Rudy and Stasher accepted my wife and I when they were six weeks old.
Stasher hissed at me when I removed him from the carrier. Rudy was quite
an ugly little fellow but he grew up to be the “classic cat”. Rudy was
always the complacent one. It really hurt his feelings when he was
reprimanded for bad behavior while Stasher would just look you in the
eye, flip his tail, and walk away. Stasher was adventurous. As a kitten
he fell in the commode, fell into the fish tank while observing the
fish, got into the air duct system while I was painting the bathroom.
When we built our new home he would get on the ducts in the basement and
walk at around 4:00 A.M. The ducts would flex and BOOM as he traversed
them. In Phoenix I built them a “Cat Walk” (dogs have “runs” but cats
stroll) with an entrance through the laundry room wall. It was 8’ wide,
12’ long, and 8’ high with a ramp and perches at various locations. Rudy
loved to sleep on a perch early in the morning, before it got hot. They
could go outside whenever they wished.
Although Stasher was adventurous he was strictly a homebody. He would
get traumatized when trips to the vet were made and take out his
frustrations on Rudy. We found a mobile vet that made house calls and it
helped a lot but they both would try to hide when they saw the vet in
the house. Both of them became totally deaf at about 15. Rudy developed
kidney problems at 18 and we injected 200ml of Ringer’s every other day.
At 19 he had arthritis and received Cosoquin (probably misspelled) every
day. He loved roast turkey breast and would sit in the kitchen for hours
waiting for cooking to be finished. He was not a lap cat but wanted to
lie beside you in the recliner. His favorite spot for daytime sleep was
his basket, which he had for about 20 years. At night he slept next to
my wife and Stasher slept next to me.
Stasher was kind of a “don’t touch me unless I say it’s O.K” for a long
time. I sometimes called him Bear because he had only two dispositions,
Grizzly Bear or Teddy Bear. In 1995 I underwent chemo and radiation
simultaneously and was quite ill. Stasher would get on the bed at my
feet and wouldn’t get up to drink, eat, or visit the litter box until I
got up. After my recovery he followed me around and wanted into my lap
whenever I sat down. I started calling him my “puppy”. As they aged,
their intake of food concerned us as it was minimal. With the vet’s
blessing I mixed Turkey baby food with their regular food and they
actually regained a bit of weight. Turkey was the only baby food we
could feed them as it was the only variety without onion powder. They
would only eat about a tablespoon at a time but needed it about every 2
hours, including all night.
At 21, Rudy just couldn’t make it any more. He was ready for crossing
the “Rainbow Bridge”.  Within 10 days of exactly one year of Rudy’s
passing, Stasher joined him. We still miss them and speak of them often.
We compare traits of our new pair, Psycho and Rambo, with those of Rudy
and Stasher.