How to Have a Cat Make You Crazy

Step 1:  Get a call from Festus telling you there is a stray cat hanging around his workplace.  It is friendly, and it is trying to eat one of the rats that had been poisoned at said workplace.  (Said workplace deals in food, and has to use heavy duty stuff to keep vermin out or be closed by the Health Department.)  They were concerned, so could the rescue take the cat?  Tell him, since you aren't even home at the time, that he will have to call and make arrangements.  Come home to find he brought the cat to the field across the street, that it has found your house and adopted you, even trying to get inside whenever it can, and that it has uncontrollable diarrhea.

Step 2:  Set up a place for the kitty, now called Porch Kitty, on the front porch, with food, water, and a nice warm place to sleep.  Make arrangements to take her to the vet for tests and other medical care.

Step 3:  A few days later, put Porch Kitty in the big isolation cage for one night so you will be able to find her the next morning when it's time to go to the vet.  Take her and 5 fosters to the vet and drop them off.  Come home late that night, after Sweetie picked the cats up from the vet to find out that Porch Kitty needs five kinds of medication, one of them for two weeks.  Another has to be rubbed on her sore bum several times a day.  Hope the cat appreciates that her bum is being salved a few times a day, but doubt it seriously.

Step 4:  Make further arrangements to have Porch Kitty spayed, out of fear that she will go into heat, escape the house, and you will end up with even more cats.  Take her for spaying, along with another foster.  Go pick her up to find out that when they shaved her, they found a scar, so she was already spayed!  Have it hit you like a thunderclap that you haven't checked her yet for a microchip.

Step 5:  Find her microchip, and track her down to  the local cat rescue that is associated with the pound, the one for which you fostered two of the bottle babies that are just now big enough to go for adoption.  Call the pound and talk to the people in charge of fosters.  Tell them about what's up with one of their cats, which is missing from its foster home and which said foster home hasn't even reported to be missing.  Figure out, along with the lady from the foster program, that the former foster home is a bad one and no longer to be used.  Also figure out that this cat has already been completely vetted and that, except for the medication for the diarrhea, all the other money spend on medical testing and care was unneeded.

Step 6:  End up fostering Porch Kitty yourself!


Yes, really.  That's what happened, and we need to come up with a better name than Porch Kitty, since she is no longer out on the porch.  She is the most laid back cat i've ever seen.  She never growls at other cats, even if they are growling at her.  She just tries to make friends with them, and she is already friends with every person she sees.  Also, she will eat anything, as long as you put Forti-Flora (a probiotic for cats) on it.

Today is:

Build a Snowman Day -- occupy your mind, as Christmas seems too far away still; if you have no snow, make snowball cookies

Chocolate Pizza Day -- yes, really

E-Mail Santa Claus Just in Case He Didn't Get Your Letter Day -- send it here
Festival for Juventas -- Ancient Roman Calendar (goddess of youth, protector of young soldiers)

Icelandic Yuletide Lad of the Day, Skyrgamur -- Curd-glutton, who loves skyr (milk curd) so that he sneaks in the pantry to try to get it all

I've Got My Big Fat Guy Pants On Day -- someone tired of tight clothes started this, a day to wear whatever you like, so long as it is comfortable -- and roomy

Look for an Evergreen Day -- although if you haven't bought your tree by now, you may have waited too long

National Hard Candy Day -- this time of year, it probably means candy canes

National Heroes and Heroines Day -- Anguilla

National Oatmeal Muffin Day

Opalia -- Roman Empire (feast of Ops, goddess of abundance; 3rd day of the Saturnalia)

Riddle-Making Trials -- Fairy Calendar

Robinson Crusoe Rescue Day (1686)

St. Bernard Valeara's Day (Patron of Teramo, Italy)

St. Samthann (Samantha) of Meath's Day (Patron of the spiritual life)

United Nations Day for South-South Cooperation -- UN


Anniversary Today:

First radio broadcast from space, a Christmas greeting from President Eisenhower, 1958


Birthdays Today:

Jake Gyllenhall, 1980
Alyssa Milano, 1972
Tyson Beckford, 1971
Amy Locane, 1971
Kristy Swanson, 1969
Criss Angel, 1967
Jessica Steen, 1965
Jennifer Beals, 1963
Janie Fricke, 1952
Robert Urich, 1946
Richard Leakey, 1944
Alvin Lee, 1944
Tim Reid, 1944
Cicely Tyson, 1939
Al Kaline, 1934
David Susskind, 1920
Leonid Brezhnev, 1906
Ralph Richardson, 1902
Carter Godwin Woodson, 1875
Minnie Maddern Fiske, 1865
Mary Ashton Livermore, 1821
William Edward Parry, 1790


Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Titanic"(Film), 1997
"The Man with the Golden Gun"(Film), 1974
"Homecoming A Christmas Story"(TV introduction of "The Waltons"), 1971
"The Music Man"(Musical), 1957
"A Christmas Carol"(publication date), 1843
"American Crisis"(publication date of the Thomas Paine essay in which he wrote, "These are the times that try men's souls."), 1776
"Poor Richard's Almanack" (publication of first issue by Benjamin Franklin), 1732


Today in History:

Licinius abdicates his position as Roman Emperor, 324
The Seldjuken under Toghril Beg occupy Baghdad, 1055
The Susan Constant, the Godspeed, and the Discovery depart England carrying settlers who found, at Jamestown, Virginia, the first of the thirteen colonies that became the United States, 1606
Benjamin Franklin, under the name Richard Saunders begins publication of "Poor Richard's Almanack", 1732
Thomas Paine publishes his first "American Crisis" essay, in which he wrote that "These are the times that try men's souls," 1776
Chinese troops occupy the capital Thang Long Vietnam, 1788
The US state of Kentucky becomes the first to appropriate money for road building, 1795
The US state of Georgia becomes the first to pass a birth registration law, 1823
Allen Wilson of Connecticut patents a sewing machine that can sew a curved seam, 1854
Albert L. Jones patents corrugated cardboard, 1871
The first black US Catholic priest, Charles Uncles, is ordained in Baltimore, 1891
The first city ordinance requiring separate neighborhoods for blacks and whites is passed, in Baltimore, 1910
Robert Ripley begins his "Believe It Or Not" column in the NY Globe, 1918
The British Broadcasting Corp begins transmitting overseas, 1932
The US Earth satellite Atlas transmitted the first radio voice broadcast from space, 1958
The last manned lunar flight, Apollo 17, returns to earth, 1972
The Sino-British Joint Declaration, stating that the People's Republic of China, in 1997, would resume the exercise of sovereignty over Hong Kong, is signed, 1984
Mikhail Gorbachev, leader of the Soviet Union, releases Andrei Sakharov and his wife from internal exile in Gorky, 1986
A record high barometric pressure of 1085.6 hPa (32.06 inHg) is recorded at Tosontsengel, Khövsgöl Province, Mongolia, 2001