Little Mouse

Mouse was the runt of the litter.  She fit in the pocket of my pajamas when she was a kitten, and I named her Mouse because that's exactly what she looked like - a little gray mouse. 

Every one of my cats had a unique personality, and Mouse was no exception.  I wondered many times if cats can get schizophrenia like people do, since she seemed to fit the profile.  For most of her 13 years she lived under my bed.  When I could get close enough to touch her, she cringed as if my very touch caused her pain.   

It was as if she had a sign on her back that said "kick me".  Some of the other cats recognized her weakness and would lay in wait when she came out for food, pouncing on her and chasing her back under the bed.

In March I noticed that she was wheezing.  Her appetite still seemed good, but she was losing weight, and she wasn't a big cat to begin with.  And her behavior changed - she started hanging out with me, jumping up on the couch, laying next to me, and letting me stroke her back.  I put some blankets in an old laundry basket near my bed and Mouse took up residence there.  Her breathing got so bad that I actually dug a grave in my backyard in preparation.  But the vet gave her an antibiotic and an antihistamine, and she rallied just before I came to Minnesota for the summer. 

Sadly, she continued to lose weight, and when my pet sitter took her to the vet he told me that he thought she was in renal failure.  Through my tears I gave him the go-ahead to put her to sleep, knowing that it was the right thing to do for her.  She was 13.

So now my house has 2 cats - Grace (Mouse's Mom) and Sam (Mouse's brother).  I won't have 5 cats sleeping on or near me at night, greeting me at the door, and following me everywhere. 

I've always said that when my cats are gone, so am I.  Not in the literal sense - I just don't want to live in Texas anymore.  The state was good to me job-wise, but I long for the 4 seasons I can enjoy in Minnesota, along with the proximity to my family. 

I didn't know you well Little Mouse, but I'll miss you all the same.  And I know that Sam will miss grabbing you by the scruff of the neck and holding you hostage. 

The Sleepy Shells

My four year old great-niece told me about building a sand castle this weekend and how she was sad because the shells were sleepy and floated away, only to be eaten by fish.

Here's how the conversation went:

Me: Did you build a sand castle on the beach?

Niece: It was a big castle!

Me: How many bedrooms did the castle have?

Niece: Mommy helped me build rooms for the shells, but then they fell asleep, and floated away, and a fish is going to eat them now!

Me: Well, maybe the shells bedroom is in the fish's stomach, and they just wanted to go to bed.

Niece: No, that's not right, because it's dark in a fish's stomach.

Me: But isn't it dark in your room when you sleep too?

Niece: No, I have a little light.

Me: So maybe there's a light in the fish's stomach too.

Niece: No, there's no light in a fish's stomach.

Me: How do you know?  Have you ever seen inside a fish's stomach?

That ended the conversation.  Either she thinks I'm really really smart since I know where shells sleep, or she'll be telling stories about her crazy Aunt for the rest of her life.

Sydney's Garden

Sydney and Maalea were twins, and I adopted them as soon as their Mother weaned them.  They were born in my friend Karen's backyard in August of 1991.  I'd never had a cat before, but still agreed to take one.  Karen played on my emotions and told me that twins shouldn't be separated, so I took them both.

Maalea died of cancer in 1998, and my grief-spurred energy made me dig a pond in my Texas backyard.  I dug through the Texas clay and finished it in two days, collapsing from exhaustion each night.  Maalea's pond is still going strong.

Sydney died Tuesday at the very advanced age of 19 3/4 years old.  My last trip home I knew he was failing - he stayed in one place for long periods of time, wasn't eating, and seemed out of it at times.  My last night there I picked him up and brought him to bed with me, where he stayed all night.  In the morning I hugged him and kissed him and told him how much I loved him.  He purred loudly, and finally had enough - he jumped down and went looking for food.  I knew in my heart that I was saying goodbye to him then.

Again, my grief led to a burst of energy.  This time I dug a garden around a chokecherry tree near my Summer Palace.  It's planted with shades of blue and purple, with pops of orange.  Although the sign in the garden says "Sandy's Summer Palace", it's really Sydney's Garden. 

Rest in peace sweet boy.  Every time I look at your garden I'll smile, knowing you'd approve of the catmint I put in one corner for you.

The Tunisian Bellhop

We disembarked the aircraft in a fog, with little sleep on the transatlantic flight DFW to Frankfurt, and a 7-hour time change to contend with.  Luckily, our hotel was connected to the airport terminal, so after Immigrations and Customs we collected our bags and walked over.  As we entered the cavernous, sun-filled lobby of the Sheraton, a man in a bellhop uniform practically ran towards us, shouting how happy he was to see us.  He immediately took my bags from me (however, not my traveling companion's) and ushered us to the reception desk. 

As we were being checked in, he continued to circle me, exclaiming how much he liked me. 

"I'm so glad you're not blonde", he said.  "I don't like blondes."  He moved right in front of my face as if to study it further, and then told the reception clerk to put my colleague in a room far away from me so that he could come up and flirt with me.  My colleague, also female, is blonde.  Alas, it just wasn't her day.

As the reception clerk checking me in rolled her eyes, she confessed to me that the bellhop was her father, and that her mother was the clerk two positions down.  I could tell that she had seen this little performance before.

I heard a Scottish or Irish accent in the man, so asked him if he was Celtic.  He kept circling me, hooting how much he loved me.  He finally said no, "I'm Tunisian - I'm Arab".  Wherever he learned his English, his instructor was definitely Scottish.

He took us to our rooms (he didn't get his wish - our rooms were next to each other), and I laughed the whole way.  I tipped him $5 and shooed him out the door after he told us how to get downtown on the train.

I never saw him again, but he certainly made the start of my trip to Frankfurt more interesting!

Vigil for a Sick Cat

Mouse was the runt of the litter, and was seemingly born with a sign on her back that said "kick me".  She lived under my bed for the first 10 years, then moved upstairs the last 2.  She seemed to like me, sidling up to me occasionally, but cringing when I tried to pet her.  I finally realized last year that she was deaf, which explains a lot about her behavior.  She is constantly being startled, not hearing when other cats (or humans) approach.

A couple of weeks ago she developed a cough and started sneezing.  I did my research on the internet, which said that either she was dying of an incurable disease or she had a cold.  Not having a lot of cash on hand, I haven't taken her to the vet.  I feel a lot of guilt about that, but it's been a bad year for me - lots of plumbing bills, medical bills, and the economy has left me a bit strapped.

Mouse started hanging out with me - she'd jump up on the couch and sleep next to me, allowing me to pet her, first time in her thirteen years of life.  One night as I jumped into bed, she actually climbed under the covers and snuggled next to my chest, falling asleep until I had to turn over.  Now I knew she was sick - this was strange behavior for her.

I put a laundry basket full of clean laundry on the bench at the end of my bed, and Mouse claimed it for her own.  I eventually needed to rewash the sheets in the basket, so fixed up a nice spare basket with a blanket and a towel for her very own. 

When I went to Ethiopia I really didn't know if she'd be alive when I got home.  She was, but now she was wheezing and sounded awful.  She was still eating though, and as affectionate as ever.

Two days after I got home, her breathing became much worse, and she struggled to get oxygen even while sleeping.  When I opened the can of cat foot, she didn't come running like she normally does.  I even brought the food bowl to her basket to try and encourage her to eat, but she just turned her head.

All Monday I checked on her every 15 minutes or so, sometimes laying at the foot of the bed with my hand on her back, willing her to get better or to be free of her pain.  I went to the backyard, found a nice shady spot, and dug a grave for her.  I said my goodbyes, and thought that when I woke up the next morning she'd be gone.

But just the opposite happened.  The next morning, when I reached in her basket to pet her, I could tell her breathing was better, and she didn't have the smell of sickness on her.  She leaped out of her basket and sat in front of her food bowl as if it was just a normal day. 

I fed her twice Tuesday, and twice today.  She is still living in the laundry basket at the foot of my bed, but seems to be better.  Who knows what tomorrow may bring?  I'll still wake up tomorrow morning expecting to bury my littlest one, but miracles do happen...

Injera, Tej, and Giggles

In my last post, I told you a little about the traditional meal we enjoyed while in Addis Ababa.  Being a foodie, I thought it deserved a little more attention.

There are no tables in the restaurant; only small rattan tables the size of an end table back home.  The chairs are wooden, straight-backed, and low to the ground.  There are carpets spread everywhere on the wood floor, and the air is full of the scent of frankincense, used in the Ethiopian coffee ritual.  If you're Catholic, you know what that smells like, because it's the same incense used on high holy days. 

The middle of the restaurant is dominated by a semi-circular stage, and 4 musicians are playing traditional instruments.  I can't remember what they are called, but they sound like a guitar, violin, drums, and flute. 

It's fasting season, what we call Lent, so there is a fasting (vegetarian) and a non-fasting buffet.  We go to the buffet area, where an attendant squirts soap on our right hand, and pours water over our hand into a basin.  Remember, only the right hand is used for eating, so that's the only one that gets washed. 

The injera is rolled up, and there are different colors.  We take a plate, and unroll a couple of sheets of injera to cover the bottom of the plate.  This will serve as our serving platter.  A third roll will serve as our fork and spoon. Then we choose from several pots of what can only be called stew or pureed food, both vegetarian and non.  Some of the choices included spinach, green beans, lentils, chickpeas, lamb, and chicken.  Each choice is puddled onto the injera until you have 8 or 10 little circles of food on your plate. 

Once we returned to our eating area, we were served Tej, a honey wine which really packs a punch.  It tastes like a wine cooler on steroids.  It's served in a glass shaped like an old-fashioned lab beaker; round on the bottom, and a small opening on the top.  To drink, you hold it between your index and middle finger and try not to spill it all over you.  It doesn't help that the Ethiopian girls next to you giggle every time you take a drink.

Now onto the food.  Using only your right hand, a small piece of the injera (think pancake) is torn off the spare roll and is used to grab one or more chunks of the stews on the plate.  It's all put in your mouth in one bite and washed down by the Tej.  Needless to say, your right hand gets quite messy.  The napkin you're given is not used for the hand however, only to wipe your mouth when necessary.  In between bites, the right hand is kept cupped upwards in your lap.  The spinach was my favorite.

Ah, the dancing has started.  There is a story behind the dances, but they all seem to have something to do with boy meets girl, girl spurns boy, boy chases girl, happy ever after, etc.  Except for the one with the umbrellas - I'm not sure what that one meant. 

I can now understand the enthusiam people have when they talk of Ethiopian food.  I thought Ethiopian food meant tough, stringy, chicken and lamb, which is all I ever seem to eat there.  If you go, I recommend sticking to the fasting menu.

Toilet Paper Gratitude, or Four Days On the Road, One Night in a Bed

My latest adventures started Sunday, with a trip to the airport.  I was flying Dallas Fort Worth to Cincinnati to Washington, DC.  After a night in a hotel there, I'd head for Addis Ababa, Ethiopia Monday.  Boarding started, and just as I was about to hear the satisfying beep of the gate reader, the pilot came out to the gate and said "stop boarding, we have a problem".  Within a few minutes, the delay was such that there was no way I was going to be able to make my 30 minute connection in Cincinnati, so after a phone call to Delta, they got me rebooked on the AA nonstop flight the next morning.  I got to go home and spend another night with my cats.

Knowing that my flight was leaving at 7 a.m., I went to bed around 8.  And was wide awake at midnight.  I tossed and turned, and when the alarm went off at 3:45 a.m., I was actually grateful.  To make it slightly worse, it was the night that the clocks "spring" forward, so there went another hour of sleep.

The flight to Dulles airport was uneventful, and I made the Ethiopian Airlines flight to Addis with plenty of time to spare.  Thirteen hours in the air, and try as I might, no sleep for me.  Just when I thought I might doze off, there was a tap on my shoulder. 

"Canape, ma'am?" 

I looked up at the flight attendant, and said, "when is this flight landing?"

"About 7 hours, ma'am", he said.

"And you woke me up to ask me if I wanted canapes?"

I politely declined more food, and rolled over.  I still couldn't sleep, and now I was pissed off because the flight attendant wanted me to sit up and eat.  So I sat up and played games on my iPad the rest of the flight. 

We landed an hour late, made it through Immigration and Customs, and headed to the hotel for a shower.  We somehow showered, changed, and applied makeup in twenty minutes - my personal best.  The bus that was supposed to pick us up never showed, so we took a taxi to the office.  Of course with the office being on the airport grounds, they had to drop us off at a security office about a half mile from the actual building.  After getting permission to come in, we walked.  And walked. 

We made it to the office, and what was supposed to be a two-hour meeting turned into six.  At this office, the bathrooms are cleaned often, but the toilet paper is stocked once.  When the one roll is gone, it's gone for the day.  I really missed my own office building, where the toilet paper magically appears when it's close to being gone. 

Back at the hotel, we debriefed for two hours (and I must admit, had a couple of beers), then I hit the wall.  I had been awake for 36 hours, so I went to bed without supper.

The next day, I got up at 5 hoping to catch up on some e-mail.  We caught the bus this time, and worked until 6:30 p.m., when we were taken out to dinner at a traditional Ethiopian restaurant.  There, we learned about injera, a pancake-like bread, which is used to form the bottom of the plate.  After a hand-washing ceremony where only the right hand is washed, we chose several stew-like dishes to ladle onto the injera.  Extra injera is taken to eat the food with.  There are no utensils - you tear the injera using only your right hand, and use it to scoop up bits of the other food. 

Music and dancing ensued, and then the bus showed up to take us to the airport.  A fifteen hour flight later, we landed in Washington again, still with no sleep.  Delta messed up again, this time to my advantage - they rebooked me on a nonstop flight home.  So instead of getting home around 5, I walked in my door before 2. 

A short power nap later (5 hours), I awoke and watched TV.  For 2 hours.  I hit the wall again, and slept until 6 this morning. 

This is exactly how not to travel if you can help it.