This week Midge got very sick, I had an MRI, Midge got better, the Dork Lord got a 96 on his calculus test, we had 14 trick-or-treaters and two extra cats joined us on the patio for breakfast this morning. Two large males. Pretty sure I’m not going to be able to relieve them of their testicles by petting them into submission so the ante in this little Control the Feral Cat Population game has just been upped.

We also got word that my brother-in-law, whom we have not met, will be visiting us next weekend while he’s stationed in Oklahoma City for training. I’m so excited! And not because he looks like My Military Ken Doll or anything. But come on, that’s hard to beat. Even my two-year-old niece Penny, who can parrot the names of each of her aunts and their spouses, has chosen the new guy as a clear favorite. She now answers, “Shane!” to the question, “Who is Heather/Audrey/Joyce married to?”  Nevermind the guy is married to my sister Nora. Naturally, it’s the uniform.

At any rate, the Dork Lord loves when a brother-in-law sleeps over – it means staying up late talking about computers/sports/video games and whatever other things I mostly nod and smile about – so we’re pretty excited.

Now that we have Midge back operating at 97% Obnoxious, our household should be relatively chaotic (which is our version of calm) for a while. On Sunday, she crawled up on the couch with us, snuggled into the down comforter and went to sleep. And then she didn’t move all day. Our evening went a little something like this:

Living Room,  6PM

Me: Something’s wrong with Midge.

Him: Nothing is wrong with Midge.

Me: But she hasn’t moved! All day!

Him: She’s fine. She’s a cat. They’re lazy. It’s what they do.

Me: Okay.

Living Room, 7PM

Me: Something’s really wrong with Midge. Hal sleeps all day. Midge wreaks havoc. She’s not wreaking havoc. Cats can’t say “I don’t feel so good,” they just stop being normal.

Him: Midge. Is. Fine.

Me: Nuzzles kitten. This cat has a fever! Midge has a fever. Feel how warm she is!

Him: She’s been sleeping in a down comforter. Of COURSE she’s warm.

Me: Okay.

Living Room, 9PM

Me: Bursting into tears. There’s something wrong with Midge and you’re NOT PAYING ATTENTION! Cry, cry, blow nose.

Him: Would you like me to take her to the vet in the morning?

Me: Okay.

Vet’s office, 8:30 AM the following morning

Him: My wife is not happy. I want to make my wife happy.

Vet: Yes, let’s do that. Examines cat. Your cat is very sick. She has a 105 degree fever.

I have held off on the I Told You So routine that would ordinarily accompany this kind of situation because one) knowing that the kitten was indeed very sick did not make me feel gloaty and two) he already owed me an I Told You So about something else so I figured eh, let’s call it even.

Besides, when she was sick, he made a down comforter nest in the middle of our bed and plopped her cat carrier down in it so we could co-sleep with her while she was getting well. Ten points for Gryffindor.

I talk about cats a lot. People who stumble on the blog or twitter have started to get the notion that I’m some kind of cat hoarder. Then they send me emails about how I need to get out of my house and how I will, inevitably, die alone. I kid you not. So, should you be one of those stumblers and feel inclined to send me such a message, this post is for you.

We were a one cat household, not some cat hoarder den of crazy. Well, actually, until January, we were a one cat/one dog household but we lost the dog to the tragedy of old age.

When we bought our home in the spring, we didn’t move in for almost two months while we undertook some rather ambitious renovations. During this time I one, got very good at using a caulk gun and two, happened to notice that we were surrounded by cats. Feral cats. Not strays – these cats (with the exceptions of a gigantic white male who can be seen in possession of a collar and tag as well as a giant set of kitten-makin’ balls) had never been anybody’s pet and were likely born in the same yards they now prowled.

One day in early May, while we were scraping paint for what had to be the 70th hour, I looked out the window and saw the cutest little ball of fluff bouncing around in the bushes. Immediately I knew I needed to hug this little ball of fluff so outside I ran to introduce myself to its mother.

“Hello, Mama Cat!” I said, crouching down and offering a hand. “I’m very nice and I would like to hug the guts out of your baby.”

Somehow it had escaped me that a feral cat wouldn’t be all that enthusiastic about letting me do anything to her baby, much less give it the Lennie treatment. I got the clue, though, what with all the hissing and growling. When we moved in a week or two later, I started putting out dry cat food for the angry Mama Cat because I wasn’t certain whether she had a predictable food source and a nursing mother should have at least that. She ate the food but she was not my biggest fan.

Two weeks later when we got home from our honeymoon, I spotted that same ball of fluff, laid out on the concrete in the heat of the day, moving only when the mockingbirds began dive-bombing her from the trees. Enough, I thought. All it took was an outstretched hand and that little kitten came running. She was bones and fleas. Off we went to the vet and when we came home, my husband called her Midget; at six weeks old, she weighed less than a pound. And that’s when Midge came to live with us and we became a two cat household.

That’s also when I decided to do something about the uncared-for cat population on our street. And I would start with Mama Cat. I contacted a local rescue, KittiCo, who told me that I could borrow a quote/unquote humane trap, catch her, bring her in and they would spay and release. But after I emailed back for details, I never heard from them again. Which was all fine and dandy – I couldn’t bring myself to frighten an animal by trapping it in a metal cage. I don’t see that as humane and I didn’t have it in me. But I also couldn’t stand the idea of Mama, who couldn’t have been a year old, popping out litter after litter.

The best thing about the timing, though, was that Mama Cat was already working on another litter. Ha. Ha. Haaaaaaa. Yay.

Anyway, I decided when I took Mama to the vet, it would be because she let me pick her up and take her there. When my vet heard my plan, he was not thrilled.

“Be careful,” he said. “Feral cats can be very tough.”

“Whatever,” I thought. “I can be very tough.”

What I meant was stubborn. Every morning and every evening for the next several weeks, I sat on our driveway and fed Mama Cat from a bowl that I started out by placing six feet away, then four, then two, then right at my side. By the time she was eating next to me, she was also letting me scratch her back. Then she introduced me to her babies: two seriously cute little ladies (around four weeks old, by my guess) who were not so thrilled to be called to dinner while I sat nearby, but they were not given a choice. Morning after morning and night after night I sat on the driveway being eaten alive by ants and mosquitoes and sweating through my clothes. The heat of the summer drove us all to do some desperate things, and Mama was no exception – by the end of July, a combination of hard earned trust and desperation made her willing to lie belly up on the driveway and let me rub ice water into her fur. She began waiting for me at the front door, sometimes calling for me to come out.

Mama Cat became Mama Cass. Today, she lives on our back patio and not only lets me pick her up and hug her (okay, “lets” is a strong word. She tolerates it), she sits in my lap, nuzzles me and as of this week, has started leaving me presents. Two very dead, very neatly displayed robins.

Back in the second week of August, one of Cass’ kittens got sick. I found her dying in the bushes. And that’s when Vera came to live in our bathroom, then master bedroom and then, lucky thing, permanently at my mother in law’s house.

And then there was one. One totally effing terrified-of-humans kitten, who was still nursing. When she had weaned that final kitten, I calmly picked up Mama Cass, put her in a cat carrier and took her to the vet. Because she let me.

But until a few weeks ago, the last baby cat (who we cleverly call The Baby Cat) wouldn’t even climb onto the patio to eat until I was back inside the house, watching from the utility room window. That’s when I started giving her the Mama Cass Treatment. Every night and every morning, I sit on the patio, food bowls at my knees and I do not move until she has finished. I built them a shelter out of a re-purposed storage bin and got downright gleeful when I watched Baby Cat crawl out of it the next morning, stretching and yawning. I began sneak-attack petting. And then sneak-attack hugging. And this morning, I picked her up, plopped her into a cat carrier and took her to be vaccinated and spayed. She, uh, sort of let me.

“This,” I told the kitten as I petted her nervous little head, “is what they call winning.”

(Unless, of course, you’re speaking financially, because I don’t know how winning my husband would say it feels to have spent almost twelve hundred dollars on cats who are not actually your pets but it’s like I told him: “doing the right thing isn’t usually convenient. Besides, you were warned. For every time you re-watch the NBA finals, I will rescue another kitten.” He told me I’d better start looking for a cat lady scholarship.)

And I know, believe me, I know that these feral cats are not my pets. But despite all the knowing and how often I repeat “they are wild animals,” my attachment to them is very deep and I was awfully relieved when the vet just called to say all has gone very well and that we can bring her home this evening.

“Does she have a name,” he asked.

“Oh, um, Baby Cat?”

“Well, why don’t you work on a name so we can get her rabies vaccination registered.”

So, taking my cues from Dirty Dancing, our “Baby” has just been named Frances  – after the first lady in the cabinet. Or Frances “Baby” Houseman. Whatever. It’s a real grown up name.

Today is the first day in eleven that I haven’t had a headache and I’m celebratin’ with a blog post.

Two Sundays ago, I got knocked down with a migraine so gnarly that the sound of my husband making chocolate milk at the other end of the house felt like that spoon was bouncing around tink, tink, tink inside every bone of my face. Then it never really went away. On Thursday, after a second migraine (this time, at work) that made my left foot go numb, I went to see a neurologist, who ordered an MRI and prescribed some sort of miracle, migraine killing drug. The kicker is, the drug is a compound only made at two pharmacies in the whole of Dallas/Fort Worth and wouldn’t be ready until… today. And in the meantime, I had to stop taking over-the-counter crap because, get this, it causes “rebound headaches.” So with ear plugs jammed into my ears and bags of frozen Brussels sprouts pressed into my left eye socket (what? the ice packs never resurfaced after our move) I watched the World Series and waited for the MRI that has to be approved and scheduled by my insurance company. I expect that to happen sometime around retirement.

What’s most frustrating, I mean, aside from constantly being able to feel my heart beat in my brain, the headaches do a really good job of making me stupid. I lose my train of thought, can’t seem to remember work-essential vocabulary words and I get so busy reminding myself to breathe in and out, basic literacy escapes me. It is not pretty.

But today I feel normal. And since any paranormal powers in the Universe responsible for jinxes and related silliness are all tied up in baseball right now, I think it’s safe to risk saying the headache is gone.

And speaking of baseball…

How’d you like that transition? Thanks. I worked hard on it.

With the Rangers in the World Series, I’m listening to a lot more sports radio on the way to work instead of my iPod. This morning, I happened to catch a segment the Ticket calls, “Women Say the Darndest Things About Sports.” The gem of this 5 minute trip down Condescension Street was an email from a dude who says he put a bunch of effort into coercing his wife into watching sports with him – with the singular goal that she say something revealing her lack of sports knowledge, thus giving him material to submit to the show. So he can have 45 seconds of fame. By making fun of his wife.

Wow, guy. Just wow. We’ll check back in on your marriage in a few years and see how it’s holding up.

The incredibly patronizing “Women Say” segment did a great job of highlighting what I don’t like about sports broadcasting and fandom:

1. Sports knowledge does not equate to intelligence. I’m always a little baffled by the Sports Genius who is ignorant about so, so many other things (world events, finances, literature, HOW TO OPERATE SMALL HOUSEHOLD APPLIANCES) and yet behaves as though his sports knowledge makes him somehow erudite. You big scholar, you.
2. Many, many sports rules are not logical. When the Sports Naive asks why something happens the way it does, the Duh tone that accompanies the answer is absolutely ridiculous. I give my Dork Lord much credit for never, ever assuming the Duh tone with me. You don’t get to be patronizing about a past-time that fully supports wearing seven-day-dirty drawers as a talisman against losing. You just don’t.
3. Sports broadcasting often panders to sexism. Because it can. Because bucket loads of sports fans don’t see anything wrong with it. They’re likely the same ones still screaming feminine pejoratives at the TV when their heroic sports icon doesn’t quite live up to his bazillion dollar pay, too. That’s one of my favorites. A wide receiver with too many dropped passes doesn’t just really suck at his job, he’s a pussy. If he’s down too long after a hit, he’s not engaging in histrionics, he’s a whiny bitch. In sports, when a man is under-performing, he’s equated to a woman. Nice, right? All I can say is, may the good lord bless you all with daughters. And someday, may some poor fool go on national radio and talk about your little girl like she’s a halfwit.

Every once in a while, when the store doesn’t quite have what I’m looking for, I make my own greeting cards. Today, I took a whole hour for lunch (the luxury!) and worked on these for my stinky little Skype buddies – my nephew Owen and my niece Penny who are turning three and two, respectively. Man, I love those kids. Theirs are likely the only cards that will arrive on time this year – no stamp required!

I don’t really buy into causes. I think it’s because, on a day-to-day, choice-by-choice basis, I try really hard to do The Right Thing and stubbornly expect other folks should be doing the same. And, it follows, if we’re all doing that – being good – we shouldn’t need causes. How d’ya like that logic?

Mostly, though, causes are just really annoying. Pit-marked by tunnel vision and awkward, naive passion not wholly unlike the post-adolescent variety that made you wail Indigo Girls lyrics into the dashboard of your parents’ American made auto (don’t say you didn’t), causes can be really exhausting and frankly, a bit embarrassing, for anybody who happens to be stuck in the passenger seat.

I mean, god love ya for all your feelings, but shut up already.

When I say I try really hard to do The Right Thing, I mean, I’m still a gigantic mess of a human being who makes mistakes and, if we’re being honest here,

• is not very good at recycling outside of the office
• uses paper products instead of a towel or sponge too often
• does not check the label before buying things made in China
• manages to leave her reusable shopping bags at home on shopping day like, 93% of the time

Among other things (oh, the glorious spectrum that is my imperfection).

What’s more, my motivation for doing The Right Thing doesn’t have as much to do with the greater good as it does a fear of consequences. Simply, doing The Right Thing means I’m not doing The Wrong Thing. And for me, there’s a lot of safety in that kind of validation.

An exception, interestingly enough, is that when it comes to animals, children, anybody or anything vulnerable or weak, my motivation is born of what I can only describe as a feeling of empathy so intense it borders on grief. I become consumed and overwhelmed by it.

I didn’t need to pay a professional to tell me why I am wired like this, but I did anyway. For validation, you see.

Empathy is why, after watching Food Inc., we don’t buy mass-market chicken, eggs, beef or any other livestock who has been subjected to the kinds of conditions that the folks at Tyson, et al, raise them in. I have no problem eating animals. But now that I know there’s a choice, I want them to have as close to a Little House on the Prairie existence as possible before it’s time for, you know, the dying. The images from that movie are burned into my brain, and probably burned into my husband’s brain is the memory of me, sitting on the couch, sobbing about how those poor chickens felt never going outside like chickens are supposed to. Think of how they feeeeeel. Not exactly the point of the film, I’m guessing.

Illogical hyper-empathy is also why, in the middle of a rainstorm, I will climb out of bed during the dead of night to build a cat fort out of painter’s tarp on my back deck. Because I won’t sleep if somewhere within my realm of responsibility, there are sick, scared, hungry or cold creatures. I mean, wild animals out in the wild? The horror, I know.

In light of yesterday’s post, please add to the above-listed imperfections:

• does not include rats on the list of animals she is responsible for preserving

And empathy is why I turned to my Dork Lord last night and said, “We can’t buy cheap chocolate anymore.”

“Okay.”

“Like, no Hershey’s or Reese’s Pieces or anything.”

“How come?”

Because I read this.

I didn’t even know. And the image of some little boy straining every muscle in his legs to lift a bag of cocoa beans so that I can give myself a headache from too many M&Ms is nauseating. I didn’t know and now I do and I’m sad. And because I don’t want that kind of suffering on my head, I’m out. I’m bound to falter (moments of weakness most likely related to late work nights and vending machines) but I will just keep trying harder so that when I close my eyes at night, I can say that I did everything I could to not hurt anyone else that day and, perhaps, save the silly bursts of panic for the neighborhood ferals.

I’m not telling you what to do, and I won’t get all cause-y about it (a stirring rendition of Language or the Kiss, anyone?) but if you’d want to know about cheap chocolate and child slavery, you can go read about it, too.

Rage Against the Minivan link via Helen Jane‘s twitter.

I spent the last week in Key West, keeping my fingers well pruned and off a computer keyboard. Sometimes a girl just needs to disconnect. Especially after working 65 hours the week before. That was… fun. I actually really like my job and the people I work for/with, so putting in a bunch of extra hours in the name of turning out a good product doesn’t bother me. But it turns out that physically, you can’t work 7AM to 11PM several days in a row and maintain… well, anything. A good attitude or sense of humor, a household or even appropriate caffeine to food intake ratios. I was a disaster. A twitchy-eyed, cranky disaster.

But now! Now I am well rested, appropriately caffeinated and trying to get back into the swing of things at work. Only, I’m totally distracted thinking about rats.

Oh, yes, you read that right. RATS.

This morning as I went to leave for work, I looked up from my car to see actual, gigantic, thick tailed rats walking on the window ledges of my neighbor’s house and immediately felt every hair on my body stand on end. I mean, rats. On the house. Next door. First, I freaked out and ran inside to my be-toweled husband who said he was unsurprised – the yard next door is in a state of serious neglect and the amount of rain we’d gotten over the last couple of days simply drove the vermin upwards. Totally un-comforted, I ran back outside.

“Mama!” I hollered. “C’mere, Mama!”

As Mama Cass came running, with her bow-legged little trot, from where she’d taken shelter on our back deck (I made a tent for her and the Last Wild Kitten out of a blue tarp and some patio furniture and while sure, it looks like we’ve got squatters, I just couldn’t stand the idea of them out in that rain) and I realized two things:

1) Mama is not a whole lot bigger than one of those damned rats and

2) Omg, thank the baby j that I have wild cats living in my yard

Mama Cass took after that nasty thing in a blink and, having seen Mama Cass yank a bird out of mid-air once, I was filled with every confidence that she and the LWK would soon be snacking on wild beasties. At the very least, she will keep them on their side of the fence.

Which all leads to the very important question:

Is there such a thing as anti-vermin traps or poisons that won’t hurt Mama and her kitten?

I feel like we should be pretty aggressive about keeping those horrid creatures away from our home, but I won’t do anything to compromise the health and safety of our officially unofficial pets. You know, the ones I’m considering buying a dog house for so they won’t get so wet and fine, probably even an electric blanket because cold is not an option either. SUCKER.

In a surprising bout of spontaneity, I took an unplanned, whirlwind trip to New York this weekend. Sure, now I have this nagging voice going on and on about what that does to my carbon footprint, flying across the country for like, 24 hours of capriciousness, but that’s neither here nor there. Plus, I picked up some nasty little bug so that must even things out a bit with the Universe.

Last week, E (or Ari, for you fishblog veterans) had to put her dog to sleep. She was so sad and, having just been through that surreal bit of horribleness, it ate at me that I wasn’t there to ugly cry with her. And then self medicate with Apple Jacks. Whenever I toy with the idea of finding super cheap airline deals, I’m always disappointed. But this time, I lucked out and scored some $49 tickets on an airline that wouldn’t even let me take a carry on (that woulda been another $60-$90) or choose a seat ($40, please). Like I cared. I didn’t need anything more than a toothbrush and a change of clothes. Look at me being so free-wheeling!

So off I went, and when E walked in to her apartment on Saturday and there I was just sitting lah-di-dah on her sofa, well it pains me to say I didn’t record her reaction. She stood there for the longest minute looking confused and WTF-ing.  She told me later she thought she’d imagined me there. Surprise well executed.  Because it was so last minute, I was also able to show up, unannounced, at a friend’s Willow-watching party and get so much hugging in, I filled the reserves.

The Dork Lord sometimes worries that I want to be back in New York. And even I, knowing better, sometimes wonder what it would be like, living among my people again, under a whole different set of circumstances. It can seem a bit rosy. There’s a lot of love there. But then I ride the subway. And I’m out. No. Thank you. It’s why I left, in part, because I found myself clenching my jaw just to keep from screaming, “Stop touching me!” every time I hit the pavement or descended into the hot, smelly subway.  New York is really no place for the part-time misanthrope.

I’m allergic to cats.

Hahahahahahah. Oh, man. That’s pretty precious, right? More on that later.

I’ve had a lot on my mind lately, stuff I can’t really talk about here because I’ve still got some sorting out to do. No, I’m not pregnant and seriously, if one more person suggests it, whether online or in person (I’ve put on some weight, yes. But it’s cheese and beer not a goddamned baby, okay?) I’m going to completely lose my composure and do something… well, very un-composed. TAKE THAT.

Because I’ve been so distracted, I’ve been a little more tweety lately, so if you want to read me wax brilliant on the company potty, toothpaste and diamonds, that’s where you can go to get your fix.

Otherwise, I’ve been spending my internet time planning home improvements I can’t afford and stalking a Kate Spade handbag, waiting for it to go on sale for many, many fewer dollars. The home improvements thing is kind of lather rinse repeat, but the bag thing is new. I’m not usually one to lust after labeled luxury goods (I happily wear Target shoes and spend more money getting them resoled than I actually spent on them in first place) but that’s how you know it’s love, right?  I saw this bag and then the heavens opened and fat little angels sang me a song about how if I owned it, all my troubles would cease. And I believe them.  However, having spent upwards of a thousand dollars in the last month or two on cats who do not even live with us I’m fairly certain that if I buy that bag and it’s not at a screaming deal, I’m going to have a screaming husband. Or a sulking one. You know. He’s been so patient with the cat lady thing, I can’t even tell you. Probably because I warned him that for every time he watched his recordings of the NBA finals I would rescue another kitten. And he’s WAY up on that count.

And, we’re back to the part where I realize I’m allergic to cats but it never came up because Hal (Sir Halitosis Maximus, the Grand Duke of Bad Breath) has some protein in his saliva that makes it stink like death and goat cheese and sweaty teenage boys which also counteracts the dander and blah blah, he’s essentially hypoallergenic.  Midge is not. And she’s going to learn to love baths.

Today I took my lunch break at the vet’s office, this time with Mama Cass, who is going to have her baby making factory closed, posthaste.  Right now, I’m waiting for Dr. Jim to call me and let me know if her blood tests come back negative for Scary Cat Diseases. He told me that he will suggest putting her down if they’re positive (Mama is feral, will never be an inside cat, and would only spread these Scary Cat Diseases around the ‘hood). I don’t know if he realized how unprepared I was to hear him say that, but I’m due for a bit of reality in Heather’s Wild Kingdom, I suppose.

Update

Mama Cass is negative for any Scary Cat Diseases, out of surgery and everything went fine. She’s spending the night at the vet so that tomorrow we can release her back into the wild.

I’m burnt out.

On top of life, the last few weeks have been exceptionally stressful at work – I live by deadlines and sometimes, there are honestly just too many to manage well but I’m me, so I refuse to admit that and simply do more, longer. Until, well, until it’s as though I can smell the brain cells burning, like hair caught in the business end of a blow dryer.

I’m tired. Like, the kind of tired that they’d lock you up for back in the day, in a yellow wallpapered room and watch from a safe distance as you started to form meaningful relationships with the images you saw in it. I’m arguing with the wallpaper, people.

All I want to do is sleep but even sleep is an exercise in frustration. Night sweats. Bad dreams.  I worry about the as yet unsaved kitten factor living in my yard, my own sick cat who, out of sheer stubbornness, refuses to get well, my job that I’m falling behind on and this enormous personal crisis I’m having that we can’t even go into right now.  Sometimes it feels like someone is standing on my chest and I think maybe if I just go back to bed, it won’t feel as heavy.  And in the midst of it, my husband, a man who doesn’t actually ever clean anything but manages to constantly place our crap into tidy, right-angled arrangements and call it cleaning, erupted in fury that I’d let the utility room get messy. I can’t even breathe and he’s mad that he can smell cat food.

I stood there, bouncing a sick kitten on my hip, suddenly thinking about tensile strength and would it actually show if I just broke inside?

He was sorry, brought home flowers. I cleaned and daydreamed about taking a nap.