Sparkle the Designer Cat's Blog, page 418

Picking a Rescue for the Petties

As many of you know, I’m a finalist for the Best Cat Blog category in the Petties! And as some you know, voting was closed for several days when they discovered that a server glitch messed up the list. The good news is that some finalists who saw old blog posts or videos listed now have the right ones up on the Petties Finalist page. The bad news is that some of the supposed finalists weren’t finalists at all, or wound up as finalists in a different category. I know how disappointed and upset they are — I would be too.

I am fortunate this year in that not only am I still a Best Cat Blog finalist, but the other blogs I am up against have readerships that don’t overlap a whole lot with me. That’s nice, considering that my human is friends with two of the bloggers and I am an admirer of all three of them! We all have our own raving fans whose votes we can depend on, and I am sure those who read some or all of these blogs will wind up voting differently every day. Of course, the other blogs all have a larger readership than me, so I am counting on my raving fans to be more diligent about voting for me every day between now and August 7!

Click where it says Finalist Voting, then log in with your Twitter, Facebook or email to vote! Like I mentioned, you can vote every day, and the winner in each category gets to have $1000 donated to a rescue of their choice — or in my case, if I win, a rescue of your choice! And the rescue you choose will get some sort of donation, no matter what!

Let me explain how this is going to work: I want you all to comment below with the name of a U.S. 501(c)3 rescue that you like (don’t cop out and say I should choose — I really want you to pick!). On Monday night, I will randomly pick five of those rescues and from Tuesday, July 15 through Sunday, July 20, you will get to vote for your favorite among the five! The rescue with the most votes will be the one I name if I win in my category of the Petties. But it gets even better — Monday, July 21 is my human’s birthday, and I’ll be having a commenthon that day to benefit the same rescue! That way, they get a donation whether I win or not!

Sound good? Name your favorite rescue below!
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I’m a finalist for the Petties, in the Best Cat Blog category! Please vote for me, and your other favorite blogs, at the Petties homepage! Just go to the top menu where it says “Finalist Voting” and sign in with your Facebook or Twitter account, or sign in by email! You can do this once a day until August 7!

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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” I have answers to many annoying problems in my two award-winning books! Visit my author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of my awesome Dear Sparkle books!

More Things Domestic Cats Have in Common With Wild Cats

Cougar photo courtesy of Eric Kilby on Flickr.com

Yesterday, the Pawesome Cats blog had a list of things we house kitties have in common with wild cats. It was a really awesome post, and proved that we domestic cats are a lot like our bigger brothers and sisters. In fact, I liked the post so much, I was inspired to add a few more things all us cats, large and small, have in common!

Here is my list:

We all love catnip! (Don’t believe me? Check out this video from Big Cat Rescue.)
Big cats like boxes too — here’s another Big Cat Rescue video to prove it. Apparently some big cats even enjoy creating awesome box art.
All us kitties, wild and domestic, need our beauty rest. Wild cats sleep just as much as we house cats do. So don’t call us lazy unless you are going to go up to a lion or tiger and accuse him of the same thing.
Cats of all sizes have retractable claws, which helps us be the fierce killing machines we are!
All us cats want to look our best, and we spend lots of time grooming! It takes effort to look sleek and beautiful. What, you thought it was just natural?
Every cat loves and needs meat! Yum. Trust me, if we little cats could take down a gazelle, we would, and big cats love chicken just as much as domestic cats.
Even though we are called “domestic,” we are in reality as wild as our untamed relatives! We chose to live with humans, not the other way around… and admit it, that’s one of the things you like best about us kitties.
The biggest threat to all cats is… humans. Whether it’s encroachment on a big cat’s environment, attempts to “get rid of” (i.e., kill) feral cat colonies, or a random act of cruelty, you guys are dangerous! We need to watch our backs.

Got anything else you want to add to the list?
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I’m a finalist for the Petties, in the Best Cat Blog category! Please vote for me, and your other favorite blogs, at the Petties homepage! Just go to the top menu where it says “Finalist Voting” and sign in with your Facebook or Twitter account, or sign in by email! You can do this once a day until July 31!

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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” I have answers to many annoying problems in my two award-winning books! Visit my author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of my awesome Dear Sparkle books!

It’s in the Bag – or Not

We cats each have our own way of enjoying bags. Boodie, for example, enjoys just lying next to them. She hung out there like that for half an hour and never went inside.

I prefer the more usual way of enjoying a good bag!

Sadly, my human took the bag away from us to use for recycling cans. For some reason she thought Binga would be happy with this dumb pillow. Do you think she looks happy? Me neither.
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I’m a finalist for the Petties, in the Best Cat Blog category! Please vote for me, and your other favorite blogs, at the Petties homepage! Just go to the top menu where it says “Finalist Voting” and sign in with your Facebook or Twitter account, or sign in by email! You can do this once a day until July 31!

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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” I have answers to many annoying problems in my two award-winning books! Visit my author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of my awesome Dear Sparkle books!

Bailey Boat Cat – Birthday and Book Review

How fun! I get to review my pal Bailey’s book on his birthday! Happy birthday, Bailey!

If you don’t know Bailey, you should visit his blog. He’s a very special kitty — he lives on a boat! In fact he may be the only blogging boat cat around. At least he is the only one I know personally! It is because of his unique living situation that he got a book deal. The publishers thought humans and other kitties would want to know what life was like for a boat cat. And Bailey obliged with a charming little book full of photos and nautical wisdom (from a cat’s point of view, of course!).

Let’s take a quick look inside!

Bailey Boat Cat: Adventures of a Feline Afloat is a little under 100 pages and full color throughout, which is awesome because the photos are beautiful! It’s also laid out very charmingly in ocean colors. Bailey and his humans live full time on their boat, the Nocturne, and hope to sail around the world one day in the not too distant future. So as you can imagine, Bailey knows a lot about both boat and human upkeep! But he makes things like boat knots, cloud calculations and “trimming the sails” very easy to understand. If you are a kitty, you also get tips on “how to communicate with your tongue,” the top five things to remember in an emergency (my favorite was number 4: “Take the opportunity to scratch all the furniture. You might not get the pleasure again.”), and of course, you get to hear all about the dinghy devils, better known to feline landlubbers as seagulls.

Binga enjoyed Bailey Boat Cat too — I think it made her dream of fish. This is a very fun book, and you will come away knowing more about boating and human management than when you started! It’s a great gift book for boat lovers and cat lovers, and children will especially enjoy it! Even if you are like my human and know very little about boats, you will love reading about Bailey’s day to day life and may be tempted to set sail!

Bailey Boat Cat is available at Amazon in both hardcover and Kindle — buy it here!

Link to Amazon is an affiliate link, which means I get a small commission when you buy the book by clicking on it. But don’t you think I earned it?
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I’m a finalist for the Petties, in the Best Cat Blog category! Please vote for me, and your other favorite blogs, at the Petties homepage! Just go to the top menu where it says “Finalist Voting” and sign in with your Facebook or Twitter account, or sign in by email! You can do this once a day until July 31!

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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” I have answers to many annoying problems in my two award-winning books! Visit my author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of my awesome Dear Sparkle books!

Going for a ResQwalk

Excuse me, but I can’t talk now! I’m about to go for a ResQwalk so I can help kitties in need!

What?! I don’t get to walk? My human’s going to do the walking? Well then, I guess I had better explain what a ResQwalk is. It is a new app that helps raise money for animal rescues and shelters! The cool thing is that all you have to do is walk. Here is how it works.

You download the ResQwalk app to your iPhone (an Android version should be available by fall).
You log in and choose a rescue to support. There is a weekly donation pool and the miles you walk will go towards a percentage of that pool for your chosen rescue. Currently there are 520 rescues supported. My human picked Stray Cat Alliance, because they are a local cat rescue that we already support! They advocate and educate communities about cats, especially community cats, and find homes for those who are adoptable. We were very happy to see them on the list!
Go for a walk, while the app logs your mileage using GPS! It’s that easy.

I told my human to hit the big “Start Walk” button and get going!

My human already walks a couple times a week as part of her fitness program. She also strength trains, does Pilates and yoga and does cardio dance. But walking is what gets her out of the house! And she was determined to walk for Stray Cat Alliance, even though it was 84 degrees out! As you can see, she blurred the street names so you can’t come and visit me unannounced.

This is one of the routes that she regularly travels. Usually she tries to hit 5K (3.1 miles) on this path. As you can see above, she was a little over the 2 mile mark here. She was a bit bummed about her slow pace (she can walk 5K in under 40 minutes), but it really was hot out!

She did not take any breaks either, except to photograph this garden gnome. She takes photos of weird things sometimes when she is out walking.

Because she was walking for a cause, she walked a little extra and wound up with 3.34 miles! Just a note: if you don’t check your mileage every other minute like my human did, you will save a lot of battery life!

Plus there was a reward at the end of my human’s walk!

There is also a shopping area on the app, which features items from ResQthreads, which also supports rescue, and a library of pet articles too!

If you have an iPhone, do download this app now and get walking! If you live in the U.S. or Canada, chances are you will find a rescue you know! And you can always have a favorite rescue sign up to become a partner — there is a link at the bottom of the ResQwalk homepage! And yes, rescues for rabbits, exotics and farm animals are welcome, in addition to cats and dogs!

You can also help spread the word by liking ResQwalk on Facebook or following ResQwalk on Twitter.

Although this is a sponsored post and I received a small fee to blog about ResQwalk, I am very enthusiastic about endorsing them because this is an exciting new way to help animals!
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I’m a finalist for the Petties, in the Best Cat Blog category! Please vote for me, and your other favorite blogs, at the Petties homepage! Just go to the top menu where it says “Finalist Voting” and sign in with your Facebook or Twitter account, or sign in by email! You can do this once a day until July 31!

* * *

Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” I have answers to many annoying problems in my two award-winning books! Visit my author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of my awesome Dear Sparkle books!

Cat World Domination Recovery Day

With the Fourth of July holiday and the extra day my human accidentally added to my giveaways, we are just now getting around to the aftermath of Cat World Domination Day. As you can see, Binga had a few too many catnip coladas.

I want to thank everyone who came by my blog to help me celebrate Cat World Domination Day (and my birthday)! This was my most successful giveaway so far, and a really awesome commenthon! In fact, so many of you commented, that my human raised the top amount from $50 to $75! And I am thrilled because the Rafflecopter random winner generator chose Jan’s Funny Farm’s rescue choice: PAWS of Connecticut! We follow the stories of many of the cats there through the Animal Shelter Volunteer Life blog. I am so happy they were picked!

Now lets get to all the winners — I am extra thrilled about them too because most of them are good blogging pals of mine!

The Rafflecopter mug winners are:

Hannah and Lucy

and

Angel and Isabella!

My newsletter mug winner is a longtime reader and special Facebook fan:

Phyllis W.!

I’m also really happy about the winners of the fun prize pack of toys, because this feline family recently went from two to four kitties! It is:

Celestial Kitties!

Unless you get my newsletter, you won’t recognize this bag of food — that’s because it was a newsletter subscriber-only giveaway! I do these giveaways whenever I can, so if you do not subscribe to my newsletter and want to, you can do so right here. It turned out the winner of this bag of Purina Beyond cat food lives so close that my human can drop it off in person at her work! And that is especially cool because she is planning on donating it to a workmate who has a neighborhood colony of cats that she feeds (and has also spayed and neutered). This winner is:

Diane J.!

Now let’s get to the grand prize winner of this awesome one-of-a-kind quilt by Stacy Hurt. I am so excited about this one because she is such a big supporter of us blogging kitties and just an all-around awesome and interesting human! The quilt winner is:

Grace!

Concatulations to everyone, and thank you once again for proving that we cats really do dominate the world!

Binga was disappointed we did not get to keep any toys. But at least we kept the bag!

Now let’s see how she likes getting photo bombed!
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I’m a finalist for the Petties, in the Best Cat Blog category! Please vote for me, and your other favorite blogs, at the Petties homepage! Just go to the top menu where it says “Finalist Voting” and sign in with your Facebook or Twitter account, or sign in by email! You can do this once a day until July 31!

* * *

Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” I have answers to many annoying problems in my two award-winning books! Visit my author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of my awesome Dear Sparkle books!

Sunday Catinee: Pallas Cat Party!

Some of you may have seen a couple of these videos recently when my human carelessly forgot to post the single link to a prior Catinee and instead linked to the whole list of my YouTube favorites! Sheesh. It is so hard to find good help these days. In any case, when my human first found the original Pallas cat video, it was still a semi-secret. It has since gone viral:

If you can’t see the above video, click here to watch it on YouTube!

Pallas cats (sometimes known as Pallas’s cats) are native to central Asia and are considered “Near-Threatened” on the endangered species list. There is a lot of interest in preserving these cute nocturnal hunters!

If you are ever in Brooklyn, you can see Pallas cats at the Prospect Park Zoo. Here is a video clip in which one of their employees answers some questions about Pallas cats.

If you can’t see the above video, click here to watch it on YouTube!

Want a Pallas cat kitten fix? I’ve got one for you below!

If you can’t see the above video, click here to watch it on YouTube!

Want to know even more about Pallas cats? This 5 minute mini-documentary from the Cincinnati Zoo documents their Pallas cat breeding program (and how domestic cat moms are helping!).

If you can’t see the above video, click here to watch it on YouTube!

If you want to know even more, you can read about Pallas cats on Wikipedia.
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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” I have answers to many annoying problems in my two award-winning books! Visit my author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of my awesome Dear Sparkle books!

The Caturday Report: Kitty News You Can Use

It’s time again for The Caturday Report, in which I report kitty news from around the internet! I hunted down some cool items for you, so let’s get to it!

Here is what went on this past week:

You know how June was Adopt a Shelter Cat Month? BlogPaws had 5 reasons not to adopt a cat! You will agree with all these reasons.
We have not been following the World Cup around here, but apparently some kitties have because here are some World Cup highlights as portrayed by cats! Consider this a bonus Catinee.
Have you heard about the cat cafe that is opening in San Francisco? There is great news for you Bay Area humans, because there is also one being planned in Oakland!
If you want to know about the feline grieving process, the Pawesome Cats blog has a great post about it.
If any of you kitties want to learn Yoga, hurry up and get a free Kindle download of the book by Swami Zoe! This offer only lasts until July 8, so do it now! I already have my copy.

Here is what happened on my blog this past week, in cased you missed a post:

I started off with a guest post from a Facebook fan about nine reasons to adopt another shelter cat!
Binga proved once again that she is a master photo bomber!
You will love these pretty portraits of me and Binga… and you will probably like the outtake at the end too!
The three of us taste tested Wellness Divine Duos… and somekitty really went nuts over them!
There were some unfortunate fashion choices for Independence Day.

That’s the Caturday Report for this week — if you see anything newsworthy going on in the kitty world, let me know and I may feature it in my Caturday Report. See you next time!
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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” I have answers to many annoying problems in my two award-winning books! Visit my author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of my awesome Dear Sparkle books!

Fashion on the Fourth

My human was at some crafts store (Michaels, not the other one), and she saw some Independence Day stuff. Sadly, she bought a few things… for us cats to wear.

I keep hoping she’ll outgrow this bad habit.

Don’t think Binga got a pass on this festive occasion.

I much prefer when my human sticks to Photoshop.

May you have lots of fun and treats on the Fourth!
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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” I have answers to many annoying problems in my two award-winning books! Visit my author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of my awesome Dear Sparkle books!

Are These Duos Really Divine?

When Chewy.com said they were going to send me samples of Wellness Divine Duos to try out, I was expecting two or three cups. Instead, they sent me a case! I was impressed.

Here they are —24 cups of the Chicken Paté and Diced Salmon Flavor. So let’s open up a cup and check it out.

As its name implies, this flavor of Wellness Divine Duos is chicken paté on the bottom and salmon cat food chunks on top, all of it smothered in gravy! Sounds awesome, doesn’t it? Plus it is grain free! But was it as tasty as it looked?

Yes! I don’t eat much at one sitting these days and get bored of food very quickly, but I hung in there for a while with the Divine Duos. I ate around the carrots — I always do (why do they put them in there anyway? Kitties don’t like them!). While it’s not my favorite-ever food (that changes on a day to day basis anyhow), it was pretty good!

Boodie had no reservations (and she didn’t make a reservation either — she just showed up). She chowed down like someone was going to take it away from her!

In fact, she wouldn’t even let Binga try it by herself! My human kept pushing her away, but she kept on eating out of Binga’s bowl! Both of them were too excited over the food to trade smacky paws, which may have been a first.

The consensus? I give the Wellness Divine Duos three paws up (I prefer the Wellness Core canned), Binga gives it four, and Boodie gives it four paws up, plus two ears and a tail! My human thought the protein ratio at 5.5% was a little low, and she did not like the carrots either, or the non-recyclable plastic containers. But she thinks is still much better than a lot of the other food out there! So we are getting lots of Wellness Divine Duo dinners for a while.

Disclaimer: I received this case of Wellness Divine Duos from Chewy.com for review, but all opinions are completely my own. And Binga’s and Boodie’s. Especially Boodie’s.
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Having problems with your human or the other cats in your house? As the internet’s “Dear Abby With Claws,” I have answers to many annoying problems in my two award-winning books! Visit my author’s page on Amazon to buy one or both of my awesome Dear Sparkle books!