Is "Amazement" An Actual Word?

As in "Much to my amazement," is that proper, or not? In my lazy-ish mood, I'm not gonna go look it up...

When I got back home after the ice storm, Hannah had some nasty little scabby-lookin' places above her eyes and close to one ear. Upon closer inspection, I also found varying sizes of scabby bits of cat hair on my white blanket. I knew I had to do something, but I wasn't sure what. Though she's sweet & cute at (rare) times, she's not exactly the easiest cat to deal with, and the thought of getting shredded while trying to get her into a carrier and then back out of the carrier at the Vet's office scared me to death.

I spent most of the night with a million horrible things (like mange) running through my mind and wondering if I should try to call a cat-owning friend first or just call the Vet's office, I also considered just slathering her with some Neosporin, but I decided against it because the bits of hair on my bed were gross enough, I didn't need 'em mixin' with greazy medicine. I was ever so glad Becky called me the next day -- and I was very relieved when she said I should just stop by the Vet's office, sans-a-kitty, and ask if they could just give me something without having to go through the stress of hauling her in.

Hannah was sweet as ever that night, purring and kneading and rubbing her scabby little head on me; and the next morning I left early-early to stop by and see the Vet on my way to work. They wouldn't sell me anything without seeing her, I had to make an appointment. Dammit.

While it's good to know that I can take her to a professional who'll check her over and give her what she needs so I don't have to worry about her, I know this cat pretty well -- this cat who growls at My Mom and does a little hiss & hide routine when Clay walks in. She's a one-girl-cat, but sometimes she's even mean to me, and I'm the human who brings home the cat food and makes sure the speeyack gets washed out of the blankets. She's not going to be easy on me when it comes to gettin' her in the cat carrier, and she's probably not going to be easy on the person who opens that cat carrier in a strange place with strange people and the smells of strange animals. Opening that cat carrier would probably bear a close resemblance letting an angry Lion out of the trunk of a car. Inside a closed garage. A very small, closed garage.

I had myself all psyched-up and I carefully planned the whole ordeal in my head. I soaked the inside of the cat carrier with that "calming spray" and let it dry, then soaked it again. I sprayed a towel to line the bottom of the carrier, and then I sprayed my jeans and my sleeves with it too. I put the carrier on the desk in the living room, 'cause if she saw me walk in with it, she'd hide for sure and then I'd be two hours late and shredded and dirty by the time I managed to wrangle her out of wherever she decided to hide. I was as slick as I could be about it, I just went in there and picked her up, loved on her a little bit, and headed for the door. She squirmed a little as I headed for the living room, but she didn't howl or bite like I'd figured she would.

Much to my amazement (see, whether it's a word or not, I'm gonna use it), she let me put her right into the carrier without a problem at all, and it was nothin' like when ShadowCat would make himself as huge as possible so as not to fit through the door. I was stunned.

The fifteen minute drive to the Vet's office wasn't near as awful as I'd expected either; she cried a bit, but when I turned up the radio and sang, she got pretty quiet and just stared at me. Heh, my Grannie used to do the same thing, I think they're both just stunned at how bad it is...

When we got there, they were ready for us; or, well, they were waiting for us, I kinda figured there was no way anybody was ready for the fur-tooth-fang-and-claw tornado that was surely about to come flyin' out of that cat carrier.

I put the carrier on the table and the Vet reached to open the door; all I could think of was "Oh shit, don't you want me to close these doors so she doesn't thrash everybody in the office??" The Tech reached in and took her out and I was stunned. Hannah Kitty, the super-meanie, was totally calm and quiet, and she let a total stranger hold her and love on her while another total stranger stuck a scope into her ears and poked her in the shoulder with a needle so big it made me feel a little woozy just watching. I was in total shock. She didn't make a single sound, no biting, no clawing, and she even let the Tech turn her over and rub her belly. This girl even picked a scab off to look at it up-close. Seriously, pickin' a scab off a cat, that's incredible, even I am not about to try that bare-handed. When they were done, she went right back into the carrier without a single protest. I was completely stunned. I'll say it again, Stunned.

So, the kitty had ear mites. She got a shot to stop the itching, and a squirt of stuff to kill the little critters. She has another squirt coming in January, which shouldn't be near as scary as trying to give her pills or drops or ointment.

Thankfulness? Check.

Iams Pepperoni

Even though I forgot to bring home the to-go-box out of Clay's fridge last night, I vividly remember deciding I was full and putting the leftovers in a box to take with me. When I got down to the last two bites of the piece I had on my plate, there was a bite that was just crust, and a piece that was thick and cheesy with a perfectly centered slice of pepperoni. In the interest of "saving the best for last," I ate the crusty bite first and then finished off with that lovely thick, cheesy, saucy, pepperoni-loaded last bite, and it was good.

And why might I have such a vivid memory of something so small, so trivial, so pointless? Well...

Last night when I got home, I was struck by a distinctive smell, and even though it took me a couple minutes to figure out just where it was, the stench was unmistakable. Cat Puke.

I still wonder why she never pukes in the litterbox; as human logic sends (most of) us toward the toilet when the urge to spew hits. They say Cats are clean animals, so why can't Hannah at least find her way to someplace easy to clean when she feels that urge to "eich-iech-eich" comin' on? I wouldn't mind tossing a magazine into the garbage, or shaking a rug out the back door, or spraying some 4-0-9 and wiping the tile floor, or even rinsing a gob down the bathtub drain. Why does she always have to speeyack on my bed and usually right where my pillow belongs???

Unlike my kitty, I've never been good at puking. I can go years without it, and when it does come around, it's usually violent. In the past ten years, I've barfed three times, tops. Twice while seriously ill, and one time involving booze; that's it. I inhaled a bug at the Fair the first year Clay and I were dating and I was soooooo sick and sooooooo close to puking, but I just couldn't get it to happen -- no matter how hard Clay tried to get me over the edge. I've had close-calls with cat products in the past; after two years of flinging the litterbox in it's entirety into a dumpster or over a ledge in the backyard, the first time I had to stay in the house and dump it into a garbage bag, I almost puked; but it's always an almost, and I wasn't exactly at my best then anyway...

Last night when I turned the Shop-Vac hose on to that turd-shaped gob of Iams Original mortared together with clotted hair and relentlessly stuck in a near-dried puddle of cat saliva on my pale pinkish peach bedspread, I was very, very close to that edge. I might've been alright if the Shop-Vac had worked the first time; but when I pulled it away and the gob strung back out of the hose, I was a near-goner. As I started to heave, I had to look away to concentrate on bein' tough, c'mon, don't be such a wuss, it's only a little cat food; but by the third heave, I had already decided that if it was gonna happen, it was gonna happen and I'd about as well just point the hose upward and mainline my puke into the Shop-Vac instead of making my bed even worse. At least Hannah's speeyack wasn't enough to soak through the blankets and into the matterss -- if I puked on the bed, I'd surely kill the mattress with my all-but-two-slices of a medium deep-dish pizza, two Diet Dr. Peppers, and then a bottle of water, and a couple mints that I ate on the drive home.

It must've been knowing that the end of the Shop-Vac hose had just been dragging about in a gooey gob of partially-digested cat food that stopped me from putting it close to my own face to let fly with my own partially-digested dinner; because once I'd "threw up in my mouth a little," I forced that last bite of pizza (which had apparently crowded around the mints) back down so I was fine and therefore able to scrape the chunk off the bedspread with the end of the hose and let the suction take it away. If you have pets of any sort (or maybe kids too), the Shop-Vac is quite possibly the greatest thing you could bring home -- because let's face it, if I'd had to use paper towels and plastic grocery bags to get that wad off of my bed, I really would have barfed full-on into whatever was handy and then had a much bigger mess to clean up. Plastic grocery sack full of my own vomit? No Thanks, that's why I forced it back down -- shorter path, less resistance, absolutely no visual...

So, tonight, it's Laundry-Mat Night -- where I'll happily have time to knit away from home and possibly finish up Mom's "Christmas Scarf '07," while listening to SmodCast on my iPod.

See, cat speeyack isn't all that bad...

More (hopefully with less puke) later. _\,,/

The One Time To Be Thankful For Cat Puke...

A couple weeks ago, I picked Hannah up to love on her a little bit before I left for work and I thought I felt something strange. I tried to put it out of my mind, but it was with me all day and all I could think about was getting home to look her over a little closer.

Hannah's one of those cats who wants her human affection on a fairly limited basis, and always on her terms... Trying to figure out what I'd felt in my hand earlier that day turned out to be quite a challenge because she was not very interested in being held at that particular time.

When I had to have ShadowCat put down because of that "Aggressive Tumor," I asked the Vet if it was something that might've been passed along to the other cat, or possibly caused by something environmental; he said "no" on both counts, but still, I worried a bit.

After about three days of trying, I finally felt it again. Hannah Kitty had a lump near her, uhm, left front teat. Or Tit, or Milker, or Boob, or Breast, or whatever you'd prefer to call it. Now, I don't know if Breast Cancer is a common thing among cats; ya don't see 'em wearing pink ribbons or passing out laminated cards to hang in the shower with instructions for self-exams; but I've already lost one Cat to cancer, so finding a lump anywhere on the remaining cat obviously freaked me out a little bit. What if it's something in the house that's doin' it to 'em? What if that something could be doin' it to me too? What if, what if, what if...

I've had some cats in the past who were calm & laid-back enough to let me maul 'em any which way -- but Hannah would have no part of being laid out on her back where I might part her fur to see what was goin' on with her lefty-fronty, nuh-uh, no-way, no-how. Since there wasn't much chance of looking, I spent every chance I got trying to feel for it; every time I'd pick her up and pet her, I'd pay close attention to her chest and her belly as I put her down, and I could feel that lump almost every time.

I was thankful it wasn't getting bigger, but still, it wasn't disappearing either, and it was making me anxious as hell!

A couple days ago, she was rollin' around sheddin' on my bed while I was close enough to see and I caught a glimpse of something in her fur that wasn't moving quite like the rest of the cat. I couldn't let it go any longer, I couldn't stand to keep worrying, I decided that if she wouldn't let me check it out this time, I was callin' the Vet's Office that very moment. So I reached for her, and before she could bite/claw/gnaw on my hand too much, I discovered that though the lump wasn't getting bigger, it was growing out, as in hangin' off of her long silky fur...

I'd freaked out over a matted gob of hair. Yeah.

The next night when I got home, she'd speeyacked the biggest damn hairball I've ever seen; but I couldn't gripe, 'cause hey, at least she got it -- the lump was gone.

Yeah, even with just one cat, I've still got a little bit of that "Crazy Cat Lady" thing goin' on.

More later... _\,,/