Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

Accountability, motherfuckers.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Meanwhile over at truth Social, the former president is busy confessing to crimes.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Innocent people don’t delay justice.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

The GOP couldn’t organize an orgy in a whorehouse with a fist full of 50s.

I didn’t have alien invasion on my 2023 BINGO card.

Conservatism: there are some people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

Republicans can’t even be trusted with their own money.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Take your GOP plan out of the witness protection program.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

You are here: Home / Pet Blogging / Cat Blogging / OMG Steve’s Coat

OMG Steve’s Coat

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I’m not posting pictures because if I did Ronnieroo would come up here and kick my ass, but Steve apparently spent a day rolling in pine sap in the back yard and looked like a cross between Chewbacca and a komondor, so I tried to brush and cut some of it out of him, and he looks like a god damned disaster. I’m seriously thinking he might need a not to the skin shave but a real close cut so his coat can grow back properly for the fall.

We’re going to the groomers on Friday, but I had to do something because he was walking around with clumps of pine needles on his back. Oh, and he’s fucking pissed.

Reader Interactions

81Comments

  2. 2.

    Gin & Tonic

    I’ve heard that if you smear him with mustard you’ll get the pine sap off.

  3. 3.

    Doug R

    My wife trimmed the fur of our large long haired cat with electric clippers. Now she’s noticing I need a haircut….

  6. 6.

    MomSense

    My Maine Coon cat used to do that. I had to have him shaved many, many times. He would roll in pine tar and pine needles and then dirt. Just go have him shaved. It’s the only way. You’ll have to be careful about how much sun he gets while it grows out as they may have to shave very close to the skin.

  7. 7.

    Betty Cracker

    Did he claw the shit out of you when you were hacking away at his coat? C’mon, man — we need pictures!

  9. 9.

    Elizabelle

    Pictures, please. Chewbacca Steve before and after.

    And maybe you too. Who knows if you will escape this unscathed.

  13. 13.

    Adam L Silverman

    @efgoldman: So he’s got one of the dogs acting as spotter, estimating windage, drop, and range to target, and barking “send!” whenever Steve’s ready?

  14. 14.

    RoonieRoo

    I promise not to come up and kick the crap out of you for fat Steve pictures. I’m in a pretty darn good mood today. My Labrador had his annual today (3 years old) and we finally achieved the much coveted “Perfect weight, don’t change a thing” from our vet. I’ve been fighting a 5 lb overage on him all freaking year and I finally figured out his calorie needs vs training goodies. So I promise to not yell at you today. :)

    With that said, I might need to see Steve covered in pine sap just for the hilarity of it.

  15. 15.

    Gravenstone

    Been nice knowing you, man. Hopefully you pass on the keys to the joint to someone trustworthy.

  17. 17.

    bystander

    We all want pictures, but not if there’s too much of Cole’s blood splattered across the background.

    Come to think of it, Cole’s life does have a certain Stephen King tinge to it.

  18. 18.

    Corner Stone

    @bystander:

    We all want pictures, but not if there’s too much of Cole’s blood splattered across the background.

    Who are we to draw a line in the sand?

  19. 19.

    RepubAnon

    Warn Steve that he might end up trapped in amber:

    Rare Dinosaur-Era Bird Wings Found Trapped in Amber
    National Geographic

    Two tiny wings entombed in amber reveal that plumage (the layering, patterning, coloring, and arrangement of feathers) seen in birds today already existed in at least some of their predecessors nearly a hundred million years ago.

  20. 20.

    Percysowner

    Go buy clippers! I learned the hard way this month. My guy is getting older and he was so, so tangled. I cut out a few mats and then he moved and I cut him. I felt terrible! I then bought a clipper to help with the mats.

    I have had long haired cats shaved/clipped in the past. With the heat this summer, Steve would probably be more comfortable, anyway and he wont be ingesting massive amounts of fur when he grooms himself.

  21. 21.

    1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)

    Yes, Cole, go let someone else bleed for this good cause. They’re trained professionals, they’re used to handling agitated critters who need hygiene interventions, and you can tip like mad if he’s too cranky with them.

    Also, their pictures will probably be clearer than yours and will be taken in better light. Please remind them to share with us.

    I have no fond memories of dealing with the spring mats our longhair would get; she was a cupcake right up until it was grooming season.

  22. 22.

    TaMara (HFG)

    I don’t know about Skin So Soft, but hand sanitizer takes tree sap off of cars without harming the finish – it might work on Steve – just make sure you clean it all off of him so he’s not licking it.

  26. 26.

    NotMax

    You’re concerned and have trepidations about someone getting all up in your grille* about something?

    Knew ought to have made that investment; can’t tell which dimension we’ve slid into without the guidebook.

    *(Is that how the yutes say it?)

  28. 28.

    lurker dean

    @debbie: it’ll give the dogs something to chat about. and as a maine coon steve can handle it, it’s cole’s dignity that may suffer :D

  29. 29.

    gogol's wife

    I remember that pine sap routine from when I used to let my cats go out. Smells good, though.

  30. 30.

    greennotGreen

    Just because I want pictures and was rather insistent about it, I’m in moderation?

  33. 33.

    Gravenstone

    @TaMara (HFG): Most hand santizers today are gelatanized ethanol. You most definitely do not want Steve licking that (Cole either, for that matter).

  36. 36.

    Baud

    I wonder if George Stephanopoulos dies a little each time he has to report on the email “scandal.”

  44. 44.

    kathyp

    My brother’s cat got into pine sap once and the vet shaved most of the fur off but not all. My brother was quite upset because “he looks like a French Poodle now”.

  47. 47.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Gin & Tonic:

    I’ve heard that if you smear him with mustard you’ll get the pine sap off.

    Yes, and where would one go about finding the mustard in the first place, mmmm?

  51. 51.

    WaterGirl

    Cole, I had never gotten haircuts for any of my cocker spaniels, but one February my cocker escaped into some field of endless burrs that all attached themselves to her coat. I tried everything and she was just a total mess. So she got her first haircut ever – I think she was seven.

    She LOVED it! When I pet her, she would just shiver (on a good way) like oh that feels so good! We always got haircuts after that – not the traditional cocker cut, just a short length all over. So I think you’re probably on the right track for how to deal with the mess. Plus, if you’ve already started cutting parts out, I’m not sure you have much choice.

    It will be interesting to see what Steve thinks. Let us know, please!

  57. 57.

    khead

    How can this grooming happen without sedation? We have one, maybe two cats that will tolerate a bath. Gracie actually gets a bath every so often due to allergies. But there’s no way any of them would sit still for a de-sapping without being knocked the #%& out first.

  60. 60.

    Mezz

    Cole – I don’t have a Maine Coon, but I have an “enormous” (seriously; that’s everyone’s preferred adjective when they first see him) longhair. I won’t even bother to try posting pictures, but like you I try to keep on top of the grooming and it proves impossible. Four summers ago I decided that every summer I would get him shaved to the skin for the summer, to deal with the matted fur and dandruff, etc.

    I’m positive he hates it, but when he gets it done (he’s going in Friday as well) and for a few months after, when he can clean himself fully and without ingesting all that fur and the attendant hair barfs, I know he appreciates it. Up in Boston I don’t know how warm it gets in WV, but do it. Steve will thank you in the end.

    Plus if your groomer is cool like mine, she or he will offer the “Lion” – do it. My wife refers to Franklin as “Her Lion” for like three months after he gets buzzzzzed.

  61. 61.

    TaMara (HFG)

    @Adam L Silverman: I long ago quit buying anything that claims to be antibacterial. I saw a health demo once that showed washing and drying cleans off more bacteria. So I thought, why waste the money? I keep baby wipes in the car.

    But Belle (my Soul) needed something to remove the tree sap – it was the only thing I found that works well – palmolive works, too, but you have to use so much I was afraid it would harm the finish.

  63. 63.

    rikyrah

    You really need to become a reality show, Cole. The stories you tell….HILARIOUS.

    But, you know you can sneak us a picture or two.

  64. 64.

    Gvg

    Supposedly cooking oil gets sticky stuff out.

    In an earlier thread I mentioned googling Siberian huskies and cats and accidentally found out about a breed of cat called Siberian cats who seem to be about twice as furry as Maine coons. Seriously go look for pics and imagine grooming one of them! Huge furry mounds of cat.

  68. 68.

    satby

    @TaMara (HFG): geeky soap trivia here: in lab tests they’ve actually coated bars of regular soap with (non-infectious) e-coli bacteria and then measured bacterial levels on the hands of people who washed normally with it. No bacteria found, regular old soap washes away bacteria; and there’s some speculation that it breaks the cell walls of bacteria, killing it too. You don’t need all that antibacterial stuff they sell, normal washing with any old soap does the trick.

  70. 70.

    MomSense

    @Gvg:

    Wow. There’s a feral cat named Mufassa that adopted my friends. We assumed he was a giant orange Maine Coon but he looks a lot like a Siberian.

  72. 72.

    Beezus

    Just three weeks ago I had my explosively fuzzy/furry cat Bunn shaved by a mobile groomer (mats that were impossible to detangle). She was not happy with the processing but LOVES her new look. She can groom herself, she feels ccooler and lighter, and she is impossibly soft and velvet-y. Impossibly cute, too.

  74. 74.

    Central Planning

    @TaMara (HFG): QFT:

    hand sanitizer takes tree sap off

    One of my kids turned their hands brown with tree sap, diet, and pine needles. Only thing we had was hand sanitizer. It took that stuff right off. We were amazed

  75. 75.

    serge

    He’s pissed? Serves his ass right…

    (Major dog person whose own animals “never” roll in smelly, gooey shit.)

  76. 76.

    Bill_D

    This is going to sound pedantic at first glance, but it has practical application.

    Pine “sap” isn’t sap at all. People almost always assume that any fluid coming out of a plant stem is sap, but that’s often not the case. Sap is the plant equivalent of blood – a water based fluid that circulates via vessels throughout the plant bringing nutrients to tissues. Think of maple syrup and maple candy, both water soluble and consisting of concentrated maple tree sap.

    Some plants also have other fluids in separate vessels. White “sap” from various plants such as dandelions is actually latex, still water based but protecting the plant against herbivores rather than having a circulatory function. Most cone-bearing trees have pitch, which is hydrocarbon based (*not* water soluble) and which protects against bugs that want to burrow into the tree.

    So when it comes to cleanup of plant fluids, you need to know whether they’re water soluble or not. Thinking of and calling all these fluids “sap” doesn’t help here, however truthy it may seem.

  77. 77.

    PurpleGirl

    I watch a show on Animal Planet titled “Animal Cops — Houston SPCA” about rescuing different animals in the Houston area. They have video of cats and dogs being rescued from homes where they are abused and/or not being taken care of. And when an animal’s fur is matted, the groomer shaving the matts off use clippers and electric razors. They often take off all the fur except for the head and face. They have one person holding the animal and another person doing the shaving. (One dog had more than 2 pounds of matted fur!)

  79. 79.

    Kay Eye

    Pictures, please. We’ve all had to look at Donald Trump’s hair for months. We deserve this.

  80. 80.

    Ella in New Mexico

    Peanut butter, well worked in, used to take the pine sap out of my kids hair. Or orange oil, but then, They weren’t likely to lick the stuff I put in their hair, and so weren’t in danger of being poisoned by it.

    Good fricking luck, John.

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