There’s a war of the sexes going on at my house. My kitty, Sneezy, just “became of age.” You know … she’s in season . . . in heat. The poor kid is a horny teen-ager who wants to get laid, and she’s being quite vocal about it - twenty-four hours a day. She runs from window to window, door to door, trying to get outside to take care of her little “needs.” I don't let her go outside because she hasn’t been spayed. I’ll be damned if she’s going to make me drop her babies off at the shelter and stare at me with flat eyes of resentment the rest of her life. No way.
Being as quick as lightening, she has escaped a few times. I have to go out and chase her around and around the bushes, across the porch, away from the street, and crawl under the car, just to have her dart out the other side. She likes that game even better than Hide and Seek the Mousie. Just when I think I can reach and grab her, she sticks her tongue out, springs six feet into the air, and vanishes. It usually takes about half an hour of tempting her with toys and tuna to finally catch her. When I spank her little butt, she puts her legs into overdrive, scoots around the corner, slides down the hall, jumps up on Misty’s bed and pouts for … count ‘em … one, two, three seconds, until she’s off to find new ways to terrorize me.
Poor Catfish can’t even enjoy a decent meal without her sniffing at his butt. He gives her a tired look of disdain. Undeterred, she crawls halfway under him, searching for something to satisfy, then looks up at me as if to tell me he’s defective. She wails even louder and scoots away on her elbows, her butt in the air, flaunting her feminine wiles with an air of superiority. She still has all her parts.
My husband insists I lock her in Misty’s room (farthest from the TV) during the evening, and in the front part of the house at night, but I won’t do it. I remind him of how it feels to be without, how it can feel that way again, and threaten to lock him in our room alone the next time he has needs. This does not set well with him. “Then make her shut up,” he says. “Fine, the next time you come crawling, I’ll tell you to shut up, how’s that?” I shoot back. The expression on his face is one of total fear. Me 2, Husband 0.
This is Sneezy’s first uh … time. Her little hormones are raging and all she understands is that she wants a boyfriend. She doesn’t know why it’s happening, but she’s very clear on what to do about it. I used to know a guy who stuck a pencil up – well, you get the idea. It worked, too, but I just can’t bring myself to accommodate her on that front. Do they make little battery-powered sex kitten toys? Maybe I’ll write a letter to Santa for her.
I went to the animal hospital to see Sneezy tonight. Have I mentioned how vocal she’s become? When she saw me, she yelled, “Mama! Mama!” (okay; "meow! meow!) and hobbled over to the bars of the cage as fast as she could (she has stuff attached to her leg that seems painful). I put my fingers through the bars, and she rubbed and rubbed against them. She was soooooooo happy to see me. She wouldn’t let me stop petting her. After a while, I tried to visit with the poor dogs there who also ate the poisoned food, but Sneezy had a fit and kept calling for me until I came back to her. The vet tech said it did her a world of good, that it was the first time she’d perked up since she’d been there. It was the hardest thing in the world to leave her again. It just about killed both of us. She cried and carried on like I was never coming back for her.
The vet may check her kidneys in the morning. If she’s doing any better, she can come home tomorrow night. If he waits until afternoon to check them, and she’s doing better, she has to wait until the next morning to come home. We didn’t talk about what would happen if she’s not better. If she gets to come home, she’ll have to be on a special diet the rest of her life – dry food. She’s not going to be very happy about that. After all the stuff I’ve read about pet food these past couple days, I’d never give her canned food again anyway – of any brand.
At some point before I awaken each day, I must be moving my arms out from under the blanket because what wakes me is Sneezy making biscuits on my bare skin. She always manages to find that one little place that isn’t covered. If I draw the arm back under the covers, she switches to the other arm. Today, as I lay there enduring the torture, I wondered why we call our sheets, our blankets, our bedclothes -- covers? Is it because they cover the bed, or because they cover us? Maybe subconsciously we relate it with undercover, which covers a variety of secret activities like reading with a flashlight, or playing with snakey.
Ideas on the subject of covers were going off faster than paparazzi flashbulbs in my brain, one after another. The timing was right, the play on words so delectable I tasted them. This post would have you ruining keyboards. I got up, let the cats out, made coffee, let the cats in, the husband came home hungry, there was dinner to make, the dishes to clean up, cats to let out, cats to let in, and by the time I sat down to write – poof. It was gone. How freaking annoying.
This happens to me all the time, most often when I’m in the shower, or out in the garden. It happens in places where my brain is engaged in something that doesn’t require concentration, and somewhere, way underneath, there’s a little wiggle, and the wiggle worms its way to the surface and breaks through the concrete. The idea hatches full-blown, and all that’s required of me is to write it down before it wriggles its way back to the netherworld. But of course, there’s no pen handy. I will run in from the garden, my hands covered with soil and manure to jot down the gist of an idea, but I will not run through a chilly house, soaking wet with hair dripping. I have limits. What really ticks me off is when I’m writing gangbusters and my husband comes in to tell me about some dumb thing he’s watching on TV (especially when it’s a commercial), and breaks my concentration. Like now.
Do you remember the last good idea you had, where you were, what you were doing at the time, and what caused it to disappear?
I am particularly annoyed today because it was the best idea I‘ve had in a while. I’m in edit mode, not writing mode. I’m desperately trying to get the chapters in my novel flipped back and forth between past and present, while weeding and pruning with what I’ve learned from Miss Snark in the past few weeks. This has been going on long enough and I want to start querying again before the paranormal trend dies and becomes the ghost of Christmas Past.
I can sit and read someone else’s work, and what needs to be fixed is clear as brand new contacts to me. When it comes to my own, I might just as well be sunk in a mud bath with tea bags over my eyes. I think I am not getting the whole “this is set-up” business, especially when no one will be running through my story with a flaming coiffure.
I feel guilty when I don’t visit everyone else’s blog, or reply to comments, and I must take time to go vote on Miss Snark’s blog, since I participated in the Crapometer this time. I think I owe her at least that much. Before I know it, the clock will strike midnight, and I will have lost another day. I will edit until three, okay, five o’clock, ignoring the e-mails popping up in my box, and the ones already open and shouting for my attention before I crash and burn to sleep the morning away. Then I will somehow manage to allow my bare arms to sneak out from under the covers and rouse to find Sneezy making biscuits on them. I will tumble out of bed, start all over again, and not accomplish a damn thing.
Is your pet now on a lifetime diet of k/d? Have you looked to see who manufactures it? Go look right now, and then call your veterinarian and tell him you are outraged that he’s supporting the very company that poisoned our pets! I don’t want to sound ungrateful for my vet, because he did save Sneezy’s life (so far), but now I feel betrayed, and very, very afraid. The assistant at my vet’s office told me, “But it’s not on the list.” There were other brands not on the original list that are on it now. How do I know the next can I open won’t be just as poisonous as the original food that killed Catfish and sickened Sneezy? How do I know the can Sneezy already ate isn’t tainted? Is it possible that k/d is tainted as well, but there are no reports of it making pets sick or killing them, because they're already sick and no one will attribute it to k/d? At the very least, to prescribe food made by the same company is a huge conflict of interest! We should all ban together and insist our veterinarians pull all Menu Foods from their supplies, and find alternative foods – or only take our pets to vets who will!
I’m waiting for a call back from my vet now. I want to know what’s special about k/d that it helps my cat’s kidney failure, and then figure out if I can incorporate it into food I cook for her myself. If anyone’s pet is on a different kidney diet – one not made by Menu Foods, please let me know!
Okay - the vet just called and argued with me about it, so I will pay him what I owe him and will be looking for a new vet. If anyone in the Memphis area has suggestions, please get in touch. btw, he said the kidney diet is low protein, so if anyone else plans to cook for their pets, that's what we need to keep in mind. Update in 2017 - the vet was Horn Lake Animal Hospital. I would NEVER take one of my pets there again! I've tried almost every single vet within ten miles and the best, in my opinion, is Stateline Animal Hospital on Guthrie over by Baptist Desoto Hospital, off Airways.
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I just left Sneezy at the animal hospital where she will undergo dialysis for the next two days - if she survives. If your pets show excessive thirst, or are peeing where they shouldn't, they've probably eaten some of this food. If they aren't showing symptoms, but you know they've eaten the food, DO NOT WAIT to take them to the vet. GO NOW. The sooner they can be treated, the better chance they have of surviving. By the time you see the symptoms, their kidneys are already shutting down. Just like us, they cannot survive without them.
If anyone hears of a class action lawsuit against Menu Foods, I want to join. Please contact me. And if any of you Menu Foods people show up here, look at the post below to see what you've done. My cat died and the other is fighting for her life Menu Foods Class Action Menu Foods Class Action Menu Foods Class Action Menu Foods Class Action Menu Foods Class Action Menu Foods Class Action
I wanted a kitty to keep Sneezy company. Remember the cats from the house behind mine that I told you disappeared after a thunderstorm, and finally showed up again a few days later? One was pregnant. Then she wasn’t. She was spending all her time at my house, and didn’t seem to want to go home any more, so I put food out for her. Today, four little wild cats showed up in my back yard, and they look just like her.
I named one Ghost. She is the meanest little thing, white as a snowflake, except for a patch of gray on her butt, and her tail. She hisses and growls, and spits and scratches, and bites and carries on like a poltergeist (05/28/07 - Ghost finally got over it. She's very sweet and loveable now). Another one has been named Shy. She’s white with gray patches all over. She's the runt, and the other kitties don't play with her (05/28/07 She wasn't getting enough to eat, so I had to bottle feed her. The poor thing was starving, and chewed the nipple right off the bottle in about two minutes. She's doing much better now). One is an explorer. I’m thinking of calling it Columbus, but that may change when I discover its gender. He's roly poly chubby, and the fuzziest of the four.
The fourth one looks just like Shy, except she has a white tip on her tail. Her name is Champ, for the sister of one of my husband's friends, a little girl who wears a baseball cap backwards, and loves sports.
I put down a glass quiche dish with a fish dinner in it for them, big enough that they can all eat simultaneously. Mama Cat ate every bite, so I gave them more. A few minutes later, I looked in on them, and all four were up in the dish, chowing down, with Mama Cat supervising. They are in my house, protected from Old Yeller – the yellow feral cat that hangs around sometimes, all the neighbor’s dogs, the weather, and anything else that gets kitties (05/28/07 - The last time I saw Old Yeller, he had a huge patch of skin hanging off his neck. That's been quite a while ago, and I think he went off somewhere and died).
I went to the neighbor’s house to let them know the situation, and they said it isn’t their cat (a likely story). I cannot keep all these kitties, and I will not take them to the shelter. In addition, I have a black kitten on hold for me as soon as it’s weaned. And another neighbor is trying to get me to take a yellow and white kitty they adopted, and decided they don’t want. I can't take it! To top it all off, Sneezy doesn’t like any of them.
I need a new kitty. Sneezy misses Catfish, and she’s lonely.
There were some other cats, four, I think, that must live in the house behind mine, who were here constantly up until we had the thunderstorm last week, but now they seem to have disappeared. I shudder to think what may have become of them. I cannot go to the shelter and look for them, because if I found them, I would have to adopt them. I could never take one or two, and leave the others behind. I simply couldn’t. Nor can I afford to adopt them all, much less feed them, and pay for their vet bills. The good news is that the shelter in my town is a no-kill shelter. People who discard their pets like yesterday’s newspaper irk the shit out of me. When I adopt a pet, it’s for life, come hell or high water.
I’d like to get a solid black male, like Catfish. Someone told me the other day that Sneezy will know the difference. Ya think? I didn’t know whether to laugh or be annoyed. I’m pretty sure when the term “dumb animal” was coined, it’s because they can’t speak, not because they aren’t smart. In many ways, I think they’re smarter than we are. I’m certain none of them ever voted for Dubya Bush.
I checked bulletin boards and the paper today for “kitties, free to a good home,” but there were none. I couldn’t believe people want from $20 to $$$ (hundreds) of dollars for a cat, when normally, you can’t give them away. It’s why I had Sneezy spayed before she ever had a litter. God bless the animal shelters, but I can’t go there. It reduces me to tears. When I fantasize about winning the Powerball, the first item on my list of things to get are all the animals at the shelter, and round-the-clock employees to help care for them. Of course, I’ll need a big ol’ plantation to house them all.
So anyway, if any of you in the Memphis area have friends who are trying to give away kittens, and they have a solid black male, would you please let me know? Sneezy will love it to pieces.
P.S. There's an update about low phospherous diets and binders in the comments here. Hopefully, there will be an update about Azodyl next week. low phospherous binders Azodyl low phospherous binders Azodyl low phospherous binders Azodyl low phospherous binders Azodyl low phospherous binders Azodyl UPDATE May 7, 2007: I ran into Matt this weekend. He's the vet tech who's sharp as a tack and truly cares, and he looked into Azodyl for me. He said it works well for animals with chronic renal failure as opposed to acute renal failure. So while it would not have helped Sneezy at the time she ate the tainted pet food, it will help her now. This is worth asking your vet about.
Someone came here by way of a Google search with the term "chronic renal failure cat makes clicking ticking sound." I know nothing about that, but I'd like to, if anyone can clue me in!
