So, fiasco, part 1: my beautiful long hair black princess of a kitty has this … bare spot on her flank.<\/p>\n
Just for fair and balanced reporting, I present an opposing view:<\/p>\n We brought her home from the surgery this last Tuesday, along with a clutch of pain meds, and we stayed up with her for part of the night, but eventually we did go to bed. The next morning it was time for her first med. She was entrenched in her traditional resting place, which is on top of some of my Art Editor’s artwork underneath the pool table in the basement (you can see parts of it, above). Thus, we hauled out the artwork, grabbed her, and unceremoniously squirted her mouth with the med.<\/p>\n An hour later, it was time to give her a second med. Alas! She had disappeared!<\/p>\n Eight hours later, she was Still Missing. We knew she wasn’t outside, and we were afraid she was hiding in the ceiling of the basement. Our two original cats (Mischief and Mayhem) access the ceiling in several ways, but their favorite is\u00a0a hole in the wall of the laundry room, since patched:<\/p>\n The white square is foam core now covering the hole. The shelf is reached via washing machine, so our freshly stitched kitty attained security in\u00a03 pretty large jumps.<\/p>\n Indeed, we did eventually discover her in the ceiling – by first hearing her wheezing pathetically. \u00a0We verified\u00a0her presence by ripping down some of the paneling visible above, but could not reach her from our small access port.<\/p>\n Then came Phase II: Recovery.<\/p>\n It didn’t go well.<\/p>\n Six hours of requests, begging, calling, waving tuna fumes in her direction, poking with a tape measure (quite gently), and the occasional frustrated screech could not dislodge her from the top of the (warm) vents upon which she was resting\u00a0or\u00a0entice her to any opening. \u00a0We pulled down more paneling, sawed holes in the sheet rock\u00a0and\u00a0unscrewed ceiling access panels, but we were never able to reach her.<\/p>\n Finally, the basement in a shambles and with horrid visions of having to retrieve her body from the ceiling in a few days, I halted my proceedings, and left a light on in the basement for her. \u00a0I went upstairs exhausted and frustrated, and drowsed\u00a0on the couch as a rerun of\u00a0Family Guy<\/em> played on the TV. \u00a0At midnight, deep in depression, I fell asleep.\u00a0 Startled suddenly awake, I heard Deb hiss at me:<\/p>\n “Hue! Look!”<\/p>\n Mischief was sauntering across the living room, with nary a cobweb in sight (Deb & I were filthy\u00a0by comparison). \u00a0She walked right across to Deb, jumped into the chair, and settled in her lap.<\/p>\n So, fiasco part 2: Two adult humans are defeated by a partially bald, very ill, elderly small cat, who, having achieved her aims, finally comes out to applause and adoration.<\/p>\n Sheesh.<\/p>\n Deb transferred our little furry fink to me, then spent the next hour boarding up all the access\u00a0points in\u00a0the ceiling so that, hopefully, we don’t have to repeat this process ever again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Really, my life is not a cascade of fiascos – it’s just one of those weeks. Our beautiful black long-haired\u00a0cat, Mischief, has come down with an aggressive carcinoma in her lungs and chest, which will probably kill her, according to the vets at\u00a0Blue Pearl\u00a0(described by a former vet tech friend \u2026 Continue reading ![\"CAM00206\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/CAM00206.jpg?resize=800%2C600&ssl=1\")
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