We are planning to bury or burn (bring to get creamated) tommorow late afternoon. He is in a unheated garage right now. The high for today was around 60 the low tonight is around 40 and a high tomorrow around 50. Will he not start obviously decomposing (stinking) by then?
Perhaps not very dignified, but fairly obvious - Put him in the freezer. (if you can bare it)
in a plastic bag.
Sorry for your loss.
Put him in a large bag in your freezer. It’s exactly what they would do if you left him at the vets office. I’m so sorry.
So sorry.
40-50 degrees should not start any kind of decay, or stink.
Your garage floor (concrete?) will stay quite cold if you are coming out of winter instead of going into it.
If you can, leave your loved one on the concrete in a plastic bag on the concrete. Cover them with an old blanket to help keep the cold in.
Thank you for your condonances, he had a terminal illness for about 6 months and we’ve already come to terms with it. The actual death was somewhat more of a relief and closure then grief. He was just a shell of himself when he died.
I have moved him to the floor, the freezer is out of the question since he wouldn’t fit unless we took out almost all the food (and the ick factor).
{{{{{{BigMassiveHug}}}}}
So sorry for your loss kanicbird. It’s just the shell he left behind. Never-the-less it sucks so damn badly when people you love bugger off like that.
Just a thought : Share something. What was his name? Share a moment with us, please? A moment you have about him; digging up an expensive plant, sitting on you and purring when something shitty happened to you; leaping and trying to catch midges? Anything?
Apologies if I am intruding, but damn, I would be crying my eyes out right now. If you want to share some memories I think that many people here will listen. I think that this is a safe place to let it all hang out. Really.
A cooler, perhaps?
I’m sorry for you loss. Truely. My bestest buddy in the whole world died January 17.I wrapped him up in several towels, then some plastic, and I laid him in a little casket I made. We want to bury him in our garden and have a memorial stone. But this is Wisconsin and the ground is still too frozen to dig.
So I’ve got the little casket sitting in our yard barn. I check it every so often and theres been no smell or anything, so I assume it’s alright.
Where are you at? If it’s cold like it is here keeping him in the garage should work.
I’m very sad for you.
I don’t think you need to keep him in the freezer - the garage sounds cool enough for 24 hours.
The decision was made to bury him next to his older feline pal, due to rain we might not get him in the ground till Sunday - Again will he keep that long?
At the risk of pissing off the GQ mods (but since this post is going up due to GQ reasons I don’t see that they could have a real problem with it):
I called him Fuzzy, he had a real cat name but it would be too identifying (for me) to post here, and I only used his real name when he was being bad.
Over the years I have had many cats, 10 come to mind now but there may be more, nope 11. Cats have their own special thing they do, one was a fighter and no cat in the 'hood could stand up to him, one was a birder who one day brought me something like 7 birds, one tried real hard to catch birds but always failed to the point that birds would fearless dive-bomb him, one who would climb under the covers then re-emerge with her head on my pillow and her body still under the covers and take a schooze. This one was different too. He had his own thing, he was much more intuned with human emotion. He would be the one who would come up to you when you felt down. He instinctivly knew when you needed him (or at least something) and actually acted on it (those who have cats understand that last part).
He loved to play with foster kittens we get from time to time, he was really a big kitten himself. He was mainly an indoor cat, on the rare occations when he did venture out he would not like it and just want to go back in. He hated traveling by car but loved checking out new places once he got there.
He also had this annoying habit of hopping into the litterbox to take a leak, as he was leaking he would stand up, which made his urine stream overshoot the box and land on the floor. This made us switch to a covered litterbox which the other cats (and him) weren’t exactly pleased about but it did solve the problem.
Well work is calling, got to go for now.
PKbites, how touching. Perhaps you could introduce this as a ritual for handling grief.
Someone suggested a cooler. If you are worried about him keeping fresh until Sunday, just buy one of those cheap styrofoam coolers and a couple of bags of ice. Good luck.
Ok the rain held out, Fuzzy is burried next to his old feline pal Mr. Peabody (also a nickname).
Thanks all.