You may remember that I got a kitten right after my birthday last fall. Well, Purrrrrbucket's a sweetheart, but yesterday he decided he wanted to be a singer. He has this very cute little meow, that's more of a "Mrrrrrrrr?" than a "Meow" and I think it's just darling. Okay, I thought it was darling, until he started doing it incessantly. Mom said he was singing to us, but hearing the same record over and over gets old really fast.
When he started it last night, I thought he wanted to play. But I was exhausted, and busy talking to an old friend from California, and helping Michelle put up a web page for her class. I felt bad, but I just didn't have any time to give him, so he went on crying in the other room. I didn't get to bed until after one, and my cold was making me miserable, so I didn't even care that he was making noise, except that it kept me from sleeping terribly deeply.
Mom thought it was Munchie, my female cat, making the noise late last night, when the cute little mrrr got to be full fledged opera. Munchie has this crocheted doily she likes to play fetch with, and when no one pays attention to her, she'll stuff the thing in her mouth and walk around the house, crying. I heard "Shut up, Munchie!" a time or two last night, and Mom says she said it more than that.
This morning when I woke up to talk to Jev, Purrrrrbucket was still talking almost constantly, though he was back to pop and not opera. I lured him out on the front porch, where I can't hear him, and slept a few more hours after Jev headed off to class. It's not that he's loud with his singing, he's just persistant.
After I'd had some sleep and felt like dealing with him again, I let him in, and tried playing with him; he still kept singing. I got him on video doing it, which wasn't very hard, so now it's saved for posterity. We went into the kitchen and he flopped down on the floor and I sat down beside him and petted him, and he started rubbing his head against my slippered foot, and was actually quiet for a bit. But that didn't last long.
He got up and headed for my room, when I noticed that he was walking strangely... his back half was sort of hunched down low to the ground like he was slinking, so immediately I started to worry. Was there something wrong with him?
I told Mom, and she picked him up and felt around his stomach... he didn't seem to care, or wince or anything, and he didn't feel feverish, so she put him down again. I followed him as he walked back into my room, back half low to the ground, and he stopped to sniff something, and my female cat came up to sniff him. Then I realized: instead of Purrrrrbucket, or the Figaro that came to mind, maybe I should call him Tomcat Jones!
So tomorrow afternoon, Purrrrrbaby will be going in to see the vet, and when he comes back on Wednesday, he'll be a changed cat. A little sore for a while, but none the worse for the wear. And hopefully he'll decide that being a one-hit wonder is quite enough of a singing career for any cat.
Yes, you probably hear it coming, don't you? We always get our cats spayed or neutered. They're much happier, and healthier when they're not fighting, or looking for a mate, or having litters of kittens every time you turn around. I highly recommend it for anyone who has cats as family housepets. For more information about the benefits of spaying and neutering, you can go to The International Cat Association's Spay & Neuter page.
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