Drowning My Soggy Basement Sorrows

In short, this has been the week from hell. I guess when you see a rattlesnake the size of a fire hose on Sunday, it’s possibly some kind of omen that later in the week men are going to be using extraction machines attached to fire hoses to suck the four-inch-deep water-swamp out of your basement. And that I’m going to have to act like a rattlesnake from hell with the insurance adjustor who can’t understand why the hardwood floors must be replaced. Because they’re buckling into six-inch-high teepees that trip me, dumbass? And that I might have problems with other long, hose-like objects later in the week, like maybe gas pumps that should have been replaced before I drove off from the gas station.

So I briefly – very briefly – considered getting myself drunk tonight. I kind of earned it. The house I was supposed to put on the market this week has over $50,000 worth of damage to it, and that’s not counting the furniture, exercise equipment, and stored items that are ruined. As a matter of fact, one of the few items that suffered no damage was the empty aquarium that was once home to a ball python, Hunter’s pet that escaped several years ago and was never found.

But getting drunk is not the answer to my problems, because although I’ve only been really drunk three times in my life, each time it did not end prettily. One of those times occurred while my whole family was in St. Augustine. My poor sister-in-law had to put my drunken ass (or “ash,” as I pronounce it when I’m drunk) to bed. I woke up in the middle of the night very, very thirsty. I tiptoed downstairs and was greedily chugging a liter of Pellegrino when I noticed a cat on my front porch eating from the dish I set out for Degas, the Siamese across the street who spends most of every day going door to door begging for food. Only it wasn’t Degas at the dish. I made my way over to the front door and watched the kitty eat. I wanted to go outside and pet the pretty kitty, but even in my semi-inebriated state, I remembered that opening the door would cause the alarm to beep, and I didn’t want to waken the entire household. So I stood and watched the cat eat while I finished my Pellegrino.

The next morning, I made my way downstairs in time to meet my family for breakfast at eight o’clock, proud of the fact I was not in the least bit hungover. Plus, I pointed out to my brother and niece, at two o’clock that morning, I’d even had the presence of mind not to open the front door and pet the kitty because I hadn’t wanted to wake them.

“What cat? Degas?” Beau asked.

“No. It was a different one. I’d never seen it before, but it was a really pretty kitty,” I said. “It was grey, and it had these cool black rings around its tail.”

After my brother picked himself up off the floor, he explained to me that the “pretty kitty” was, in fact, a raccoon who probably carried rabies – the ultimate in tainted pussies.

So on this night, when I probably have every reason in the world to drown my soggy basement sorrows, I will not drink. Because as sure as I do, some creature from Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom will show up at my house. And with the way my week’s been going, it will be that long-lost ball python, now the size of a fire hose and hungry enough to eat a dachshund.

Karmic Kitties

My friend Jan adopted a stray cat several years ago and very responsibly took the cat to be spayed. Unfortunately for the cat, the vet cut her open to perform the surgery only to find that she had already been spayed.

Several months later, Jan came home from the grocery store and, after bringing in one load of groceries, got distracted and forgot to retrieve the rest. When she remembered, she went outside to discover her cat dangling from the closed trunk by its leg. Apparently, the cat had jumped into the trunk hoping to find something yummy, and the defective spring on Jan’s trunk had given way, closing the trunk on the poor kitty’s leg. Jan’s husband, an emergency room physician, insisted that the major artery feeding the leg had been irreparably damaged and that the leg would have to be amputated. But Jan, responding that he was a “people doctor” and not a “cat doctor,” insisted they try to save the leg. Following a $1300 surgical attempt to salvage the limb, the vet called to tell Jan her husband had been correct. The leg was amputated.

The cat went on to live a relatively happy life, I guess, despite two unnecessary surgeries and the hassles of balancing on three legs. When she developed rectal cancer, there was an unsuccessful attempt to remove the tumor before she was mercifully sent to kitty heaven.

Jan called me several days after the cat died. She was annoyed because the vet had sent a sympathy card reading, “On the death of your four-legged friend.”

“They didn’t even know my cat!” she complained. “They’re the ones who removed her leg. Of all people, they should have known my cat had three legs!”

I tried not to laugh, but it was just too funny. And I’ve told that story often, usually commenting that I wonder what the cat did in a previous life to deserve that kind of existence. Whatever you want to call it, that idea that we get what we give, it’s a fact that sometimes karma’s a real bitch. Somehow, what we put out there always comes back.

I should know, because I laughed at Jan and her cat, and here's what happened: in the past month, my son’s dog had a leg amputated, and Lauren’s Bengal cat, the one who had already been spayed, was in heat.

I called the vet, who claimed it was “impossible” that she was in heat. “We take out BOTH ovaries when we spay,” the receptionist said when I called to make the appointment.

“But she’s trying to escape the house, and there’s blood,” I answered. So they told me to bring her in. And in the examination room, the vet began making strange chirping noises.

“What are you doing?” Lauren asked.

“That’s the noise they make when they’re in heat,” he explained. “I’m trying to get a reaction out of her.” And that was the extent of the examination. He shrugged and said, “We removed both ovaries, so she can’t be in heat. The blood must be the result of a rectal issue.”

So the $1000 kitty with malodorous diarrhea (see the August 26 post for an explanation) is now constipated. And Lauren's daddy, the man responsible for giving me this tainted pussy, now refuses to take the cat until he can get a fence built in his backyard. Apparently, the idiot is hoping to build a fence that will contain an exotic wildcat who may or may not be in heat.

But I'm not going to laugh at him. I'm afraid he might come back to me.