I am, remarkably, on good freindly terms with my first boyfriend Jeff, whom
I met at the age of fourteen and broke up with after I turned 30. He and his
family have always been cat-crazy and he has a very gentle way with them,
even when wrasslin with Stosh. He's also one of the few "non-residents" our
skittish, shy Odessa will allow to pet her.

When he lived in Cleveland for a few years, Jeff was found by a
near-anorexic cat who'd apparently been put out by his (feh!) humans. The
cat had been beaten up and had an almighty abcess somewhere along his back.
Jeff immediately took the poor fellow, who was friendly and willing to go
for a ride, and tok him to a vet to see about his wounds and get tested for
all the kitty nasties. He was negative for the nasties, and the doctor
shaved a patch off his long fur to go after the abcess, and Jeff found
himself with a black cat whom he christened Sweetie.

In the three years or so since, Sweetie's grown into a huge longhair of
near-heroic proportions. Not so much fat as just really huge, he reminds me
of Baloo from the Jungle Book cartoon: big and bearlike, friendly and free
of worry. You can't even see where the cat had to have stitches, and where
the doctor had to treat the infection that would have otherwise killed him.

Now Jeff is also a big guy, so much so that it's created a case of
particularly nasty sleep apnea, and he has to go to bed wearing a mask
around his nose. I forget what they call the machine, but it takes in air
through a compressor and forces it into him when it's Bedtime for Bonzo.
Since going on this therapy, he's feeling good, but the same could not have
been said of Sweetie in recent times. Seems he developed some tummy trouble
(later diagnosed as allergies to some filler in some cat foods, after
another round of tests, for which we are happy to say he is still negative.)

Sweetie is a yapper and is very expressive in both voice and body language,
but when the tummy trouble started Jeff didn't get moving fast enough for
his liking. So Sweetie, in that wisdom that only a cat could have, figured
that showing was sometimes better than telling. After Jeff went to bed,
Sweetie went up to the air intake vents on the sleep apnea machine and
dropped a pile worthy of a Brahma bull right where it could be most
effective. Jeff told us last night that it was the first time in his life
he'd ever been suddenly awakened by any smell at all, let alone one with
such an, ahem, unique bouquet and he had to get up and gargle. Sweetie got
his doctor visit, a nice bag of prescription food, and relief from the tummy
trouble. Jeff got to spend a happy evening swabbing out his sleep machine.

The moral? Never, ever, ignore the master of the house.

Blessed be,
Baha

--

Three thousand years ago,
cats were deified in ancient Egypt.
To this day, they have not forgotten.