Currently I have three foster kittens, formerly feral and fierce, now adorable lap cats who purr endlessly and chase each other around. They are large enough and more than tame enough to be adopted out... but they can't go back to the pound and go up for adoption until they are free of their ringworm (ringworm, a ridiculously misnamed ailment, is not a worm but instead a fungal infection which causes cats' fur to fall out in little circles). There are several schools of thought about treating ringworm, but my rescue program currently believes in sulfur dips. This means taking writhing, clawing animals and dousing them completely in buckets of bright yellow liquid until one's entire body, clothing, and home smell like rotten eggs.
Today I felt like multitasking and getting two things done simultaneously that I'd been procrastinating over for days: touching up my roots and dipping the cats. The latest sulfur protocol calls for shampooing the cats before dipping them. I put dye on my roots and put the cats in the shower, with the bucket of sulfur handy. I got in myself. One of the crazed kittens jumped on my butt and clawed herself up to my shoulders, and I started screaming obscenities. I got out of that shower as fast as I could, and all the kittens escaped, taking refuge in the large, covered litterbox, which seemed like the best hiding spot available. When I pulled them out of there, of course their wet fur was coated with cat litter of varying degrees of cleanliness, which got all over the bathroom, which now looked like a hellhole as well as smelling like one.
Later, much later, after all the hell of the morning was over, I said to the husband, "I think that was the most stupid thing I've ever done."
"What were you thinking? It would be fun? That they would gambol around your feet while you showered?"
"I thought they'd cower over in the corner when I wasn't washing them."
8 comments:
OMG! This is SO what I would do!
Hahaha. That is sad for you. :D
You and I and the zoo keeper at the SF Zoo can form a "Seemed like the thing to do at the time" Club.
That'll teach you to multi-task!
Eh, my roots didn't come out so hot. I'll do them again in a week or two (I need to start economizing more, sigh, and one of the obvious candidates for economy is dying my roots at home rather than going to my beloved hairdresser).
OMG what an awesome post. By the way do you have any other ringworm suggestions? I think one of our adoptees has it. (A cat, I mean)
Homoeopathic THUJA, SULPHUR, BACILLINUM are very effective treatments for ringworm. For cats I would dose their drinking water or some goats milk. Ring your local homoeopathic chemist and see if they can post you something, The remedies are not very expensive and they will likely be happy to advise you. Good luck. Hope you are recovering from your sulphur dip ;-)
I just guffawed.
Hello! I'm semi-new...I've been catching up from the beginning and enjoying every post.
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