Lately, the weather forecast has been completely wrong. They swear it will rain, heavily. We get some light clouds. This has been ongoing for weeks now.
It's frustrating because Ron plans certain outings around the weather. If it's going to rain, for instance, we won't do truck day.
Today was supposed to rain heavily. So he told the handyman not to come, gave us the day off, and did an afternoon (hate them!) Walmart trip instead of a morning one.
It's a lot quieter in the morning.
And of course it didn't rain.
I slept in and got up at 7:40, gave the cats their num-num (Baby Girl wanted some, too), did my God Time, and took my shower. I finished 2 loads of laundry and put them away.
I watched some TV and took my medication, with a slice of pizza. Then we went to Walmart.
Ron didn't bring his walker, which is fine. I am happy to help prop him up. I will ask him to wait if I will be putting his weight, and mine, on one leg when going up or down. I move, and then I help him.
No sense wrecking my knees. Ron died laughing over a Facebook joke "Remember when you had a left and a right knee? Now you have the 'good' and the 'bad' knee!" Most of the clients on the service laugh at the joke.
We got there and I couldn't find any kiddie carts. Frustrating. I left Ron on the bench next to the security guard and went shopping on my own. I got some supplies for work, on a separate receipt.
I then turned to the important businesses of num-nums. I got some tuna in gravy, some seafood in gravy (only one can of that, it's probably everything left in the net after they take the good parts), and some Styrofoam plates.
I give the num num on a Styrofoam plate. It is 7 inches in diameter. If Baby Girl is hovering I break it into 2 plates. One entire plate for each cat, half a can on each.
Doing that runs through a lot more plates, but it does promote harmony and eliminates food-aggression. That's when a cat gets mean around their food. Gravy had that with other cats, he would strike Biscuit if Biscuit got too near the food. He did that in the beginning but improved dramatically.
I caught Baby Girl smacking Biscuit one day so I spread the food out so everyone gets a fair share.
Torbie will "sneak" bites of the num num when she thinks I'm not looking, but she's more a dry food and treat kind of girl.
I observed the depression is always worse on a day off, as I've seen in the past. However, we had structured our day around the weather forecast (!!).
We had to wait a while to go home but we finally made it. I put away the cold stuff (some milk and ice cream pints), and took a nap.
Actually I had more of a lie-down with Biscuit. I called him and he got in bed with me, curled against my legs, and lay with me for over an hour. He is such a sweet cat. Don't get me wrong, Gravy was cute, and endearing, and sweet at times, but Biscuit is pure sugar.
I still miss Gravy, though.
The other day I cried and cried during "Safe and Sound" when it came up in my playlist. I have always seen it as Biscuit and Gravy's song.
I will always wish I could have done more for Gravy. [crying break]
Speaking of doing more, the handyman is coming tomorrow. Ideally, he does the whole thing. Hopefully, he at least makes some progress on it. I'll feel a lot better when the cats are confined.
Torbie is going to be a bad girl, I see that. She always waits at the front door when she sees we are leaving. I'm going to have to lock her, and the other cats, into the bedroom.
I think Biscuit will be OK with lockdown. After all, he saw what happened to his brother and it was horrible.
I won't think about that or I will cry again. I have to try at least.
Today I saw another loose dog roaming the neighborhood. I tell you, if I ever start running again I'm going to get a treadmill, I'm sure not going running out there. People either don't care, or don't bother, to keep their dogs confined.
I suspect a dog got Gravy, it looked like a dog bite injury to me but the vet said she couldn't say.
I was OK with free range cats when they only had the occasional abscess. That's an easy fix, and not a big deal. Vaccines prevented any sort of disease.
For Bubba, I believe the most traumatic outside experience resulted when a beagle treed him in our front yard, baying delightedly as the neighbors yelled at him to SHUT UP. He had an abscess at one point but as I said, an easy fix.
Frosty was an older cat but still fine. He was scared of strangers and ran away from them. Smart cat. He took quite a while to warm up to me, and I had tuna! His only problem was also an abscess. He died of illness, not injury, and old age. It was one of those "He is so old we shouldn't bother" and this was the vet, who would make a lot more money if they "tried". I took that pretty hard, let me tell you.
BabyGirl was probably bit by a dog, on her hindquarters last year, but that was easily fixed with a long lasting antibiotic shot and a vaccine.
Torbie has been fine, with no problems. Ron ran over her with the walker, once, that was about it. She hissed at him, it never happened again. And she learned to get the heck out of the way when she saw him coming!
That was a big concern for Ron with Gravy, would 3 legged Gravy be able to get out of the way? You have to remember that Gravy was very bonded to Ron, so much so he was pushing Baby Girl into second place.
Now that I've actually lost a cat to the great outdoors I'm looking at it a lot differently. I know they will still have problems, no creature can maintain perfect health all the time (although Torbie belies that statement), but hopefully no more trauma. Let me tell you, it was traumatic all around.
Ugh. I feel raw, and exhausted, still. Everyone tells me I need to take my time and grieve, and it's getting better. I just want to feel like they're safe.
So, we have tomorrow off. We didn't make any paratransit plans because the handyman is coming and he may need my help with various tasks. I will be happy to assist.
I also need to reorganize the bedroom so I can set up a feeding station for the cats, when they are on lockdown.
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