I warned you. It's long with some background.

Let's see --- Shadowkitten, myself and the Ex (not ex then) lived in a slum
rather poorly-owned by an alcoholic criminal (I have nothing against
alcoholics, just criminals).  At one point the criminal element became so
violent, it necessitated me and SK making for my husband's family place in
CT.  I was assured SK was welcome.  We made the trip.  SK in her ridiculous
carrier that was I guess a heavily coated fiberboard, riveted and with this
clear plastic bubble on top.  A mightier carrier there never was and it
served her all the days of her too short life.  

Short version of roadtrip:  I went up to inlaws in CT and their feral
children would not leave her alone a minute, they pulled my cat's whiskers
out and I ran back home, sortof... to a hotel.  About 10 hours on the road
that day total (there was a bad storm with hail!) and we were ensconced in
a Holiday Inn.  My poor kitty in Mighty carrier was on a luggage cart with
my pillow case stuffed and knapsack serving as luggage, seriously).  The
staff made much fuss over her.  I pretended to be a refugee from a CT cat
show and she was a "Russian Blue Cream".  Geesh, they bought it.  She was
grey and white that got yellowish from her cleaning the white patches LOL

SK loved the hotel room, we were very high up for this area.  About 15
floors maybe.  And they had, get this... AIR CONDITIONING.  That is a thing
that blows cold air when it is summer!  Cool.  Literally :)

I put her litterbox in the tub and I fed her Tender Vittles (are they still
around?) on the dresser.  And she settled in.  She would travel anywhere in
the early days I set this up as such every time.  All hotels/motels have a
tub and a dresser :) She knew the drill.  She knew to look in the tub for
her litterbox and hop on a dresser for food!  And she was very well behaved
on the road, she would not use a litter box in the car when I stopped, so
she had to come into the rooms with me and get her royal Russian Blue Cream
self set up :)

Fast forward a couple of months of this and we finally, though not
fortuitously, found an attic apartment where they were okay with the cat.  

Fast forward again.  The attic apt was a hell-hole that winter, no heat.
And they raised the rent 3 times in six months.  During that time, SK grew
up and I had her spayed.  It really hurt me so bad to leave her overnight
and when she came home she tried to jump to her windowsills and missed.
She loved her windowsills, she talked to her squirrel friends for hours! So
I made stairs with books to her favorite windows.  She turned into a total
tummyslut when I had company, hopping on the couch and rolling over for
people to admire her shaved belly and stitches.

It was shortly after the stitches were out and her fur had not even grown
back completely that I became ill myself and needed a lot of surgery, was
struggling to keep working in a job with no healthcare insurance, my
husband had no health insurance either.  I got depressed in that place and
went out on the Saturday night of some holiday weeked (I think Memorial
day, maybe July 4th) with a girlfriend from school and "tied one on".  I
got home late, after the husband had already left (he worked graveyard,
remember?) and I recall him being pretty ticked off when I called him from
the bar and reminded him to feed SK her 9-lives in gravy before he went to
work because I planned on closing the bar if I could.

I got into the apartment which basically was a kitchen and a room, and saw
that SK had not touched her food.  She didn't greet me but she was that
way, she would ignore me when I had the gall to go out to work or to party.
I went to bed or passed out.  Hard to remember.

Woke the next morning and noted yellowish bile spills on the floor, rot roh.
No sign of SK.  She had never touched her food and was no where to be
found.  I was about as hungover as I ever would be in my life.  I finally
went into the bathroom, raging hangover, and there was SK meatloafed in the
tub.  This was not a happy meatloaf and she periodically gagged.  Oh, sh*t.

I called our vet.  He was away for the holiday and left instructions to call
the neighboring town's animal hopsital for emergency.  This was a very
elite area, I had the misfortune to live in the slum sections of some of
the most exclusive areas in the state.  This animal hospital was the Mayo
clinic of veterinary.  I looked up in my catbooks, did not believe for a
minute it was hairballs but did give her some Pepto Bismol.  My head was
splitting open, I was eating popsicles two at a time to rehydrate my own
gagging self and my poor kitty was dying.  I was quite sure.  I called up
the animal hospital which was closed except for emergency and told them I
had a vomiting kitty.  They told me to withold food and water and wait 24
hours, so I told them she had a raging fever (she didn't :)  They said
bring her in and I did.  

I got a nice young vet.  He looked too young.  He seemed to genuinely like
my kitty.  He took her temp - normal.  Oops, I told him I must have read it
wrong in my panic.  He was about to dismiss her when he decided to look in
her mouth, which she didn't like one bit.  He saw some thread or string
wrapped around her tongue, he called for an assistant and he snipped the
string.  Now what?

They had to keep her, give her IV fluids and xray to see if things were
going to move.  I left and went to my mother's with my empty Gigantor
carrier not wanting to see the husband.  I got the call from the vet there,
her intestines were bunched and she needed surgery.  Err, how much would
that be?  About four or five hundred dollars (this was around 1979).  Err,
nopers I don't have that.  Well, then I would have to go down and sign
papers for them to euthanize her and oh, the bill so far was 200 dollars
for the emergency care (this was 1979).  Oh sh*t.  I told my mother I had
to go down and sign my kitty's death warrant.  My mother said don't, she
would help me pay the bill (yeah, right, my mother is indigent like me or
she wouldn't have a bunch of sick pregnant strays at her place).  I don't
know what possessed me but I went down and worked out a payment plan for
like years. I then went home, woke up the husband (he worked graveyard,
remember?) and told him I just signed papers to pay the vets for like
years.  I thought he would kill me.  I told him, hey, we could have a dead
200 dollar cat or maybe a live one for a couple of hundred more.  *sigh*

Shadowkitten had the surgery.  They gave me the string in a jar.  I never
ever found out where it came from.  It was very heavy thread, not like my
sewing thread, I had no yarn that color and it  happened to be the color of
all our apartment furnishings.  Rust.  The chair and sofa, the carpet.  The
husband and I tore the place apart trying to find one loose thread end and
never did.  She ate it all whatever it was.  For years after she did go to
RB, I still picked up every little itsy bitsy thread, cellphane etc that I
ever saw.  Out of habit.  She did have a few more episodes of finding
inedibles.  Once even again on a holiday weekend when my regular (read:
normal priced) vet was on vacation.  But I knew the drill by then and when
she was puking for a day and then I found her munching on the broom (she
was a little character, oh yes she was :) I lucked out that although she
had a bunch of broom in her tummy it moved through.

Sorry to go on so long.  That is the story of my 600 dollar patio kitten
that I would talk landlords into letting me have for years.  They thought
because she was a Genuine Russian Blue Cream and cost 600 dollars.  LOL.
They called her a "thoroughbred cat".  :)