2126 Mostly about water

Monday, November 24, 2009

The highs over the past week have been barely above freezing, and in the teens overnight. I have two plastic bottles of water in the car. One is filled with water from my well. It's frozen solid. The other is "Vasa" (or something like that), labeled as "pure spring water". Not frozen. Not even little spikes of ice.

Why? What's in that stuff? I find that scary.

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What's with the bathing of cats? YouTube, CuteOverload, and LOLCats are full of photos and videos of cats freaking out during baths. For some reason people seem to think cats need baths, and they find the panic funny. Not me. They upset me. That's close to torture, and I don't find it the least bit funny.

Cats don't need baths! There are only a few cats in the entire world (tigers?) who willingly immerse themselves in water. Cats are self-cleaning.

Some people seem to think that bathing a cat will lessen the dander. It doesn't. It temporarily removes the dander that's there now, but it dries her skin, which means MORE dander very soon. Vicious cycle. Not a solution. Just gets worse and worse.

Occasionally a cat will get into something icky that wouldn't be good, or is too much, for her to clean off herself. What you do then is take a rough wash cloth very wet with lukewarm water (no soap) and use it as a "tongue" to wash her. Short stokes, with and against the fur. No immersion. She'll love it.

Same with dogs. A healthy dog never needs a bath. The natural oils in his fur prevent dirt from sticking, especially if he's brushed frequently. The more often his fur is washed with soap or shampoo, the more it dries out and will soak up dirt and odors, and the more oil his skin will produce to compensate. Vicious cycle again. However, since it doesn't upset them so much, one or two baths a year probably won't be so bad, especially on a hot summer day.

In the wild, both beasties get combed by running through brush. Since we don't allow our pets to get much of that kind of exercise, we need to brush them regularly, and that's enough to keep their fur and skin in top condition.

Stop torturing those poor kitties for your own amusement!

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I don't understand why anyone is still using AOL as a browser. I don't know about theirs, but mine is unacceptably slow. Videos are downright painful - four seconds of play, six seconds of load, four seconds of play, six seconds of load.... Dripping water torture. I just copy the URL over to another real browser, and it plays it at the same time it's loading. Maybe AOL doesn't have enough temp space, but that's not something I have control over. Maybe AOL hasn't heard of multitasking?

I use AOL for email. That's the only thing it's still pretty good at.
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