At least, I have comfort food. I dashed across the road and got a box of macaroni and cheese and made some for lunch. I add bacon-flavored popcorn seasoning for more win.
I mentioned in last night's post that a rescue cat had been dropped off to me. He came from a feral colony looked after by one or more little old ladies. He was called Gramps and was at least 10 years old, because the ladies had been feeding him that long. He's an unneutered male, who's been in fights, as unneutered males do, but unlike usual tom, he had also looked after two kittens that were in the colony. They curled up to sleep with him at night in the cold. (And it's been some awful cold lately.) The kittens had been rescued recently, and were headed for the foster program. It took some doing for the cat rescue volunteers to convince the colony caretaker to let them trap Gramps. She thought the stress of trapping would kill him, due to his age (very advanced for a feral). They argued he looked like he needed medical attention, with wounds and such, but she said "he doesn't look too bad now."
This is how he looked in my recovery cage this morning. (He did use the litter box some, but yes, he pooed on his towel, too, poor boy.)
This is his "good" side. The volunteer who brought him over watched me move him from carrier to cage last night, and we stared in horror when we got a good look at his left side. from jaw way down to shoulder, about eight square inches of skin was all raw and abcessed and crusted with blood. I didn't get a photo, but I'd have to put an "image may be disturbing" warning on it if I had. And this was "better" now, according to the colony caretaker. I can't imagine it having been worse. There was a smell of infection on him -- when I woke up this morning, I could smell it at the other end of my apartment in my bedroom -- it overpowered the smell of his poop, which I couldn't even smell till I opened the recovery room door.
I took him to the vet this morning, and hoped they wouldn't find him septic or with some other chronic condition as well and need to put him down. Here's what they found, quoting from the e-mail of the rescue group trapping coordinator:
"the neck wound is an abcess of some sort, possibly from a tooth root that is infected and has worked it's way through or from a fight wound that has gotten infected. They said it was very scabbed up, he had mats and his teeth (what's left of them) are in really bad shape.
They removed a lot of the scabs and mats and said that they will start working on the wound and giving him antibiotics. They said that most likely all his remaining teeth will need to be removed. However, they do feel he can be saved.
The good news.. he is completely friendly!! They said he was purring while they were removing his scabs and that he loves having his chin scratched.. they were carrying him around and petting him. The vet tech said he would be totally suitable for fostering!"
He already has a foster home lined up with the fostering coordinator, so he won't be coming back to my place at all. He'll be neutered on Monday, and I've asked for an "after" photo for comparison, once he gets to his foster home.
He is warm, and safe, and bathed, and on his way to feeling better. Now there's the heart-warming story we needed for a day like today.
I stand by my belief that people, in general, are very disappointing creatures.
Honesty, dignity, decency. Is there none of it anywhere?
But, I had to remove my line to God about "what could be next"? cuz if you ask that sucker to "bring it on" He will.
...I need a bucket of it that I can stick my feet into. My toes still haven't thawed. According to the weather link on our intranet homepage, it's 1 degree out there. And that's before the wind chill. Whoof!
Our neighbor (or someone, I didn't look to see who) was out sweeping the snow off the sidewalks this morning at 5:30. It was cleared all the way up the block past the next building, so maybe it was the association doing their job, for a change.
I'm not sure about the Denver street maintenance people, though. It was extremely slippery last night getting home, and there were spots this morning, even on the highway, that were quite slick still.
Although I can't even remember the last time I ate Bugles.
I got my rebuilt computer back this afternoon, and it's going to take me ages to get everything arranged the way I like it again.
I tried to install some fonts, but it won't let me because apparently I don't have correct security permissions for it to register them to the Type 1 Fonts registry (whatever that may be).
That's fine. I probably don't need most of them anyway.
But how do I get it to STOP trying to register them? I've clicked "OK" and "Cancel" eleventy-seven times each, and still every time I go into the Fonts directory, it takes me through each one of them again to tell me it can't install them.
I can't delete the fonts, because they don't show up in the directory.
Halp!
more snow? more fecking snow?
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39. Celebrate the completion of goals 1-38.
Thanks to my friend Rick for that suggestion.
In the last two days I've done well on doing dishes right after dinner and not leaving them in the sink. Success!
I found it on a card (blank inside). Can't bear to actually send it to anyone, because then I won't have it any more.
