Other Side of the Planet dot com

Cats: Robotic Litter Boxes: PetSafe Simply Clean

Posted on February 17th, 2009 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Cats.

[Tarzan stared at his quietly-humming litter box for a very long time…]

As Tarzan is a finicky creature when it comes to his litter box, and as my new habit for weekend trips involves my not cleaning the litter box between Friday morning and Sunday night, I decided to invest in a self-cleaning litter box.  I mean, really, who doesn’t need another robot in the house?

I went to NYCPET, where I buy Tarzan’s favorite litter.  I saw the very same litter box Beth had…for $189.99 (plus New York’s 8.375% sales tax!)  So I went home and asked Beth where she got hers, and what she paid.  $100 at Fleet Farm.  Doubting that I would find a Fleet Farm in New York City, I opted for Amazon.com.  ($90.52, direct from Amazon, and free shipping!)

Tarzan was quite apprehensive at first - you’re supposed to acclimate you cat to the new, perpetually-spinning litter box, but who has time for that? - but he soon adjusted (bless his easy-going, ever adaptable soul.)  I was able to leave him for four days, and there was really only one fault with the box…the lip is definately not high enough for Tarzan’s enthusiastic digging tendancies.

[My bathroom upon my return home.  A clean litter box, but a messy floor.  Obviously some slight modifications need to be made.]

4 comments.

Tarzan: The Christmas Gift Box

Posted on January 27th, 2008 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Cats.

It occurs to me that I haven’t recently blogged about Tarzan.  Like myself, Tarzan is a geek, so he obsesses over things easily.  This is the story of Tarzan’s obsession with a box.

Tarzan and I had just arrived in Minnesota for Christmas, and his cousins, Sophie and Smokey, had been picking on him.  He got a little defensive and, Christmas Eve, while we were opening presents, decided to lay claim to a gift box.

He defended his gift box from his cousins any time they came near.  Eventually, he curled up and took a nap, so when it was time for bed, I took the box to my room and set it in the headboard.

Tarzan slept every night in that box in my headboard, so when it was time to New York, I brought it back with us.  A month later, the box still sits, wedged between my pillows.  It’s one of his favorite spots in the apartment.

What a geek.

2 comments.

Tarzan: Something to Feel Good About

Posted on May 2nd, 2007 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Animals, Blog, Cats.

One day last month I was looking back at some old pictures when I stumbled across a few images of Tarzan from about three weeks after I got him, back when he was still only known as “Little Brother” (Didi/Deedee).

[Tarzan in April 2006, about 3 weeks after I got him]

When I got Tarzan, he was fully grown and living in a cage about 12″x12″x18″.  He was given neither food nor water by day, or even a litter box.  His fur was matted with feces and he suffered from a skin fungus.  He had open wounds on his head.  He weighed 4 pounds (less than 2kg.)  This, unfortunately, is the life for animals in Taiwanese night markets.

[Tarzan in April 2007, about 1 year after I got him]

While thinking about all this, I looked over at my dear kitty, who was spawled out on the bed.  He’s now more than twice as heavy as the day I brought him home, and his fur is soft and thick (even though it costantly flies off his body…)  And looking over at him, I feel good knowing that I made a difference in a life.

2 comments.

Meaningless Rant: Return of the Jedi Cat

Posted on January 22nd, 2007 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Animals, Blog, Cats, Meaningless Rants, Star Wars.

[I’m learning how to do lightsaber effects!]

It occurred to me that Tarzan is somewhat lacking from my recent blogs, but he’s been strange enough lately to definately warrent a post - so here goes (again, actually, this is the third time I’ve written this post…my server keeps crashing on me.)

Tarzan maintains his bizarre sleeping behavior, which imitates that of a human.  He sleeps on his back, with his head resting on a pillow.  Is this comfortable for him?  It’s not very cat-like…

Tarzan continues to be very playful.  He’s not quite two years old yet, and I guess they’re kittens up until then, so…maybe he’s normal…in his own way.  Above, he’s playing Tug of War with me…because he thinks he’s a dog.  I see no other explanation.

3 comments.

Tribute: Beauty

Posted on January 11th, 2007 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Animals, Blog, Cats.

[My cat Beauty, opening the Christmas gift I brought her all by herself - and, in the process, enjoying said gift very much.]

A small tribute to the small-framed, gray ball of fluff named Beauty, who entered my family’s home on February 4^th, 1990 at the tender age of seven months after being adopted from her foster mother, Ann, at the Animal Rescue League.
 
Terrified of humans until her last year in the world of mortals, I won Beauty’s love and trust with patience sitting next to her and reading out loud, or offering my hand to her instead of petting her directly.  She grew attached to me, and became my constant companion, the gray ring of fur around the crater in the feather pillow on my bed was a friendly reminder of this fact.

Thinking of herself as a human, Beauty enjoyed wearing dolls clothes and eating junk food, like Oreos and Doritos.  A timid creature, no one ever dared scold her, not even when she worked up the courage to jump up onto the dinner table.  She was fond of Subway sandwiches, which made it convenient for her to eat from one end while I ate from the other.  She had a preference for white meat, and no power in the verse could hide beef jerky from her.

Beauty had her quirks, as all good cats do.  She preferred climbing over jumping, and always made a point of digging her claws into the side of a piece of furniture to laboriously pull herself up the side of a bed or a couch.  She also had the tendency to fly down the hall and disappear at the smallest provocation, or seemingly no provocation at all, leaving tufts of soft fur floating through the air in her wake.

She was a very gentle cat, and though she had all her claws, and though she used them liberally, she rarely ever scratched me, even if she was struggling to get away.  She also had an excellent set of manners, and always made a point of walking carefully around the random art project, book, or remote that might be in her way, never stepping or sitting on things as other cats are inclined to do.

Beauty left our world on December 21^st, 2006, and though I’m sad to have her leave us, I’m also grateful that she gave so much to myself and my family.  As Angelica said, “the reason you were so sad when she died was because she gave you so much love while she was alive.” Truer words were never spoken.  For seventeen years, she made our lives better: seventeen years of fun, curiosity, warmth, and enjoyment.

And I dare say that perhaps she looks back and thinks the same of us.

0 comments.

Requiem: Beauty

Posted on January 4th, 2007 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Animals, Blog, Cats.

A friend
before I could comprehend the word.

A confidant
before I understood the need.

In your company
I never knew emptiness.

Dear Beauty,
your gentle spirit is freed.

3 comments.

Meaningless Rant: Tarzan’s Artistic Endeavors

Posted on November 5th, 2006 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Animals, Blog, Cats, Meaningless Rants.

I’ve been on an artsy streak lately. So has my cat. Every time I paint, he has an irresistible urge to touch the wet paint. Usually, I’m quick enough to defend both my painting and my palette. Occasionally, he’s managed to get a wee bit of paint on his toes and squirmed away before I could stop him, but the damage was always minimal.

Not this time.

I had a small set of paints that came with a kit for making your own mask. I brought it home to try the product out before subjecting my students to it. The night before the lesson I planned to make the masks in, I made to pack up all the parts of the kit: but the paints were missing from the shelf I thought I had left them on. Not that I’ve never misplaced anything. Lately, I seem to misplace lots of things. Which is odd, because my entire apartment is only 125 sq. ft. There aren’t many places to place things at all.

Yet my set of six paints was gone.

It happened around midnight a week after the disappearance of the paints. I saw Tarzan carrying the paint set in his mouth. It had been him all along. I might have snatched them back then, but the lesson was over and I no longer had a need for them. And it was funny to see a furry little cat carrying them around. But after turning away I caught a glimpse of something terrible in my peripheral vision. Half of my students had not been able to open the paints, but Tarzan had popped open the cap on the first color with disturbing ease.

Red paint was spilling onto my floor.

Shocked, I turned to take the paints away from him: just as he deliberately reached forward with his front left paw to soak his toes deep into the colorful new puddle. My attention quickly turned from the paints to the cat. The puddle wasn’t going anywhere: the cat was a different story entirely. Tarzan sensed my eyes locking on him, and his brilliant green eyes turned up to look at me just as I was moving towards him. And he knew he was in trouble.

He bolted.

The ensuing scramble left red paw prints here, there, and everywhere, like something out of a Dr. Seuss book. Red paw prints in the bedroom and the bathroom, everywhere from the toilet to my clothing. I grabbed hold of him and took him to the bathroom sink to wash his paw, only to discover that, as he ran, that front left paw had made contact with his back right leg, and one or both of them had also managed to produce stripes of red along his cream-colored tummy. A simple paw-washing would not fix the problem.

An emergency cat shower was the only solution.

Tarzan is not a joy to bathe - no cat is. Tarzan howls like a mortally injured sheep might as he is bludgeoned to death. And my neighbors might be sleeping. But what choice did I have? So we battled with each other for a half an hour as I struggled to wash all the red paint out of the young demon’s fur. By 1am I had a soaking wet cat that had finally reverted to his original, god-given color pattern. All I had to due was dry him and finally get to bed.

Cats are not easy to dry.

They squirm. They struggle. Claws flail wildly. Eventually, all cat-owners give up and let the cat deal with it by itself. So after removing a large quantity of moisture from his fur, I settled him down in one of his favorite spots on top of the mini-fridge where he could repair the damage I had inflicted upon him.

He did not want to sit on the mini-fridge.

He took off and leapt onto the bed. I had already turned down the covers for bed, and he proceeded to soak the sheets and pillows that I required for my rest. I teach kindergarten. I require rest. I removed the cat from my bed, but each time I released him he immediately returned to my bed.

I was doomed.

The moral to the story is this: a cat carrying around a set of paints is not cute: it is a recipe for disaster. They say that curiosity killed the cat - unfortunately, I think it’s far more likely that the cat’s curiosity killed the cat owner. (Not that anyone owns a cat - it’s he who owns me, and I fully acknowledge that fact.)

0 comments.

Meaningless Rant: Jedi Squirrels

Posted on September 24th, 2006 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Animals, Blog, Cats, Meaningless Rants, Squirrels, Star Wars.

While surfing the net during my luxurious 2-hour mid-day break at work one day, I discovered that there is a disturbing amount of stuff on Jedi squirrels on the net.  Not a LOT, mind you…but why would there be any?

[Image rights disputed by multiple parties - please contact if you have proof of ownership so I can credit this picture accordingly]

I mean, who thinks of this stuff?  Who decides to put a lightsaber in the hands of a squirrel?  And why?  It makes me think of the albino squirrel back on the U of M campus.  Can you imagine it slicing open trash cans, nuts, pizza boxes, or whatever, with a lightsaber?

[Perhaps this image belongs on my Sith Squirrels post…]

I understand that it might be cute to create a picture or your feline or canine companion carrying a lightsaber…come to think of it…I have the perfect photo of him for that - I’m totally doing it!

Certainly I can’t be the first person to do this to their beloved pet…but isn’t it awesome?  He’s got the perfect expression on his face - so serious!  There is a new force in the galaxy to be reckoned with - Tarzan, Jedi Cat!

30 comments.

Taipei: An Awesome Kennel

Posted on September 20th, 2006 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Animals, Blog, Cats, Taipei, Taiwan.

These photos were taken at an awesome little kennel in Taipei where Tarzan stayed while I was in Thailand.  Like some sort of Montessori school for animals, this kennel had no cages - just rooms full of toys with a caretaker on duty in the room.

When I came to pick Tarzan up from a pre-trip visit, I caught them spoon-feeding my cat canned cat food (to make him more comfortable, they told me.)  It made me worry that Tarzan may not want to come home after two weeks.

The kennel employees managed to turn Tarzan’s fear of dogs into a calm acceptance of them.  Before long, he was running around the dog’s room, stealing their toys!

The service wasn’t cheap, but I got to enjoy my trip knowing that “my son”, as my old landlord refers to Tarzan, was in good hands.

1 comment.