The LintRoller Confessional: How Princess Tootie Came To Live At Our House For A Short While, But Just Long Enough To Stay Forever.

It was the best of times, it was the...oh. Wrong story.  Let me start again.

  This is a story of how Princess Tootie came to be at our house.  Or? How my husband nearly went into cardiac arrest at 2:00 AM when I got around to telling him the details about how Princess Tootie came to be at our house.  I'm now a full believer that the devil is always in the details.

Before I tell the tale though, and in all fairness to my husband and to protect my reputation, I did call and ask him if I could rescue a kitten before I did it.  He said "yes." 

So, as far as I'm concerned my conscious is clear. He's had seven years to catch on.  If he doesn't know by now to shake me down at the door?   He'll never figure it out.

But I'm ahead of myself.  Let me back this pony up and start at the beginning.

It was one of those Saturday mornings where my son's in school activities required getting up at the crack of still dark to take him to school to catch a bus.

He was off to a Forensics workshop at a University 50 miles away.  It was rainy. It was Foggy. 

Thundering. Lightening. I don't trust buses, bus drivers or anyone else in inclement weather when it comes to driving around my son.

So? I did what all paranoid mothers do.

 I put my son on the bus, smiled and waved good-bye, dashed to the gas station, filled up the car, went back to the school, parked a block away and when the 5 bus caravan pulled out??

So did I. 

I wasn't completely breaking the rules. Parents were invited.  Of course I did not figure this out until I saw all the other parents in the parking lot  ready to tag along in the caravan.

 But the parents who'd planned on going looked a bit more shall we say, dressed.  Me?   I'd planned on going back home and getting back to sleep before sunrise. Between pride and paranoia?  Pride took the fall.

 So, there I was in Conway, Arkansas.  I attended the first seminar sitting in the darkest section of the very last row of the auditorium. It wasn't that bad, but I decided maybe I should go on back home and sleep comfortably as long as I was going to be snoring. 

I called off my fear of bus wrecks and headed back home.  And I was good and on my way, until I saw a shopping mall full of stores we don't have where I live.

It was still thundering like crazy. Big booming cracking lightening strikes were making me jumpy. And then, then that horrible squealing sound came on the radio. 

SQueeeaaallll...zinch-zinch-zinch-beeeeeeeeeeeeeeep.

This is not a warning. The National Weather Service has issued the following severe weather bulletin:  TORNADOS are in the IMMEDIATE AREA. BE ADVISED TO MOVE TO A SAFE AREA.  THIS IS NOT A TEST. Beep. Beep. Beeeeeeep.   And repeat.

All I could think was kids in an auditorium. Tornados. Tornados spotted in the area.  Worse yet? The News at Six covering the disaster.  I decided to stay in Conway in case a tornado  hit the auditorium and I could be of use. 

When I do absurd things like this I  think in the back of my mind that if I stay, nothing bad will happen.  Somehow I realize this is completely irrational behavior. But?  I just can't help it. I only have one child and it's my job to make sure he outlives me.

So, I got out of my car, immediately sacrificed my umbrella to the Wind Gods and  took refuge from the horizontal rain strom inside  PetSmart.  Not that  PetSmart is deemed a shelter, but my thinking was that at least if a Tornado hit the PetSmart?  I'd be twirled up, up and away with loads of great cat toys to bat at until I passed out from the g-forces, or fell a mile out of the sky fully awake and splatted myself on something uncomfortable - - like cement. Or a tree top. Or on the roof of the auditorium.  

(As the wind howled and sounded like it was peeling the roof off the Petsmart I wandered the aisles making up 'funeral talk'. When I'm caffeine deprived this happens sometimes.  You know when we imagine what people will say after we croak? In my mind I heard this:"Well, you did know she was well on her way to becoming one of those crazy cat ladies we see on the news!! Her whole life, one thing after another always dragging something home claiming it followed her. Her momma and daddy are blaming themselves for this entire thing. Between you and Me?  I NEVER bought half of those stories. And her husband, oh -- that poor, poor man.  I don't know how he stood it all those years.  Tsk, Tsk.  Can you believe it??? She died at that PetSmart during a tornado!! who in their right mind shops for cat food during a tornado??  I knew those darn cats would be the end of her one day!!")   

Soon enough, I ended up (SURPRISE) at the PetSmart Cat Adoption center looking at cats.

My  Mother Bear spidey senses were already on, but they were in overdrive due to the weather.  After a few minutes of admiring the fluff balls in the kennel,  I noticed one kitten looked miserable. Sitting in a hunched position. Eyes closed. Quivering. Rocking back and forth. Teeth scraping one another.

Alert. Alert.  Helpless baby in need of  intervention. Proceed with caution.

Something was seriously wrong.

An attendant let me in to visit with her and with one whiff and a look at her messy behind I realized she had giardia or coccidia. Hard to tell from smell alone. What I knew, having seen this so many times before, is that she  wouldn't make it through the rest of the weekend without treatment.

I asked the PetSmart manager if I could take her to a local vet  and sponsor kennel time for her  until her rescue organization could get her back into foster care.

The answer:  NO.  He wasn't mean or rude, but he said PetSmart did not have a policy to cover that kind of intervention.  I threw all sorts of information at him.  I tried to make him feel guilty, nearly convinced him to make up a special rule and to look the other way but I struck out.

About then my phone rang. It was my son. 

"Mom, where are you?"  And I explained to him I was in Conway with him. 

 "You mean you followed me up here?"

  I kinda sorta lied since  technically I  followed the bus three buses behind his bus.   Crossing my fingers I tried to sound casual:

  "Oh no, I just decided to see what this was all about, parents were invited you know."

 He was delighted. We met up for lunch at the Arby's.  I told him about the kitten at PetSmart and he wanted to go see her.  I guess I knew at that point we basically had another cat.  So, I called my husband.   Here is the EXACT conversation I had with him that day:

"Honey, do you mind if I rescue a kitten?" 

"Nope. Bring it on home."

"But, don't you want to know..."

"Nope, tell me about it later "

"But -"

"Hey, it's been awhile, it will be like old times."

"Love you Sweetie"

"Love you too, Bye."

Damn the torpedos, full speed ahead !!

Click and Ka CHING!! I checked out, dropped the 85.00 for the kitten and left the store with a kitten with a drippy backside and a very big MEOW.

Since I now had the kitten, Bryan asked me to hang around and let him ride home with me.

I asked, "are you sure you want to ride with me? you can ride back on the bus with all of your friends, that's OK you know." 

His answer came back even firmer,

"Mom, my bus doesn't have seat belts, haven't you been paying attention to this weather??"

So, when his workshop was over, he clambered into the car with me and the sick cat.

The best treatment for diarrhea from intestinal parasites, is loads of fluids and straight protein and perhaps some benefiber mixed in.  I fed her a high protein wet food, injected her with fluids under the skin, put her on a heating pad and kept her close.  She seemed to appreciate the comfort, but she looked more like a once live cat wrapped in a blanket.

Later that night, my husband met her.

To her he says, "Awe, poor baby, we'll get you all fixed up."

To me he says, "we aren't keeping her."

I said, "Of course not, just until she's fat and healthy, then we'll adopt her out through the vet's office."  And this is exactly what I intended to do.

Later that night, at 2:00 AM my husband asks me as he's drifting off to sleep, "so where'd you find that cat?"  Marital unbliss ensued. 

Torpedo Bay Open, Launch Sequence Initiated:  Dive! Dive!! Dive!!!

After a semi uncomfortable explanation ?? His last comment  was  "well, whatever makes you sleep at night." 

Reminding him that he did not allow me to tell him about her earlier in the day didn't help. He was a bit peeved, feeling deceived as we both knew this rescue was far from the normal 'can I bring it home' story.

 He sort of got over it and then? Damnit to hell and back, RIGHT before he fell off to sleep, he muttered the last three words that would be the nails in my proverbial coffin: 

"for free, right??"  Gloom, despair, and agony on me. Owhhhhh. 

Back to the kitten's story here:

It was obvious from the infection site on her spaying scar and her being underweight, that the kitten  was going to be with us for a while. So? We spent two days trying to find a name that fit her.

As with most cats?  She named herself.

As Captain Kirk would say? She was a "strange and gaseous creature." 

The sick kitten who passed gas every time she inhaled was irreverently named, Princess Tootie. It became a 'gotcha' joke to pick up the kitten and casually walk by another household member and slightly press on her abdomen at the same time. 

While Princess Tootie recovered from her intestinal problems, she made some serious in-roads to my husband's heart. If he sat? she sat at his feet and screamed for him to pick her up. 

If he moved? She was one foot behind mewling all the way.  If he slept, all 8 inches of her would crawl up the bed skirt and onto the duvet and she'd fuss and bellow until he uncovered his head and say "OKOK you found me, now HUSH!!" 

While our house is full of shoes with laces? She only ate his. 

 Eventually questions popped up like, "Are we keeping her? She's not going anywhere is she?"  And comments like, "Oh, look, she LOVES the dog"  and "I wonder how she'd look in the Christmas tree?"  And  finally,  the deal breaker:

"Hey, it used to be Bash and Ben, and now?  It's Tucker and Tootie." 

Ben and Bash had both passed away years ago.  Now, quite by accident or divine intervention whichever you prefer?  We had another 'pair' of double consonants on our hands again.

And that's the story of  how Princess Tootie came to live at our house for a short while, but just long enough to stay forever.

All Hail Princess Tootie!!

She's still a strange and gaseous creature!!