Because I love my pets so much, it was driving me crazy that I could not get Steve a lion cut in April like I normally do, so I tried on my own a couple weeks ago and it was a complete failure. Undeterred, I ordered special clippers and a cheap grooming table from the great online Satan, and today was spa day:
Because this is a full service blog, I even paused for videos:
He is not totally perfect like the groomers do, but it will do until it is safe to get him in for an appointment. He has (well, had) a lot of hair:
He was actually pretty well behaved, although he did not like the clippers near his nether regions, but really, who does (NOT THAT I WOULD KNOW MIND YOU). Bathtime was a different story:
I think that picture speaks for itself. I am going to go shower and then soak my arms in bacitracin.
schrodingers_cat
Mr Cole prepare to die. I know where you sleep.
-Steve the Cat
You should trying making these hats
Nicole
This is why I’m glad I own a shorthair dog. Cutting my son’s hair was traumatizing enough for me.
(I think you did a good job on Steve, btw. Better than I did on my son.)
Baud
RIP Cole.
ETA: SC got there first.
RepubAnon
Steve’s got that “you’ll have to sleep sometime” look…
ruemara
@schrodingers_cat: We need to prepare ourselves for a missing JC news story. Seen fleeing, one very smug kitteh.
Wag
Best post of the pandemic. Thank you for your bravery!
Cacti
You bathed a cat?
LOL
batguano
Steve is magnificent!
MissWimsey
“You should see what I did to my own hair” lololololol
Michael Demmons
That poor cat looks completely defeated.
catclub
Those videos that made it look easy, ….were on the Darwin Awards website.
?BillinGlendaleCA
So John, who’s going to take over the blog after Steve is done with you?
Omnes Omnibus
May god have mercy on your soul.
Emma from FL
You are dead meat, Cole. That look means business.
rikyrah
Cole
Cole
Cole……
You better not go to sleep tonight…
If you know what’s good for you…
Mannnnnnnnnnnnnn……
Steve is plotting….
Miss Bianca
THAT LOOK
DCrefugee
That last pic of Steve looks like Hobbes as he’s about to rumble with Calvin
hueyplong
JFC, Cole skinned his poor cat.
If Steve has any self respect at all, he is honor-bound to kill Cole. Tonight.
No jury would convict.
Ann Marie
Thoughts and prayers for your arms, John.
Laura Too
You made a shitty day bearable. Thanks John. And I too loved the part about your own haircut. My husband tried to do his own as well. Lets just say it took me about 10 minutes to quit laughing…oh hell, who am I kidding, I’m still laughing.
grumbles
Holy crap, you could make a whole ‘nother cat out of that fur.
phein60
We’ve got a cock-a-poo (in Australia, they call them spoodles, which I think is a little more dignified) whom we need to shave (don’t even ask why; if you have one of these dogs, you know why). We got a cheap Wahl pet clipper which had no success cutting her thick curly hair. Does anyone out there have a recommendation for a good pet hair trimmer that doesn’t cost a fortune?
danielx
Do not go to sleep.
Ever.
Patricia Kayden
Steve is gorgeous. It’s so soothing to read about his shave and bath. A good note to end the day on.
kevin
Looks like a productive, well spent day
CaseyL
My god, that plaintive little meow. And the way he’s licking himself on the freshly shaved areas – “Where’d all my hair go? Why don’t I taste like myself anymore??”
PsiFighter37
Dead man blogging.
lamh36
Lordt that poor kitty…LOL
zhena gogolia
I love to pet that suede-like texture that they get.
Gin & Tonic
@grumbles: That’s going to be me when I go for my first post-quarantine haircut.
Dorothy A. Winsor
That last picture is pure menace. LOL
Elizabelle
He’ll forgive you and snuggle in tonight. Cuz he might be cold.
Gonna be a chilly weekend. You don’t even want to think about putting him in a sweater.
Tazj
Poor Steve! I don’t know what he will do later, but it looks like he was pretty good during the whole procedure except for a few minor complaints.
Quaker in a Basement
Pro tip: Clip the claws first, THEN the fur.
Cole, you’re the only person I know of who approaches my wife’s level of pet pampering.
Zelma
I have a Lhasa apso who has not been groomed since early February. He does not like to be brushed. He looks very fluffy but I’m not sure he can see where he’s going. I’m not sure when I can get him to a groomer. We’re closed till June 5. What kind of clippers did you get, John? Inquiring minds want to know. Please.
RedDirtGirl
Thank you for that. Felt like I was there, without risking my skin’s integrity
kindness
You did great John! I don’t see any of your blood on the table.
Robert Sneddon
You could knit another cat from the clippings. Two cats.
LarryB
“The YouTube videos made it look so easy” is the new “Hold my beer”
Barb 2
Such a good kitty. And then the last photo!
we had poodles years ago. I can see why short hair dogs are popular. Plus short hair cats are nice.
HumboldtBlue
Steve is pissed at his terrible new haircut, he was going to join Jimmy the Turkey to pick up chicks on this guy’s farm.
MomSense
Pobrecito. He looks so forlorn in the bath.
I don’t know what is up with my pup, but she barely said hello to me when I got home after 12 hours at work. She’s probably giving me the silent treatment because I wasn’t with her all day.
Another Scott
@phein60: @Zelma: From the first picture, it looks like JC got one of these to use on an apparently very appreciative Steve.
HTH!
Cheers,
Scott.
Grover Gardner
Jeebus, that was brave. We have a tiny, one-year-old tabby who, in these cramped times, we finally decided to let out into the back yard because he was driving us crazy. Man, I almost lost an arm trying to get a teeny little collar on him.
schrodingers_cat
RL Bagheera is gorgeous.
I follow a forest service officer in India on Twitter, who is also an excellent nature photographer and he posts gorgeous pictures that he and others have taken of wildlife in India.
debbie
Just made an appointment for a haircut in two weeks. Hallelujah!
TaMara (HFG)
Well, that made my night.
Anne Laurie
Did Steve bark like a seal, Cole? The one ‘Maine-type’ cat I’ve ever had to bathe (there had been an incident involving a half-full bottle of barbecue sauce that the other roommate should *never* have left open on the kitchen counter) made seal noises I’ve never heard from any other cat. Possibly because the human holding him while I handled the soap & water was even bigger (& 20 years younger) than J.G. Cole…
If you haven’t already fastidiously disposed of the fleece, I vote you mold it into a vaguely Steve-shaped figure, and see how much you can terrify Thurston with it.
MomSense
@Anne Laurie:
I watched a video the other night of a spinner who incorporated cat fur with her wool and made yarn. It was wild. She knits sweaters and shit from her cats.
Leto
@TaMara (HFG): Think this is the hardest I’ve laughed in a while.
You’re a brave man than I, Mr. Cole.
Barbara
@Robert Sneddon: I was visiting a relative in West Seattle and walking around the neighborhood when I saw a storefront of some kind of artsy shop with a book prominently displayed: Crafting With Cat Hair. I got a picture.
Anne Laurie
I was told, many years ago, that cat hair is too brittle to be much use as yarn unless it’s heavily ‘assisted’ with a sturdier wool. (Dog hair, yes; cat hair, no.) But it does felt beautifully!
(Of course, the idea of Cole with a felting needle is… terrifying, frankly. But Maine Coon hair/fur can probably be molded like fibrous putty, if one has the hand strength.)
lahke
So why did Steve need a bath once you’d shaved off his hair? Were there fleas?
Just One More Canuck
Well, I’ll be a shaved cat’s ass
Anne Laurie
I’m guessing Steve didn’t need one, but Cole did!
(Poor cat’s feet probably stank, from sheer terror. And Cole’s got that Germanic fastidiousness.)
MomSense
@Anne Laurie:
The only good thing about needle felting is being able to stab something a thousand times. These times are made for needle arts.
Joy in FL
That last photo!
I feel so bad for laughing. But I really appreciated the laugh.
SWMBO
@phein60:
@Zelma: Whatever clipper you get make sure it doesn’t get too hot. Put it on the inside of your wrist. If it’s too hot for your skin, it’s too hot for theirs. They used to make a product called Kool Klip that you sprayed on the blades to cool them down. We also had quick detach blades that could be swapped out and keep going. If you don’t want to spring for a table, you can use a leash on a chair or table or counter(don’t really recommend a counter but if that’s what you’ve got). Start at the neck and go toward the tail. Keep the blade flat against the skin. Do the bum last if they are cooperating. Hold the tail straight up and go down each side of the butthole. There are little ligaments that you can mess up without trying if you go up instead of down.
On the face, hold the eyebrows down and don’t use the clippers on those muscles. Use scissors to see their eyes. Leave eyebrows a decent length. It gives character and expression to their face. If you have to use clippers on the face, go from the ear to the nose. Don’t ever go towards the eyes.
ziggy
John could gather up that fur and send it to Tamara, and she could make little duck hats or something.
Omnes Omnibus
@ziggy: What kind of psycho would mail someone a pile of cat hair?
SWMBO
@Omnes Omnibus: The finest in all of West Virginia.
Adjusted from Donald Trump’s Home Alone 2 cameo.
mrmoshpotato
“This is hurting me as much as it (laughs) hurts you.” LMAO!
Mary G
I’ve had cats for 45 years and never tried to give one a bath but once.
mrmoshpotato
@Omnes Omnibus: You more of a mailing someone a horse head kind of guy? :)
debbie
All that licking is sure to create quite the hairball.
Yutsano
Proper authoritahs have been alerted…
JustRuss
Bath Steve-o is adorable.
dww44
Thank you, John, for this. I needed the Steve pictures and your commentary for the lighthearted respite from my sheer sadness and anger engendered by Trump, Barr, and all his minions today, made worse by a call from my Fox watching brother wanting me to agree with him that the FBI did indeed lie in the Flynn matter and that the latter didn’t sell out his country to the Russians, that this was a good thing that Barr did today. Sad because I can’t make him see the obvious. Angry because Barr is so corrupt and Trump doesn’t really care about the thousands of Americans who have died.
Phein60
@SWMBO:
Thanks!
terben
I’m just PMSL!
Anathema Device
You’re braver than me, but fortunately my two lovelies are short-haired cats. Neither would tolerate a buzzing thing anywhere near them. I haven’t had to bathe them either. The older one, a beautifully behaved and elegant black cat, would just be miserable and resigned, but the dark tortie we lovingly refer to as “the buzzsaw” would cover me from one end to the other with painful, probably close to fatal wounds. She does her best to kill me when I pet her if she’s in the wrong mood, bless her furry little psycho brain.
Love them both, but I know their limits. And mine.
singing truth to power
Save Steve’s fur for a cap (or six)! https://www.designboom.com/design/ryo-yamazaki-nukege-hats-cat-hair-07-24-2019/