WWC and medicating cats

i played WWC this week! go me! the words this week were three and fire. i've been super impressed (slash jealous) of how cool tink's number collages have been, so i went ahead and sort of did, uh, the same thing. imitation is the highest form of flattery, right? ....right?

anyhoo. on to the pictures. fire is pretty self explanatory.. i wish i'd had time to do something cooler with it, but here's what i've got:

i like decorating in groups of three, it turns out, so i took most of those pictures in my house last night, then added in the butterflies and the bridesmaids to fill out the grid :-) clockwise from the top left, we've got:

*a grouping of three vases, from japan, nicaragua, and peru;
*three butterflies from a camping trip last year;
*three lit bulbs from my bathroom;
*three prints with some of my favorite lines from le petit prince;
*three super hot bridesmaids at our bridesmaid dress party;
*three astronomical prints i have hanging (vertically, like that) in my living room; and
*my "garlicky / onion" dish, which just happened to have three items in it last night - one shallot, one onion, and one hunk o' garlic.

so you know the expression to describe something frustrating slash futile, "it's like herding cats"? i'd like to modify that to "it's like MEDICATING cats. repeatedly. with oral medications given via syringe down the gullet." i mean sure, it doesn't quite have the snappy conciseness of the original, but jesus h., it's accurate.

ps: nilsa teased me last week that i was becoming a cat lady, what with all the kitten posts. hold on to your hats, folks, because here comes a lot of cat talk :-)

on thursday when i got home, oliver was acting... weird. normally he GALLOPS to the front door when he hears me come in, purrs like his little head is going to explode, and flops onto the floor in front of me so i'll pet him. on thursday, he just... didn't. he spent the evening lying under various pieces of furniture looking miserable, and doing this weird retch thing every few minutes, like he had a hairball. except six hours later, he hadn't produced a hairball (or anything else), was still gagging, and hadn't eaten or drank since i'd been home. i googled "cat retching" and promptly freaked myself out (intestinal blockage!! act immediately or your cat may DIE!!!!) so i called the emergency vet clinic to ask if they thought his symptoms sounded worrisome. they said it was too vague to tell over the phone, and should probably bring him in just so *i* could sleep. in i went.

sick cat

once at the vet, she found that in addition to the gagging, lethargy, and loss of appetite, he also had a really high fever. she examined his mouth and throat to see if he had something stuck in it: nothing. she did xrays of his throat and abdomen: nothing. i spent about 2 hours there while the vets basically scratched their heads because it was such a weird combination of symptoms. they eventually sent me home and told me to watch him closely, and keep an eye on his temperature - if it went up any more, i'd have to rush him back in immediately. (aside: guess how you take a cat's temperature? hint: not in the mouth.)

by saturday, there was no improvement, so i brought him back in. at this point the vet was really worried, because if there WAS something caught in his intestines - say, he swallowed a string or some pieces of plastic bag, because he's an idiot - we were now running the risk of rupturing an intestine, which is Really Bad. i had to make a decision on the spot whether or not to send him to surgery to check it out. there was crying. i sent him to surgery.

the vet called soon after to say that inexplicably, they found nothing at all in his stomach or intestines (although bonus: he looks REALLY HEALTHY on the inside!). they put him on anti-nauseau meds and gave him stuff to coat his stomach and throat, assuming that it must have been irritation of some sort that was causing all the retching. he spent sunday and monday in the vet hospital, then came home with me last night - on a bunch of meds, and with a big incision up his belly, but more or less fine. the little shit basically faked us all out. he's WAY better now - acting like himself, playing with the kitten, eating like mad - but i have to give him a whole ARSENAL of medications several times a day for the next week to ensure he stays this way. and the method of giving him these meds includes shooting syringes full of scalding lava into his mouth, as far as he's concerned.

much better cat, but showing off his poor shaved belly and forearms for sympathy

so! that was my weekend. hopefully yours involved less crying and fewer thousands of dollars. i mean, unless it was on something SWEET, like a car.