2021 is here. And, whilst most Londoners were sitting at home wondering what tier we might be in today, Cat Daddy and I were taking Louis Catorze to the vet. Yes, again.
Although Catorze’s skin is looking much better, so much so that we have reduced his steroid pills to one a day, his appetite has been down lately. I didn’t call this in sooner because nothing else suggested that he might be unwell: he has been alert, playful and full of energy. The day before the vet appointment, he even broke into the attic crawl space, thrashed around like a psychopath and, somehow, managed to switch on the light. Until then I’d had no idea that this space even had a light.
We have seen Catorze approach his feeding station only to stare at his bowl as if it were some alien life form, then stare at us. Because he’s so odd anyway, it’s hard to know whether something is wrong or whether he’s just being his usual stupid self but, as he’s lost weight, we thought it best to have him checked.
As bad luck would have it, instead of our usual vet, our appointment was with the vet who saw Catorze when I thought he had a tick and it turned out to be just a lump of crud stuck to his fur. He’s perfectly nice, but I was so embarrassed by that incident that I had hoped never to have to see him again. So how typical that the last dregs of accursed 2020 would find us face to face again, after more than two years of avoiding him (and doing a fine job, I might add).
In the waiting room, I chatted to the daddy of a black Labrador called Dexter. Apparently Dexter had been “trying to bark at all the cats coming in but, being just a puppy, he doesn’t have a voice yet” (his daddy’s exact words). One look at Catorze, however, and he found it. It was throaty, deep and deafening. And clearly Dexter’s daddy had seen enough horror movies to know that, if the dog is unhappy with someone or something, that’s a signal to get the hell out.
Anyway, there is nothing whatsoever wrong with Catorze, and his weight loss (from 3.71kg on 23rd November to 3.29kg now) is because he’s gone off his new food. Yes, he ate it happily at first, but this is Sa Maj we’re talking about; nobody knows why he does the stupid things he does. Cat Daddy and I are very disappointed as we love everything about the Cool Cat Club, and we so wanted this to work. Hopefully they will understand that this isn’t a reflection on their product, and that cats are just imbeciles.
By the time we got home, Catorze’s vet-administered appetite-stimulating pill had kicked in. But, once again, he went to his plate and just sniffed and stared. Then, when I sifted through his 30-70 mix of old and new food, giving him the pellets of old food only, he ate them.
So then we had a problem, because his old food has been discontinued.
After frantically panic-Googling high-protein cat food I discovered that Thrive have a dry food product, although none of the sellers were able to deliver anytime soon. The fastest and cheapest delivery was, unbelievably, on Ocado Zoom, a grocery delivery service for disorganised brats who want stuff within the hour. I remember once laughing at a friend for using this service, and no doubt she will giggle when she learns that I, too, joined the throng of disorganised brats.
Unfortunately the pack of Thrive was 50p below the minimum order quantity, so I asked Cat Daddy if we could add anything else to the order. Apparently we needed, erm, Branston pickle. (Non-Brits: ask your British friends.) I was concerned that the driver would wonder what special kind of disorganised brats we must be to need Branston pickle and to need it RIGHT NOW, and I was right to be worried because, when the delivery arrived, it contained Branston pickle and nothing else.
The evening was topped off by Catorze putting his best efforts into screaming his guts out whilst I was on the phone to Ocado Zoom asking what had gone wrong. The poor lady on the phone was saying, “Oh my God, your hungry cat! I can hear him! I feel so bad!”
Whilst the rest of the world reflects, dreams big and sets goals, all we want in 2021 is for our cat to eat the bloody food. Any food. NO, NOT THE OBSOLETE FOOD, FOR GOODNESS’ SAKE.
jesuisleroisoleil 
Your latest post has me in stitches! Thank you so much for leaving me laughing out loud at Catorze’s antics at the end of this miserable year. Hoping the three of you all have a very happy and healthy 2021 and that Le Rio finally finds some food he likes that is readily available🤣
LikeLiked by 2 people
Happy New Year to you! You couldn’t make this nonsense up, could you? It really is constant drama here. 😐
LikeLiked by 1 person
Today’s Katzenworld featured a picture of Catorze – I guess.
https://i0.wp.com/katzenworld.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Picture-Perfect-Pets-Winner-Amy-Buck-18-Half-vampire-1.jpg?resize=1320%2C934&ssl=1
(Here;s the link to the whole post to put it in context https://katzenworld.co.uk/2020/12/31/picture-perfect-rspca-youth-photo-comp/
We did google Branston Pickle, so we hope you get your order straightened out soon. Although it wouldn’t surprise us to learnCatorze loves Branston Pickle !
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hahaha, this must be his evil twin in the picture! Or, rather, his good twin, as he is clearly the evil one. He may well have to learn to love Branston Pickle because we still haven’t managed to get hold of any new food for him.
LikeLike
I recommend Doris Lessig’s book On Cats. it’s available on Amazon. She was very fond of cats and tried to cater to their every whim. And believe me, she had some strange cats! Each one had a distinct personality.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you! I’ve not heard of that book but I will check it out. I don’t know what Doris would make of Catorze. We’ve lived with him for 6.5 years and we don’t have a clue. 🤣🤣🤣
LikeLiked by 1 person
You’re not alone with a fussy cat! Maya has now been put on a gastric food diet. Previously on the urinary care because of Inca having a stone in her bladder….she started being sick every other day. The vet diagnosed acute gastritis and the only bag they sell is 4kg bag at1000 pesos (£38). She was ok for a week or so, but she’s not keen anymore …. and there is no alternative to flavour!…this bag is going to last her for months! The good thing, is after some medication for 5 days, she has improved a great deal.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Oh my! What on earth do you do when they start disliking the one food that’s available? I guess we are lucky that we have many options here, but this is the time of year when none of them are available for days, or even weeks! And what do we do if we don’t happen upon an acceptable one anytime soon? Arrrrgh! 😫😫😫
LikeLike
Poor starving Louis. If only there were some way for him to silence his screaming belly. 😂
Is there a reason he only gets dry food? I only ask because KitKat highly recommends Thrive’s wet food (like, really really highly) but we haven’t tried their dry. I can’t afford Thrive tins as her full-time diet, so she usually gets Gourmet with a Scrumbles/Thrive dinner for special occasions, but she also has biscuits out to nibble on all day. (She’s a very delicate eater so a bowl of dry food lasts several days.) She recommends IAMS chicken or salmon biscuits, but you’ve probably tried them already…
Also, KitKat wants me to suggest Thrive’s freeze-dried chicken (or salmon) treats. She eats far too much (several pieces daily, it’s more like her breakfast than a treat), but I don’t mind as long as she maintains her ideal weight and still eats actual cat food, and she’s very good about stopping when she’s had enough (unlike me). It’s 100% chicken and has no additives as far as I can tell, and it’s available on Amazon Prime. Bit expensive but a 200g tub lasts quite a while (available in smaller tubes and other flavours if you’d rather not commit until he’s tried it lol). I obviously don’t recommend it as his full diet, but it could tide him over and help stop the weight loss until you can get him some food he’ll actually eat?
LikeLiked by 2 people
Thanks so much for the tips. Catorze only gets dried food because the little sod won’t eat wet food. What I would ideally want is him having both, but sadly this isn’t what he wants.
He has tried the Thrive freeze-dried white fish and tuna. It was a NOPE. If he doesn’t eat the Thrive dried food when it comes, I honestly don’t know what I will do. We can’t switch back to his old food because IT NO LONGER EXISTS.
If he were my human kid I would be telling him to eat what he was given and stop being such a whiny bitch about it, but what can I do if he just won’t eat it?
LikeLiked by 2 people
Yeah, KitKat only likes the chicken and salmon Thrive, she won’t touch the other flavours. (And the salmon is only ever a special treat, she gets bored of it super quick compared to the chicken 😅) It might be worth trying him with a different flavour?
I feel for you! I’m super lucky with KitKat, she’s picky but not really, especially compared to His Maj. I hope you find something he’ll eat soon (that, you know, continues to exist…)
LikeLiked by 1 person
We’re a bit wary of swapping flavours because the vet said that changing from one animal protein to another could be enough to trigger his allergy. So we’re on a mission to find a fish-only variant with no traces whatsoever of chicken, and it really isn’t as easy as it seems.
LikeLike
Oh, dear, I didn’t know that. I have no ideas for that, then. KitKat doesn’t usually eat fish (besides salmon) so I have no other suggestions. Fingers crossed you find something for him, though!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you! I’m a bit stressed out about it, actually, as I don’t have enough of the Lily’s Kitchen left to do a slow phasing of whatever new food we pick (not that it did me any good last time!) so it’s going to have to be just a straight swap and hope for the best. I’m even wondering if I should get a couple of different things in case the first one I try doesn’t work out? Especially as he’s proven that he won’t “get hungry enough eventually” …
LikeLiked by 1 person
I would, yeah. Last time KitKat got bored of the Gourmet, we tried a handful of different foods. She went back to Gourmet pretty quick, but she was actually on Felix with her foster family and the first month here, before she decided she didn’t like it anymore 😅 I realise you don’t have many options with His Maj, though. Wish I could help!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes, unfortunately we are very low on supplies of his existing, soon-to-be-obsolete food. We did have more but, because the little shit was happily eating the Cool Cat Club food at first, we didn’t think we’d need it and we gave it to the food bank. 🤦♀️
LikeLike
I second Mandy’s vote for ebay, then. There are just so many brands and sub brands even just of dry food, it’s a tough one 😳
LikeLiked by 1 person
Happy New Year!
I just wanted to say how much I’ve enjoyed reading your blog again over the last year – it’s so funny reading about Louis and his antics..!
Have you tried ebay for the cat food that’s no longer readily available? I find it really handy for things you can’t get elsewhere and it’s usually pretty reasonable price wise too
Good Luck with it all anyway :o)
LikeLiked by 2 people
Thank you, and Happy New Year to you, too! I initially rejected that idea because I didn’t see the point in giving him something that we’ll only have to change shortly, but I am now rethinking. At least it would buy us some time. I’ll see how the Thrive goes and then possibly revisit that …
LikeLike
Sounds typical cat to me. Three of my cats eat and eat well, stealing if they can. Gracie dines. She usually has a few bites, then leaves to go to the powder room and comes back. I have to stand and guard her food while she takes a damn potty break or one of the others will eat it. She also drives the food choices as the others will eat anything. She only like one brand, one flavor. Until she doesn’t. Argh!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Gracie est la reine! I know it must make you mad, but she’s a lady who knows what she wants! 👸
LikeLiked by 1 person
Like I said she dines. The other cats eat.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Bonne Année and bonne chance to you 🙂 I wonder if the Egyptians worshipped cats because it made sense that only divine beings can be so demanding…
LikeLiked by 1 person
Bonne Année! Hahaha, you may be right!
LikeLiked by 1 person