We got on the motorcycle and went to upstate NY where some friends of ours had generously offered a corner of their backyard. We were both braced for this to be a really hard trip, but it wasn’t. I think the whole burial ritual, or funeral ritual in whatever context, evolved because you really need that sort of closure to get on with things. Even if the creature you are mourning is a small fuzzy gray cat.

While we were back there, Mrs. L– beckoned us and said “Look! Racoons!”

Rob kept digging, but I went over to look, and sure enough there was a family of mama and two baby racoons coming out of their garage. Mama and one of the babies hightailed it across the lawn.

The other one wandered over to check out what Rob was doing.  It stood up on its hind legs, about two feet in front of him as if to say, “Hi there! What are you doing?”

This amused all of us, while at the same time, being glad that Rob had a shovel just in case Mama decided to feel protective. Rob waved at the little guy, who dropped back down to his haunches.

Then stood up again. “Whatcha working on? Huh?”

Sadly, attempts to establish a true cross-species dialog didn’t proceed past that and the little fellow trundled off to his mother, who probably said, “How many times have I told you not to talk to strangers?”

Sorry that the photo is as fuzzy as the racoon.  It was awfully cute and a nice place to leave Maggie.

We spent the night and then had a leisurely morning up there.   Rode back today, taking the scenic route.

The hardest thing right now is expecting to see her around the apartment. Such a small creature and such a big impression.

Meanwhile, I thought you’d like to see these two videos of her. She’s only seventeen in them but was this feisty up until a few weeks ago.

Yesterday was fairly low-key, largely because I spent the day hanging out in the kitchen. Maggie would eat a few bites at a time if I was in there, so I hauled a chair in and hooked the computer up.  She eventually ate some White Chunk Tuna in oil with a fair bit of enthusiasm and even had some kibble.

Today, mysteriously, she likes the kibble and not the tuna.  The ways of ailing kitties are mysterious.  The kitchen floor has seven bowls of different food set out to tempt her. It’s a kitty buffet.

My big accomplishment yesterday was finishing the outline for Glamour in Glass, the sequel to Shades of Milk and Honey.  With the help of Michael Livingston, I pounded out some details to make them clearer for people who aren’t in my head.  You know how it goes. “Interesting scene with local characters” makes total sense to me it’s just, um, not particularly clear to the rest of humanity.

I actually like outlines and at some point will post the two versions of the outline for folks to look at. There’s the one that’s meant for me, and there’s the one that’s “unpacked” to make sense for other people.

I sent the outline off to my wonder-agent, Jennifer Jackson
to see what she thinks and spent the rest of the evening hanging out with Maggie and Rob in the kitchen.  Today, Maggie seems to be feeling better, so we are alternating between the kitchen and the sofa.

But she wasn’t eating. So they gave her an appetite stimulant and subcutaneous fluids.  Back at home, Maggie kept looking at the food as if she wanted to eat it but was too nauseated to consider doing so. And then, finally, she nibbled.

The problem was that she wanted to be near me and followed me from room to room.  I wanted her to hang out with the food. So I hauled my computer and a chair into the kitchen and camped out there for most of the day.  She ate a little.

The situation is that if she goes the weekend without eating her kidneys will likely begin to shut down.  There are also likely larger issues going on, but at this point the vet says that everything, except irritable bowel syndrome, is untreatable. So we’re treating it as if it’s IBS and hoping for the best.

Maggie is alert and walking without pain, if a little unsteadily.  Really, aside from the loss of appetite there is nothing apparent wrong with her.  I wish I could speak cat so she and I could talk about what was going on.

Edited to add on Friday: She has begun nibbling and had some tuna and kibble today.  Many thanks for the healing vibes.

I got home and she was basically a skeleton with fur and just hiding in the closet.  I called the vet, explaining that she wasn’t eating or drinking.  We discussed humane euthanasia, but decided that as long as she was still happy sitting in someone’s lap that we’d let nature take its course.

I was struck by the fact that she kept trying to go to the litter box with no success.

Now, this serves as a warning to everyone that I’m going to be talking about the tail end of a cat’s digestive system.

Seriously, read no further if you don’t want to know about a kitty enema.  I’ll let you know right now that she’s much better, but it does involve an enema and a cat.

I mean it.

You’ve been warned.

Don’t say I didn’t tell you.

Right… so, I researched “constipated cat” on the internet and found several different sources that talked about how this was fairly common in older cats, particularly ones on a high meat protein diet. Now the only thing she’d really been eating last week was tuna, so this seemed to qualify.  Several of the sites had people commenting that their vets had told them to adminster a glycerin enema for infants.

It was fairly late, but Rob and I talked about it and decided it couldn’t hurt at this point.  I trotted off to the pharmacy and came home with a box of them, guaranteed to invoke a bowel movement in 15 minutes to one hour.

The results, shall we say, were astonishing.

I’d read that what would happen to a cat would be that water would leach out of the colon and turn the stool into a “hard, concrete-like object.”  Yes.  What nothing prepared me for was that the gylcerin greases the system enough so that these hard pellets come out of the cat like projectiles.  Thankfully, Rob had the foresight to do this in the bathtub.

Basically, he laid her on her back in his lap on a towel. My job was to scritch her ears. We alternated between saline enemas and glycerine three times. The tube for the actual infant enema seemed awfuly large for a kitty, so Rob inserted it into a narrower tube from the bottle that I use when dying my hair. It’s totally clean enough for use with her, but I’ll be buying a new one for me, thank you very much.

There was nothing wrong with her vocal cords, but she was weak enough that she just let us do this unpleasant thing to her.  So, we cleaned out her, um, system and washed her off. She hated us but seemed to be moving better.

Then this morning, a miracle occurred. She jumped onto the bed and demanded to be fed.  She’s been eating and drinking normally all day. Now, she’s still feeble and not back to her old self, but the turnaround is so astonishing. I mean we both really thought she was dying.

She might still be, but we’re hoping that we’ve got a reprieve.

• 12:49 Worried about Maggie. Rob and I realized that neither of us saw her eat yesterday. She has no interest in food today. Not even the treats. #
• 13:22 Just loaded an unprotesting Maggie into the cat carrier. The vet has an opening today. She’s drinking water at least, so that’s good. #
• 13:33 We’re in the cab and there’s NOTHING wrong with her vocal cords. Man, that’s a lot of volume from such a small cat #
• 14:35 Maggie and I are on the way home. She weighs 5 lbs 10 oz, which is way too light. They are doing bloodwork. #

The vet gave Maggie an appetite stimulant and pumped her full of fluids.  The suspicion is that it’s kidney trouble which isn’t uncommon in older cats.

About an hour after I got home, she nibbled on some tuna which was an enormous relief.

An enormous and short-lived relief.  When I got home tonight, Rob told me that Maggie has developed diarrhea in addition to vomiting.  The poor thing is curled up on a heating pad and looks just miserable.

Our challenge is that our 10 year-old cat does not need anything high calorie, but totally knows every time we pull out the wet food. I’ve been looking for something bitesize and kittylicious but she’s pulling the whole finicky thing on me. Any suggestions for something soft, yummy and high calorie?

So today, I went out and bought a furminator. My heavens. The thing works exactly as promised. Plus you get the added bonus of getting to say, “Careful, or I’ll furminate you,” or “I furminated Marlowe earlier,” or “Not just now, I’m furminating.”

I mean… really. How can you not love that.

Despite my fond hopes, Maggie never glowed in the dark. But, thanks to modern science, there are glow in the dark cats in the world. That would be the end to tripping over the infernal beast at night.

I really want one.

Really.

I CAN HAZ GLOW-IN-THE-DARK?

I was, to be honest, anticipating some fireworks. When I got Marlowe as a kitten, Maggie hated him so much that if I petted Marlowe and then tried to touch her without washing my hands, she would hiss at me. I’m not making that up. She tolerates him now, more so after the cross-country drive than before.

And Marlowe has never seen another cat, except ones outside the window. His only other experience with other animals have been with dogs that we’ve dogsat. (Boy, that word looks wrong.) Oh, and the mice. Anyway, I had no idea how he would react.

Zoe came right out of her carrier and went up to Marlowe to sniff his nose. He was totally freaked. He had no idea what to do. He only knows this one other cat who beat him up as a kitten–in fact, it’s only in the last year or two that he’s realized that he’s bigger than she is and that she’s old. So, despite the fact that he looks like a giant hulk next to Zoe (also a black cat) he was afraid of her.

Maggie stretched, walked up to Zoe. They sniffed. Then Maggie went to take a nap on the futon. She was so not interested. I think she was just pleased that I hadn’t brought home another dog.

We spent most of dinner watching the cats watch each other. The best moment came after dinner. I wanted to show Jenny and Chris the thing that Marlowe does with the basket. I didn’t think he’d do it, because there was so much strangeness. Man, he saw the basket and beelined across the room to sink his face into it. He immediately sank into his “I’m invisible” posture and seemed so much more at ease.

Zoe. Zoe clearly thought he was insane.

She crept out from under the bookcase where she had been hiding and stretched out to sniff the basket. Marlowe made one “meep” and she levitated backwards, kindof like, “My god! There really is a cat in that thing!”

After that everyone settled into a good routine of ignoring each other. I saw her this morning when I put her food down, but she’s hiding now. I think she’s in my closet, but I’m not going to fish her out. Jenny and Chris come back to pick her up tonight.

I think Maggie heard it first, but Marlowe was very persistent and caught it. We let him play with it for a little, hoping for a quick kill. Silly us. He was the gentleman and let Maggie play with the mouse first. It astonished me how gentle she was with it, reaching out with velveted paws to tap it. This phase did not last long, of course.

In all, I don’t think the mouse was in the cats’ possession for much more than a minute. I kept trying to tell myself that this was nature and that I should stop being squeamish. Yeah… that would have been fine if they hadn’t just been toying with the thing. I mean, watching it try to get away with a broken leg was horrible.

So, Rob scooped it up in a tupperware and we discussed the most humane way to kill it. The cats, meanwhile are looking for another mouse.

My suggestion was to wrap it in newspaper and smack it on the head with a hammer. Rob concurred. In her youth, Maggie just presented me with a dead mouse so I’ve never had to make this decision before.

On the whole though, it’s nice that the cats are earning their keep. Right?

Rob and Kevin pulled our bikes out of the truck today (they were on top) and we biked along the Lake Wobegon Trail. Man, it was nice to stretch my legs. The ride is beautiful. There was a giant patch of ladyslippers by the side of the road which my mom would have been gaga over. I wish I’d had the camera on the bike ride with me.

The cats seem fine here. In fact, all guilt that I have felt about keeping them cooped up in the truck has vanished. Maggie has spent the entire day sleeping in one spot. And Marlowe? He found a spot on an empty shelf which is smaller than the carrier he’s been riding in. He’s spent today sleeping in there. He had a brief nose-sniff with Roo, their golden lab, but has otherwise been content to stay in his cave.

We’re planning on hitting the road about 8:00 tomorrow morning and head for Racine.

The cats are ensconced in our room. They seem have settled into the routine nicely. Maggie tends to stay in the “upstairs apartment” which is the open carrier on top. Marlowe alternates between the downstairs and “the cave,” which is the area under our seats. I moved a bunch of stuff to the rear of the truck, since we weren’t using any of it, so that he had more room to hang out. He still gets freaked out by being outside during the day, but last night was hankering to go out. We had them both tied to our luggage inside the tent until we got settled.

Today, I even got them both to play a little bit with string. I don’t know what they make of the whole trip, but they are being remarkably adaptable.

We’ll see how well they let us sleep tonight. I am dragging and looking forward to a day of being stationary. We’ll stay here in Avon until Monday, when it is off to Wisconsin.

We have arrived safely in Salt Lake City. Alas, we had to cancel the dinner with friends because, even getting up at dawn, we still didn’t arrive at Beth’s until after eleven pm. Meanwhile, you can click on the photo above to look at an album–unlabled–of the past two days.

Things we learned today.

1. The truck goes about 60 to 65 mph, except up hills, then it goes 30, if we are lucky, for an average of 50 mph.
2. Marlowe, the cat who escaped outside last night, today exhibited signs of having kitty agoraphobia. He spent the first part of the day with his face pressed into the corner of his cage. He’s doing better now.
3. Maggie thinks that being in the van just means that she gets lots and lots of laptime.
4. Salt Lake City is much farther away if you can’t go 75 mph.
5. Weigh stations are not very exciting.
6. Wild fires make great sunsets.
7. Idaho roads are very bumpy.
8. Bumpy roads will cause the ferring guard to break on a motocycle if you are using it as an anchor.
9. Motorcycles are heavy if you have to tip them back upright.
10. When buying bottled water, make sure you select bottles with lids that screw on instead of ones with a bottle cap.

• Dogs and cats: Symptoms of overdose of metronidazole include the gastrointestinal signs (anorexia, vomiting) and neurologic signs including depression, ataxia, disorientation, head-tilt, tremors, bradycardia, rigidity, stiffness, and seizures. Neurologic signs may occur due to acute overdose although they are more commonly seen in animals that are on long-term moderate or high doses (oral doses greater than 66 mg/kg/day). Signs of chronic toxicity often begin 7-12 days following the start of treatment. After the drug is discontinued, it may be several days to two weeks before these neurologic signs begin to diminish.

Sigh…

I spent the morning hanging out with Christina and in the evening, Rob and I went to the store to pick up some wet cat food to tempt Maggie. Lo! She ate. Thank heavens. Marlowe is, of course, wondering why he doesn’t get the same treats she does. Silly kitty. I offered to wrap him in a towel and shove butter down his throat, but he doesn’t seem interested.

The vet nodded, “If she’s not eating; then you may need to bring her back in.”

“I don’t think she’s getting sicker; I think she’s depressed.”

Across the waiting room a black cat yowled as if someone were killing him right there. His owner tried to reassure him, but the cat didn’t speak English. Neither does Maggie, so I can’t tell her what the vet said–that if she doesn’t finish the antibiotics, she could develop a super-resistant strain of stomach bug.

“I know.” I nodded. Years ago, I’d wanted to be a vet; I hated being the neurotic pet owner now. “It’s just that I feel like I’m making things worse.”

“Well, if the half-tablets are too large, try cutting them into quarters and see if she’ll take it with some soft food.”

I blinked. “Half-tablets? We’ve been giving her whole tablets.”

Looking down at her chart, the vet said, “Half tablet every twelve hours. Fortunately it’s a very mild medicine, so it’s not dangerous.”

It still made me feel ill. I mean, misreading medication like that could have been fatal. “So, instead of having three more days, I have six more days?”

“Right. But if we can get at least seven days of antibiotics and if the symptoms have stopped, then it’s probably safe to stop the pills. It’s better to finish the round, but if it’s making her miserable you can stop after seven days.”

I thanked her and biked home with my handy syringe. Rob was waiting for me, so we could do her morning pilling. I told him what the vet said and then I grabbed the bottle of pills.

The label said, “One pill every twelve hours.”

One. Not half. I called the vet’s office, related my story and learned that the label was wrong. So, on the one hand, there’s a measure of relief, because I didn’t misread the instructions. On the other hand, I’m ticked. I mean, hello? It’s lucky that it was a “mild” medication because I could have hurt my cat.

The half-pill is, surprise, easier to get down Maggie’s throat. The routine goes like this. I butter the pill and then we stick it in the freezer (thanks, Christina), which helps keep the coating from melting. I grab Maggie and swaddle her in a towel, sitting on the kitchen floor. Holding her on her back, I brace her while Rob pries her mouth open and shoves the pill back as far as he can. She cries. He squirts water down her throat, which forces her to swallow. It does seem to help.

Both pilling sessions went well today. But–but we have to do it for twice as long as we thought we did. Or…or we quit after seven days. And poor Maggie has no idea why we decided to start torturing her.

Poor kitty.

The vet suggested coating the pill in butter, because it would seal in the bitterness and also make it slippery. Willing to try anything, I buttered the pill. Lo! It worked! She was even licking her lips and climbed into my lap afterwards. Such relief for all of us.

Edited to add: Well, it worked this morning. At the moment Maggie has a handle-bar mustache of foam.

We’ve been bringing Maggie downstairs and praising Zamboni is she doesn’t lunge or bark. Today I carried Maggie down, and Zamboni only whined and sniffed, then wandered off and lost interest. That’s great progress, so Maggie can sit in my lap while I work again.

I spotted this on Maggie’s blog. Interestingly, “Scary Mary” was what my brother called me when growing up.

Each player of this game starts with the “6 weird things about you”. People who get tagged need to write a blog of their own 6 weird things as well as state this rule clearly. In the end, you need to choose 6 people to be tagged and list their names. Don’t forget to leave a comment that says “you are tagged” in their comments and tell them to read your blog.

1. While standing, I can turn my feet to point backwards. Not all the way but definitely pointing back.
2. I can’t stand cooked carrots and will pick them out of my food like a little child.
3. I have a weakness for B-movies, but can’t stand bad theater. I think because you can’t heckle live theater.
4. My procrastination skills are so refined that I sometimes get stuck in the house.
5. My cat wears a basket on his head.
6. I have never had a Southern accent.

I’m tagging Beth, Maggie, Jenny Rae, JJA, and Patrick.

The trees still have fall foliage here. Reds and yellow are everywhere, and the weather is clear. In Portland. In November. It’s like a welcome home present. Our cats, Maggie and Marlowe, seem to remember me. I honestly wasn’t sure if they would or if they would care that I’ve come back. They were very affectionate and clingy last night.

I woke up around 4:30, but was able to get back to sleep until a more reasonable hour. I got up around 7:45, which is not bad for jetlag. Now, I’m sitting in Fuel, my favorite coffee shop. I had an egg and cheese bagel for breakfast with a decaf mocha. Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve been able to order a decaf anything without wondering if they would have decaf?

What do you do when you make a mistake, or cough, or have to clear your throat, or take a drink of water?

I know that a person can take a break when recording a reading, and one can take a drink then. I also recall readers for the talking books for the blind making mistakes and just saying something like, ‘Excuse me,’ and moving on. But would you re-record the mistake?

We’ve been talking about two different types of reading aloud here, for a recording and for a live audience. The beautiful thing about recording is that you can always re-record the mistake. It’s better to give a clean reading, of course, but you do have the option of fixing it.

The beautiful thing about a live reading is that the mistake isn’t recorded and likely something that your audience will forget. Also things like, coughing and taking a drink of water, aren’t mistakes at a live reading. They are just part of it being live.

In both cases though, there are things that can go wrong that you can avoid or minimize.

Stumbling over a word.

What to do.
In the studio, pause. Go back to the beginning of the line and start again.
In a live reading, it doesn’t matter. Just continue on as if you meant to say it that way. Chances are your audience didn’t hear it, or will have no memory of it by the time you reach the end of a reading.

Possible causes
Chances are that your mouth has gotten dry, particularly if you stumble more than once in a paragraph. Pause. Take a drink of water and start again. In a recording, it’s easy to edit that pause out. In a live reading, your audience will understand.

It’s also possible that you aren’t thinking about what you were saying. Seriously. You might be thinking about the words, but not what you are saying, as in, not the whole sentence and the idea it conveys. Or you might be thinking, “Dang, I sound good,” or “Do they hate me?” or “Who’s that hottie in the second row?”

It might also be the first time you’ve read it outloud. While there are occasions where one needs to read something cold, it’s always better to get the mistakes out at home.

When speaking in a normal context, you might struggle to find the next word, but you rarely stumble on a word. Let me use an analogy from my artschool days. A group of us were bemoaning that we could draw a person but not a straight line. My teacher said, “That’s because you are looking at the line, not at where you are going.” It turns out that if you put a pencil down at the starting point, and look at where you need the line to end, your hand will naturally go there. But when you stare at the line itself, you lose all sense of context and meander. When speaking, you need to always be thinking about where you are going or you will get lost in the minutae of the words. Does that make sense?

I’ll demonstrate.
Here is the original raw recording of an excerpt from Danger Planet by Brett Stirling, in which I stumble a lot. This is a cold reading, so you’ll hear me stumble because of unfamiliar words (in particular Venusopolis) then you’ll hear me stumble because I’m thinking about “Hey, I said it right that time!” You’ll also hear dry mouth and decisions to change character voices or the intent of a line-reading. Because I know that I’m recording, I’m stopping after bobbles that I would let slide in a live reading. Normally, I would also have read the text beforehand and figured out how to say Venusopolis.

Here is that excerpt in which I’ve cleaned out most of the mistakes.

Inverting Words

What to do
Everyone does this from time to time. If I am recording someone else’s words, I’ll stop and rerecord the line. If it’s my own, I make a note and change it in the text later. Chances are it will be easier for my readers as well. Live? Doesn’t matter, just keep going. If you look back at it you will stumble on another word.

Nerves

What to do
This is a live audience thing and differs from person to person. Your hands or knees might shake. Your voice might crack. You might get sweaty. None of these matter. The only things that will affect the reading are the things that will distract the audience by making them worry about you.

You can’t stop your hands from shaking, but you can avoid holding single sheets of paper. The paper will amplify your shaking and take it from being something that is annoying you into something that the audience can see. I like reading from books or binders so that I have something with more mass to hold.

Does your voice crack? Slow down, take deeper breaths and drink more water. When you’re nervous, there’s a tendency to rush so you can get it over faster. Remember, none of these people have heard the story before. They want to be there. Slow down.

Possible causes
You know, I don’t know why a reading provokes the fight/flight response in people, but I do know that nerves are basically an excess of adrenalin. For some reason, your body thinks that it either has to escape the tiger or kill something. But you don’t, you just have to read out loud. Before the reading, walk around, and try to spill some of your excess energy. Do deep breathing, so that you’re getting the extra oxygen that tension is making your body need. For some people, distractions work well, for others, focusing on the reading by practising helps. Mileage varies. Mostly, slow down, drink plenty of water and remember to breathe.

Next question?

I would like everyone who reads this to ask me 3 questions: no more, no less. Ask me anything you want. Anything! Doesn’t mean I’ll answer them in the way you expect. Then go to your journal, copy and paste this, allowing your friends (including me) to ask you anything.

Amoung other things, I’m curious how many people read this and it seems like a fun way to find out. Yes, you neo-luddites may ask questions even if you don’t have an online journal.

1. I’m writing this with a towel on my head.
2. There is a poodle asleep on the sofa next to me, but neither the poodle or the sofa are mine.
3. I have tried to learn Icelandic, German, Italian, Bengali, Mandarin and American Sign Language.
4. I cannot ski.
5. I have no problems climbing heights, but have trouble descending them.
6. I do not like cooked carrots.

I am tagging Jason, Clarissa, Buster, Chris, Maggie and Steve.

Why? Because I want all of you to post more often and this is an easy way to get a post out of you.

I am quite relieved.

I am now going downstairs to remove the cats’ food bowls because Maggie goes in for surgery tomorrow morning. She’s not allowed to have food after 8pm tonight.