i've discovered the holy grail of inducing cat anger

Henry has fleas.

I guess the universe reads my blog and knew I was wondering about the BEST WAY TO TORTURE A CAT. It delivered.

Yesterday I discovered a couple of mystery bugs crawling around Henry's face. Yep. Fuckin' fleas. On an indoor cat. My life.

I started Henry's de-flea regimen by furminating him within an inch of his life (okay, he purred the whole time—that cat loves him some furminator!) to get rid of eggs and detritus. I ordered some Frontline & flea spray on amazon, then gave him a bath with dishsoap (so the fleas would stand out in his fur).

I then TWEEZED the FLEAS from Henry's body, ONE by ONE, using my expensive-ass TWEEZERMAN. If that's not love, I don't know what is. Henry assumed I was trying to slowly kill him, and turned on me. Luckily he's too gentle to scratch or bite. Any wilder cat would have made me into a hunk of meat.

This morning I woke up and the fleas had MULTIPLIED. By a lot. I drove over to Glendale Petco, picked up a flea comb and flea spray, drove home and set to work.

Step one, spray cat and rub flea spray into skin. Theoretically this will kill fleas on contact. Step two, de-flea with comb and tweezer. Again, ONE by ONE. Step three, give another bath. Step four, de-flea AGAIN with comb and tweezer. By the end, Henry was shaking and crying...and so was I.

Tomorrow comes the Frontline, and I could not be more excited.

Friday stress levels

Henry 10/10

Katie 10/10

home again

and now, homesick again.

 

how to enrage and demoralize your cat in one short weekend

Moving your cat from Wisconsin to California? Three simple steps to a mental breakdown and a cat who hates your stinkin' guts.

1/FRIDAY Pill + 3 hour car ride 

I bought herbal sedatives for Henry in hopes they would ease his anxiety during a 2000 mile cross-country move. I decided to test them out on the car ride from Madison to Menomonie.

I should have realized forcing a pill down Henry's kitty throat would have made him the opposite of calm.

Throughout the entire weekend, the pill administration was the closest Henry came to clawing the crap out of me, which is saying a lot for my harmless little guy. I decided it would be wise to nix the pill before our flight the next day.

Friday stress levels
Henry 7/10
Katie 5/10

2/SATURDAY Airport security + 4 hour flight + relocation

I was so nervous about taking Henry through airport security that I literally worried myself into a panic. The mere idea of taking this 16 pound cat out of his carrier in front of a line of impatient travelers, WALKING him through security and then wrangling him back into his carrier was enough to reconsider the trip.

Surprisingly, Henry was an air-travel-champ. When we went through security, he went into an "I'm a terrified catlump" deadweight mode, though he did start howling as I retrieved his carrier from the conveyor belt. He was pretty good on the plane, only trying to escape the carrier twice.

Saturday stress levels

Henry 7/10

Katie 9/10

3/SUNDAY Bathtime

After all this traveling there was no getting around it—Henry was in dire need of a bath, especially after I discovered mystery gunk on his fur when I woke up this morning.

Cats are notorious water-haters, and Henry is no different (unless you count toilet water...in which case HE'S IN, BRO!). As soon as I set him down into the water, he started a series of pathetic mewls. Sadly for him, there was no escaping. Four years of cat ownership means I'm a bath-giving pro.

As I type, poor Henry sits grooming himself obsessively and rueing the day I adopted him. He'll come around.

Saturday stress levels

Henry 8/10

Katie 3/10

FINAL WEEKEND STRESS TALLY:

Henry 22

Katie 17

internet meetups

This is what meeting people from the internet looks like! We went to an interesting bar downtown, ate Demon Burgers, drank overpriced cocktails and chatted in a dark corner.