Friends of Roman Cats is a US based organization which raises money for the street cats of Rome and other parts of Italy and for the cat sanctuaries. They help pay for spay/neuter, medical expenses and food. They also raise money to spay/neuter cats in San Francisco. Here’s some information about this very unique and special tour. We hope you can go! Ciao Bella!

From the Friends of Roman Cats…
 
Friends of Roman Cats is excited to announce another Cats and Culture Italian tour this coming October! The tour offers cat lovers and lovers of Italy a chance to see how another country treats its homeless / feral cat population. Italy is a No-Kill country where cats have been appreciated for centuries for their companionship and for keeping down rodent populations. You will meet dedicated individuals who care for some of Italy’s stray cats and learn what is working and not working with Animal Welfare in another country. The tour will be a way for people to understand Italy and Italians through the way they interact with animals The tour will start in Venice where we will meet some of the cats whose ancestors came from the Middle East to combat plague-carrying black rats. We will visit a cat colony that lives in Venice’s main public hospital and see more cats and their dedicated caretaker on Venice’s Lido Island. We will have plenty of time to visit some of Venice’s greatest artistic treasures and take in its beauty.

The tour will proceed to Florence where we will see the cats that live in a magnificent Renaissance garden, and in a picturesque cemetery that looks down on the City. Participants will have ample time to explore this beautiful city. Then we will visit a cat sanctuary in the Tuscan hills on a property donated by a beneficent Countess. We will next visit the medieval town of Arezzo and meet with an Anglo-Italian veterinarian who has created a 21st century cat shelter outside the town. We will spend the next day and night in the beautiful hill town of Siena where we will have a guided tour of the town and visit with a group that works with the Sienese municipality to spay and neuter Siena’s stray cats. We will spend our last 3 days in Rome, visiting the Forum, Coliseum, The Vatican, the Trevi Fountain and other monuments in historic Rome, and as well as some of the cat colonies that live in the midst of Roman ruins. All the cats in the shelters and sanctuaries we visit have been spayed or neutered. A good number of them are former house cats that have either been abandoned or whose owners could no longer care for them.

The tour will begin on October 7th 2010 and end on Oct.19. The price for 15 people will be $3,025 double occupancy. A single rate of $549 is available and there is a $500 deposit that will be refunded if we do not get enough people by May 1. It will include 3-star hotels or better with breakfasts, some dinners, a comfortable private bus, a one-time transfer from the Venice airport to the hotel, vaporetto tickets for 2 days in Venice, entrance fees to some museums and historical sites, local city guides and all the cats you can desire! $250 of the price is a tax-deductible donation and goes to help the shelters we will visit. Susan Wheeler, President of Friends of Roman Cats will accompany the group. For most of the tour a tour manager will also accompany the group.

 The dollar is stronger right now than it has been in several years. This price is based on current prices so the sooner people sign up, the better. People who sign up before April 1 will get a $50 discount.

www.friendsofromancats.org

As this news broadcast says, this will send a huge message to puppy mills and backyard breeders across the country!

We love West Hollywood because they were the first to ban declawing cats. Since then Los Angeles and San Francisco have done the same.

Please share this with your local mayors and city council. Let’s see this ban go nationwide!

Prevention: Once a month pour 1/4 – 1/2 cup of Anti Icky Poo down each drain. AIP will happily clear out grease and soap scum.

Slow running drain: Start with 1/2 cup. After a few hours run some water to clear away remaining waste. You may need to do several applications.

Completely backed up drain: Anti Icky Poo probably won’t work 100% as it can’t eat through hair, but depending on what’s down there, it’s worth trying 1/2 cup before calling the plumber.

Recently we learned something fascinating: human emotional tears contain Serotonin which is a natural anti-depressant. So, when something very sad happens to you, like the passing of your cat or another loved one, don’t hold back the tears, let them flow. Your grief or sorrow will ease; peace and understanding will come.

Here we excerpt a paragraph about human tears and Serotonin from the book “The Blessing of Tears,” by Julie Sheldon.

“In 1994 the findings of a study of the chemical composition of different types of tears was published ( X.D. Martin and M.C. Brennan “Serotonin in human tears” European Journal of Ophthalmology 4(3), 159-69. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter. Recently developed antidepressant drugs such as Prozac aim to increase the amount of Serotonin in the brain. The study compared the amount of reflex tears and emotional tears, and relatively huge amounts of Serotonin was found in emotional tears. This happens because when emotion is experienced, the hypothalamus in the brain releases several neurotransmitters, including serotonin. In emotional tears, Serotonin is the messenger to boost the volume of production of tears from the lachrymal sac.”

If you want to learn more you can read the book online at Google Books, or buy it through links on that page. You can also find out more via a Google search for serotonin in human tears.

They came upon the body of a young man. The students looked the man over, looking for marks, blood, any of the usual indicators to explain why a person might die.

They found nothing. Puzzled they asked their teacher:

Why did this young man die?

The wise Lama said: Because he was born.

May this simple thought and perspective ease your pain.

Back in the day Patty White was a computer systems analyst. It was rewarding and challenging work which she enjoyed. She was going to stick it out until retirement. But what to do next?

When the book The Natural Cat came out, Patty read it from cover to cover. She was particularly impressed with author Anitra Frazier’s chapter on cat grooming and stories of her life in New York City as a professional cat groomer. Viola! That was IT! Patty knew that when she retired she would become a professional cat groomer. Patty firmly believed that making house calls was the way to go because cats don’t travel well and a trip to a salon for grooming would be traumatic.

For 10 years Patty dreamed of the retirement day. When it finally came she had already sought out the finest training she could find. It was one-on-one training with a master cat and dog groomer. It wasn’t easy getting to her instructor, but Patty wouldn’t settle for second rate training – and it shows in her skills! The groomer was the same sort of compassionate perfectionist Patty is.

Once Patty was qualified, the referrals from the clients at Especially Cats, a veterinary practice in San Francisco completely devoted to cats, poured in. Patty now spends her days going from home to home grooming cats of all ages, sizes, and fur types. Best of all for Patty, she’s booked weeks in advance.

Before Patty enters our home she has already completely changed her clothes for the health of wellbeing of the next cat she works on. Upon arrival, she lays out her own equipment and tools. If we’ve asked her to bathe a cat, she’s got her drier, water hose for the kitchen sink water faucet, and towels. She likes to sit on the floor holding the cat by a sunny spot near a window for good lighting. She puts a plastic bag on the floor, a clean sheet on top of it, sits down and then begins her gentle grooming, de-matting, nail trimming and whatever the modern housecat might need to look good and feel good.

We’ll hear her softly say to the cats “ooooooh you know Auntie Patty loves you, you hold still for Auntie Patty, Auntie Patty is going to make you look gorgeous.” The cats love it!

One of the benefits of having your cat professionally combed and brushed is that sometimes your groomer will detect someone amiss with the cat – perhaps the lack of luster in the cat’s fur is a sign of illness, or the groomer might feel a mass or lumps.

When the grooming session is over, Patty completely cleans up after herself, not a single bit of fur remains on the floor. She hands over the fur she combed out of the cats and we toss it into the composter.

So if you find yourself staring at a cubical wall thinking that you’d like to do something more meaningful, take inspiration from Patty White. Get the best training you can find, and read everything on cat behavior and anatomy. Its wonderful to make living doing something you are good at and love!