I have 7 cats as of about September 2021 when Ginger (a male apparently just weaned at the time red tabby) was presented to me by an older gray medium hair cat that I thought was Ginger’s mother.  About 6 months later, I was surprised to discover that the supposed “Smokey Jo” (whose owner had told me was a female gray cat) is an apparently neutered but definitely male cat so Ginger’s deliverer is now called “S.J.”.  I am also feeding the two neighborhood cats (S.J. and Smokey Jo) and have been feeding a raccoon “Raccy” and an opossum “Smiley”.  My current cats from oldest to youngest are: Vanessa T (14 years old), Smokey (13 years old), Athena (10 years old), Cassiopeia (10 years old), Serina  (10 years old), Sheba (10 years old) and Ginger (1 year old).  This was written on September 22, 2022.

Update on my household:

My husband tried to be an over the road truck driver from late 2011 to about mid 2012.  During that time, my cat population went from 4 cats to 6 (Miss Kitty, Lieutenant Starbuck, Vanessa T and Smokey were the "original" cats and ChiChi joined the household as a permanent fixture and Red/Tiger joined the household as a "time share" cat because he spent some time at a neighbor's house (where he was called Tiger) and some time at our household (where he was called Red).  Well, Red was male and ChiChi was female and before I could get the finances up then their shots up to date to get either fixed, nature took its course and ChiChi got pregnant.  In late April 2012, I took her to the vet to get a diagnosis of why her nipples had gotten bigger which I had never seen happen in either of my 2 spayed cats.  The vet diagnosed her pregnant with 3 OR (that "or" will become important to the rest of this story, I promise!) 4 kittens.  On May 29, 2012, at about 2:15 AM, I started my midwife duties.  At about 4 AM, she had given birth to 4 cats, so I assumed (we know what that word does, right?!) she was done and I went out to have a smoke (I do not smoke in the house since the feline and piscine (4 fish) members of the household do not need the smoke in their lungs).  I come back into the birthing room, look into the birthing box, do a quick count of the kittens - 1, 2, 3, 4, - hey, wait, that is ANOTHER one making five!  By 5:15 PM, ChiChi had given birth to 3 PLUS 4 kittens - told you that "or" would be important to the story!  ChiChi and Red were (Red has since died, ChiChi is still alive) both red tabbies and ChiChi gave birth to 2 female Siamese mixes, 1 male Siamese mix, 3 female gray tabbies and 1 female tortoiseshell.  I gave away the male to the people who had been time sharing Red with us and gave away a gray tabby and a Siamese mix to 2 households from the local Freecycle group and kept the other Siamese mix, the other 2 gray tabbies and the tortoiseshell.

So, we now have 9 cats (ALL of whome are spayed/neutered - do NOT want anymore 7 per pregnancy surprises!) and their names are - in order of their moving in or being born (well, the "borns" are being listed in alphabetical order since I no longer have any idea on their birth order!): Miss Kitty (gray female tabby), Lieutenant Starbuck (gray male tabby), Vanessa T. (female calico), Smokey (gray and white swirl pattern), ChiChi (female red tabby), Athena (female gray tabby, born here), Cassiopeia (female gray tabby, born here), Serina (lilac Siamese mix, female, born here) and Sheba (female tortoiseshell, born here).  I had already given away the male Siamese mix (the neighbors named him Snowball because he is mainly white with flame points) when I went to the vet with the other 6 for gender identification and I asked them to attach something to each of them so that I could keep it sorted as to which gender each of them was since I was expecting more than ONE gender, they came out of the examiniation rooms with IDENTICAL paper collars with the word "girl" on them - yep, the litter was 6 females and 1 male!  When the vet saw the way the 6 I brought in looked, he made the comment, "Well, ChiChi REALLY got around!" Which meant there was the possibility of 3 different fathers even though I only saw 2 presumed males that were presumed to be unneutered (Lt. Starbuck and Smokey were already neutered), Red was nonneutered for sure and there has been a gray long haired presumed male stray cat hanging around since before ChiChi got pregnant.  Never have seen a Siamese hanging around but was told one could have come from a very long way away, did the deed then gone to a different territory afterwards.

I had a relatively bad fall yesterday morning just before 8 AM. I was using the four steps leading to the back door when I had a momentary gray out and came back to find I was in the middle of a fall from the next to top step. I hit the ground hard hitting my head, snapping my neck to the right and hit my right hip and right shoulder. The ground here is HARD! I have been slightly more sleepy than normal and had a headache ever since so I am taking it easy and following the advice to keep an eye for whether or not the symptoms get worse - I already had it in mind to set up an appointment with the doctor as soon as the car gets its warranty work done and I will let him know what happened but I will not be driving until after I see the doctor and he gives me advice on what to do about this. I am also carrying my cell phone with me even when I walk outside for only a couple of minutes because it only took a few minutes for that to happen and for me to end up on the ground motionless for a couple of minutes so I need a way to reach someone to help me should it happen again.

Well, a setback for Starbuck he was delivered to the vet as a dropoff because I did not have an appointment for him and they agreed he needed seen sometime today and cannot guarantee a time frame so since this is more than likely an all day visit, they have the owner drop off the pet and then the vet calls the owner when something is known about the condition. This has occurred because he was unable to take last night's Benadryl and had a lot of mucus. I think I got him there in enough time that it could be mcuh more simple than it was with my other cat, Miss Kitty, in January 2007 when I got her there almost too late but I hope to have as good an outcome with Starbuck as I had with Miss Kitty as she is still with me and has not been sick other than the little bits of tiredness after her shots since.

Good news, Starbuck made it back and was meowing at the door to come in as I was talking on phone with hubby to go pick him up from work - this was about 12 hours after he disappeared. He was started on an every 4 hour regimen of Benadryl last night and I discovered that if I was a little late, I got woke up by his starting to sneeze. Talked to the vet today and decided that since they were full of appointments with pets with worse allergy symptoms and I am handling the symptoms fine at home that Starbuck does not seen by them and I am to keep an eye on Miss Kitty, my female cat, and if she gets the same symptoms to start her on the same regimen. I am also going to start Starbuck on allergy eye drops to wash his eyes out and help them more so, since the bottle I had on hand had been opened for my use and was expired, I will be buying two bottles of that - one for me and one for him and will mark which is which.

Fun of having cats, my male (I have a male and a female about the same age) cat might have allergies, he kept me up all night last night sneezing after being outside all day yesterday. I called the vet this morning and was told to give him a child sized dose of Benadryl and keep an eye on him. Luckily, I have a pretty large stash of Benadryl that I keep on hand to try to keep my autoimmune disorders somewhat at bay so I just broke one in half and gave it to him. Now, to the fun part, about 30 minutes later, I had been outside and was coming inside when he tore out of the door and decided to do another of his disappearing acts. At least I have the entire neighborhood keeping an eye out for "the cat with the red collar" - my cats are the only cats in the neighborhood that wear collars and my female cat wears a flowered collar. I also let them know that I was concerned because he is on Benadryl and I am supposed to be keeping an eye on him today.