Update April 29, 2023

News

Saturday

Saturday was a busy day. I got home from work at 9:15 and had to be at the high school from 10-12 for helping out with the costumes while M10 rehearsed for his show. Then, I had to be at the middle school from 1-4 to chaperone and then attend D13’s middle school play. She did a great job! It was a 70’s talk show about Snow White and the 7 dwarves. Then we went out to dinner for my dad’s birthday and dyed D13’s hair red.

Sunday

Sunday I burned out again. I had to rush to Target to get M10 his costume for his dress rehearsal because they gave us the requests on Saturday, and I was busy Saturday. Then M10 had a 4 hour rehearsal, which I chaperoned. I was moving beyond the limits of my people skills by the end of it, and would have liked to turtle, but the kids wanted family day. So we tried watching the first episode of Firefly, but M10 was unimpressed and spent the entire episode getting IL4 all jacked up so that they were both screaming and running around the livingroom for the entire episode, which gave me negative people energy. I sent them all to bed 15 minutes early, before I broke down in tears. Then I tried to get a hyped up Loki to settle down for bed. Once he was sufficiently calm, I read to him, further negating my stores of people energy. Then D13 came upstairs twice to ask me simple questions that gave me a huge headache, whereupon I asked Aaron to finish reading to IL4 and I pulled the blanket over my head. Oh, and IL4 started crying during Firefly because he wanted yelliw hair, so now he has yellow hair.

Monday

Monday should have been recuperating from my over-extended weekend, but it didn’t turn out that way. While D13 and M10 were at school, IL4 ran around like crazy. He flooded the bathroom, ruined his half-price chocolate bunny by soaking it in water, filled the litter box with toys, and then attempted to suck up the litter with a Dirt Devil. I was at my wits’ end by the end of the day.

Then I picked up M10 at school and took him straight to his rehearsal for his show, cooked dinner, and picked up M10 to take him to baseball practice.

Tuesday

Tuesday was a hard day. It started with D13 and I taking Myra to the vet to be euthanized. She had stopped eating, and really was quite sick. We went to Perkins afterwards, and then to an appointment for D13. While she was in there, I called the plumber, electrician, HVAC technician, and sprinkler system person to make appointments with them all.

When we got home, D13 (who was taking a mental health day) started searching for her Snow White shirt for the cast and crew party. She became frantic, and we each searched the drawers of everyone in the house, as well as the dirty laundry to no avail (eventually one of the directors donated his so she could get it signed by everyone.) While we were searching, transportation called to tell me they were trying to put IL4 on the bus, and I’d made a no ride request for him. I told them that yes, I had. He didn’t belong on the bus. Then I called the daycare to ask why they were trying to put him on the bus when I’d told them not to. (His school had said they didn’t want him while he had diarrhea.) They told me that they’d sent him to school, wasn’t he coming back. I’m like “oh, $***. It’s noon. He’s stranded at the school! He’s not at the daycare.” So I rushed over to the school to pick him up. I decided to keep him home because I was in a rush at this point.

I had been supposed to cook a steak for M10’s feeding therapy, but all plans for that were shot. I picked up M10, and he complained that the walnuts didn’t look edible, so I showed him all the nuts I had, and he chose the almonds and cashews. He then complained that he couldn’t eat because he was weak and his throat hurt. He did manage to eat three almonds, though. I took his temperature, and he had a fever. At this point, I texted his mom to say he might not make it to his band concert that night, and he started crying. He had a special part and had been practicing for months.

I then went to pick up the kitten I’d promised D13 (yes, too early). But he needed to go to the vet one last time, so I returned home without him and rushed D13 off to her cast party.

M10 and I watched Shanghai Knights and then D13, Aaron, and I watched X-Files (she’d returned at this point). The foster parent brought the kitten, and D13 was thrilled. It’s a one-eyed cat we named Polyphemus (after Odysseus’ Cyclops).

Wednesday

Wednesday I took my dad to a hearing aid appointment and played D&D. M10 was home from school with a fever (missed a show and baseball practice that night).

Thursday

So…weird story. When I first adopted Polyphemus on Tuesday, I was under the understanding that I had adopted a fixed, vaccinated, microchipped cat, who’d been tested for FIV and feline leukemia. And that this was from an established rescue.

On Tuesday, I requested the vet records be sent to my vet. The cat had just had an eye removed two weeks prior, and my vet needed that info along with the vaccination records. The foster mom mentioned the name of her vet, and said she’d requested the recirds sent.

By Thursday, the vet records hadn’t arrived at my vet, but the foster mom had sent me a screenshot of a vaccination record for what was clearly another cat. (It was for a cat that was 2 years older than my cat and weighed a good 5 pounds more than my cat would have weighed as a newborn kitten ~3 months ago, plus was adult vaccines.) I sent a text to the vet saying “Hey, I know Foster Mom has requested these files be sent to my vet, but why don’t you send them to me instead, and I can forward them.” That way, my vet doesn’t get confused by the differently named cat and differently
named owner.

Now, as it turns out, the foster mom asked to pop over at this time to see if she could take Polyphemus to her vet because of the puss in the eye. When she arrived, I mentioned that I’d texted her vet, not to fret about the records anymore.

She looked irate and said “Are you always so high maintenance?” I answered “I’m sorry?” She then started screaming at me how she already sent the records. I answered calmly that she mistakenly sent me the wrong records and I was just trying to sort it out. She yelled “They use the same birthdate for every cat!” I let that drop, despite the fact that the weight was also off, and it was unlikely any vet would vaccinate a newborn kitten with an adult vaccine, and that this newborn kitten wouldn’t be 5 pounds.

Anyway, she then started rant-screaming at me and said she just wanted the cat back if this is the way I was going to be. I calmly told her that I had already given him to my stepdaughter, and I wasn’t giving him back. If she didn’t want to give the records, I’d just start from scratch. She screamed at me that I was crazy, that I would have to pay my own vet bills that way (umm? Of course?) and left.

It was really bizarre, because I had remained calm and polite the whole time – mostly because I was assuming she’d see reason – but my dad suggests she started responding with so much anger because she’s lying and I’m starting to see through the lies. But what would be her purpose in lying? The only thing I really don’t want this to be is for him to have feline leukemia or FIV. I should check if he’s even been neutered. Lol

In the evening M10 had a show, and my dad, friend Liz, and I went. It was really well-done, and M10 was so proud of his performance.

Friday

So I was on poop patrol on Friday, as I decided to go ahead and try a second attempt at evacuating IL4’s bowels. 2.5mL of Senna and 4 capfulls of Miralax later, he hadn’t pooped. Silly me, I decided to go to the library. That went well at first, until he was sitting in front of a computer playing a game and I heard a pooplosion. I told him it was time for a diaper change, and he stood up, spread his legs, and insisted several times to continue playing on the computer.

Eventually, I scooped up all of our books in one arm and him in the other, checked out the books, waddled, overburdened, to the car, dropped off the books, grabbed a diaper (no wipes, OMG!) and carried him back to the bathroom.

2 minutes later, he was covered nape to heel in brown. I stripped off his clothes, and put him on the floor, bare as the day he was born, and tried to clean the brown puddle that had accumulated on the changing station. He pressed the handicap button and the door opened wide to him, filthy and exposed, for about 4 people to see. They could also see the brown puddle.

I snatched him up, cleaned him off with paper towels, and dressed him in his jacket and pants (which were thankfully unscathed). Then, as he repeatedly pressed the handicap button, I cleaned the changing station.

But that wasn’t the end of the adventures IL4 would provide. Later that day, while I was writing letters, he opened the spice cabinet and poured the white pepper all over the place. He got some on his tongue, and I was unsympathetic. D13 came along later and asked why he kept licking his arm, and he told her he’d eaten some pepper, so she gave him some milk. She’s kinder than I.

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