Wednesday, October 22, 2008

CAT-astrophe

Where do I begin?

I guess...at the beginning.

Sunday night, we came home from a weekend trip to Nevada to visit Paula and Jay. Mo came pounding out to greet me, per usual, complaining mightily at being left in the lurch. Each of us caught a glimpse of Bella, we think. This is not usual...she usually comes out for dinner, at least. Before bed, Sascha opened the garage door to take the trash out. We haven't seen Bella since. That was almost three full days ago.

So, we're missing a cat. While I'm not remarkably bothered by this fact (she's been getting more and more reclusive and senile lately so I'm wondering if she's been preparing to die), I am bothered by the idea that she a) ran into a coyote; b) picked up the ubiquitous rat poison around here; or c) is lost, scared, starving and freezing. Meanwhile, I'm pretty sure Sascha's planning his own little celebration for tomorrow night, providing Bella still hasn't returned. Four days was his opined deadline for being "concerned" as to her whereabouts. "Concerned", my ass. I still love you, Sweetie, but I can read you like a book.

And then.

I've been noticing this weird dirt falling off the cats over the past couple weeks. They'd been itching and shedding more as well. Being that I was distracted by some other personal issues and was simply happy if they weren't sitting on me, I wasn't paying too much attention. So it took about four weeks to catch on to the fact that my cats have fleas. Fleas. Yes, fleas. Oh. My. God. Being from the Midwest and having, up to a few months ago, strictly indoor cats, I have absolutely zero experience, and tolerance, with said pestilence. I didn't even know what the friggin' things looked like. Well, I know now. One flea bath* and one "picking" session later (ugh), I showed up at the vet's office this morning with fleas still hopping on an unhappy Mo (Bella likely being coyote fodder by now). An hour later, I left the vet's office armed with a flea-treated and fully vaccinated cat, 5 more doses of Revolution, an appointment for a feline dental cleaning and the assurance that this is the worst flea season on record in Southern California** and, oh yeah, flea season doesn't really end here and, oh yeah, the fleas are becoming resistant to the treatments but maybe this one will work...and I was $130 lighter.

Thus begins the Eradication of the Household. Borax on the carpet, vacuuming every day (my favorite chore), washing galore. Well shoot, the house will probably never be cleaner, I should be grateful.

So, if you have any extra white light hanging around, wanna toss it this way? I'm tired.



*Sascha redeemed himself by helping me contain and wash a yowling Mo.

**We have encountered more pests since moving here than I thought possible in one year. Spiders, ants, termites and strange bugs of the what-the-hell-is-that!? variety throughout the house. Gigantor spiders dangling over the sidewalks. And now fleas. Oh, and then there are the coyotes lurking in the canyons, which are everywhere.

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