November 11, 2009
It was a tough day for two out of three pets at Casa de Dos Quesos.
Fluffer had a veterinary appointment. Fluffer is a very finicky cat. She hates almost everything. She does not like the other pets. She does not like changes to her routine. She hates car travel. And she especially hates veterinarians.
She is not all that fond of us, either. Except for my husband. Although he never had any desire to be a cat person, she is %100 his cat. So I drove, and he cat wrangled.
This mostly involved holding on for dear life and trying to say soothing things, while Fluffer chanted for seven miles of country driving, quite clearly and in English, “No. No. Nooooooooh. no. No.”
The vet remarked that although she was healthy for a fourteen year old, there was no box on the exam sheet for ‘attitude’ or he’d have had to check, “Royally pissed off.”
Then he gave her a shot, and forced two worm pills into her that made her foam like a science fair volcano. I mopped the drool off my husband with an old towel, and we went home.
The day proceeded uneventfully, with Fluffer avoiding us, and Havoc the labradoodle being a nuisance.
Until I began to hear that funny, angry buzzing sound that a cell phone makes, when it is set to vibrate and forgotten somewhere. I searched the house, but all the phones were accounted for.
And then, I found the source of the noise. Fluffer had arranged herself to fill the bar of sunlight that was falling on the dog’s bed in the kitchen.
The dog had returned to what he thought was his room, only to find a seething rectangle of hairy feline hatred, sleeping in his bed and blocking the way to his food dish.
She was explaining that she did not care that he outweighed her by sixty pounds. She had had enough. And one false move on his part would mean certain death.
He was standing over her with a look that vacillated from confused to worried to frightened, and then looking back to us, trying to decided what he had done to get on her wrong side.
Sometimes, you don’t have to do anything, Havoc. Sometimes, just being there is enough.
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