with her dry food.

Mixing the treats and/or meds in with mushed up sardines.

Using pill pockets.

Wrapping the medicated treats in cheese*. (Yes, not vegan I know, but my cats aren't vegan anyways, and I'm desperate here.)

Chasing her through the house with a treat in my hand bellowing, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD WHY WON'T YOU JUST EAT THIS GODDAMN THING?!?! and then sobbing a little. (The most ineffective thus far.)

Cursing my very existence. (Also ineffective.)

So please: any suggestions you may have, lay them on me. Just please don't suggest anything that requires me catching her and forcing something in her mouth because--trust me--it's an impossibility (esp. since I don't have doors in my apartment).

Annnnnnnd... GO!




PS. These are my three little chickpeas. They thank you ahead of time for your help:

Scrumptious Turd Dogs

To be added to my menagerie of scatological recipes (i.e. ones that resemble dookie and/or puke) are Vegan Dad's homemade sausages.

Don't get me wrong: the recipe kicks serious dookie-shooting ass. And it's really super-simple to whip up.

But then there's this (fathers, shield your babies' eyes!!!):



Needless to say, when you wrap the sausages in foil BE SURE TO CINCH THE ENDS TIGHTLY.

Otherwise you and everyone else at your barbecue will call them Turd Dogs all night.



VEGAN DAD'S HOMEMADE SAUSAGES

INGREDIENTS:

• 1/2 c. pinto beans, rinsed and drained


• 1 c. cold vegetable broth


• 1 T. olive oil


• 2 T. soy sauce


• 2 cloves garlic, grated (with a microplane, or very finely minced)


• 1-1/4 c. vital wheat gluten


• 1/4 c. nutritional yeast


• 1-1/2 t. fennel seed, crushed (Lindy Loo sidenote: can you BUY this shit crushed? Because I've tried crushing it myself, and I don't even think the Incredible Hulk could pull it off.)


• 1 t. red pepper flakes


• 1 t. sweet paprika


• 1 t. dried oregano


• Several dashes fresh black pepper

DIRECTIONS

Before mixing your ingredients, get your steaming apparatus ready, bring water to a full boil. The rest of the recipe comes together very quickly.

Have ready 6 sheets of tin foil. In a large bowl, mash the pinto beans until no whole ones are left. Throw all the other ingredients together in the order listed and mix with a fork. Divide dough into 6 even parts. Place one part of dough into tin foil and mold into about a 5 inch log. Wrap dough in tin foil, like a tootsie roll. Don't worry too much about shaping it (EXCEPT FOR THE ENDS, PEOPLE--CINCH THOSE WIENERS TIGHT!/end lindy loo cry of desperation), it will snap into shape while it's steaming because this recipe is awesome.

Place wrapped sausages in steamer and steam for 40 minutes.

(Recipe from Vegan Dad)



(The rest of Lindy Loo's scatological menagerie can be found HERE.)

This Year's Rooftop Garden

So my rooftop garden is up and running again. I'm not planting any Don Knotts this year like I did last year, but I *did* convert my old papasan frame into an herb garden, so hopefully that makes up for it.

Why not join me on a tour?

This is kind of the skyline view of my rooftop garden. Thankfully now that everything's potted, the pots have stopped toppling over the edge of the roof. In the foreground you can see my ladybug sandbox that I garbage-picked, the lid of which the cats sleep under on hot days and stalk birds from (unsuccessfully)...



And in closeups...

Black-seeded simpson lettuce, lavender, grape tomato plant, Zooey:



A couple heirloom tomato plants, more lettuce, wildflowers, moonflowers, mint, and green onions:



This is what my cats and I refer to as "the stink pipe" which is the pipe connected to my downstairs neighbor's toilet. As you can see, my goal is to camouflage it a bit (and discourage the cats from sniffing in it all the time)... Planted here is catnip, leeks, chives, basil, wildflowers, and a jalapeno plant.



This is my newest addition to my rooftop garden: my papasan herb garden. It's made from an old papasan frame and some landscaping fabric. The white twine leading out of it and up onto the doorframe is going to (hopefully) allow the peas to climb. In it: basil, cilantro, chives, green onions, black-seeded simpson lettuce, and peas. Fran is a big fan of the shade it produces, as you can see.







And finally: a small portion of the 36 basil plants I have growing. Yes, I am ridiculous. And yes, I love me some basil.



Stay tuned for more tales of urban gardening as the season progresses!