A bunch of animals from a hoarder case finally became available for adoption today. One of them was Blue, a cute little black and white Dutch mix rabbit with blue eyes. He needed a picture, so I went to get one. The only ones they had of him showed how filthy he was when he came in and the state that his nails were in. Not good.
When I went in, my supervisor was in there with someone else, and Blue was excited. I think he likes my supervisor. He was hopping around and rubbing his face on everything. Marking. I should have known better at that point.
Over the course of a few hops, a piece of poop pops out of the cage and right into my shirt pocket. It's dry, so it's not a big deal, but still. He flung poop into my pocket.
When everyone left, I took my camera out and put it against the bars, waiting for him to back up and be still long enough for me to snap a photo. It never happened. I was worried about him chewing on my camera and flinging more poop at me.
Next thing I know, something gets slung across my face. I look and don't see anything he could have kicked up, like wet food. I look at my camera, and it's pee. He sprayed, right in my face. The cage he's in is eye-level (for me) and he decided to spray out of the cage. What an asshole.
He pooped in my pocket then peed on my face. And my camera. And my hand. What a jerk.
Monday, March 26, 2012
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
More cats and avoiding rabies
Working with the cats every day, I definitely have my favorites. I'm actually going to tell a story about one that isn't my favorite, but still good.
Anna Banana, a cute little long-haired kitten, is seriously the cutest thing in the building at the moment. She has a deposit and should be getting spayed any day now so she can go home.
Last week I went to clean out her kennel and saw that she had two poops in her cubby. I closed it off, cleaned it and put her in there so I could clean out the rest of the kennel. Not 5 minutes later, I looked over at the cubby window and saw that there were droplets of liquid on it.
Little Anna Banana had pooped in her cubby and peed in the corner, then somehow managed to spread it all over every surface, 360 degrees of pee. I was shocked and disgusted, and had to clean her cubby all over again.
She's gotten better about using her litterbox since then and yesterday sat nice and patiently at the window while waiting for her kennel to be cleaned. And whoever cleaned her up after than debacle said that she loves getting baths. How about that.
My favorite cat at the moment is another 5 month old kitten, the only other one we have right now. She's a little calico and she's just the sweetest thing. I want to take her home. Her name is Tinker, but I call her Tink.
My other favorite is Johnson. He's sick right now and in isolation, but of all the cats I've had to pick up at work, he was the easiest. And he was by no means the smallest. It may have been because he was sick and lethargic, but he gave no resistance and was just as sweet as could be. I go visit him whenever I can. He still has a few days of treatment yet. His photo is terrible.
I also met the owners of one of the cats in quarantine. At a big group dinner, one couple was talking about how their cat had been taken because she scratched someone trying to give her a rabies shot at the rabies clinic.
Sure enough, I saw her yesterday and the KA who cleaned her kennel said she was not very nice. One of her owners said she was a "heinous bitch" to strangers, but actually "very cool" once she got to know you. I overheard people talking about her the day she went in, and she has quite the reputation for being crazy.
Since she was getting her rabies vaccination, she is now on rabies bite hold. Which leads me to my next topic.
I got my first of three pre-exposure rabies vaccinations Friday morning. And, as a freebie, I got one for tetanus, too. It actually might not be free, but the nurse assumed the county would pay for it and gave it to me, and I had no reason to think otherwise. A coworker told me later that they offered it to her but said she had to pay for it. I better not have to, because I wasn't informed that it might cost me money.
Tetanus didn't hurt going in, but it was sore until yesterday afternoon. Rabies burned a little but felt fine by Saturday evening. I got them in different shoulders, so both arms were not happy Friday and Saturday. Two more to go!
Anna Banana, a cute little long-haired kitten, is seriously the cutest thing in the building at the moment. She has a deposit and should be getting spayed any day now so she can go home.
Last week I went to clean out her kennel and saw that she had two poops in her cubby. I closed it off, cleaned it and put her in there so I could clean out the rest of the kennel. Not 5 minutes later, I looked over at the cubby window and saw that there were droplets of liquid on it.
Little Anna Banana had pooped in her cubby and peed in the corner, then somehow managed to spread it all over every surface, 360 degrees of pee. I was shocked and disgusted, and had to clean her cubby all over again.
She's gotten better about using her litterbox since then and yesterday sat nice and patiently at the window while waiting for her kennel to be cleaned. And whoever cleaned her up after than debacle said that she loves getting baths. How about that.
My favorite cat at the moment is another 5 month old kitten, the only other one we have right now. She's a little calico and she's just the sweetest thing. I want to take her home. Her name is Tinker, but I call her Tink.
 |
| Tinker |
I also met the owners of one of the cats in quarantine. At a big group dinner, one couple was talking about how their cat had been taken because she scratched someone trying to give her a rabies shot at the rabies clinic.
Sure enough, I saw her yesterday and the KA who cleaned her kennel said she was not very nice. One of her owners said she was a "heinous bitch" to strangers, but actually "very cool" once she got to know you. I overheard people talking about her the day she went in, and she has quite the reputation for being crazy.
Since she was getting her rabies vaccination, she is now on rabies bite hold. Which leads me to my next topic.
I got my first of three pre-exposure rabies vaccinations Friday morning. And, as a freebie, I got one for tetanus, too. It actually might not be free, but the nurse assumed the county would pay for it and gave it to me, and I had no reason to think otherwise. A coworker told me later that they offered it to her but said she had to pay for it. I better not have to, because I wasn't informed that it might cost me money.
Tetanus didn't hurt going in, but it was sore until yesterday afternoon. Rabies burned a little but felt fine by Saturday evening. I got them in different shoulders, so both arms were not happy Friday and Saturday. Two more to go!
Monday, March 19, 2012
Holy moly
It's been 10 days since my last entry. We've been crazy busy, adjusting to my new schedule, my husband changing jobs, trying to get rid of our foster dog, taking advantage of our insurance while we have it.
I'm going to break this into a few posts over the next couple days just so I don't end up with one post that takes an hour to read.
I reckon I'll start with work-related things. Last weekend marked the beginning of Daylight Savings Time, and our household did not participate. We forgot to set the clocks back, so it wasn't until I was sitting down to eat my oatmeal that I realized I was already half an hour late for work.
I opted to eat my oatmeal in the car and arrived 45 minutes late. It also meant that the car hadn't defrosted and I had a very small, slightly too high window of vision for the first 5 minutes in the car. No one really seemed to notice, and I wasn't the only person who made that mistake. I only felt like a big fool, not the biggest fool.
I made myself a headband out of a silk tie from Goodwill using an old bra strap, a needle and thread, a stapler and scissors. It keeps the hair out of my nose and decreases my number of sneezes dramatically. I still sneeze pretty badly on my first day back after not working for a couple days, but I hope that will get better. I think there are also seasonal allergies messing with me now, so I've been sneezing all morning. Maybe I should shut the door.
The other day, I asked a coworker if she had ever known of a feral cat to give birth while in stray hold. She said she hadn't. Not one week later, I saw my first litter of feral kittens.
I'd heard what sounded like just-born kitten mewling, but I though maybe one of the kittens just had a really wimpy meow. They were in my second-to-last kennel of the day because I started on the other side of the room. It figures. The whole batch was euthanized and the justification for it was unsatisfactory, so I won't recount it here. Suffice it to say that they have their protocol and they follow it.
In the upcoming season, I can expect an average of three births every week. Fantastic.
I think I have a real knack for predicting animal births. Last time I had a premonition was with Cream Puff, and she had beautiful babies within days.
This is getting long. Up next: More cats and avoiding rabies.
I'm going to break this into a few posts over the next couple days just so I don't end up with one post that takes an hour to read.
I reckon I'll start with work-related things. Last weekend marked the beginning of Daylight Savings Time, and our household did not participate. We forgot to set the clocks back, so it wasn't until I was sitting down to eat my oatmeal that I realized I was already half an hour late for work.
I opted to eat my oatmeal in the car and arrived 45 minutes late. It also meant that the car hadn't defrosted and I had a very small, slightly too high window of vision for the first 5 minutes in the car. No one really seemed to notice, and I wasn't the only person who made that mistake. I only felt like a big fool, not the biggest fool.
I made myself a headband out of a silk tie from Goodwill using an old bra strap, a needle and thread, a stapler and scissors. It keeps the hair out of my nose and decreases my number of sneezes dramatically. I still sneeze pretty badly on my first day back after not working for a couple days, but I hope that will get better. I think there are also seasonal allergies messing with me now, so I've been sneezing all morning. Maybe I should shut the door.
The other day, I asked a coworker if she had ever known of a feral cat to give birth while in stray hold. She said she hadn't. Not one week later, I saw my first litter of feral kittens.
I'd heard what sounded like just-born kitten mewling, but I though maybe one of the kittens just had a really wimpy meow. They were in my second-to-last kennel of the day because I started on the other side of the room. It figures. The whole batch was euthanized and the justification for it was unsatisfactory, so I won't recount it here. Suffice it to say that they have their protocol and they follow it.
In the upcoming season, I can expect an average of three births every week. Fantastic.
I think I have a real knack for predicting animal births. Last time I had a premonition was with Cream Puff, and she had beautiful babies within days.
This is getting long. Up next: More cats and avoiding rabies.
Friday, March 9, 2012
I smell like cat poop and litter
Wednesday was an interesting day for me. I made my first trip into the euthanasia room, which other KAs who have been there months have avoided and not yet entered. Morbid curiosity got the best of me, however, and I made a foray into the room unescorted, just to take a look around.
I'm not going to go into what I saw. It was nothing horrifying or, I suspect, out of the ordinary, but it was a small wake-up call. Dealing with the feral/stray cats, I know who goes where and, most often, what happens to them. It's just unsettling to be surprised by the aftermath of the decisions that people make.
I will, however, share a different anecdote. When cleaning out the public cat rooms, there are supposed to be dividers that you can close between their cubby and the main kennel. The idea is to get the cat into its cubby, close it off and clean the main kennel. Due to warping and debris, some of the sliders don't slide and some are just plain missing.
For those cats, unless they give no indication of coming out of their cubby, you need cat boxes. Cat boxes are rectangular wire boxes with a handle and most have two opening, one on top and one at the end. You can't reuse the box because of germs, so it can be a nuisance. I can only carry four at one time without assistance.
I needed more boxes, so I went out to the sally port to get more. When I opened the door, I was immediately transfixed. There was a truck parked in the sally port with a guy standing next to it with a large trash can. The trash can was full of water and cats. The guy had a cat grabber* and was taking the cats out of the water and putting them into the back of the truck.
I stood there watching him for what seemed like forever, then got my cat boxes and proceeded to go back inside. On my way back through the door, I stopped to watch again. I couldn't help it--it was the strangest thing I think I've ever seen with my own eyes.
He sees me watching him slack-jawed, and says in a delightfully country accent, "I bet you're wonderin' what I'm doin!" I nodded dumbly. "I take these cats to schools all around! It's for science!"
While he's waving the cat grabber around, he excitedly tells me that he takes them to be dissected in high schools and colleges, including NC State, which has a darn good program. A lot of our vets studied there.
I'm glad he explained, because if it had not been for his charming explanation, I might have thought he was making cat-skin lamps or something.
* I didn't realize it was really called a "cat grabber." It makes me so happy when things have logical names. Makes Googling so much easier and fruitful.
I'm still enjoying my job. I'm not quite as tired as I was that first week, but now I'm waking up too early. On days I work, I wake up at least 30 minutes before the alarm goes off. On my days off, like today, I wake up around 7. I refuse to get out of bed, though, because what the heck is there to do at 7 a.m.? It's ridiculous. Nothing good can come from getting up at 7 a.m. and not going to work.
My husband may soon be joining me at the shelter. He got offered a part-time receptionist job and is supposed to go in for training on the 15th. Pay is the same and will replace his Home Depot job. He was in the middle of some mess with them, but I'll let him go on about that if he wishes. He'll be working much shorter days but making about the same amount of money. Everyone wins!
"I've never seen someone so happy and singing to be cleaning up cat poop."
I'm not going to go into what I saw. It was nothing horrifying or, I suspect, out of the ordinary, but it was a small wake-up call. Dealing with the feral/stray cats, I know who goes where and, most often, what happens to them. It's just unsettling to be surprised by the aftermath of the decisions that people make.
I will, however, share a different anecdote. When cleaning out the public cat rooms, there are supposed to be dividers that you can close between their cubby and the main kennel. The idea is to get the cat into its cubby, close it off and clean the main kennel. Due to warping and debris, some of the sliders don't slide and some are just plain missing.
For those cats, unless they give no indication of coming out of their cubby, you need cat boxes. Cat boxes are rectangular wire boxes with a handle and most have two opening, one on top and one at the end. You can't reuse the box because of germs, so it can be a nuisance. I can only carry four at one time without assistance.
I needed more boxes, so I went out to the sally port to get more. When I opened the door, I was immediately transfixed. There was a truck parked in the sally port with a guy standing next to it with a large trash can. The trash can was full of water and cats. The guy had a cat grabber* and was taking the cats out of the water and putting them into the back of the truck.
I stood there watching him for what seemed like forever, then got my cat boxes and proceeded to go back inside. On my way back through the door, I stopped to watch again. I couldn't help it--it was the strangest thing I think I've ever seen with my own eyes.
He sees me watching him slack-jawed, and says in a delightfully country accent, "I bet you're wonderin' what I'm doin!" I nodded dumbly. "I take these cats to schools all around! It's for science!"
While he's waving the cat grabber around, he excitedly tells me that he takes them to be dissected in high schools and colleges, including NC State, which has a darn good program. A lot of our vets studied there.
I'm glad he explained, because if it had not been for his charming explanation, I might have thought he was making cat-skin lamps or something.
* I didn't realize it was really called a "cat grabber." It makes me so happy when things have logical names. Makes Googling so much easier and fruitful.
I'm still enjoying my job. I'm not quite as tired as I was that first week, but now I'm waking up too early. On days I work, I wake up at least 30 minutes before the alarm goes off. On my days off, like today, I wake up around 7. I refuse to get out of bed, though, because what the heck is there to do at 7 a.m.? It's ridiculous. Nothing good can come from getting up at 7 a.m. and not going to work.
My husband may soon be joining me at the shelter. He got offered a part-time receptionist job and is supposed to go in for training on the 15th. Pay is the same and will replace his Home Depot job. He was in the middle of some mess with them, but I'll let him go on about that if he wishes. He'll be working much shorter days but making about the same amount of money. Everyone wins!
"I've never seen someone so happy and singing to be cleaning up cat poop."
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Work day
Get up at 5:30 a.m. before the alarm goes off.
Leave at 6:45, get to work at 7. Have meeting, do work.
Get hungry around 10:45. Eat lunch between 11 and 2.
Finish assigned work. Find something to do for a few hours.
Leave at 6. Get Bojangles because Alex is at work and can't feed you.
Take Chuck out at 6:30. Nap until it's time to pick Alex up from work.
Pick Alex up and talk at him for an hour straight. Fall asleep on the futon.
Go to bed at 11 p.m.
Do not pass Go, do not collect $200.
Leave at 6:45, get to work at 7. Have meeting, do work.
Get hungry around 10:45. Eat lunch between 11 and 2.
Finish assigned work. Find something to do for a few hours.
Leave at 6. Get Bojangles because Alex is at work and can't feed you.
Take Chuck out at 6:30. Nap until it's time to pick Alex up from work.
Pick Alex up and talk at him for an hour straight. Fall asleep on the futon.
Go to bed at 11 p.m.
Do not pass Go, do not collect $200.
Friday, March 2, 2012
A whole lotta love
My job is going well so far. I'm sore in all sorts of places. Pretty much everywhere, actually, right down to my fingers and face. I think I make a lot of stupid faces at work. *shrug* The hours are long, but it's busy so the 5 hours or so before lunch pass quickly. The second half also goes pretty quickly, but it depends on how early work gets done and loitering begins. I'm hoping I can go full time soon... one more work day per week and I can quit writing.
Speaking of, I gotta get to it.
Speaking of, I gotta get to it.
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