She's just a regular orange tabby. She does have weird fur, it's not the normal smooth short fur, but it's long-ish on her body and the fur on her tail is very fluffy and long, so I'm wondering if the long fur is part of the problem.

Without going into too much detail, I don't think it's diarrhea. Um, just trust me on this!

I am worried about how cats normally keep themselves clean and she's so messy. I have noticed that when I'm outside and she's around, she'll start to work on it, but when I leave to go inside she stops. Possibly she's too scared and on guard to take care of it? It looks like for some reason when she was going she sat in it right away and just hasn't gotten it cleaned up.

Anyone else have any ideas? It sounds like a vet trip may be in order....how do you call to schedule an appointment for something like this?! Have you had kitties that were able to clean it up by themselves?

Thanks for all of the advice so far!