blamebrampton

I love the J, but his idea of catharsis is to read about Min here, and you are all too bloody lovely, and it ends in tears. Unsurprisingly, this is the same reason I am behind on some of my replies to comments, because I can only do so many before I have to step up and walk around and go outside and look intently at the roses or think of something manly. I have been reading back issues of F1, and Scouting for Boys.

All of this grief is my excuse for writing fic about my cat. Just look away, it's not sane. We are not sane people when it comes to the Min cat. Her ashes are back and we will send her off to her garden spots tomorrow and then we will be saner. Really.

… a very good last day. There was sun, salmon, some compost guarding, and some me guarding as she checked the laptop posed no threat.

And, at the end, with all of us kneeling around her cushions in the garden, she tried to bite the vet despite being sedated to the eyeballs. Because near-death does not mean a Min cat should give up the fight. The vet was incredibly charmed by this, and described it as extremely Minlike. The vet nurse cheered Min on, which I suspect was a trifle treacherous.

It is clear to me now that I cannot die before J, because, like the good, strong, tough man he is, he is bawling.

I have discovered that I can write 15K words in a bit over 24 hours. I shouldn't, but if the fate of the world ever hangs on 15K of H/D being produced in a day, call me.

And if you ever want to shriek: "Oh fuck oh fuck my life has imploded in every direction and I have only half-written this fic with 24 hours to go on a rigid deadline!!!" call me, too.

I'll tell you that you can do it, and then bind you to the gang who swears never again for a rigid deadline.

The only reason I was able to get this story done was because I had a lot of help, so I would like to stand here in public and testify that the following people are bloody marvellous. Normally I have one lovely beta, but she and I see pretty much eye-to-eye on everything, and I needed a different view on parts of this tale, so in the end there were five people who helped me get over the line.

jadzialove is so calm, competent and supportive that I wish she was actually the US Secretary of State since there might be some hope for the Mid-East Peace Process if she were. Thank you so much for your many hours of fine-toothing and gentle poking.

pushdragon is like one of those paladins in a medieval tale who rides in at the crucial moment to say "Yes, no, are you aware that you actually forgot a word in this sentence without which it can mean three different things, and you made a joke about X, hurrah for jokes about X!" That supportiveness came on a really shitty day and I am grateful for it.

bryoneybrynn is a champion, not just for being the only one among us to spot one particular typo (out of many), but also for her sensible suggestions on when occasionally more is more. Not to mention the cheeriness of demands for more. On that topic, oh animagi fest girl ...

oceaxe was wonderful help on the first section, which I had overwritten because I wanted to show everything that happened, except that a lot of that belonged in another story. Not to mention her delicate hint that I can be culturally untranslateable on occasion. Guilty as charged! and, I hope, sorted.

and who_la_hoop was another wonderful pair of eyes to remind me that young people today are young, and also that they teach people to spell like Americans far too much these days. Jail was bad enough, but fetus? What is the world coming to?

Anyway, you all led to a tighter, and more cohesive story which was actually achievable, rather than the epic novel I seemed to be headed towards for a while there! Many many thanks to you all, and let me know when I can return the favour.

In sad news, Min is enjoying her last day as a garden ornament. Her breathing has started to grow laboured at night and she threw up her breakfast today. She is back out guarding the bags of compost from the compost thieves, and Carmen the lovely vet will come over this afternoon at five. I have given myself a mental health day and will spend it housecleaning and regularly popping out to take cat photos. She is blissfully unconcerned and has just nibbled a pelargonium. Typical.

The Min cat is still with us!

In fact, aside from one alarming night and an ongoing wheeze, she has been in robust good health. She has even reclaimed her kitty tower as 'the' place to be after disdaining it for most of the last year.

In some ways it is simply tragic to see how healthy she is, aside from the cancer. On the other hand, it is wonderful to see that she is in good spirits and clearly no or very minimal pain. The many good wishes she has been sent have definitely been helping! Well -- they've definitely helped us at any rate!

The salmon diet, apparently, is the kitty version of medical marijuana. I have had to go out and buy another stash of tins, hurrah! We're onto the good red salmon, sod the wussy pink.

The weather has been exceptionally cooperative, and after the first wet summer in a decade has continued fine and dry since she has been home, so she has sat in her pot of miscanthus each day, then trotted out to follow the late afternoon sun. Her old people have visited her daily and she is pleased to see that she is finally being worshipped appropriately. In further good news, the local vets will be able to come here to euthanise her when the time comes, and there is a pet crematorium who do local pick-ups. We plan to scatter her ashes in her garden beds (several) and favourite rat hunting ground.

For my part I have been a bit lj invisible for the last few days as I desperately struggle to get through my worldcup fic. No extensions under any circumstances is a bit ghastly, since no one can plan for RL disasters and there are a number of people in even worse situations than me who are left hanging between flogging themselves and letting down their teams. We are all choosing to flog ourselves, but I do feel that in a perfect world we'd have a little leeway to work some more sleep into the schedule.

Oh well, when you read the fic with more typos than any other (and you do not want to KNOW how bad my brain is at homonyms when I am this thinly spread), be kind, it will be mine, and it will not in any way be the fault of my lovely betas.

Back to the writing and the listening to breathing, out and in, with only a little whistle, she still has time ...

Was reading Ring for Jeeves the other day and burst out laughing. Colonel Aubrey Wyvern's third-rate domestic staff are named Trelawny and Bulstrode.

Also, Happy Birthday raitala! And happy birthday for tomorrow, draykonis.

In sad news, Min cat is now out of chances and is living out her last weeks with all the salmon she can fit in.  The lovely vet assistant from the uber vet dropped round her pain meds this evening. She doesn't need them tonight, but it's good to have them. Poor brave kitty.

The thing that really irks me about diagnostic medical dramas is that they start off with something relatively innocuous, like asthma, then progress to more extreme probabilities, such as pneumonia and lymphoma, and then in the third act the tests come back and the chief medico (in this case Richard the understanding and sympathetic uber vet) breaks the news that it's not as he hoped and is in fact a carcinoma. At which point either a miracle cure is effected as the last crucial piece of information falls into place, or it becomes a maudlin exploration of death with dignity.

So, to be the bearer of bad tidings, the Min cat is down to her last thin hope.

It could well be a thyroid-based carcinoma, and, if it is, it may be one that responds well to radioactive iodine. Otherwise she has a few weeks to a month, maybe two at the very outside.

I didn't ask for percentages, because it either will or won't and there's really not much point playing maths for the next two days until those tests are back.

In happier news, she's at home and breathing quite well. As Richard said, it is bizarre that she has improved markedly over the last two days, and, aside from being near death, she is in excellent health. It seems extremely unfair. J and I are trying to be all jolly as she bounds up and down the hallway and leaps out from her hidey hole under the study bed to scoff salmon.

So we will be on constant kitty watch for the next four days, wait for news, and assess our options. In a worst-case scenario, we'll see about day boarding her at the vet next week so that she won't be alone if she has a bad attack while we're at work. I'm taking tomorrow of and J is taking Friday.

On Min's part, she is happy to be home and appalled that other cats have apparently been in her garden. She is hiding under her favourite bed and being a bit freaked out, despite the fact we have put the cat box away. She knows Things Are Afoot. I can see her keeping her Stoic front up so that any bopping on the head is delayed for as long as kittily possible. And of course, aside from the fact that her windpipe is being closed by cancer, she is in excellent condition. But she could do with a spot of luck for once.

As things are, we will be spending tomorrow in the garden, with the expensive salmon, and a water gun so she doesn't need to make any effort should stray cats appear.

A very happy birthday to dumbys_baby and i_autumnheart, who are both nearly at the day after, but the phone was used! Fingers crossed life will calm down enough for the three of us to catch up in person before too long. Easter, I suppose.

Happy birthday also to celandineb who is such a force for good, I hope that the silly things that are plaguing you will stop soon and under_an_oak, who wages a glorious battle against faceless corporatism, with style and wit. I hope you have both been visited by the present fairy. Happy birthday for tomorrow to aoifene, you're lovely, but you know that.

OK, that's enough about people whose parents were frisky in June.

Saw Min this evening, she was mildly interested to see us, which changed to fairly interested when we pulled the tins of pink salmon from my handbag. She'd not been eating today, probably because they offered her cat food. After hoovering most of one tin, she looked up at us with an expression of mild satisfaction. The vet laughed a lot. We explained that when she was feral she lived on rats and scraps from the Thai restaurant and was fed tidbits by the posh restaurant crew.

She seemed in reasonable nick, if quiet and grumpy. She hates her drip, but may well lose it tomorrow if she keeps eating and drinking. And then it looks like chemo on Wednesday or Thursday morning.

Then we were trapped in a traffic jam on the North Shore, where people cannot manage a simple merge to the point they cause accidents. At least there's a fair chance it was an actual OAP ...

 Firstly, you folk are amazing. Thank you all very much for all the human support and cat love; I even managed to sleep for five-and-a-bit hours!

Two vet conversations today. The first one was to check she'd lived through the night. The night vet was a nice chick who confided that she'd nearly rung me to tell me it looked hopeless around 1am but had slapped Min back in the oxygen box and thought to wait ten minutes first. After ten minutes, Min was so much better that she settled down and had a good old sleep. The vet was astonished, and very glad she'd not 'woken me' (I didn't confess I stayed up till 6.30 so I could be sure of talking to her before she went, because I'm only comfortable looking that odd in front of J and you).

Then she popped Min back in her box and Min proceeded to eat up all her food and sit down and have a good groom. Said the vet: I have never seen another cat do that, ever.

Me: Oh Min loves food. When she stops eating, she won't be dying, she'll be dead.

Vet: Great cat, I can see why you guys like her so much! Anyway, I'm much more optimistic about her than I was at 1am. The medical specialist is in at 9am and he'll give you a call when he knows what's up.

The medical specialist just called. He said that she had had a bad attack of fighting for breath shortly after he'd come on duty, so he'd investigated her first and found numerous growths in her windpipe (I KNEW her lungs weren't full of fluid!). He'd scraped several back and collected tissue samples for path. She was actually responding quite well to the increased airway and the oxygen tube, though he was keeping her under some sedation. He said that he thought the most likely story was lymphoma of the windpipe.

"Ooh," I said, deflated.

"No, you see it sounds bad, but that's actually good!" he said. "We have a saying that if you have to have cancer, be sure to get lymphoma, because it responds better to treatment than anything else!"

"Oh," I said, more hopefully.

"So you may well end up with a cat on chemo, but that's not too expensive and it's eminently survivable. We have a Siamese in here at the moment who had it four years ago, and he's fine, except for his broken leg."

"Was that the cat that was yowling all last night?"

"Er, probably."

"So she'll have a voice, still?"

"Oh yes, though she seems very quiet."

"She is, until she wishes to announce to other cats they are about to die, then she's loud."

"She sounds like a real character."

"Easily the most interesting cat I have ever owned!"

At this point I realised I was doing what I do when I get run over and impressing upon the medical people that they want to go to extreme efforts to save this cat/person of great charm. So I stopped. The vet told me that the path would be back on Tuesday and that we would have a plan of action by then. I forgot to ask if we could visit.

Thank you all again for the good wishes and positive vibes, I am sure that knowing her importance in the universe is no small part of Min's resilience in the face of great adversity!

Now, off to research cat chemo!

My poor old cat found us several years ago soon after we had moved into this house. She was a keen investigator, and would come and supervise while I worked on the garden, occasionally digging up plants she thought were less than perfect and squashing others she considered good bedding material. After asking around, we found that she belonged to two lovely people in the back street and had been rescued by them some years previously, to join their brood of three ancient cats.

While it took her time to let us touch her or to come inside the house, she slowly moved from being amusing visitor to being regular guest. She'd trot in with us when we came home from work and then trot out for dinner around nine, returning for a sleepover around 10. Original owners thought this was a good system because she stopped picking fights with their ancient cats before dinner.

After a year of this, she suddenly became sleeker. We thought this was just because the evil cow next door who used to feed her but lied about it had moved out (NB, her original owners knew she was hanging out with us but we didn't feed her because she wasn't 'ours', they laughed with us about her teenaged couch surfing.) We ran into the owners on the street and they expressed dismay; they had a new cat who beat the crap out of Min, she had stopped coming home at all. They thought she must be starving and feral.

"Actually," we said, "She's in fantastic nick, all glossy and sleek. She must be living on rats and mice." And so she was. We watched that night and she trotted down to the railway outside our house, then returned with a rat half the size of her own body which she proceeded to munch happily on. They asked that we take over her primary care and continue to visit her daily out he front of our place.

Since Min became 'our' cat (she still acts as though she is a time share), she's had a few exciting medical moments including the $1200+ abscess last year, but has mostly been fit and healthy if a bit battered from her habit of scrapping with all and sundry including giant railway rats. Then at Christmas she caught a cold.

And she is still wheezing.

She's had steroid shots, antibiotics, herbal gunk and what have you. Hot vet from the local surgery now says he thinks it is feline asthma and has her scheduled for X-rays and a possible bronchial lavage tomorrow morning. He sent me home to read up on feline asthma and its treatments. There's a great site on asthmatic cats here, including photos of them using an inhaler here. I have broken out my pruning gauntlets in case we need to teach her to use the inhaler and hired my hot young friend to come around tomorrow while Min is at the vets and remove all the allergy-inducing weeds from the garden.

Meanwhile we are hoovering the entire house and have sprayed the futon where she likes to sleep in case of dust mites.

I can't help thinking that if we'd just had a child when we decided to adopt this cat, the offspring would be up to doing the dishes and bringing us breakfast in bed by now. Though I suppose we'd not be able to leave a Brammers Jnr in the laundry with food on the front verandah when we go on hols ...