Sick kitty

I had a bad bad bad scare with Chach this month.

I was in San Francisco on business, and my mom was watching Chach at her house. I would do my crazy mommy phone calls several times a day asking how he was, and she kept mentioning he was acting like he had a cold. Sleeping a lot. Not very active.

The day before I came home, her tone changed to one that was more worrisome. “He definitely has a cold.” As far as I knew, the only thing you can really do for a cat with a cold is let it ride out. My mom mentioned she was going to my house to pick up some more can food, since he wasn’t touching his dry food. I suggested she pick up some of his babies (Tweety Bird, Mr. Whiskers, Harley the Hedgehog) so he could play with them, but she said, “I don’t think he’s up for playing.”

My flight was scheduled to arrive around midnight on Sunday night/Monday morning so the original plan was to go home and pick Chach up from my parents’ house in the morning. “We’re on our way to get your car so you can just come here from the airport. Chach needs to see you tonight,” my mom said. “Is he OK?” “Yeah, he’s OK, he just misses you. But, wake me up when you get home.”

I knew something was wrong, but I immediately went into my “happy place” so I could get through the next two days. I was done with work around 10 a.m. on Sunday, so I tried to get on a standby flight in the afternoon, to no avail. Spent the whole day reading “Gone Girl” at the airport (which, if you have to be stuck in an airport, San Francisco’s is really the one to be at. Visiting other airports makes me realize how completely insane and chaotic O’Hare is).

I got to my parents’ house around 12:30 a.m.  I woke my mom up and asked where Chach was and if he was OK. “No, he’s not. He has pneumonia.”

Apparently, my mom noticed Chach was having trouble breathing Saturday morning. He was standing on the bed, looking as if he was going to throw up or cough up a hairball. She took him to my brother’s vet (Chach’s medical team was closed), they did a chest X-ray, and his lungs were almost entirely filled with fluid. They said they “hoped it was pneumonia” but that it could be heart disease. They gave him a few shots, two kinds of medicine and handed my mom the number of an emergency overnight vet, saying, “He may not make it through the night.”

My mom went into mommy overdrive and put Chach to bed with a humidifier in his room, checking on him every half hour. He was barely eating or drinking anything.

I don’t know about you, but when I’m sick, I want my mom and that was no different with Chach. When I got home, I scooped him up and he just nuzzled into me, meowing and purring. The fantastic thing was that within a half hour of me being home, he started eating and drinking again.

I was off work the next two days and basically just played kitty nurse. He had to take one pill a day for the possibility it might be heart disease and one liquid dose of antibiotics. The pill had to be shoved down his throat and the liquid had to be shot into his mouth through a syringe. If you’ve never had to give a cat medicine, consider yourself extremely lucky because it’s exhausting and frustrating. Plus, I was an absolute mess at the thought of him being in pain, discomfort or losing him altogether.

I talked to Chach’s vet the next day and had his chart and X-rays sent over from baby Pickles’ (Danny’s cat) vet. The vet looked them over and said it really didn’t look like heart disease to him, so he took Chach off one medicine and said if he continued to get better, he should come back to get re-checked in two weeks.

Chach was very lethargic for a few days; so much so that I was really worried he wouldn’t bounce back. He was too weak to take more than a few steps before lying down, and I had to hand feed him his wet food so he would eat something. 

Chach resting in my closet, hoping his sponsors, Nike and Puma, don't drop him because of his bout with pneumonia.

After texting a friend of a friend who’s a vet and asking what’s “normal” in terms of lethargy in kitty cat pneumonia patients, Chach soon started to resume normal naughty behavior. This includes trying to tear the loose threads off the bottom of my mattress and insisting he can only eat by being hand fed, even though his strength was back and he could clearly eat on his own.

He’s still taking the liquid medicine and it’s lovely to administer since half of it ends up on my shirt and the other half Chach likely spits out as he foams at the mouth. I have chewable pills he can take instead but with his refined palette (Chach only eats food that contains duck or rabbit-not kidding), he takes a few licks before looking up at me as if to say, “Tastes like drugs.” I can crush it and mix it in with wet food, but Chach does the same thing: takes a bite or two, gives it a few licks and looks at me like “Tastes like drugs.” Last night, I mixed it in with tuna and that seemed to go over better.

We go back to the vet on Friday and I’m hoping hoping hoping Chach receives a clean bill of health!

Flash mob video

For those who get the blog emailed to them, the video link won't show up in the email. You have to visit the blog website, I think.

Flash mob: Gangnam style

I crossed something off the old bucket list this past weekend: participate in a flash mob.

My good friend and roommate from college Amy and her lover Pete got married this past weekend. A few weeks ago at Amy's bachelorette party, there was apparently a discussion about doing a flash mob at their wedding (a discussion I may very well have taken part in but have no memory of-damn strippers!).

No strippers here but this picture is too kick ass not to share.

Amy's good friend Lynn sent a group of us an email suggesting we do a secret flash mob to "Gangnam Style."

Being an old lady these days, and someone who's barely in the car since I take the train to work every day, I had heard the song briefly but didn't know it was a little bit of a phenomenon, and certainly didn't know there was a choreographed dance to it.

Being a dancer, and recognizing she may be dealing with an uncoordinated bunch, Lynn was kind of enough to create a series of video tutorials on how to do the dance. I tried practicing on my own one night but deemed the event too sober and quit until I had some company.

Luckily, Sarah and Chad stayed with me the night before the wedding and after putting Chad to bed and a bottle of wine, Sarah and I thought we conquered the first section.

There were rumors of an impromptu practice session in a secret location at the hotel where the reception was, but the Wardall 7 crew took matters into our own hands the only way we know how: by buying a lot beer and pre-drinking in our hotel room before the reception while practicing.

We took our potent potables down to the secret practice location—in the hotel basement next to a bank of elevators. Lynn led us in a few run throughs, told the uncoordinated bunch (including me) we could just rock jazz hands when we didn't know the moves, and handed out some glow in the dark sunglasses, courtesy of Amy's sister and maid of honor.

The plan was for the DJ to cue up the music during the salad portion of dinner, after all of the toasts. Lynn would be on the dance floor by herself and dance the first two sections alone while the rest of us walked to the floor. Here's what transpired:

It was pretty amazing. There were close to 25 of us, and you can see Amy's mom on the far left and possibly her grandma, equally rocking out.

This obviously moves me closer to my ultimate goal of learning the entire "Thriller" dance. It still remains on the bucket list.