So, I don’t think I ever told the story of taking Mister Boogers to the vet. I know I mentioned that his left eye was goopy and we’d make an appointment to take him to the vet, then we’d get up the next morning and it would be cleared up, then the next day it’d be goopy, and then clear up, and so on for a couple of weeks. I finally decided to just take him to the vet to have it looked at, since he needed his yearly exam and shots anyway.
Thursday morning I got up and got all my stuff done in a timely manner. In fact, I got everything done and needed only to take my shower and get dressed and eat breakfast before leaving for the vet, so I read until 9:00. Then I got up and took my shower, got dressed, blow-dried my hair, made my bed, and ate breakfast.
I wasn’t concerned at all about getting Mister Boogers in the carrier, because I guess he just hasn’t been to the vet often enough to realize that the carrier equals the horror of a vet visit. He was sleeping on the end of my bed when I walked in, picked him up, and popped him into the carrier. He sat there and looked around, then gave me a disgruntled look, and settled into a kitty meatloaf to see what was going to happen next.
He was perfectly calm as I carried him through the house, out the door, and into the garage. He jumped a little when the garage door began opening, but calmed down pretty quickly. He was fine as I settled the carrier in the front passenger’s seat, and as I pulled out of the garage, started Keith and the Girl playing on my iPod, and drove down the road.
About three minutes from home, something must have clicked in his little pointy head, and he started howling. And howling. And howling. And he has himself quite the piercing little howl, does our Booger. I tried pausing the iPod, thinking the podcast was bothering him, but he continued howling.
So I picked up the phone and I called Fred, and it was timed just perfectly so that when he picked up the phone and said “This is Fred”, what he got in response was a particularly long and ear-piercing Booger howl.
He laughed. “Not happy, is he?”
“Not at all. And I have to listen to this for another twenty minutes!” I said.
Long silence, then Fred sounded very confused. “I thought your appointment was at 10:30?”
And I looked at the clock on the dashboard and saw to my horror that it was 10:38.
“What the? How? What? How did I do that?!” I had, in fact, been proud of myself for leaving the house five minutes earlier than I’d needed to. I had NO IDEA what I’d done, and I spluttered for a few more minutes, claiming that the clock on my computer must be way off, then told him I needed to call the vet and see if they could still fit me in or if I needed to make another appointment.
They gave me an appointment at 4:30, and I turned around and went home. But not before I made a little movie of a howling Boog. To experience it fully, I recommend you turn the volume on your computer up as high as it will go, and then jam a knife into your eardrum with every howl.
(I suspect, by the way, that somehow after knowing all morning long that I needed to leave the house at 10:00 for a 10:30 appointment, I must have suddenly gotten it into my brain that I needed to leave at 10:30. It’s the Alzheimer’s, I’m sure.)
After I dropped Mister Boogers off at home (and all the cats came running to sniff him over, and he growled and ran off to hide from them), I went out and spent a few hours running errands. One of the errands I ran was to the pet store, where I stood and stared sadly at Eddie Dean, Jake, and Billy Bumbler, who had STILL not been adopted, because people are BLIND to the gorgeousness that is Billy Bumbler and the sweetness of Eddie Dean and Jake. Grrrr! (But imagine my joy yesterday morning when I found that Billy and Jake had been adopted, and so had Keith, who was the only KATG kitten left at the pet store!)
I had a few hours to kill before I had to take Mister Boogers to the vet, so I hung out with the foster monkeys, read, did some laundry – the usual fun, y’know.
When we finally left for his appointment, Mister Boogers howled his head off all the way to the vet’s, and I said to Fred “I think maybe we need to switch Mister Boogers to a CLOSER vet, because I don’t know that I want to put up with THAT again” and Fred said “Oh, so you don’t want to take Mister Boogers to the GOOD vet, just any old vet will do?” and I said “I’m glad you understand.”
At the vet’s, Mister Boogers – who is under the impression he’s a great big man in charge at home – acted like a total brat, trying to run away from the vet unless I was holding him tightly, even though she sweet-talked him and told him how pretty he is. Bottom line, he does NOT have eyeball cancer, so no eye patch for him. In fact, his eye isn’t even scratched – she thinks it’s just an allergy-type thing, and since he does have an issue with allergies in the fall, I’m inclined to agree. We’ve given him allergy pills whenever we notice his eye is bothering him, and they clear it right up.
And as an extra-special bonus, Mister Boogers howled the entire way home.
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Saturday, right before Fred and I left the house to run errands, he came to the side door.
“I tried to take it back, Boss,” he said. “But it was too late.”
“What now?” I said.
From where he was hiding it behind his back, Fred brought out his right hand. In his hand was a fully-grown squirrel.
“Oh noooooo!” I wailed sadly. “Is it dying?”
“No, it’s dead,” he said. I had to look closer, because it honestly looked like it was still alive.
“You should pet it!” he said, petting it to demonstrate. “It’s so soft! It’s so warm, too. Newt must have just killed it.”
“I AM NOT GOING TO PET IT!” I yelled. He held it out toward me, and I danced away. “Stop it, LENNY. I’m not going to PET THE DEAD SQUIRREL.”
“Why not? It’s so soft!”
“It’s DEAD!”
“Oh Bessie, just touch it. Touch it with the fangers!”
“Get out of here!” I said, and cast one last sad look at the squirrel. “What are you going to do with it?”
Fred walked into the house and held it out to Mister Boogers. “First I’m going to let Mister Boogers sniff it, and then I guess I’m going to give it back to Newt.”
In the cat bed on my desk, Mister Boogers sniffed wildly, stared consideringly at the squirrel, then curled up and went back to sleep.
“You’re going to give it to Newt?” I said.
“Yeah, is that okay?”
“I feel like I should object, but I don’t guess the squirrel really cares, does he?”
“Circle of life!” Fred said, and went off to give the squirrel back to Newt.
As we pulled out of the driveway, we could see Newt playing with the squirrel. When we got home an hour later, there was nothing left of the squirrel but two back legs, a butt, and a tail.
Good times here in the country, folks. Good. Times.
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So, the funny thing about the foster kittens is that if I walk into the foster kitten room and sit down, Rhian (the tortie) and Peyton (the orange tabby) will come over to be petted, then they wander off and play or whatever, and the rest of the kittens just ignore me. But if I go in and just stand there for a few minutes, they’ll all eventually mill around me, begging to be petted, especially Jesikat (the calico), who is the skittish scaredy-cat of the bunch. Very odd.
This is Spooky, who is gorgeous and friendly and just an all-around sweetheart.
Jesikat in the sun.
Bath time for Spooky.
“Pleasepleasepleaseplease can it be snacktime now?”
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Snack time!
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Previously
2006: Meester Boogers, he hate you.
2005: No entry.