Real Men ♥ Cats

My friend, Mary Ann, over at The Very Best Cats recently surprised me with a delightful gift! She is a skilled artisan who creates many fun and delightful animal-related designs that can be applied to lots of different things, like shirts, mugs, aprons, bags, etc.

She thought this T-shirt might fit me well, and guess what? She was right! I love it!! I'm definitely a "real man" and I ♥ cats!

Here's the design on my new shirt:

And here's some dude from her Zazzle store wearing the design:

(this dude is not me!)

I wore this shirt for the first time at my recent crazy cat person party and got quite a few compliments. Everyone loved it!

Mary Ann has an online shop where this design and many others are available. The holidays are coming up and Meow Meow Bow Wow is sure to have a design that would make the perfect gift for the animal lovers in your life. Browse the selection at Meow Meow Bow Wow Gifts or go right to the Real Men Love Cats T Shirt.

A few of her other designs that I really like:

This one describes me well:

Yes, I am cat co-dependent! Is there a 12-step group for that?! Although even if there is, I'm not ready to do whatever it takes to change.

This one might make the perfect gift for Laura:

Although she might enjoy the Cat Yoga bag too as her official yoga bag. So many fun choices.

Thanks Mary Ann for the very thoughtful gift. I should note that Mary Ann in no way requested that I write about her gift or about her store. In fact, I think she was a little hesitant to give me permission to post about it.

super-bonanza!

Way back in May, I won a Sam's Club Pet Care Product Package giveaway over at Pawcurious. The details of what I had won were unknown, just that the package had an approximate value of $450!

A lot of time went by and nothing happened. I figured my winning moment probably had fallen through the cracks of such a large company. Such is my life.

Then, out of the blue, while I was away last week, the Fed-Ex man arrived toting some large, extremely heavy boxes. Five such boxes appeared over two days. Several of them weighing more than 80 pounds!






Opening the boxes was like Christmas! Inside were lots and lots of cat food. Case after case of wet food and six big bags of dry cat food. There was also 82 pounds of cat litter! Quite the huge haul of goodies! I haven't worked out just yet what I will do with all this food as it is different brands than I usually use. I might keep some to add a little variety into the cats' diet and donate the rest to Purrfect Pals.

The photo shoot had to end early after Theo, not content
with just sniffing, started tearing into the bag of Meow Mix.

Also inside was a special treat for Nahum - packing paper! He loves the crinkly paper.

But wait, there's more! After getting all the loot sorted and stacked away the Fed-Ex man reappeared again today. He dropped off an even larger and heavier box than the others!

What other goodies might be in this box...

return of fish toy

One of Max's favorite toys was the Fish Toy by West Paw Design. After Max's death. it took me awhile before I would let the other cats play with Max's fish. The fish is about 6" long. The soft fleece material is made from recycled plastic bottles. There is a little bell inside that rattles and there is a bit of organic catnip inside.

Max hanging out with his favorite fish toy, Oct 25, 2008

Kitten Rose enjoy's Max's fish toy, Sept 29, 2010

Eventually, Theo discovered the fish toy and he destroyed it. Theo has a way of tearing things up. He gutted the fish so he could get at the catnip that was sewn in. I was quite annoyed because this toy had belonged to Max.

Remembering that Rose enjoyed the fish when she was so tiny, the other day I decided to look for a new one. I ordered three so I would have a backup supply. Sadly, they are harder to find now which translates into a higher price.

Theo tearing open the package trying to get at the fish

New fish

Theo loves the fish

Tastes good

Rose is indifferent. She hasn't shown any interest yet in the new fish.

new bug toy!

Thanks to Neko Flies, the kitties have a new bug toy! I recently won a Neko Flies giveaway! The timing was perfect, my Kragonfly has finally expired so I was in need of a new bug toy.

I got the Kittycada this time. All the cats were immediately interested, but Theo couldn't contain himself while I tried to remove the toy from the packaging. I held it way in the air and he was jumping like a crazy cat!

A close-up of the Kittycada. 

Like the Kragonfly, the Kittycada is made of very good quality materials. And like the Kragonfly, the cats went bonkers for it. Neko Flies are still the only toy that all the cats go nuts over.

Focus

Making the catch

Eating the prize

Hunt mode

Nom nom nom...

The Kittycada is a big hit. Shortly after bringing it out, Willow started to chew on it and I heard a big crunch. She started to act like something weird was in her mouth, I feared she had broken a tooth. Turns out, she had chewed off one of the hard plastic eyes of the bug, which was a little smaller than a BB. I immediately plucked out the other eye. I don't remember the Kragonfly having hard eyes, but maybe it does.

Thanks Neko Flies for making such great bug toys!

new toy

The other day Laura and I were at, Next to Nature, one of the best cat stores around. (They have the most horrid website ever, but their store is great!). We stopped in to restock on Wildside Salmon (freeze dried salmon treats) which our cats love!

One of the things I really like about this store is that they have a very nice selection of cat toys. It seems to me that most pet stores stock the same boring cat toys, but Next to Nature has the usual stuff and a lot more.

They had a nice looking catnip fish toy (made my The Mouse Factory) that we thought would be great for Rose. So we got it along with a bunch of fresh sparkle balls for Willow.

Rose barely got to sniff the fish before Theo took it over! Theo goes crazy over this fish toy.

 Theo loves to lick the fish until it is good and soggy and then he rubs it against his face. He does this over and over. Good times!

Theo can be rough on toys. This fish toy would not have lasted a day in our house had I not taken it away. He very methodically works on shredding such toys. He uses his amazing strength to hold the fish with his paws while he uses his teeth to rip and shred. So now Theo gets supervised when he plays with the fish.

stuff

You have heard me rant about the significant lack of quality cat toys and cat books out there, so I won't go there now. It occurred to me today that while there may be a lack of quality cat things available, there is an abundance of cat kitsch. Does that mean that cat people would rather buy stuff for themselves than spend money on their cats? What's up with that?!

Anyway, I was looking through all the cool cat stuff in the Whales & Friends catalog and found this must have mug.

Christmas is only 23 days away!