Brat.

We've all been working overtime for the big Petsmart National Adoption Weekend.  Usually, this means "hoarding" cats for the event and pray that they're not all adopted BEFORE the event so that we don't have to start over.

Crazy thinking, isn't it?

I've been spending a lot of time in the car rescuing cats from private parties who want to dump them for various reasons.  God, how I hate to go to people's homes and rescue cats.  I'm a bit of a voyeur, so I find it interesting to see how people live, but it's very difficult for me to  remain quiet and respectful while in somebody else's home at the same time they're acting like idiots.

I just picked up 3 kittens that some guy was threatening to "get rid of".  I always make provisions to help the Mom cat - "do they want to keep her?  Do they want help to get her spayed?" - but this time when I inquired about the sweet black Mom cat rubbing around my legs the man said, "Nahhhh....we want to get rid of her too."

I glanced  at David who always comes out with me for safety reasons.  She's a nice Mom cat and there's an unneutered  young Dad cat in the house, so they'll never get him fixed.  (Husband thinks it's unnatural)  So I picked up the Mom cat who was purring in my arms.

That's when it happened...

The 3 year old little boy in the house squeals and makes the usual noise a 3 year old boy makes and the Mom cat goes bizerk and leaps from my hands and out of sight.  She scratched my chest and arms pretty badly as she tried to get away from the little boy. The Dad shrugged and said, "my son has been mean to her for her whole life.  That's why we want to get rid of her, because she's mean to our son"

David touched my arm.  That means to shaddap, get the kittens, and get out.  But it just wasn't that easy for me.  This son-of-a-bitch allowed his kid to torture this Mom cat for the past 2 years and it's the CAT that is losing her home because of it.  Stupid, stupid, people.

I gently told the man, "One of the best gifts I've ever given my children was the ability to be respectful to our family pets.  They've grown into wonderful, gentle, animal loving adults."

He didn't understand and I couldn't find the Mom cat.   My offer still stands to call me if he can corral the Mom cat.  But he won't.  It's easier just to let her outside.

I hate him and his little brat too.

"Defeated, Exhausted and Frustrated" Must Be A Family Visit.

I arrived home from Seattle and had to hit the ground running.  It felt like kitten season had exploded in the 4 days of my absence.   Phone calls, rescues and adoptions were in full force and there was no recuperation time for me.  

Despite seeing my beautiful daughter, the trip to visit my parents was a disaster.  There are some days I feel like I'm the only one with "family issues".  I love my parents dearly, but have never been more disappointed in their behavior than I was  during this trip.  It was stressful and I left not speaking with my own mother. Ridiculous!  Why can't things be more simple?  

Needless to say, this was not a refreshing or relaxing trip.  I came home feeling defeated, exhausted and frustrated.  

The good news is, we had tons of adoptions and have already have almost 50 adoptions during the month of April.  I guess I need to wallow in good news for a bit.  It always makes me smile.  

We rescued six kittens from the Quebec gas chambers recently.  They spent a few  days at my house while they were vetted and quarantined.  I split up the big litter to allow 2 kittens to go to our veterinary clinic that offers our kittens to be adopted through their clinic.  Their little faces looked at me with great hope I would do the right thing for them.  I left the clinic feeling incredibly anxious.  Seriously, anxious.  I haven't had an true anxiety attack in about 15 years, but I really felt the wave of dread and anxiety hit me deep in my stomach. 

I started to think about the kittens never seeing each other again.   I fretted about it until it became a full blown anxiety attack.  Fortunately, it didn't last long but it left me feeling defeated, exhausted and frustrated. Familiar feelings from that never left me from my trip to Seattle.  

I'm OK, but am envious of families who don't have that sort of drama.  But maybe everybody lives that illusion.

Springing and Sprunging

I've been sick for the past 3 days and I'm on a plane tonight for Seattle to visit my parents.  It's awful to travel when you're sick.  So worried about bringing something nasty to my senior parents.  But I had to cancel a visit in February due to weather, so here I go....

Every year I make some silly formal announcement about "Kitten Season Has Arrived"!  I usually base this on the number of kittens that arrive at the shelters.  Not many have arrived yet, but there have been a TON of Mom cats with their nursing kittens.  We're completely full with pregnant Moms and nursing Moms and the phones continue to ring for us to help them.  We have a 7 month old pregnant kitten in our program right now.  That would be like a 13 year old human girl having a baby!  Seven months!  How awful!

We've recently rescued 13 adult cats and there are 5 more coming in from Quebec tonight.  Adults!  This will probably be the last larger adult cat rescue I do for a while as the kittens will start pouring in.  During the summer, as the adults are adopted, we rescue more but I do proceed with great caution this time of year until the fall.  This is when rescues can really screw up.

One of our volunteers took their kitten into the vet clinic the other day only to find that somebody had dumped a very handsome 2 year old cat to be euthanized at the clinic.  Apparently, the poor guy had an untreated UTI and was peeing outside the litterbox.  Why are people so stupid?  Why would they choose to kill him and not get some frickin' antibiotics?

Isn't he handsome?  AND his litterbox habits are perfect now.   We'll find him a great home.  Kudos to the volunteers who were in the right place at the right time!

As I type this blog post and wait for the Dayquil to kick in, I can see a bird building a nest in our bird house.  She's going back and forth with sticks.  I get so excited this time of year as my yard awakens with new life.  If only kitten season made me feel so positive!