No Grooming for Plum

Towards the beginning of October, I finally made and kept a grooming appointment for Plum.  He was very clumpy again, and although I had made resolutions to brush him every other day in September – and actually stuck to that schedule – I still thought that one of the reasons why he became so clumpy in the first place is that he was just overall rather dirty and needed a bath.  And I certainly was not going to attempt to bathe him myself – I would leave that task for professionals.

But easier said than done!  The problem is that there aren’t cat groomers near me that I know of.  There’s one about 45 minutes away but Plum gets very carsick (or used to, at any rate) and I figured that if I got him cleaned that far away, then he would probably sully himself on the way home – for that is how these things work.  One of our vets recommended a nearby grooming and boarding place, and so I made an appointment there with the one guy who “does cats.”  And this guy, Miguel, was very nice, except that he warned me when I dropped Plum off that the bath might not happen, since he had no restraints for cats, and was only able to bathe those who wanted to be bathed.  Which struck me as a little optimistic of him – do any cats “want” to be bathed?  I certainly couldn’t think of any.  At any rate, I wished him luck and went on my way, and then felt sure that Plum had okayed the bathing, since I didn’t get a call from Miguel until 3:00.  But no, he had tried three times to bathe Sir Plum, and each time Plum had said, Surely you jest? And so there was no bathing of the purple cat.

He did give him a good brushing and a “deshedding something or other”, and did not charge me very much, so there’s that.  But I have had to give up my notion of a sparkling clean and sweet-smelling lilac British shorthair in my house, and Plum continues to clean only where he sees fit – his privates, his paws, and his face.

The Furminator

We have been having a lot of, shall we say, unpleasant furball-related incidents, in which Sean, who is usually the first one downstairs in the morning, will discover furball puddles in multiple rooms, as well as on the staircase.  I’ve been trying to brush Plum more, so perhaps have been making the situation worse by loosening more fur?  It’s no doubt the kind of thing that gets worse before it gets better?

At any rate, the cat comb I had was getting old and not as effective, and my boss recommended that I try The Furminator, a dog and cat comb that was guaranteed to work wonders.  I found a good deal on amazon and so far have been pretty impressed with the results.  Sean is skeptical—he says it looks like a cootie comb in a handle—but it does do a really good job of getting out all the loose undercoat.  And it even finds loose undercoat on Posy, who is extremely type A when it comes to personal hygiene.

The jury is still out when it comes to the furballs, but surely the handfuls of fur that come off when I use the furminator are handfuls of fur that will not end up in vomity ball form on my floors later on, no?  And that is something.