Cat Scratch Fever

It was a dark and stormy night. The dog was nestled on the air-mattress next to me, the cat was prowling the house and E was out of town. The rain was gently tapping on the window, then blowing against the window with gales of 40mph, then horizontal sheets of water were thrust directly through the window and door and onto the bedroom floor while gently, no, violently spraying my face with cascades of water. Well, it isn't too far from the truth. 

The Neighbors were terrific, lending me a huge bag of beach towels to stop the water from infiltrating the house. Here I was, all worried about leaks in the roof. I had buckets, pots and pans all ready to go. I didn't expect to be wrenching the door open with a hammer the following day with visible veins of water in the wood.

That isn't even the fun part. The best was when the tiger cat presumably fed and left by the previous owner yowled from 3am-10am when I lured it out from under the house with food. The animal shelter/animal control didn't have any units available due to the vast quantities of rain that landed in my room the previous night and was still seeping in. They suggested luring it into a box and bringing it into the shelter. Thus it began. The cat came, purred, rubbed, licked, then BIT. It latched it's komodo dragon of a mouth onto my hand. To the ER I went, thankfully I had my father-in-law's automatic truck. The sparkle in the sky part about this story is that the ER is awesome. The wait time was nil (I'm sure a blood soaked paper towel helped) and of all the ERs I've known before, and there have been many, this was the best.

Now I could go on about how the parking garage only accepted cash/check and I of course left the house thinking "I better make sure I have my check book at more than $5 in cash on me". I could tell you that the hospital's ATM was broken and I was directed down the street which I dutifully started walking to in the pouring rain. I also realized after 6 blocks it was crazy and went back, tried asking the parking lot attendant to let me out, hold onto a credit card, and I'd be back with cash. Nope. I could then tell you how I then walked in the rain again to another 'closer' place to get cash. You see, I could tell you that, but that would have nothing to do with the theme of this blog, but if I did, it would be extremely therapeutic.  

Back at the ranch the rain continued to come down and towels continued to get soaked. In the past 48hrs I've learned:

The roof doesn't leak

The windows/doors leak

The clothes dryer doesn't work

The oven doesn't work

The fire alarm Does work. 

And on a last note, I withheld pictures pertaining to today's post owing to the fact that I am way too tempted to take a picture of the puncture, blood, and puss on my hand. Instead, meet Betsy the neighbor: