In the past couple of weeks, I’ve realized how many people I know, because all of them called and emailed wanting to discuss the situation in Ukraine and Russia. It’s war. It’s a nightmare. No, nobody is okay. All I can do on my end is rage, feel helpless, and donate money. It’s hell over there and purgatory for anyone whose relatives are caught up the war zone.
My father told me during our last call that I’ve been over here too long and I am now an American, because I want to hold Putin accountable for all of it rather than accepting it with cynicism and apathy, like it was some natural disaster. He might be right. The right to demand accountability from the government is very American. I’m glad I am an American.
This is my fourth draft of these two paragraphs as I am trying to express myself without resorting to profanity and ranting.
Let’s talk about something else today.
How is Salem?
Whoever suggested that she might have trouble with her esophagus is an MVP. Thank you on behalf of the elderly kitty. We don’t know if that is it for sure, because our vet has been booked solid, but we tried Hartz Delectables Stew Lickable Treat, which is basically stew like food with little chunks of meat in it. It is a resounding success. She licks up the broth and eats a bit of the meat. Not all of it, but enough to make a difference. She is no longer lethargic, and we’ve had zero vomit since February 21st. Now I need to find a food that’s mostly liquid like that rather than a treat.
Tuna, on the other hand, is most vocal about her right to liquid treats, so she gets one too. Otherwise, she screams. Not meows. Screams.
Are you used to the bread machine now, do you use it regularly?
Bread machine and I are bestest friends. Yesterday I made pizza dough and served two pizzas, a pepperoni and mushroom and a vegan cheese. I even attempted pepperoni twists. Everything was eaten.
One thing is, the dough didn’t have that… I don’t know how to explain it – maybe volume? – of a good artisan pizza. It was delicious but more like thin crust. Gordon loves thin crust, so that worked out. It wasn’t the rise. The dough rose like a mushroom in the bread maker, and I followed the directions to flatten it into disks and let it rise again for 30 minutes. I might have to look at more pizza dough recipes online.
Also, I’ve made various types of bread now, the French bread, the wheat bread, the honey wheat bread. 10 out of 10, will use again.
What does self-care mean to you? Once you finished Ruby Fever, which took a lot out of you, what did you do for your mental/physical wellbeing? The past 2 years have been a lot and I’m looking for inspiration on recovery techniques.
I was never very good at self-care and lately most of my coping mechanisms have been failing. I have made numerous attempts at it in the past two weeks with very mixed success.
As one of my self-care options, I decided to write a bit on the project that had been backburnered for two years. No, it has nothing to do with anything that we have written before. It doesn’t belong to any of our universes. I wanted to sit there and quietly poke at it to see if it is something or nothing. The problem is, the project called for a dead dog. The dog dies off page, but it is very traumatic. It’s a John Wick type of a scenario. I had to get through it to get to the actual story and it was so difficult.
Mod R: How are things?
Me: Still killing the dog.
Two days later.
Gordon: How is it?
Me: Still killing the dog.
Two days later.
Kid 1: I thought you would work less.
Me: I’m trying to kill this dog.
Kid 1: What do you have against dogs, Mom? Can you go through a book without killing a dog?
Me: … We only killed two dogs over a 15 year career…
Kid 1, who is in charge of a certain adaptation and all of the work that goes into it: Brutus, Mom! You did not tell me that was a dog-killing book!
I finally killed the dog and then cried, so I managed to stress myself out even more with my “self-care.”
I did have some success. On Friday, Gordon and I went on a date to Gruene Door. We sat outside and it was lovely. It is a quiet place with good food off the beaten path, and I really like it.
Kid 2 is obsessed with squishmallows, so I got to go on a squishmallow hunt twice so far. The last one was on Saturday and she and I ended up having dinner at a sushi place.
I tried to paint the other day. I am very unskilled but there is something about watercolors that makes me happy, so I bought these art paper sheet preprinted with geometric patterns. I was going to sit there and color them, and I even got to start, and then Salem came and lay on me. She rolled on my painting. She tried to drink the water. Long story short, I put it away and sat on the couch with her for a bit until I got sleepy and went to find Gordon who had the right idea from the start and took a nap.
Mostly my self care is sleep, lately. I did start the Princess Bride knitting project but I am far behind. Will post pics when I have something substantial.
Knotts Berry Farm in Buena Park,CA has Squishmallows as prizes for their carnival games. They all look so cute.
If you have a Sam’s Club near you, I’ve seen pictures of Squishmallows for characters from Pixar’s”Up”
Before my cat Guen passed, I would have to coax her to eat. Some of the things that worked were the fancy feast pouches as well as putting her food in the blender and making a kitty smoothie out of it. With my current batch, they don’t like the prescription canned food straight from the can, I have to mash it up and mix it with water, but once I do that they snarf it down, even if I mix their meds in there. (Thank goodness for that, because this clowder is a PAIN to pill.)
I hope you find something that works for Salem!
Would you be willing to share some of the bread machine recipes? Mine sits on the shelf collecting dust because my loaves have all turned out horrible. I haven’t had much luck with any of the recipes I’ve tried (even the ones in the booklet it came with).
For Pizza: try Pizza flour. King Arthur Flour Pizza Flour can be found in my local grocery stores.
One of the ways I deal with being really angry or upset is I’ll write all the thoughts clogging up my brain in the most impassioned way possible. Even the stuff I know isn’t true, but I just need to get it out of my head. Not censoring anything seems to be the key. Then when I get it all out I destroy it in some satisfying way, usually ripping it into tiny places, but burning it can be satisfying too (just be safe obviously). I might still be angry or sad afterwards, but I feel a lot of relief. I can then move on to using my time more productively and stop obsessing over whatever is bothering me.
Hi Ilona, I am not sure if you can get it in the US but I can really recommend “Royal Canin Recovery” cat food. It is rather liquid and intended for cats after sickness, surgeries etc. My elderly cat loved it almost until his last moments. Here in Europe it is mostly sold at vet clincs but nowadays everything is of course on the internet too. All the best to your kitties! Anja
P.S.: I am on a rerun of Kate Daniels audio books. It am grateful for a bit of distraction these days! Thank you so much!
After reading this I wanted to hug you, fawn over the cats and then give you another hug.
Tiki cat makes some mousse cat foods that may work. Ive also seen Nulo. My fuzz gets them as treats when hes being food picky. I also blend regular food and add water as he has hydration issues. The things we do for our fuzzy rulers ????
If you have a blender you can make your own semi-liquid cat food. I did this for my elderly cat. You can make a large enough batch to last a few days and keep it in the fridge.
My four year old car was trapped in a house undergoing renovation, we went round the village asking people if they had seen him, out up posters, nothing. My husband asked homebuilders at that house if he could go in to search, it’s a large house and they refused, even though it’s empty, Finally ,13 days later ,the cat was found in the house by the owner who had stopped by to view the work. He survived by drinking from a toliet but he was so thin! His system has been fragile ever since and I spend lots on various foods but I don’t mind. I could have done something nasty to those builders though. How they didn’t spot a distressed cat or hear him I don’t know. He’s a Siamese and very vocal.
I fed baby kittens boiled chicken with the water that was boiled in. I added fish-tasting vitamins for extra punch. They ate it and loved it. Just boil a big batch, keep it in the fridge and blitz it in a blender. Heat it a tad in the microwave if she likes her food warm.
I’ve been leaning towards getting a bread machine, but seeing as we just got an air fryer (free! One good thing came from sticking with the same company X# years!), pretty sure the husband doesn’t want to give up any more counter space. Woe. Hope you find a pizza dough recipe that works! And glad kitty is feeling better!
For me, self care involves stepping back from whatever is running me ragged. Sometimes I spin. Lately I’ve been making color charts for these pencils my mom gave me (Derwent Inktense. Sort of like watercolor pencils, which are already easier to control than watercolor, but the color sticks to paper better). I watch a show I’ve seen a billion times for background noise and just…do something repetitive. Even if it’s petting the dog (because she loves being petted). On the writing front, I’ll often veer off and basically…fanfic my work I guess. Write a short story here or there to fill in a gap or a bit of backstory. Nothing ever meant to be seen by readers. For my reference only.
Hope you are able to wind down! Please take care!
I watch Gardeners Eorld in the evening. It’s on Prime. I find it relaxing – all the beautiful sounds and colours, and people are nice and they talk about what things smell like or fell like, not just what they look like.
For self-care, Emily and Amelia Nagoski have a book called Burnout and a podcast called The Feminist Survival Project 2020. Both are good. If you are currently burnt out, then do not listen to the book as audiobook as I did – it was too much. A copy that can be skimmed through if it gets overwhelming works better. And it’s overwhelming because someone describing the conditions of burnout while the person is burnt out just makes the burnout more intense – it’s not that the book is bad.
*Gardener’s World
Also, I listen to a white noise appointment my phone as I fall asleep. It is set to turn off half an hour before I’m supposed to wake up, so all the little noises in the night get smoothed out.
I’ve lately started also listening to Gordon Hempton as I fall asleep, at the same time as the white noise. He does nature recordings in places that have little to no human noises. The recordings can be 20 minutes to an hour long. Very relaxing.
I spent a small fortune tracking down a jack skellington squishmallow for my neice for Christmas. I know the pain.
The new nacho flay cat food has a substantially higher moisture content than anything else I have seen recently. Try the turkey or salmon in particular.
I didn’t make it through all of the comments, but you can also try mixing kitten formula with wet cat food for extra calories and nutrition.
I started watching Last One Laughing Canada on Amazon last night, I’d never heard of it before, but apparently there’s a whole series of them, and I haven’t laughed that hard in a long time.
I think really good pizza dough requires sitting around for a while. I can whip out a pizza in under an hour. But the crust ends up missing something. When I make the dough Monday and bake the pizza Tuesday, that’s when I think it tastes best.
Tiki Cat has pouches of mousse cat food and broths that might work. My cat absolutely loves everything I get from Tiki Cat.
Re: Russia and Ukraine, very best to your family and friends for safety. Re: aging cats, try a low salt jarred or powdered gravy mix. Re: killing dogs, why not a big spider or scorpion. Re: leaving Texas, (a few posts ago), come to Maryland! Be well.
Is Tuna a Norwegian Forest Cat?
For the last seven months of our senior kitty’s life, we fed her chicken baby food (the kind that’s only chicken and water, nothing else) and Fancy Feast Broths to keep her from vomiting. Broths seem to be tasty goop with some slivers/pieces of meat or fish mixed in. I mashed up the solid bits with a fork to make them as small as possible and our kitty could keep it all down. Hope this helps; I am so sorry your family is going through this kind of struggle on top of everything else.
The link below is to a dehydrated food grade cat food. When mixed to the recommended consistency it’s mush but you can just add more water to make it soupy. When my dog had a tooth removed & the wound came open we gave her the dog version. It was convenient & they have samples so you don’t have to commit. I don’t know about the cat one but the dog one has an unpleasant smell,to me,pup loved it, husband didn’t care. Good luck
https://www.thehonestkitchen.com/cat-food/meals/grain-free-cats
Try baby food puree. I nursed my elderly cat Frankie (also velvet black) with throat problems with baby food, the thin meat kinds. I also used no salt chicken broth to blend cat food, but I think he got more nutrition from the baby food. My vet ok’d it so Frankie was my baby for a few years. Inspurred a few interesting convos in the grocery aisle! lol 🙂 And yes I had to guard his dish from LB the food thief. Who got treats and extra samples, but loved the thrill of the baby food stalking.
Lot of essential nutrients required by cats missing from human food. Just sayin’. I’d be pretty careful with that one if it was the only source of food.
The cathartic benefits of a profanity based rant are highly underrated. To avoid “Karen” associations, my family requires a public announcement “I need to rant”, “I’m going to whine” in advance (keeps you from taking yourself too seriously, too). Feel free.
Yep
I get it..
I had to Google Squishmallows. Very cute and wow. What a variety!
Weruva cat food is very soupy and my cat loves it. I am glad your cat is doing better ❤️
I made cheese piroshki today. I need more practice but it was well worth the very tiny effort.
I’m glad to hear the kitty is better. Fancy Feast makes a food with liquid centers that when warmed is lickable. It’s called Fancy Feast Savory Centers. Might find a can or two to try it.
Tiki Cat has liquid cat food. I think they call it “velvet mousse.” They have a few different kinds for elderly cats, special needs food, etc. It’s super hard to find cat food where I’m at (Michigan) so good luck.
My self-care in this current time of tribulation involves Dr Who and Girl Scouts. We found at the library a 12-disk collection of the first 4 seasons of the modern Doctor. We also spent $20 on Girl Scout cookies. Every day, my husband and I take a break to make a cup of tea and watch one episode of Dr Who while eating 1 Girl Scout cookie and sipping our tea. We know it’s a particularly riveting episode when we reach the end and realize our tea is cold!
For Self care
As a massage therapist. We have to do a lot of self care .
A dietician said self care starts with you and treating yourself to certin things you really enjoy doing
Pampering onesself. Pedicures
I found paper art very satisfying
You collect squares of artistic paper and make pictures out of the designs . Frame them or sell them. They go for a lot a friend sold one of hers 4 by 4. For 150.oo
Pizza stone + parchment paper + 550° oven + 6 min bake time really made the difference for me. It makes no sense to me, but the hotter the oven, the softer the crust. I have small square pizza stones that cover the bottom rack of my oven and I don’t take them out of the oven.
Sending good wishes/supportive vibes to everyone for help in dealing with problems, both near and far.
Couple of commercial options for very wet cat food:
– Tiki Cat Compliments “topper”
– — mine like this better than the Tiki Cat Broths
– Blue Buffalo tastefuls turkey & chicken entrée pate wet cat food
– — this is the wettest of wet cat foods, and mine really like it
– Churu lickable cat treats, puree in a tube
The store Aldi often has Squishmallow stuffed toys. Next week there will be Disney and travel pillow Squishmallows. Sorry, no sushi though.
There are so many comments on this already, not sure this will be read, but if you are looking for good pizza dough recipes, check out the King Arthur Flour website. (I am trying one today where you start the dough the day before and don’t even have to knead it!) They also sell different kinds of flour for pizza dough, if you want, and flavorings that make it taste more like pizzeria pizza. I haven’t tried those, but all the recipes on the website are really well tested, and the comments from people who have tried the recipes are also really helpful. They sometimes also have videos to help. Give it a look.
All comments are read ????. Thank you for your suggestions, Laurel.
My cats love saucy food. One of the biggest hits is Weruva B.F.F. OMG – Best Feline Friend Oh My Gravy! assortment. I just pulled that out of my order history. It is very soupy.
I give my dogs Trader Joe’s Bone Broth in their meals to make it soupy. They love it. Good source of protein Good luck with beautiful Salem
Like many others here, I took my cats’ and dogs’ hard food, added water and let it set in the fridge in a big bowl. Then take out food scoops, add more water or broth, mush it with a fork and voila kitty soupy food. Worked well for us over the many years of pets and health things. Self-care I try outside and unplugged as much as possible. As a career teacher/administrator, my stress runs high and I try to soothe in nature… Just my way, not surefire.
“The right to demand accountability from the government is very American.” This concept, that citizens in other countries do not see their governments this way, is so shocking to me. Thank you for teaching me one more thing to be grateful for, having been raised in America. It also gives me one more reason to be grateful for modern communication … maybe the concept will spread to all of the people in the world. May all beings live in peace, harmony, contentment, equality, and happiness.
I have a very senior kitty, 18, and she likes her canned food with added water also until it is a thick soup or slurry. If you try it I do suggest trying it with a paté style. Will probably still have some lumps but they will be small.
And I hope you have better luck with you self-care!
You might be missing “chew” for your bread maker dough. Gluten formation that makes it have some “tearing” when you bite into it.
Try mixing the dough, then let it rest for 30 min to an hour. That should give the dough a chance to naturally develop its gluten. Then start to knead.
I hope that helps.
Bread can sense stress. Bread is a bitch about that. Do not fear the bread or it will know.
Have you heard of or have any place that sells Tiki cat? They have something called velvet mousse it comes in pouches and is a complete a great food for cats. I tried to feed it to my cat when she had some teeth removed.
My senior kitty gets a quarter can of tuna fish (chunk packed in water) mixed with water and squished up with a fork every morning. She seems to enjoy it and is in pretty good health for a 16 year old!
I’ve also been struggling on the self-care, and thought I’d share a book that’s been helping. It’s gentle and wise, very outside my normal paranormal/urban fantasy genre reading, but it’s lovely. Like taking a nap without the 25 minutes of “why can’t I sleep? I’m exhausted, I should be able to nap, what can’t I even do this right?”.
For Salem,
My cats have trouble as well. I take their prescription canned food and blender it. You can mix a bit of water in to the consistency Salem likes.
I can relate to your elder kitty issues- my old girl enjoyed Boston Market chicken pot pies (minus the crust) for many years. Of course, they were heated up to make them tastier!
Ho, Italy here. A friend from Napoli once told me you have to flatten pizza by hand, no tools, and the let It rise once more (10 minutes are enough). Don’t know if you already tried it
Older pets are fine eating treats as dinner unless they start to get chubby.
Keep feeding your wet treats or add salt free broth to any wet cat food “dinner” meals and blender it. No different than people who cannot chew food, you know?
One thing about buying broth from a regular grocery store — I had trouble finding commercially made broths that did not have added flavorings like onion or garlic — had read that these are bad for cats? My senior girl wanted more of the broth/liquid toward the end of her life (lost her in Dec 2020). I finally found some broth/stocks that were just the chicken broth, no added salt or flavors. But it was a tough search.
The new girls (adopted in 2021) are good drinkers, lots of water, and like the looser very wet foods (I’ve nicknamed the Halo stews as Inhale-o). And the Blue Buffalo Tastefuls Chicken/Turkey, which I mentioned in my first post.
Hope you find something that helps Salem to keep the weight on.
Regarding watercolor painting: my art teacher uses a technique where you pour watercolors &/or liquid black ink on layers of rice paper. Once the layers dry, separate them & get inspired to add details. This is based on how Chinese artists painted for years. It’s a lot of fun!
Try baby food for your geriatric kitty. It’s reasonably healthy and they seem to love it. My cat’s always liked the chicken flavor best, but beef and ham are good too. Good luck, old girl.
YouTube Chanel Vito Lacopelli knows everything about pizza. Love from Germany