To cure insomnia, stuff a pillow with catnip, passion-flower, and hops just before bed time.
Lie down with the back of your head touching the pillow and recite the following chant three times aloud:
“Catnip, Passionflowers, Hopes in this pillow beneath my head,
Bring peaceful rest to me, an stop the restfulness that plagues my bed!”
Close your eyes and think of something pleasant. Soon you will sleep and dream.
This spell teaches you how to energetically shape shift into a cat in your dreams. Shape shifting allows you merge with a particular animal spirit
and to bring the power and wisdom of this spirit into your own being. It means you can be as sleek, sure-footed, and cunning as a cat when you need to be. These can be very good traits which is why cats are so adaptive and prone to survival. Their ancestors have been around for thousands and thousands of years.
You will need pictures of cats and sandalwood incense. Cats come in many different colors, sizes and personality types. Become familiar with these many faces of cats, and in particular, what face most closely resembles who you are as a person. Take time to observe as many cats as you can. Watch how they interact with other cats and how they interact with humans. Merge with the cat spirit and become one with the cat Goddess, Bast.
Tonight before you go to sleep, put the pictures of cats on your altar and light the sandalwood incense. Call out to the cat Goddess Bast:
Dear Bast, Goddess of the divine feline
Please come to me tonight during dreamtime.
Blessed dreams! Blessed Be!
As you close your eyes to go to sleep, let the images of cats move through your mind’s eye. Merge with the cat spirit, and repeat to yourself as you drift to sleep:
Tonight I dream with the cat spirit. Blessed be, Bast!
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| Name: | UtchieB |
Age: | Eighteen months old |
| Gender: | Male |
Kind: | Sphynx |
| Home: | East Hartford, Connecticut, USA |
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UtchiB, as I call him, came from a backyard breeder. She was a very young woman who didn’t know what she was doing. I had lost my beautiful ten-year-old soulmate Sphynx, MooShoo on my birthday, February 13th from thrombosis.
I swore I would always have a beautiful Sphynx in my life, but only a rescue will do. I searched for over a year to find AustinButchie. When I took the hour-long road trip, I didn’t know what to expect. The breeder told me she was in over her head, and proceeded to bring a cat carrier full of beautiful nekkids down for me to see. Out popped UtchieB!!! He was a wild man, running all over the place. He was older than the other kittens, but I found his playfulness intriguing. Later on, I realized that he was probably the runt of his litter, as he is very small for his age. He is goofy, charming and a purr machine. UtchieB wanted nothing to do with his carrier, insisting on riding on my shoulders, purring all the way home. As far as gradually introducing him to my fur crew? Well, let’s just say he kept climbing over the babygates I had stacked in my bedroom door to be with the gang. The rest is history. UtchieB was entered into his first cat show shortly after that. While he did “okay” in the Household Pet category of the TICA show, a judge friend said he definitely needs to be shown as a purebred alter. Unfortunately, I do not have his papers so that wasn’t an option. He is happiest being housecat, though. And that’s okay with me!! |
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| Name: | Moonlight |
Age: | Deceased, Three years old |
| Gender: | Male |
Kind: | Cat |
| Home: | Tustin, California, USA |
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Inominate Moonlight the Stray, who came to accept me as his friend. About three years ago I noticed that the cat food I was leaving out in the evening for my cat Smokey to snack on was disappearing. Then soon after I caught a glimpse of a ragged black and white cat scurrying away into the darkness at just the slightest movement of the wind. Just a spooky little guy. So I began to leave more food out and in no time I had a nightly visitor. Every evening when the sun set this scrawny cat would appear, and so he became known as Moonlight.
Moonlight made great strides in accepting me as his friend. From the malnourished thief of a cat who would steal Smokey’s food under the cover of darkness to that of an occasional lap cat whose purr sounded like thunder. Smokey tolerated him with an occasional nose boop. No longer a wisp of a feline but a big hunk of a tom and as soon as the sun had set I would hear Moonlight make his way upon the tops of the fences with a loud meow announcing his arrival. He would then dine upon two cans of food and a plate of crunchies before stepping inside for an hour long nap on the couch and an occasional brushing. Afterward he would return to the back porch and enjoy the evening for a few hours safe inside my yard. Sometime later he would venture off to make his nightly rounds but would always return the next night as sure as the moon would rise. For three years this feral cat and I understood each other and respected our places in the world. He lived his life and I lived mine, but for a few hours every evening we enjoyed each other’s company. Then one evening he did not keep his dinner date. Nor did he the next night. Worried I would walk the neighborhood looking for any signs but never saw one. A week passed and nothing. On the ninth day I woke to find Moonlight sitting at the back door and since the sun was up I knew something was terribly wrong. I sat my injured friend in my lap for an hour and listened to his broken purr as he tried to get comfortable, but the look in his eyes told me a story that words could not. Sadly, Moonlights injuries were too severe and he did not survive. Thank you my friend, you will be missed. I’m honored you accepted me as one of your own. |
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| Name: | Rudi |
Age: | Unknown |
| Gender: | Male |
Kind: | German Giant Rabbit |
| Home: | Benneckenstein, Germany |
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This is my rabbit Rudi. He has this name because he is so big, like a little dog. He is a “Deutscher Riese” – a German Giant Rabbit.
We got Rudi in 2009. He came to us as a stray. One evening my dad said: “There is something white on the road.” And the next morning, my mum went into our garden and Rudi sat there! We knew that he came from our neighbours, but there he would have been slaughtered. Our neighbour told us: “You can keep him.” And so Rudi was and is still our rabbit. When it is warm, my sister and I let Rudi out in the garden and play with him. Then Rudi is very happy. He knocks with his feets and jumps into the sky. That is very funny and fun to watch. Rudi likes to eat very much and sometimes he grunts when we put some new food in his hutch. His favorite food is carrots. Sometimes he is impatient and so he nips but we know he is not bad tempered. I love Rudi very much!!! |
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| Name: | Shii-Anna |
Age: | Nine years old |
| Gender: | Female | Breed: | Siberian Husky |
| Home: | Northern Michigan, USA | ||
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Shii-Anna is also known as Shii-shii, Shii-bear, Bear-bear, and Shii-Ann. Shii-Ann is my gift from the heavens; It was two years ago when my Mom got a call from a family member asking if she would take a dog, and a cat because they could not keep them in their current situation. My Mom began uttering the word “no” when I asked her to let them know that I would take their husky. Shii-Ann is named for her personality, she is an extremely skittish dog, if a person she does not know walks into the room she hides. From the moment I met Shii-Ann, she and I both knew that she was meant to be my pet.
She is a couch loving pup, with a passion for chasing tennis balls, and going for runs. She Loves to howl “I love you,” and runs away when it’s pill time. I love her as most people love their children, and I feel blessed to have her. |
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Dr. Vivian Cardoso-Carroll, PetMD
The other day I was in an exam room with a client and she sheepishly admitted that her dog sleeps with his head on her pillow. My tech looked over at me and said, “That would be a good blog topic: What’s the most embarrassing thing you do with, for, or about your pet?”
I thought it was a great idea. You guys have the benefit of being relatively anonymous. I, on the other hand, have to stand tall in front of you faceless masses to admit my doggie dirty-laundry. But that’s okay — I don’t think I’ve got anything too scandalous going on!
So after some thought, I’ve come up with a my most embarrassing dog confession. You can start thinking of your embarrassing moments now, too.
First, Two of my three dogs are dubiously housetrained. Katelin, my Min Pin, became my dog precisely because she’s potty training-deficient.
It was during my first job post-vet school, as I was walking through the kennels, that I saw her lying on a little bed in the back of a run. Katelin was simply the cutest dog I had ever seen. Supposedly her owners were pretty sure she was a Min Pin (Miniature Pinscher), but they had bought her at a garage sale for $35, so who knows? I told them that if they ever wanted to get rid of her, I’d take her.
The little voice in my head said, “Hey newlywed girl, maybe you should run that by the new husband first?”
I ignored it, naively thinking nothing would come of my offer.
Well, Katelyn’s issues became a problem. Her owners offered her up and my receptionist took her. I realized my folly and figured I wouldn’t make my never-had-a-dog-before husband have to deal with a second dog. However, the receptionist couldn’t potty train her — this wasn’t her excuse for not keeping her, but I don’t remember what was.
She gave Katelin to a lady with cancer. This lady pretty much sat around all day with Katelin in her lap, so it was perfect. Except for the fact that Katelin peed over every inch of her house (or so I presume). The story was that the lady was too sick to take care of her. I’m sure that was the case, even a perfectly healthy person tires of cleaning dog excrement all the time.
Then Katelin went to my friend’s friend, Marty. Marty had been looking for a Min Pin. Perfect! He took her for approximately 24 hours.
You can guess what she did.
He said that, well, actually he wanted a Min Pin that fetches, and Katelin didn’t fetch. This I know is untrue because she loves to fetch; she bounces after the ball like a little red gazelle! She really just peed all over his house.
So I picked her up from Marty’s house and brought her home, telling my husband it would just be for the weekend until I could take her back to work on Monday. My secret plan, though, was for him to fall in love with her and let me keep her.
Well, he’s not really a dog lover. He likes them okay, I guess, but ultimately dogs are my thing. So I subsequently appealed to his engineer side: I wanted a cat, but couldn’t have one because of his allergies. Katelin was about the size of a cat so… I should be able to keep her instead of a cat!
“Fine,” he relented. “She’s our substitute cat.”
Cats are far easier to housetrain than our stubborn little Katelin. She was extremely talented at peeing and pooping in areas of the house we didn’t frequent; the formal dining room and the game room, for example. These places were like little graveyards with poop headstones all over the place.
We finally had to resort to the “umbilical cord” method of potty training: you keep her on a leash on your person at all times. She has to go out every 30 minutes (praise when she potties). If she has an accident in the house, we provided negative reinforcement — shake a can with coins in it, etc. to startle her. This way you can catch her in the act. It took about 48 hours, but she got it.
If you give her one little inch, though, she takes it. She also forgets her potty training every winter, when it’s too cold or wet to bother using the great outdoors.
We have gates everywhere to block her from potty locales.
Currently, her favorite place to potty is my closet. It’s the only place in the house with any carpet left that isn’t gated. We’re putting springs on the doors so that they close themselves.
I’m not sure why we’re bothering, she’ll just find some other place to go.
But we love her, so we keep trying to stay one step ahead of her “accidents.”
So that’s confession #1; my poor potty training ability.
My second confession I came up with right off the bat, when my tech mentioned the subject: I have a tendency to tell my dogs I love them more often than I tell my family.
How ’bout you?
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| Name: | Levi |
Age: | Seven years old |
| Gender: | Male |
Kind: | Ragdoll |
| Home: | Victoria, British Columbia, Canada |
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Levi is our blue mitted Ragdoll. Levi is very special to me, he follows us around like a dog, he even plays fetch! He loves his ragdoll brother Bailey and enjoys chasing him around all day. He also loves his treats and reminds me every day when I get home from work as he sits patiently in front of the treat cupboard until I give him one. He is so cute!
Levi is still the character, he and his younger brother, Bailey, love each other very much and get into all kinds of mischief… usually his brother’s fault. Levi is now seven years old and is still a kind little gentleman. We laugh because of our three cats (he also has an older sister, Maisy), Levi is the best behaved, he has never broken or damaged anything, he doesn’t start fights, he sits back and waits for the others to eat and then he will, his hair is short and neat so never needs to be groomed, and has never had any ‘accidents’ outside the litter box. He is very much loved by everyone in the family (furries and human). |
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| Name: | Murphy |
Age: | Eleven years old |
| Gender: | Male |
Kind: | Cat |
| Home: | Erwitte, Germany |
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In 2001 we saw Murphy sitting in the animals home in Lippstadt. It was in January when our last cat died after an operation. We were very sad and when Murphy looked at us we knew at once that he was the right cat for us.
After we get up in the mornings, Murphy wants to eat his catfood and he doesn’t stop miaowing till we feed him! He is always very hungry and likes eating very much. He likes to sleep in our beds. But in the living-room he must sleep in a basket under the table now, because he damaged our old sofa with his paws. Last year we had to buy a new sofa and Murphy isn’t allowed to sit on it. Murphy can go out whenever he likes. There big a hole for him in a cellar window. If we call him when he is outside, he’ll usually come very quickly. He wears a bell round his neck. But sometimes he kills little mice and little birds anyway. But he doesn’t eat them. After our holidays in summer, Murphy was very happy that we were back home, so he put a dead mouse on the floor in front of our bed. Murphy likes talking a lot. He doesn’t stop miaowing when he wants to get something. He is a good cat for us. |
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| Name: | Sadie |
Age: | Four months old |
| Gender: | Female | Breed: | Rottweiler |
| Home: | Geneva, Illinois, USA | ||
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Sadie is such a wonderful dog. We got her the week of Halloween because our old dog passed away. At first Sadie had potty training issues but she seems to be over that now, which we are very glad for. She loves food. Especially eggs and ham. I have never seen a dog so excited to eat plain dog food.
Her favorite thing to do is play tug of war. She has a problem with jumping on furniture. It is very funny. I run over to get her off of the couch and she will leap off. I know she does know she is not supposed to be on the furniture! She will also run around with things in her mouth (sometimes toys, sometimes things she is not supposed to have). Then we have to try and catch. It is actually sort of fun, though. She knows Sit and Shake already, and she absolutely loves people. I love her so so much! |
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The Witchcraft Chronicles 
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