My Least Favorite Post to Date

I've had a rough few weeks over here, no doubt. It started with the anniversary of Brant's death. I wasn't sure how to bring it up on here, but after much thought, I have decided to plant a tree in Brant's memory in the spring. What kind of tree and where exactly to plant it is still being decided, but it feels like the right thing to do.

On Christmas Eve, after the girls had gone to bed, and while John and I were sitting around the Christmas tree with his parents, our beautiful orange cat, Tabasco, died. He let out a little howl, and I thought maybe his foot was stuck in the spindle of the dining room chair, but when I went over to him, he flopped on the floor, and howled some more. I left the room, too upset to witness his pain. John stayed close to him, trying to help him the best he could. In less than 5 minutes, Tabby was gone. It happened so fast, we just all sat there dumbfounded. It was horrifying.

I always wanted an orange cat. Growing up on the farm, surrounded by cats, we never had an orange one. Right after John and I got married, John's parents' cat had kittens, and so we claimed an orange one. He was rambunctious from the start, used to keep us up all night meowing. Guess he was our practice baby. He liked to give love bites, which drove me crazy. He liked to snuggle, loved to have the top of his back by his tail scratched, but hated to have his belly scratched. He used to chew the other cats' whiskers off. He liked to play catch, if you threw him a soft toy, he would jump up and catch it with his paws. He used to lick John's head like he was cleaning him. He was our most vocal cat, always answering when we called out his name. Sometimes I still think I hear his inquisitive meow. He had weight issues, didn't always like dry chow, so for awhile he ate only wet, canned cat food in the kitchen while the rest of the cats ate the dry chow downstairs. He was special. In the past few years he had gotten heavy, and I guess that did him in. The vet said he probably had a stroke, or a heart attack, and that there was nothing we could do for him, and something like that is very hard to predict.

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

I made this little video of him, but it still leaves me feeling empty. I searched high and low for weeks to find this picture of John, and Tabby and I in front of our very first Christmas tree in our apartment in Soulard. We were so happy.


You can see a picture of Tabby here when the Roomba chased him around, and this nice picture from November 2006 of our 4 kitties. We were a 4 cat household for 8 years.

In other crappy news, my darling Java, is very sick. At first the vet thought he had an enlarged kidney, but after going back to the vet today, he thinks Java has a fast growing tumor, maybe on his spleen or something. Oh gosh. We are trying to feed him goodies, and treat him well. I guess that's all we can do for him. Already searched the house and found his kitten pictures, some 13 years ago. Gulp. Sniff. Sob.

6 years and 1 day after my very first post here on this blog, sure isn't as fun as this compilation I put together last year.

Blah.