"et and "y

Here's a post for those who like to hear cat stories, or stories about me being analytically happy, or both.

Muffet is a pretty terrific cat.

Suddenly -- instead of the laid-back, sleepy, unconcerned pet that was Zsa Zsa -- I have this quirky, spunky, endlessly-curious kitten who loves me to death and strives to be permanently attached to me. She's settling in a bit more now, but for the last week she has spent every waking moment either on my lap or a few inches to the right of my lap...at least, when she's not racing up a flight of stairs and lunging to the left in an apparent attempt to kill me.

There has been one exception to her Muffy-love, however: she's afraid of my bedroom. I don't know if it smells particularly like Zsa Zsa, or if I accidentally kicked her off the bed the only night she slept there (she weighs 5 1/2 pounds and is therefore less detectable than a pea amongst the bedding), but as soon as she enters my bedroom she becomes a new fearful creature.

By contrast, Muffet-in-the-rest-of-the-house has never seen a nook or cranny she didn't want to climb into. There is no shelf high enough to deter her. She will rocket onto ironing boards, window sills, planters and kitchen appliances without a second thought...I keep a pot-lid on the stove to place over the elements when I'm finished with them, because my biggest fear -- seriously -- is that she'll leap onto a 350-degree burn. Jeez, no.

But as soon as she crosses my bedroom threshold she's like a small child in a haunted house: a discarded article of clothing is a ghost that must be tapped and evaded, a gentle hand is an evil claw, a creak in the rafters is grounds for a mad dash into the far-off basement. The first night she came back from the vet's, she climbed tentatively onto the bed and saw my right shoulder. She solemnly pressed it with her paw and then ran away in fear.

This made me paranoid, especially when my father said "Cats are known for detecting cancer and injuries before anybody else can." The next night she climbed onto the bed, gave me an evil look, and pressed both of her paws against my forehead. Then she ran away again.

Brain cancer and mounting vet bills aside -- not to mention her occasional 5am scream-fights with the Neighbourhood Badass Cat -- life with Muffet is wonderful. She is beginning to learn how to entertain herself. She smells things in that idiotic open-mouthed way that cats sometimes have. Catnip turns her into a whirling dervish. She is clean and healthy and strong and active.

Zsa Zsa reminded me of a middle-aged film star, a sort of Liz Taylor creature who preferred to lounge and smoke and share fond memories about former lovers. Muffet, however, makes me think of a Peter Greenaway character; a Cissy Colpitts, maybe, who collects esoterica and doesn't notice when her vag is showing. Which, because she's a domestic shorthair, is always.

In honour of cats and those who love them, and also in honour of British eccentrics, here's "Cat House" by forgotten indie-minx Danielle Dax. If you haven't forgotten her then simply telling me so will bring more joy to an already joyous weekend (and it hasn't even started yet!)

Muffet

When I wrote my initial post about Muffet I was in the process of dropping into the depths of grief, panic, and depression. That is not a good time to adopt a new pet, particularly not when that pet is in heat.

Fortunately I was able to book an appointment at the vet's the next morning, and while waiting for my saintly parents to drive us there, I finally saw the GOOD side of Muffet.

Previously she'd been a manic, yowling demon...a drunken, sex-crazed lunatic without any pants or underwear to disguise the sight of her insatiable desire, a creature who I was afraid to even touch lest I set her off into another seizure of rolling and screaming and perhaps even spraying. In the morning she was still that, but she took time out to explore, purr, sit on my lap, and demonstrate her considerable intelligence.

To elaborate on Muffet's smarts:

• After two attempts to sharpen her claws on my new chairs, and two gentle removals to her scratch pad, she returned to the scratch pad and has been using it exclusively.
• "That's my litterbox? Okay, I'll poop there."
• I couldn't figure out why she kept climbing around in my laundry basins, until I realized she recognized them as places where water comes from. Carrying her to her water dish has done the trick.

Since then she has been a constant observer of everything. Nothing I do escapes her notice. She even watches me in the mirror. Right now she is sitting on my desk in front of the computer monitor, watching me type this blog entry and no doubt learning to spell.

Anyway, I took her to the vet, and after a rigorous checkup (and a rabies shot) I was told that they could keep Muffet overnight and spay her, then I could pick her up on Saturday morning. Buck Animal Hospital, you people are WONDERFUL.

They also said that here's no way Muffet is two years old...more like one year old, which would explain her zest and zeal. Her narrow face, skinny body, and long legs also imply that she's part Siamese, hence her frequent and expressive (and potentially excessive) vocalizations.

I felt bad leaving Muffet with the vet for two days, but I was rapidly turning into a basket case, and for the interim I wept and wept and gradually pulled the pieces of my life back together.

And now, on Saturday, she's home.

First things first: Muffet likes and trusts me. From the moment I picked her up to this very moment now, she has come to me for comfort and affection and play. She purrs and purrs and purrs when I am around. This is wonderful.

Secondly, she's frightened of the environment -- the wind outside, the furnace noises, and footsteps on the stairs in particular -- but every hour she is more confident of this house. She still retreats to the basement whenever things get too hairy for her, but I no longer have to spend any time coaxing her out; I call and she comes (usually with a barrage of meows).

Third, she's still a raging ball of hormones, but not nearly the way she was before. Apparently it will take some time for her sex drive to go into neutral. This, coupled with her extreme reaction to catnip, makes me worry a bit about the state of her incision; I'm trying to distract her whenever she gets too wild, and she actually slept for a while in her fuzzy cat bed.

Finally, my other worry is her food: she isn't eating her Science Diet or the soft food that the vet provided, but in my experience cats don't eat like pigs anyway; I assume that when she's hungry she will eat, and eventually I'll fall back on the super-expensive kibble that the vet gave me (and which she happily ate in her crate when we were driving her home).

Muffet is a wonderful cat. I am returning to a point where I can even be a wonderful owner. She will be a handful: energetic, hungry for affection, and playful in a very kittenish way. She will be impossible to outwit, and she's so active that I'll need to be permanently watchful. In these ways she is nothing like the relaxed and stoic cat that Zsa Zsa was, whose response to adversity was "Oh well, I didn't care about that anyway."

But Muffet is also delightful and pleasant and sociable, and I see some indication that she can entertain herself when necessary. She's a much-need attraction and comfort, right now, when I absolutely need to be kept busy.

Muffet, thank you. You're not Zsa Zsa -- however much I probably wanted you to be a few days ago -- and you're not going to reduce the stress in my everyday life (especially as it relates to the huge wads of money I've spent and will need to continue to spend), but I'm very glad to have you and I'll do my best to be good to you.

Total Grief

I am so sad. I feel like a permanent part of me is gone. I'm missing Zsa Zsa every second, especially when I come home. She was always around, and every square foot of floor and furniture is imprinted with her. When I moved here I put everything away with some consideration given to her needs, so everything I do and everywhere I look makes me think of her.

The worst thing is that the fridge has always made little noises that sounded like her "hello" meow. To come home today and go into the kitchen and hear that sound! Out back is the garden where she's buried, and the living room was where she'd lie on me and sleep while I watched TV, and the comfortable bedroom chair for reading is where she'd relax, with or without me being there.

I know this gradually gets better, and when it builds up and builds up I can finally bash out in a huge long cry that helps. I didn't have any time or energy for a big cry yesterday, but today -- with Muffet getting spayed at the vet's -- I'm back home alone in this house that I feel so much of Zsa Zsa in, it's like suffocating.

I've had my huge come-home crash-and-cry. I can see some good things. This is the worst feeling in the world. My heart goes out to everybody who has felt it, because I think everybody has, and if they haven't yet then they will.

Goodbye, Zsa Zsa

I figured that when it came time to put Zsa Zsa down I'd want to write a huge memorial post. But I think this is too personal to talk about, at least for now. And sad death stories don't do anybody any good.

I do feel really, really awful. I dread all the times I'm going to think I see her out of the corner of my eye. I'm going to try to consider that a gift instead of a curse, though, because we actually had a fond last night and that's the thing to remember. And in terms of suffering I don't think she really suffered at all until the very end.

Bye, pretty cat.

My New NEW Digs

I moved here in September when it was a little bit chilly and everybody was retreating indoors. Over the winter I've barely seen anything of my neighbours.

Now, with the obscenely beautiful weather, I'm learning a bit more about them than I'd like to. We all have little patios so we're sort of in each other's faces. Plus I'm living next door to the Brady Bunch, a family whose uncountable children simply cannot be held within in the confines of a two-bedroom house, so they spill out in all directions and are pretty much below every window and inescapable.

I'm a much more relaxed person now than I used to be, so I am better able to view their activities as "healthy play" as opposed to "intrusively noisy." And I can (so far) drown them out when I really need to concentrate by turning on the furnace fan, which provides the added benefit of air circulation and which the previous owners had on pretty much constantly.

Fortunately this community does not seem to host partiers, at least not the type for whom partying is a lifestyle instead of just a diversion. I much prefer the sound of children playing than the sound of thumping music. And even more fortunately, my other neighbours -- the ones I share a wall with -- are so quiet that I occasionally worry about them. This is a far cry from the days of yore: the barking daschund, the wrestling pre-teens on the stairway, the pot-fueled 2:00am guitar parties on a chilly Tuesday morning.

I think this will be good. I don't know how much any of these people will like me...some of them say hello when I'm watering my terminally thirsty shrubbery, while others just walk past.

Other good things: this place is so nice and tidy that it's a pleasure to clean...well, as pleasurable as cleaning can be. Zsa Zsa adores her extended patio time and her tense exchanges with the Stray Badass Cat, who I surreptitiously spray with water when it looks like things are going poorly.

A VERY good thing: just across the expressway from where I live is the beautiful, unspoiled wilderness of Bechtel Park, but to get there I have to take a huge detour around all the fences and across the overpass. I've noticed a little stream that travels UNDER the expressway and into the park, and I've been wondering if I couldn't splash my way over there that way.

So on Friday I started exploring, and holy cow! The stream does indeed travel through a tunnel, and right beside it there is a SECOND tunnel...FOR PEDESTRIANS! It's long and spooky and black -- the kind of thing that city planners don't build anymore for safety reasons -- but thanks to some skillfully-demolished fences it provides convenient access to the park. Not a place to go at night, but a pleasant and adventuresome trip for the noon hour wanderer in search of some peace.

I think I'll need to use it a few times during the warm patio weather.

The ZsaZsaBlog VII

Every day for the last year I've come home expecting to find Zsa Zsa either dead or dying. During that time she has gotten terribly skinny and bowlegged, and her posture has changed and she's not as concerned with personal hygiene as she used to be, but otherwise she's exactly the same cat. Which is weird!

She still yowls for food and for the privelege of sitting on the patio (or, at the moment, stepping onto the patio and saying "Oh wait a second, never mind"). She climbs up and down the stairs with no problem at all. She jumps from my armchair to my bed -- a seemingly impossible task -- without batting a whisker. And at every opportunity she snuggles up to me and purrs and purrs and purrs.

She has even developed a new vocalization ("Eeeow, yow, yow!") which means "I want to play!" Seriously, this arthritic and organ-failed cat loves to jump up on my bed -- always the bed -- to play the two games that still tantalize her: "Catch the feathered toy when it scoots past you" and "Stomp on the pen-tip papers when I flick them at you." She's playing the second game in the picture above.

After she soaked the basement carpet with urine, however, it was obvious that something needed correcting. So I cut the carpet into pieces and removed it under cover of darkness and I bought her a second litterbox, one with tall sides. I also removed the hood, and put one of those doggie pee-pads around it (thanks, Lydia!)

This has worked. She's stopped using the old litterbox almost entirely. I think she still TRIES to pee outside of it, but the edges are high enough to block the stream. I also bought her a cat water-fountain (her FOURTH) which seems to have improved her life immensely.

Getting her to eat can be a hassle. She used to be the least finicky cat in the world, but I think that food is less interesting to her than it used to be, and maybe it makes her a little sick. The vet prescribed Azodyl to supposedly remove some of her uremic toxins, but it's difficult to know if it's working.

Most strange is the way that our relationship has changed. For nine years she was a roommate who needed very little attention or upkeep, whereas now she relies on me constantly. I have discovered that if I interact with her through the day -- pick her up and let her look out the windows, play with her, put her on my lap, talk to her -- she becomes far perkier (and hungrier) than on those days when I'm distracted and selfish. It's to the point -- and has been for almost a year now -- that I'm afraid to leave her alone for an entire day, in case she might just give up.

So Zsa Zsa, now, is a surprisingly capable invalid. I'm hoping she lasts until the spring at least, so she can finally enjoy the patio at its best. I'm also hoping she dies when it's warm so I can bury her in the garden that she loves to play in.

But the way things are going, she'll outlast me!

Fury. The Barracks. Zsa Zsa. Animal Behaviour. Sociology.

I am absolutely DETERMINED to keep my house in tip-top shape. Since I've moved in I have been developing routines for everything that requires maintenance: watering the plants as soon as I come home, cleaning the bathroom and kitchen once a week, making sure dishes and pop cans move steadily to their appropriate places...in short, organizing everything so that cleanliness and maintenance are easy to accomplish.

I haven't gotten the dish-washing routine figured out yet, and most rooms are still so unfinished that I can't get a handle on them, but for the most part I've been thrilled with my progress.

Then, today, I came home and discovered that my beloved cat has been peeing all over my basement crawlspace.

I positively f*cking SNAPPED. To see (and smell) all of my most meticulous attentions thwarted by what seemed (at the time) to be a flippant and whimsical disregard for her litterbox...well, I suddenly understood domestic hatred. I understood how people can -- momentarily -- wish that their loved ones were dead.

It was amazing. As I crawled around in the basement wiping up more and more fresh cat piss, I seriously wished that Zsa Zsa would die. I believed that if she died I would feel only relief. She kept trying to sneak back into the crawlspace, and I kept throwing heavy objects at her to drive her away. Finally I managed to build a barrier that should keep her out, and I told myself that if she peed ONE MORE TIME outside her litterbox I'd take her straight to the vet and get her put down.

As you can imagine, she studiously avoided me for half an hour, and by the time she reappeared I was ready to make nice, and by way of coincidental apology she peed in her litterbox shortly afterward...not even in the tin pan I keep outside the litterbox door, which she usually uses.

Tomorrow I'll buy white vinegar and see if it works as well as the Old Wives say it does, and if that fails...well, I hear that stinky concrete can be sealed, though I don't know how (or at what cost).

In the meantime, though, I'm a little bit shaken at my ability to see Zsa Zsa as nothing more than an inconvenience. I think I understand -- a tiny bit -- those people who go into screaming fits when kids bicycle across their front lawns. I suppose that investing a huge amount of money, hope, and emotion into an inanimate object can skew your priorities a bit.

The Saga of the Bathroom

The previous owners of The Barracks had interesting taste in colour and style. The kitchen -- in stuart gold (HC-10) -- almost smells of sunflowers, planted on the great plains (CC-334) of the prairie dustbowl. Meanwhile some of the walls are a depressing mocha brown (2107-20) and the master bedroom is a downright murderous terra cotta tile (2090-30).

The bathroom, however, is in beautiful smoked oyster (2109-40), and while the rest of my furniture whizzes hither in trucks and trains (except for my living room chairs, which apparently are being upholstered by narcoleptic turtles), the bathroom remains the most finished part of the house.


And look at that bathroom light! They previously had a beautiful fixture in there that perfectly matched the decor...but only took sixty watt "chandelier bulbs," within nearly-opaque frosted glass, mounted high on pedestals which cast shadows on...well, everything.

Getting "into face" is difficult enough in the best of lighting, but if you can't even see yourself without a flashlight...well, you'll end up looking great in the bathroom, but you'd better STAY in the bathroom for the rest of the night. No, it was definitely time for a brand new super-bright light.

So my mom and I (you'll read that a lot in this blog) went hunting for a bathroom light, and while the plain-jane horizontal vanity fixture seemed the most practical...well, it looked CHEAP. Second-best was a mirrored light which dangled up to 200 watts of pure brilliant glare.

But how to install it? I had vague plans about getting a more knowledgeable friend to do it, but on Saturday morning I decided not to allow myself to be victimized by simple home renovation, even if it meant getting electrified and killed during my first week here.

Fortunately the light came with (vague) instructions, and after shutting off the power and sticking a flashlight between my shoulder and chin, I undertook the nontrivial task of removing the old fixture and then wiring, placing, and screwing in the new fixture all by myself. Without drinking any coffee first.

And as you can see from the picture...I did it! It's so bright in there that you can't look above the mirror without suffering temporary blindness! And now I can find all the crusty shampoo-bottle rings that the previous owners left behind!

I'll post more pictures as other rooms approach some level of completeness, but here's a picture of what Zsa Zsa did during the first week.


That's right, she sat on the back of that chair and hugged it for dear life. It was the only piece of comfy furniture I retained during the move, and even though she'd never cared for it in the old place...well, suddenly it became her bestest friend.

Epiphanies and Discoveries

Here are some things I've recently realized.

• I enjoy brushing with a small toothbrush, and I will brush longer and more vigorously, than I ever did with a larger toothbrush.
• Don't worry if you missed a Big Sale at Loop Clothing! There'll be another Big Sale next week and you'll definitely find out about it.
• Beds are expensive.
• Once you smell your cat farting after she's eaten Liver and Chicken cat food, you will be able to perfectly relive the smell just by thinking about it, wherever you are, whether you want to or not.
• The world can be awfully crappy, but it will be ESPECIALLY crappy if you EXPECT it to be.
  

T-Minus Seven

We set the closing date for my condo to be really far in the future, because one of my RRSPs was stuck like Pooh in Piglet's door. That was cleared up surprisingly quickly, so I've just been waiting...and waiting...and waiting.

But oh thank goodness, next Saturday is the moving day! I have a truck rented, and friends who will help, and I've been stockpiling alcohol of various kinds because I think they all drink different things.

I've packed almost everything and it's strange living in an almost-empty house. Most of the musical equipment is still hooked up -- just in case I need an outlet -- and my clothes and bedding still need packing, and other than that it's just the odds and ends; pots, pans, lights, remotes, extension cords, and all the stuff that's too big for me to carry.

I'm having waves of panic, apprehension, excitement, and outright glee. People are wandering through my apartment, anxious to rent it for themselves. Zsa Zsa is adjusting surprisingly well to all her hiding spots being packed up and sent to the basement, but that's probably because the basement now has new hiding spots: rows of boxes, shelving units, and the milk crates I fortunately kept for all these years.

The vacuum is ready. The broom and feather duster are seeing heavy action. I am interrupting the long subterranean war between spiders and sowbugs in the basement; do you know how sticky a spider's egg-cocoon is?

PS: I finished reading The Young People's Library of Entertainment and Amusement, and I have to say that the Spanish-American warmongering was partly countered by statements from other anti-colonial politicians, and that Victorians really knew how to spend an evening indoors.

PPS: Then I re-read William T. Vollmann's "Whores for Gloria." It's amazing how different his prose is these days. I'd forgotten how "stream-of-consciousness" he could be. Anyway, it's an ugly book about an ugly subject, and its final statement seems to be "Don't go looking for happiness, because somebody will always find a way to make your happy times turn sour."

PPPS: So now I'm re-reading Vladimir Nabokov's "Ada or Ardor," which I remember loving many, many years ago. I'm hoping it will get me through to the end of the week.

The ZsaZsaBlog VI

Last month I noticed that Zsa Zsa was looking increasingly scruffy; she had tufts of fur sticking out every where and she appeared to have stopped grooming herself. She was also extremely lethargic. "That's it," I thought, "she's REALLY dying now."

But then I had a sudden brainstorm. I took out a comb and started to brush her, and in half an hour I'd removed sixteen inches of loose fur.



It seems that the sudden heat and her new frailty had dealt her a double blow, and whereas in the past she'd been able to remove all that fur, this year she just couldn't. It was like she was wearing a pair of snowpants in the middle of summer. As soon as we finished our hour-long brushing session she went bouncing around the room, suddenly cool and free!

As always, signs of her demise were greatly exaggerated.

Case in point: she caught at least two mice last week, and in keeping with her experimental nature she left them in various states of gruesomeness.

Last Monday I stepped on a mouse tail, which she'd left at the bottom of the stairs. Usually she eats the tails, but maybe this one simply wasn't to her liking.

Wednesday's mouse was the most disgusting yet, because instead of eating it front-to-back or back-to-front, she'd eaten in LATERALLY, from the underbelly up. Three of the feet, most of the viscera, and the lower jaw of the mouse were gone...but the tail, spine, and much of the bleary-eyed head were still intact. It looked like a horror movie prop: a mouse dipped in acid, its ribs gnawed back into little fingers and one little back foot hanging off.

Why does Zsa Zsa do these things? I thought she was a cute little bundle who snores happily on my lap, not a wicked witch-monster who spends the early morning hours eating small creatures alive.

Of course this only makes me love her more.

Living with a Cat Who Is Mental About Water

Zsa Zsa has always been obsessed with running water, but as her kidneys continue to deteriorate -- and, maybe, as she grows increasingly senile -- this water thing just keeps getting crazier.

Last month I realized that her FAVOURITE way of drinking water was to lick it off of a wet loofah. You see, I have a synthetic loofah ball hanging off my bathtub tap, and every time I finished taking a bath she'd jump in and start licking it.

I figured that was an easy way to make her happy, so I broke my cardinal rule -- "Never encourage irrational behaviour in my cat" -- and started running water over the loofah "on demand." The problem was, the demand was CONSTANT and her cries became increasingly strident. She stopped reluctantly drinking out of the water bowls I've scattered around the house, instead sitting endlessly in the tub and yelling at me to pour more water, damnit.

That alone would just be sort of sad and pathetic, but I became TRULY annoyed when I realized that she'd only lick the LEFT half of the loofah. The OTHER half was perfectly wet and accessible, but she'd just never lick it. Only the left. This doubled the number of times I had to accommodate her already bizarre obsession.

I've gradually stopped her from yelling at tje loofah (by instead presenting her with a fresh bowl of water), but last week we moved to a new level of crazy. Now, instead of waiting for the tub to drain before licking the loofah -- which she still does religiously after bathtime -- she'll dive right in and start drinking before all the water is gone. Here she is.


There's no solution: she's thirsty AND crazy. It's a good thing we're in love.

Eyeing the Intestines

A few nights ago I was amazed to discover a pile of viscera in the middle of my carpet. There were intestines, and a miniature liver, and other little bits and pieces all tucked inside that I couldn't really see.

My first thought was that Zsa Zsa had finally started vomiting up her own entrails, but these were far too small to have come from a cat. They were...mouse size.

As far as I know this is the sixth mouse that Zsa Zsa has caught. As though to express the changeability of her moods, every mouse is devoured in a totally different way; the first was left totally uneaten, the second was swallowed in a single gulp, the third was chewed and savoured in a leisurely way, the fourth was bitten into two pieces with only the top half eaten, the fifth was entirely devoured except for a tiny back foot...

...but this is the first time she's eaten everything BUT the entrails, which seems strange to me; why would she favour the fur and bones and tail, but leave the "choice bits" behind?

I wonder if there isn't some truth to that half-baked idea that cats sometimes treat humans as really useless kittens. Maybe Zsa Zsa left a pile of juicy mouse-organs for me because she thought I'd appreciate them, and she knows I could never catch a mouse if my life depended on it.

Even stranger, however, was how CLEAN and SELF-CONTAINED the viscera was. I've always assumed that such things were sticky and messy and gelatinous, but not THESE mouse guts; they were damp but coherent, a whole entity unto themselves, almost as though they could pull themselves back together and saunter off into the night.

I think it's wonderful that Zsa Zsa -- who now resembles Death's Own Pussycat -- still has the vigour to stalk, capture, and eat the resident mice.

Transcript of a Night of Pain

Ten o'clock. Good puss. Yeah, she's a good puss. Goodnight, puss.

Groan. Try the left side. Oh, that's pretty good, if I bend my elbow and put my right hand up near my chin. Hmmm. Still okay.

OH! Ouch, no, try the right side. That's not working. Ouch! Maybe if I...OUCH! Okay no. If I put my hand on the pillow...okay...whew! That's a bit better. Not hurting. Hmmm. Still okay. Hmmm. Zzzzzzzz...

Ouch! Ow, what is it? Ow. Eleven-thirty. That really sucks. If I lie here on my back and just put my right hand in my left hand that feels...okay, that's better.

I must have pulled a muscle. YEAH! GREAT! Aw jeez, yeah, hello puss. How're you? How's my puss? Pretty girl! Goodnight, puss!

Maybe if I...OW! All locked up. Just to the right a bit...a bit more...sigh. Doesn't hurt much. I should be able to...zzzzzzzz...

OUCH! Ouch, my shoulder. What time is it? Two o'clock. Oooh, I'll just lie here, ow. K-9 and Princess Astra. Princess Strella. "Just to break-a-my fah...ah-ah-ah, ah-ah." Astra. "People tell me it's gonna get bet-tah, gonna get bet-tah." Hmm. Left side maybe. OW! Oh, that's better. Zzzzzzz.

OW-OW-OW! This is the bad--OW! Gotta get...OW! Four o'clock. Oooo, get lost puss, need an ice pack, why don't I put all this crap away...ahh, that's better. Ice ice ice. I wonder if Zsa Zsa will get sick from licking the ice pack. I wonder if she'll wreck it. Rough tongue. Ahhh. High blood sugar. Gotta sleep, this is a really awful sleep tonight. Hmmm. Princess Strella. No, Astra. "Just to break-a-my fah...ah-ah-ah..." Maybe if I... "I've never loved nobody fully..." Hmmm.

OW! Roll over. OW! Okay, if I really push my shoulder down. If I grab my shoulder and push it DOWN. Aha. Can I sleep like this? Hmmm. K-9. "Yes, master." Good puss. Zzzzzzz.

Wha...huh...five o'clock, what? Low blood sugar, eat some...OW! Jeez. Eat some candy. Ice pack is warm. Maybe if I lie here. That's okay. Don't look at the clock. Don't think about it. Hmmm. Zzzzzzz...

The Cat Altruism Experiment

I studied Psychology at University, so whenever I come up with a hypothesis I feel that I need to test it, otherwise it's just some subjective thing which may or may not be true.

Tonight was my first night of fun debauchery in almost a month. Finally free of bronchitis and supposedly with my "Rotary Cuff Tendonitis" on the mend, I went to Club Abstract and had a really fabulous time.

The booze was helping.

But then I slipped, pinwheeled my arm, and -- OH HOLY COW GODDAMN! -- the pain! I spent a few minutes trying to ease the terrible electric chunking killing pull-out-the-tendon agony in my right arm, and then I decided it was probably time to go home. No more fun for me.

Still drunk (even so as I write this) I lay on my living room floor. I did the exercises I'm supposed to do to ease my agony. I lay there wondering...would my cat recognize how much pain I was in, or would she be totally selfish?

Now let me be clear that Zsa Zsa -- my cat -- is dying. She's still happy and possesses a "love of life," so I can't justify putting her down, but she really is reaching the end of her long career as best friend and ultimate comfort.

But still, I thought I MIGHT be able to elicit some sort of altruistic response from her. As I lay on the floor in a dense cloud of pain that I cannot even begin to describe, I called out to her: "Help me, Zsa Zsa...help me!"

I said this several times. Each time I said it, she would circle me, stare at me, then wander into the kitchen where her food dish was. Then she'd return, I'd say it agian, and she'd wander back to the kitchen.

Oooo.

The Itis Family

Good golly, my apartment is just stuffed full of healthiness.

Bronchitis

I went to the Urgent Care Clinic when I lost half my hearing last week, and the doctor cheerfully informed me that I was suffering from bronchitis. I've never had it before and I don't even feel like I have it now -- no wheezing or rattling or anything -- but that's why He's The Doctor.

After rushing me through the diagnosis and prescription, the doctor asked me what I did for a living. I told him I was a technical writer. He then launched into a spiel about product design which lasted at least ten minutes, and I'm not exaggerating.

He said that products should require no documentation whatsoever. He said we need to spend money on better human interfaces. He pulled a Blackberry out of one pocket and an iTouch out of the other, and proceeded to describe all of their features and differences (pretending the iTouch was his iPhone, which he didn't have on him), concluding that the iPhone was perfectly engineered and that even his autistic son was capable of using it.

It was difficult to get a word in, but I did my best. I explained that simple products with single workflows require little or no documentation, but software is rarely like that, and the more flexible a product is the more documentation it requires. I explained that everybody has a different level of competence and background knowledge. I explained that his iPhone appeals to a very different market than his Blackberry, generalized to "hip consumer" versus "conservative businessman." I also wondered if his autistic son would be able to understand all the options for interfacing the iPhone with different products or use all of its options without a manual, but I was sort of afraid that would sound belittling.

Plus there were people in the waiting room who'd been sitting there for over two hours, waiting for an available doctor.

Anyway, I'm on these horse-pill antibiotics and ephedrine decongestants, which are NOTHING like the nightclub drugs they can supposedly be turned into, but they do sometimes give me goosebumps. My hearing has returned, but when I blow my nose I sometimes hear a weird squeltching noise.

Tendonitis

A different doctor -- from Waterloo Sports Medicine -- has diagnosed me with acute rotator cuff tendonitis, which means that a tendon inside the bony part of my right shoulder has become terribly inflamed. He described it as "a simple problem that's very difficult to fix," and said it came about "through a series of trivial mishaps all coming together." Those mishaps included slipping on the ice, bashing it against a wall, reaching too far behind me, learning to play the bass, and putting on an insane outfit three weeks ago that involved multiple zips and buttons in the middle of my back.

Today was my first day of physiotherapy. It's incredible what these people know about bones. I have to do a few exercises which involve lying down and lifting an umbrella, and she even told me how I can sleep without waking up in pain every hour: lie on my back with a pillow on my stomach, my right arm resting on the pillow.

This sounds good but it's like having a chubby person lying on me. A chubby person wearing cordouroy.

That's why I'm up right now writing this. Totally changing my sleeping positions -- which I've no doubt had since I was, well, a toddler -- will take some getting used to.

Conjunctivitis

On Friday, Zsa Zsa's right eye began to leak. That eye has always tended to get a tiny bit crusty, but now it's literally dripping water and -- if we're lucky -- little streaks of pus. I tried to treat it with cotton balls dipped in hot salt water (thanks mom!) but that hasn't helped, so today we went to see the vet.

The vet was less concerned with her eye than she was with Zsa Zsa's well-documented kidney problems. I was like, "Yeah, I know, she's on a swift decline with no solution short of an organ transplant, and the next step will no doubt be to put her to sleep...but what about her GROSS EYE?"

Conjunctivitis, predictably. Twice a day I'm squeezing little lines of goop onto her eyeball, which is less disturbing than it sounds. What's most disconcerting is the way the goop oozes out of the tube ENTIRELY ON ITS OWN VOLITION, as though it were alive. Also disconcerting was the bill.

Whining, Pain, Fury, Midnight Special

After almost two weeks of a really bad cold, on Tuesday I started feeling really good...I was getting healthy again!

That night I caught the flu, or something similar. Then today, while walking up my stairs, I slipped on some ice and pinwheeled my damaged right arm, and I was literally paralyzed with pain...it was like somebody had run over it. I couldn't even breathe and everything went white-hot around me.

I stumbled upstairs and got into the shower so I could spray some high-pressure warm water on it, and while I was washing my hair...I lost the hearing in my left ear. It's some congestion-related thing.

And all that time -- while I was stumbling up the stairs in absolute agony, and standing in the shower trying to figure out what had happened to my ear -- the cat was WHINING. She wanted me to put some water in the tub so she could drink it. I suddenly realized that she has NO INTEREST WHATSOEVER in my state of mind.

I don't just mean that she doesn't comfort me when I'm upset -- I would never expect that from a cat -- but she doesn't even know when I'm ANGRY. She has no idea when I need to be left alone. Standing in the shower, listening to her whine with my one good ear, holding my blazing and limp arm with my one good hand, I realized that my cat doesn't have any interest at all in my behaviour, except when I'm making her happy in some way.

So I became furious, and when I opened the bathroom door and she came bouncing in out of some futile desire to drink out of the tub, I sprayed her with the shower hose. Pain can really distort your character.

Of course I felt terrible afterward, and if she gets sick I will never forgive myself. After tracking her down to her hiding place I toweled her off and tried to make her feel better. But even now -- when my pain and frustration has dulled to a pulsing throb -- I can't shake the sudden realization: my cat does not have the LEAST CONCEPTION of how I behave, let alone how I feel.

What got me through my blue funk was a good dose of another kind of funk: the "Midnight Special 1974" DVD. Besides a few stinkers -- David Essex, Golden Earring, Neil Sedaka -- the DVD was full of goodness, but...wow, how did I EVER forget Maria Muldaur's "Midnight at the Oasis?"



I LOVE this wonderful song! I don't think I've heard it since...well, 1974, possibly. "Send your camel to bed," I mean, jeez.

But the best performance BY FAR was by B. B. King and Gladys Knight, in what appears to be a bit of an improvisation for her:



She is SO beautiful and genuine. Those eyelashes! I think it's time I gave her music a closer listen. If I ever get my left ear back.

Touching Bass

It's time, I think, for an update!



First of all, there are some new pictures on Flickr, including the one above, which serves a few purposes: to prove that I really DO have a bass, to show off my New Year's Eve outfit (theme: "red"), and to show that my cat is either still alive or stuffed...the former is true.

As a person who has never seriously tried to learn an instrument -- let alone the theory behind playing one -- my experiences might be useful to those who want to try it themselves. I bought some self-instruction books (and a cheesy DVD starring this guy), I hooked up an amp, I tuned the strings, and then I got down to business.

In order to learn a skill I need to understand what I'm actually doing, but in this case I'm forced to realize that the background information is so specialized and esoteric that I'll need to take some of it on faith. I've learned a lot over the last few weeks -- in particular the very necessary information about WHY the strings are arranged and tuned the way they are -- but I still have a long way to go. It's humbling to learn the major scale and then turn the page and realize that it's only one of many, and that all those wonderful rules and tricks I'd assiduously practiced no longer apply.

Who can we blame for the bizarre grab-bag that is musical knowledge and perception? Lay it on the Organ of Corti.

I'm playing the examples, over and over again. As far as I can tell it's much easier to learn your scales on a fretted instrument (as opposed to one with keys) because you're just transposing your fingering up and down the neck. I'm working on the major chords and trying to keep in mind the notes I'm actually playing, to lay the groundwork necessary for actual competence (as opposed to rote repetition).

It's thrilling to me how, by just doing the same thing over and over again, you are eventually able to refine your abilities. For instance, now that I can actually play my scales without thinking about them, I can concentrate on keeping the other strings from ringing, and I can even stop staring at the frets for a short period of time.

If you want to learn the bass I DO recommend David Overthrow's book & DVD, but it's disappointing how many errors and omissions they contain. A beginner should NOT be presented with an illustration containing the wrong numbers, or be forced to puzzle out why a number isn't where you expect it to be. Otherwise it's just fun watching Overthrow playing dead-simple reggae basslines which obviously bore him to tears.

In summary: if I can maintain my enthusiasm and discipline I'll actually be able to play the bass by the spring. I won't be GOOD necessarily, but I think I'll be able to hold my own.

Otherwise life is good. I've come through the holidays relatively unchanged after my initial (and sort of inexplicable) emotional snap, with the addition that I find myself simply caring less about my own behaviour in hindsight...like, I think I've suddenly stopped worrying about such things. This could be because I've done something terrible to my shoulder -- it crackles in the morning -- and this leaves me less energy for feeling silly that I dropped the contents of my purse all over the dancefloor steps last night.

It's all a matter of perspective.

And to Syd & Gary, the removal of the blog "comment" feature started out as an accident but soon became deliberate, just because I needed to realign myself to the world, and this blog is part of that. I've turned them on again! Life is good.

Oh yes, back to the cat: she continues to be fragile and skinny, yet alert and spunky. She's had a slight rheumatic limp for about six months which has suddenly gotten a lot worse, but it hasn't stopped her from catching more mice and devouring them at my bedside, always leaving a piece behind: a black organ which looks like an olive, a veneer of pinkish blood, a tiny back foot with claws and pads attached.

Cat with Mother's Eyes

Suitcase packed! Cat-sitter booked! Plans made! All ready to have a blow-out weekend in Toronto...shopping, socializing, schmoozing!

And then the storm came. Then it continued to come. Then it REALLY came, and threatened to come for many hours hence. In my mind's eye I saw myself stuck in a stranded bus on the 401, surrounded by emotional misfits and knife-wielding executioners. Then I saw myself actually IN Toronto, trudging through snow and wind to both arrive at and depart from J&C's apartment sanctuary.

My cat looked at me with the eyes of my mother. When I was a young adult, my mother would look at me and say "You CAN'T go out in this sort of weather." Unconcerned with my mortality and resenting any form of control I would go out anyway, and get stuck in ditches and mowed down by ravaging snowplows.

But now I'm an adult. My mother didn't dare say "You CAN'T go out in this sort of weather," but my CAT seemed to. And as frail and senile as she seems to be getting I can't disregard the wisdom that best-laid plans SHOULD be aborted when the situation calls for it. I'm not a quitter or a loser, I'm just being SENSIBLE.

Thanks, ma. Thanks, Zsa. I'm staying home today. Sigh!

The ZsaZsaBlog V

I'm pleased to report that Zsa Zsa -- currently known as "Zsa Zsa the Tan," or "Pinquevarnimeoi" in the Elvish tongue -- seems to be doing well. She's eating and drinking and has even started "talking" again, narrating her comings and goings with a squawk and a chirp.

I can't point to any one thing that's helped her, because I wasn't willing to do a controlled-study of her health. I just tried half a dozen potential fixes all at once.

To address her dehydration, I lowered the thermostat a bit to prevent the amount of dry air blowing around. More significantly, I stopped running my bedside fan during the night...I normally keep it going so I won't hear her snore (or the squirrels running around in the attic, which they do at all hours). Instead I just wear earplugs and I think both of us wake up with slightly moister throats.

I also did an intensive study of her water-mania. By setting up a collection of home-made contraptions in the tub I was able to figure out what she likes and dislikes about various forms of water. If your cat is obsessed with water, maybe this information will help you:

1. She must SEE the water arriving in a rivulet; if you just bring it to her in a bowl she doesn't believe it's fresh.
2. She doesn't, however, want to drink RUNNING water, which explains why her cat-fountain leaves her so unimpressed. No, she only wants to drink it once it's STOPPED moving.
3. She doesn't like LARGE pools of water; they must be small and shallow.
4. She doesn't want to actually get wet.

Therefore the BEST way to entice her is to let her see a big splash of water falling from the overhead shower. Then the water must stop running. It quickly forms into small, stationary droplets in the tub -- each about the size of a quarter -- and she'll happily jump in and drink two or three of them.

But after that the process must be repeated, maybe because by then she's forgotten that she saw the water arrive.

Incidentally, she WILL drink out of a deep pot or basin, but ONLY if she sees it arrive and ONLY if it isn't put near her food or directly in front of her. After a short period of time she'll sneak over and drink out of it.

I don't know what all this says about cat psychology, except that cats are mental.

So once I got her drinking it was time to get her EATING again, and as I mentioned before I did this by mixing a bit of cat food gravy and chicken in with her "proper" food and heating it for three seconds. After she ate it for a few days I stopped adding the gravy, which probably annoys her but she has continued eating anyway. She's even started eating her dry food again.

It's probably significant that her antibiotics (for her urine infection) have kicked in; she is no longer doing her "pee scream" and probably feels better in general. Finally, I'm spending lots of time petting her and chatting with her, which might improve her joie de vivre.

So even though she's still alarmingly thin (and she's developed an explosive sneeze), I think she's in the clear for a little while longer. I won't consider her out of the woods until she gains some weight -- and even then I think we're living on borrowed time -- but I hope we'll at least be able to spend one more Christmas together.