Thursday, July 19, 2007

A Message from Mum

Hello to you all,
Plumpy and I are both sorry that he hasn't been on the blog for a while but we have been fighting over cat-food and I told him he wasn't allowed on the computer until he ate at least half of his dinner which he has refused to do for quite a few days now. I paid $30 for 1.7kg of Hills Science Diet when I could have paid $12.95 for 1.5kg of his favourite Optimum (with Ocean Pilchards). But the more expensive food provides him with a nutritious and balanced diet which fills him up whilst not fattening him up, so the Hills remains.

Last week when we visited the "funny smelling place" Nicci informed me that Plumpy had bad teeth and he would have to come in again for full surgery - a clean and polish and possibly extraction. I would like to reassure Scaredy, Mahou, Elbi, Beeps and families that at no point was it ever suggested by Nicci or myself that ALL Plumpy's teeth would have to be removed.
By Saturday night/Sunday morning came around Plumpy had begun to sneeze, and although I was away for most of the day on Sunday playing hockey my flatmate (Uncle Dean, the other Ginge) informed me that Plumps had been most annoying - he didn't stop sneezing the whole time. Fortunately Plumpy was downstairs by his dinner plate refusing to eat Hills and didn't hear his uncle's loving comments. I am suspicious this was part of Plumpy's plot to escape. Do you know anything about this Scaredy?

Tuesday was the busiest night I have had in a long time and under a great deal of pressure to get all my chores done in time I managed to get Uncle Dean to the supermarket and Plumpy to the...erm, place... all in one fell swoop. Like all cats Plumpy is more than capable of making it perfectly clear exactly how he feels at any given time. I wish I could say he was angry and sulking at my brutal treatment of him but the truth is he was very scared and frightened and wanted very much for it all to just go away. If Dean wasn't with me at the time I may well have found myself in tears. Plumpy certainly was.

Nevertheless I signed the forms authorising Nicci to give him all the painkillers in the world at my cost and left him with the nice cat-lovers at the...ahem...place.
The house was very quiet without him and I was at a loss at 0600 the next morning when he wasn't screaming at me to feed him! BEFORE your shower thank you Mother!!!

At work the next day I was involved in helping another avionics corporal take a broken piece of motorised equipment down the flight line to the "Support Equipment Maintenance Flight" (more commonly known as SEMF), when one of the junior tradesmen came out to tell me I had a phone call in the flight line office.
"Get their name, I'll call them back." Says I.
"It's the vet." Says junior tradesman.
So I left Loons (afore mentioned avionics corporal) high but not dry and raced inside. There I was debriefed over the phone as to my darling's condition and informed I would be able to pick him up any time after three. I had to do a quick mental arithmetic to ascertain she meant 1500 hrs, thanked her for her time and good work and raced back out into the rain to help Corporal Loons deliver the Talon Lifter.

I had promised rather faithfully to help a friend of mine move house as she wasn't taking any time off work in order to make the move, and I had a long way to go. I was in such a flurry to get home from work, changed, and on the motorway that I went the wrong way home from work and nearly....!! But no, I remembered in time and made the loop to come pick up my baby.
I was attended by the nurse who instructed me in the requirements for his food and antibiotics as Plumpy demanded from his cage on the floor to know where I had been and what I thought I was doing mucking around with her when we should be on the road home. The most humiliating part, he informed me indignantly, was that I had provided these people with his real name - which I knew he hated - and he was sure I had done it on purpose just to rub salt into his wounds. I knew though that he was just venting all the stress he had been through and didn't get offended at his high handed treatment of me as I handed over $315.40 to the nurse for their work.

Here is an excerpt from the bottom of the receipt (right under "balance due")
[Plumpy] may be a bit sleepy for the next 24hrs but should be getting back to normal after this.
Hmmm, I thought, Plumpy is usually a bit sleepy. In fact all he does is sleep all day. It seems my cat might be a bit odd. I little inverted perhaps. Topsy-turvey. Because he jumped out of the cage. He ran down the stairs. He wolfed his dinner. He ran up the stairs. He clambered over the couch. He sharpened his claws in the carpet. He ran down the stairs again. At this point I had to leave to go help my friend so I made sure he had fresh water, soft food and a box of litter as he wasn't allowed outside. I kissed him goodbye and away away!

ooo 000 ooo


When I opened the door around 2138 hrs (that's twenty to nine) he raced up the stairs to meet me, demanding more food. He wanted to know why he didn't usually get jelly-meat instead of that bollox I was trying to make him eat. But he didn't push the issue because I discovered he hadn't used the kitty litter after all. Oh no - nothing so crass as that! Apparently the bath is a much more appropriate place to release the demons! I wasn't too upset though because it could have been much worse! At least this was easy to clean.

And at the end of the day, Plumpy finally got his ultimate dream.
I let him sleep with me.

Though it cost me a cold nose in my ear, eye or neck every ten minutes; though it cost me regular lifting of the blankets to let him under the covers or back out from under the covers and though my 500 thread count Egyptian cotton pillow cases were ripped from pawing and stained from bloody-dribble, it was worth it. Because even though he doesn't think I do, I love Plumpy very much and he has been through a lot of stress lately. I have never heard him purr for so long without pause, he was still going at 0100 and still strong at 0330. I might have fallen asleep around 0430. He was still purring at 0600 when the alarm went off. He is still purring now, Thursday night, but he didn't want to relive the trial and so I promised I would write for him. See - I do love you Plumps!

But I suppose you have all been waiting to know what the damage is? Well I'm not sure he wants you all to know, but I think you should in case you make a faux pas in a future conversation.

As well as a clean and polish on the teeth he still has, Plumps had to have all four canine teeth pulled. Nicci informed me they came out very easily which suggests they were particularly bad, and he also had to have a fifth (upper) tooth removed. He also had an extra dose of pain relief before he came home and is on a course of antibiotics for six days. He's not to bad at taking pills,but doesn't like me sticking my fingers in his tender mouth. :-(

You will all be pleased to know that he totally won over Nicci. I'm sure she's seen plenty of cats in her time, but she told me she really enjoyed his company and it was a pleasure to have him for the day.

Mind you, he was on drugs. ;-)






Love from Ju's Little Sister a.k.a. Plumpy's Mum.

18 comments:

Unknown said...

Very good to hear that the gorgeous furry one survived his ordeal. I'm sure he'll feel much better because if it.

Elbi, Mahou and Beeps must be very spoilt as we let them on the bed most nights. They've learnt to sleep by our feet, although Elbi woke me up early this morning by sitting on my chest and meowing loudly to kindly let me know that their food bowl was empty.

lorenzothellama said...

Oh you poor poor darling little Plumps. I am writing for me as well as Scaredy to give you our love and hope your poor mouth soon heals. (If Maalie makes any facetious remarks about birds, killing, teeth, etc. I will personally put tofu and lentils in his dinner. He is coming here tomorrow, and I'll also send Scaredy upstairs to shed ginger and white fur all over his bed).

I have extra sympathy for Plumpy as yesterday I had FIVE teeth out too! That's why I didn't do much reading blogsites and I have only just caught up to date with you. Been back to the dentist this morning and she says it all looks good. Huh! Doesn't feel good. Also I have a broken toe, so have to rely on lifts everywhere when I am so used to walking, running and cycling. So a llama in a mood isn't a pretty site!

Scaredy guiltily admitted giving Plumpy some advice about leaving food, especially if it comes from Netto. He told him if he leaves it long enough and it starts to go brown and manky you would feel sorry for him and give him what he really, really wanted. He also wants to know if he is getting used to the Hills, because his mum is too mean to buy it for him!

Scaredy also says that if you gently stroke his throat when you have clumsily put the pill in his tender little mouth and then clamped it shut, it does help the pill to go down.

Anyway Plumpy, we will follow your recovery with interest and compassion.

Love, strokes and cuddles,
Lorenzo and Scaredy. xx

Maalie said...

Mmmm, fewer teeth, eh? Fantails unite, now is your chance to strike back...

Can you airforce folk do sums? Where I live, 2138 hrs is 22 mins to nine, but that is of course NMT (Northern Maalie Time).

Unknown said...

Hello Plumpy, just checking in on the invalid. How's it going? We all think you've a very brave cat, and a charming one for winning Nicci over so easily.

I've just had to wrestle the computer off Elbi, she was muttering somthing about endless supplies of food here, being allowed on the bed most nights and you rethinking that plane ticket. Hmmm.

Anonymous said...

Hello Plumpy,
How are you doing? I sat on Maalie's shoulder yesterday evening!

Unknown said...

Scaredy - we think you're very brave too. Maalie's shoulder!!! Did you dig your claws in?

Anonymous said...

Yes I did and I have asked mum to make a new posting with a picture of me clawing Uncle Maalie.
Scaredy.

kiwi mother said...

Oh you are all spoilt-rotten towny cats, aren't you, who can't hack it when the going gets tough. Let me tell you ... I am coming up 19 years young and all my life have endured the rigors of a harsh mountain environment. No fancy litter boxes or frilly namby-pamby warms beds for me. If I am lucky I am allowed to sleep by the fire in the living room only, and get chucked outside at night by the Olds - even when we have -15C frost or 12"snow!! And to make matters worse The Olds have taken to spending some of their retirement time in town and they leave me at the farm with NO FIRE and only the bossy farm manager to feed me ( I don't like the Hills stuff either - rabbit is my favourite). I really miss the kids - all grown up and gone away TO AUCKLAND AND ENGLAND - traitors. Don't worry me maties - you've got it good.

Unknown said...

Hi kiwi mother. Poor you, you should get together with Plumpy and buy a ticket to come over here. We live on a mountain but life is great. Out mum & dad put a small door just for us in their big door so we can come and go as we please, and we do, it´s great.

We have lots of food but we do have to complain very now and again to get the good canned stuff, and we still don´t see enough of it.

All in all tho´it´s not a bad life, full of strokes and love and little beasties to chase and hunt, much beter than where we all came from. We´ll just warn you, in case you do decide to hop on the plane (and you´ll have to take care of Plumpy if you do, we don´t think he´s too keen on the idea of flying) that we don´t have a litter tray either, but you´ll know all about that - being shoved outside in the middle of winter is not nice.

Unknown said...

Oops, we forgot to say we´d taken over our mum´s account (ssh, don´t tell her, otherwise it´ll be dried ´food´ all the time).

Elbi, Mahou and Beeps

lorenzothellama said...

Hi Kiwi Mother,
If you can't get to Raela, you can always come and live with Scaredy. We also have a little cat flap so you can come and go when you want, and we don't use the dreaded Hills either.
If you come to England you might be able to see the kids too.

kiwi mother said...

Ahh - I have friends again! Thank you so much all of you for your support. Actually, I am really Black Cat, but I don't know much about this blogging stuff and couldn't set up my own name so I had to use Mum's while she wasn't looking. I still can't seem to get my own blog name so I'll have to use hers again. Well things have improved - mainly the weather so I have has a week without hard frosts. Thanks for the offers of an overseas holiday, but I am really a high-country hillbilly cat and traditionally we dislike forking out money. It looks as though summer will come before the end of the year so I'll just sit tight for now. Besides, if I did go to England I would have to visit Ju's cat Solo, and I heard on good authority she is PSYCHO - much worse than you Scardy!!!
Well I had better sign off for now before Mum catches me.
By the way I texted Plumpy yesterday and he missed Ju's little sister so much last week (she was away at a hockey tournament) that when she came home Plumpy was thin !!! However he was very happy because she arrived home unwell and went to bed, where Plumpy was able to lick and love her all day; and snuggle up for a decent sleep. Hopefully they both feel better today :-)
Lol
Black Cat

Unknown said...

Hi Black Cat. I see Elbi´s been leaving you messages, the little minx.

Good to hear the weather´s getting warmer. it´s over 30 degrees here to day - not so good for a lack cat (Beeps stays inside for most of the day and plays out at night) so you´ll probably be better off where you are for the moment!

Did I read correctly? Plumpy is thin! Can we see some evidence of this please!?

Anonymous said...

Dear Black Cat,
Can't believe Plumpy is thin! Is he going to be re-named Skinny? My Mum had a cat she called Skinny once. He was a wild, feral cat who used to come into our garden and scare all the nice little well groomed cats away, but Mum insisted on feeding him anyway and eventually he used to let her stroke him! She should be called softythellama!
Love Scaredy

Ju's little sister said...

Hi all - thank you so much for all your wonderful comments. Especially you Black Cat, who is not telling the whole truth - when I was a child I used to sneak her into bed with me for the night ;-)

I have been away for a week, and Plumpy looks thin to me, but it's hard to get a photo of it - more in the next post which he has promised to write.

Maalie, the 20-to-nine/22-to-nine issue was me being cheeky about the differences between military precision and civilie casualness rather than an inability to perform correct mathematics. Thanks for being pedantic though. And there aren't so many fantails around this winter.


'deadbzh'

Anonymous said...

Wow.



Wow, you are all so wonderful!


I haven't been able to read this post. First I couldn't bear to, then Mum went away for a week, and THEN! she came home very sick so I couldn't get on the computer. Thanks for the love (and the tips Scaredy) I will write a new post as soon as I can.

See you all soon,
love Plumps

Unknown said...

Plumpy, we're all looking forward to hearing from your new thin self very soon.

(ryxgnwq - somebody doesn't like me.)

lorenzothellama said...

Hey Plumpy, you are back!!!
We have missed you so much and were very worried about your sore mouth. Hope it is healed well now. Look forward to your new blog.

Hope your Mum is feeling better too.

Scaredy has asked me to tell you there are some very fine photos of him on a blog a few postings back.

Love Lorenzo and Scaredy