He’s home, three of his legs are shaved below the joint (paws unshaven: legs of an off-kilter coiffed poodle), he’s eating, he’s drinking, he’s eliminating what he’s eating and drinking, and he’s fighting me when I try to give him his three medications—all good signs.
Staff at VERG-South were very nice, not snitty about my fiscal inability to keep him in the hospital any longer, and quite complimentary to Mr. Jasper.
We’re both breathing easier tonight.
No more boy kitties; boy kitties break my heart.
Chillin'. It's what all the cool cats do.
My particular kitty-boy, Jasper, is in the hospital, with a problem which particularly affects males. (My old cat Jazz died from this, although he was much older than Jasper. I swore then I’d never get another boy cat. So much for swearing.) The doc should be calling me shortly to let me know how the procedure (to unblock his ureter) went—I expect it went fine—and I’ll pick him up tomorrow.
Of course, he should be in the hospital for at least another day, but I can’t afford that. To be honest, I don’t know if I can afford the care he’s currently being given. If his bill comes in toward the low end of the estimate, we’re fine. If not. . . .
I have no idea how I’ll pay it.
And then, of course, there’s the after care, which I also have no idea how I’ll afford.
But he was crying and I was crying and as I asked C., what, I’m going to let him die because I can’t afford to keep him alive?
C. did do me the great favor of looking for 24h care and telling me about CareCredit. I qualified for it—it pays the vet and then I pay it—but not enough to cover all the costs. Had I known about this before, I might have been able to get him into the vet before it became a costly emergency.
[*Update* The vet just called. He came through fine, his kidneys are fine, and he’s awake and groggy. So yes I’m still hyperventilating about the money, but at least Jasper’s okay.]
So, if you have pets and not a lot of cash, get CareCredit before anything bad happens; then maybe you can afford to pay for the little bad before it turns into the big bad.
Like it did with Jasper.
_____
*Update2* I learned a bit more about low-cost vet care—which, again, had I known about sooner, I might have been able to prevent this. (Joyce at Safety Net/Pets for Life was very nice about this, however, saying that this might have happened anyway. Thanks Joyce!)
So, for those of you in the New York City area, there are two (more) options you should know about:
I don’t have a contact number for the vet mobile, but if you’re in another borough you could call Safety Net for locations and dates.
I had looked previously for low-cost vet care, but somehow in my searches I didn’t find any of these services. Yes, I found the low-cost spay/neuter mobiles, but as I wasn’t looking for those services, I didn’t click on those links; had I done so, I might have also discovered the regular vet mobiles. And I messed-up in not finding the Safety Net program. I don’t know what search terms I was using, but they were clearly the wrong ones.
Jasper’s care cost a fair amount of money, and, more importantly, a great deal of distress to him. Perhaps had I taken him in when the problem first hit, we might have been able to avoid this. Joyce tried to reassure me by saying, well, even a vet can’t necessarily prevent blockages, and he would have had to have been unblocked anyway.
Finally, even if you’re not in New York City, you might have a Safety Net/Pets for Life program in your area. The NYC one is apparently run through the Humane Society, but it also has a page on the Animal Care and Control page. Check your local animal care societies to see if its available near you. And get CareCredit (which doesn’t cost anything to apply for and keep it on hand), just in case.
Cat issues. Jasper-cat issues.
That’s why I haven’t posted.
Well, that and other (more mundane) issues.
I gots me some dem ideers, I do, but but but. . . excuses are easier than effort.
Oh, and the kitty-boy might be improving, so may be able to avoid vet.
Might. May. The night will tell.
You are such a weirdo.
Trickster hears that a lot from me. (Yes, I talk to my cats; what of it?) A lot.
Because she is weird.
I’ll dig out the five plastic milk-cap thingies from under the shelving unit and she’ll cry because I didn’t get the one beneath the fridge.
Or she’ll cry because I dug them out and, you know, she really wanted to the be one to get them. Which means, of course, that no sooner are they dredged out than she’s shot them back under.
She also likes to sit in my mail-box:
(Oh, I forgot I had that Netflix movie. . . .)
I constructed this box out of found wood, thinking it would help me keep my mail in order. No, it’s just something for Trickster and Jasper to rootch around in.
Anyway, Trickster at least fits. Jasper, on the other hand. . . .
Well, Jasper’s a big boy:
I’d guess he’s 15 or so pounds to Tricks’s 9.
She still owns him, of course.
And while she’s not as agile as Chelsea was, she’s still able to make her way up top:
Jasper will get on the red stool and stretch his paws to the top of the shelf, but he can’t quite figure out how to get up there (it’s about 5′).
Trickster knows this.
This could be Trickster’s general attitude toward both Jasper and me:
She’s lucky she’s cute.
I got nothin’.
Yes, all kinds of opinions about politics and football and freelancing and upcoming family visits but, honestly, why put you or me through that.
So, until the mojo returns. . . kitties!
Kitty croissant, or nautilus shell---take yer pick
Here’s the kitty boy, decidedly ignoring both me and The Trickster:
Not paying atttention: la la la la la
Here he is again, driving me up a fucking wall:
Oh, is this bothering you? Really?
He’s got this thing, where he climbs on to something inconvenient and proceeds to dig away at whatever is hanging on the wall. Not the wall itself, mind you, which might be amusing. No, he has to whack away at something which could fall and break or fall and break something else and in either case generally rip up the plaster.
Or just hang around the desk while I’m trying to work, because, you know, it’s not as if there’s not an entire apartment available for their amusement:
*Sigh* Fucking Feline Union.
This absurd household has expanded once again.
The Trickster Lola
She looks innocent, doesn’t she? She certainly seemed shy and mild that first day.
Well.
Backstory: I had been worried that if I got a teeny-tiny kitten that Jasper would beat the shit out of her; a slightly older kitten, I thought, might have a chance.
The Trickster Lola (Trickster, Lola, Trixie, TrixieLa—you get the point), that was the name. Now I just needed a cat to fit the moniker.
Please don't call me Trixie
I spotted her on the Animal Control website (even though I looked too soon, I knew better, but I couldn’t help it). She was 7 months old, was given up due to owner allergies, and had a bad name.
And she was gray, striped. I wanted a gray striped kitty.
She was still there when I made it out to ACC on Saturday. Although I did look at the other cats, really, I knew as soon as I saw her she was mine; on Sunday, after her spaying, she was.
I just had surgery; no kidding I'm not all hepped up.
Tricks (that seems to be her name) was pretty laid back Sunday night, and even on Monday she was fairly calm.
But oh, did she talk. Does she talk. All the time. About everything. Reminds me of Chelsea that way—a good way.
And she’s gotten her pep back.
Jasper is not amused.
Why did you do this to me?
And, of course, she totally rules Jasper. Poor guy was freaked out by her, but it’s clear that even after he gets used to her, she’ll be running the show.
Divas are like that.
Bean loved to do two things, eat, and:
Sleep
And sleep some more
She slept on the floor, on rugs, in chairs, on tables, on my desk, in my closet, and, of course, in bed:
Whaddya mean, move?
As Chelsea and Bean got older, I set a low chest near the bed to make it easier for them to get up and down. In one apartment, however, I didn’t have room for the chest, so set this stool next to the bed, instead:
Chelsea would step lightly up, but Bean never quite mastered that. Instead, she’d climb partly on to the lower step, then stick her paw into the notch on top and haul herself up and over; made me smile every time. Shoulda gotten a shot of that.
When I had a proper kitchen set-up—i.e., a table and chairs—Bean liked to jump into the chair. She then expected me to tip it back and rub her belly. She’d squeak and squeak until I’d stop, then look at me like ‘You’re stopping? Is there a problem?’
Even without the tip-and-rub, however, she liked to reign from the chair.
This became a point of contention between her and Jasper, as he, too, liked to loll on the chair. Bean would chase him off if he dared slip on to her perch, but at some point this past winter, she ceded the spot to him. It was a concession both sad and inevitable.
Still, she never gave in fully to Jasper, never let him get too familiar. Tolerance, however, she could do.
Early detente
I did see them sleeping together—actually touching—once or twice, but Jasper could never get the hang of how to hang without chomping on Bean. And then he wondered why she wanted nothing to do with him.
Chelsea was the same way, initially, with Bean, although because they were much closer in age, they had more time together to learn how to live together.
Unfathomable in the early years, constant later on
Chelsea, as I may have mentioned, was a marvelous jumper, able to leap from the floor to the top of five-foot bookshelves with little more preparation than a look and a butt-wriggle. This was how she most often escaped the Bean-kitten, as the young Bean had neither the strength nor, frankly, the chops, to follow her.
But oh, how Bean tried. One night, when my roommate P. and I were sitting on the couch, Bean chased Chelsea down the hall and into the living room. Chelsea skipped on to the nearby desk, then hopped on to the bookshelves.
Bean, determined to follow, didn’t bother first scrawling up the couch to get to the desk (a board slung across two file cabinets), and instead tried to conquer the desk in one leap.
She managed to get half her tiny body up, but her back didn’t quite make it. She bicycled her back legs, to no avail, and her front half slowly slid back off, until all that remained on top were her paws, the claws dug into the plywood.
She hung there for a moment, her little body swinging, before she finally let go.
Bean never attained the grace so natural to Chelsea, but she had her own dignity.
And she was sweet and lovable, who pipped and squeaked and purred and purred and purred.
Bean was a good cat. I don’t know if there’s anything after life in this world, but if there is, I hope she and Chelsea are together.
They were good cats.
If there is something else, I hope they’re happy.
Penises are trouble.
You may recall a recent post in which I noted the odd-cute manner in which Jasper approached the litter box and his business therein.
I even posted pictures.
Well.
There have been developments since then, none of them good. Some cat is no longer confining his or her elimination to the litter box.
At first I thought it was Bean who, tired of being ambushed by the dauphin, went outside of the enclosed box so as to observe better the movements of the said ambusher. I therefore removed the top, thinking this would solve the problem.
It did not.
I reconsidered: What if the matter were not that of a female cat squatting outside of the box, but of a male cat perched on the edge and overshooting? What if the puddle were produced by a poorly-pointed penis?
This seems to be the case.
I’ve had a conversation with Jasper about his aim, but he gives me the blank look of a teenager bored by everything an adult has to say. If he could, I’d bet he’d stick his paws in his ears and sing la-la-la-la-la-la over my remonstrations.
Boys!
Jasper is an odd cat.
When I pour my cereal in the morning, he hops on to the table and rubs himself all over the boxes and me in a kind of ecstasy. He then closely inspects the poured cereal.
He seems particularly to like Grape Nuts.
(For all of you non-critter owning folk who are now gagging at the thought of a cat on a table or a whisker in a bowl of cereal, hell, you’re probably right: it is unsanitary. I also think it’s funny.)
(This may be among the reasons that you don’t have critters and I do.)
And no, excepting the just-poured pre-milk cereal, I don’t let him stick his face in my food. As I tell him, that’s just rude.
He does generally like to lounge on the table—which I wash off before I prep any food. My tolerance for kitty dirt does have its limits.
Whaddya mean this isn't a kitty bed?
He also has this thing with the litter box: He climbs halfway inside and pushes the litter around with some vigor.
He then perches on the edge of the box to do his business.
Then, back inside for more vigorous litter-shovelling. Which leads to litter all over the floor.
Which explains the broom in the bathroom.
C. wondered if he doesn’t like the lid. Possible, but given that he has no problem crawling all the way inside to scratch at every last bit on the box—minutes, he does this, honest to pete—I think it’s more about Jasper than the box.
Oh, and have I mentioned how well he’s training me? In addition to lulling me into thinking the breakfast routine in endearing, he’s also learned how to sucker me into comforting him—even when I don’t think he’s really all that upset:
The steam pipe in the bathroom knocks like hell, which makes Jasper squeak out a pathetic little cry, which leads me to say ‘C’mere Jasper. It’s okay. C’mere. . . .’ So he’ll squeak a little more, then jump into my lap for a round of head scratching. (And if I stop before he’s done, he’ll shove his head under my hand and wriggle it a bit.)
I gotta admit, I doubt he cries when I’m not home. I bet he just rolls over on whatever surface he’s snoozing and dreams of new ways of manipulating me.
That is, unless he falls off. Boy has no edge-sense whatsoever.
Well. Given that this is his first winter, I thought I’d introduce him to snow. It started promisingly:
But any attempt to lure him on to the fire escape ended at the sash:
Jasper was not impressed with snow.
Bean, of course, is still unimpressed with Jasper.
She’s tolerant enough of his presence, but I have seen them lying next to one another—briefly, it must be said—only twice.
He’s very interested in her, but he can’t seem to figure out that her unwillingness to hang out with him might just be related to his penchant to pouncing on her back or swiping at her with his paw or chomping on her neck.
Bean don’t like it.
In any case, as successful as he’s been in charming me, he’s not yet achieved that Zen state in which he can simply claim any space as his own.
Such as the middle of my bed.
Yes, Jasper may be the Odd Prince of Prospect-Lefferts Garden, but Bean remains Queen.
AbsurdBeats 