Whacked Out Schedule

My sleep schedule got whacked out quickly, when trying to catch the starving calico. Waking every few hours to check a trap, for only a couple of days, really knocked me for a loop. I must getting really old.

Or sick. Last night, I was freezing, even though it was warm in here. I might be getting a cold. I fell asleep early, on my couch, maybe as early as 7:00, when watching the news. I just woke up. It's 6:00 a.m. That's a long sleep.

The cats were not happy with "the long doze". I did wake up a couple times, uncomfortable on the couch, which has failing springs. I always hurt myself when I fall asleep on that thing. Boy, I need to avoid that from happening.

I lost momentum in getting a couple more Christmas packages out, one to each of my brother's families, so it never got done. I have to do it today.

I ordered a couple books for my one brother and his wife, who are book nuts, and they never came, due to the storm I think. Plus Christmas rush mail, which now is a mess due to the storm in Salem and Portland. Albany missed the storm. So did Corvallis. It was balmy in these parts the last couple of days, while the storm in points north of Salem, crippled up that area in total.

I think it's still a mess up there, with snow and freezing rain.

I got caught up trying to catch a cat at the homeless shelter in Corvallis. It was supposed to be the Siamese manx a cat hater dumped in Corvallis, from his Gladstone neighborhood. Long story. One neighbor has been posting about him off and on on craigslist, for people in Corvallis to watch for him.

The neighbors allegedly came down after Thanksgiving to search for him. There were, allegedly, four sightings, two of them near the Borders bookstore on 9th. Then I was called by the homeless shelter, Community OUtreach, that clients there had been feeding this cat. I talked to several clients and staff, emphasizing what a Siamese looks like and they swore it was him, even had him named---Bob.

Clients there are not allowed to feed strays, but some were. I went over early yesterday morning, after contacting the Gladstone man still looking for the cat, that this was likely him. Unfortunately, it wasn't. I ran into one client, whom I knew from long ago when I lived homeless along the river. He knows cats and immediately described the cat they were feeding as gray, medium hair and a female. Then as one, all the other folks, who had told me he was a Siamese, changed their stories, too, that it was really a gray cat with a short tail they were feeding.

Finding reliable eyewitnesses is almost impossible. People turn something they see into something else, for lots of reasons. The only part of the description of the missing cat that is apparently getting through is "manx" and the color and everything else is justified into "Siamese" for interesting reasons by people who have reported seeing this lost cat. It is rather fascinating to think about.

I think about the unworthiness of eye witness accounts in trials. People have been sent away for life, even executed based on eye witness accounts. I know what eye witness accounts are worth just in my experience with cats and talking to people about lost cats or cats in a colony. Eye witness accounts are worth----zilch!

Well, I did reset the trap up there early this morning. Went back, and who do I have in it? NOt the starving calico. A huge honking beat up gray male. He was difficult to haul down a steep bank and across a busy highway this morning, on my bad shoulder.

He'll be neutered today, as a favor. Otherwise, the clinic is closed all week, and only open briefly next week. I am lost without anything to do these days, and going stir crazy. Part of my problem last night, in sleeping 12 hours, was becoming overwhelmed in lonliness. I don't see anybody or talk to anybody. It's just really very hard on me, the constant aloneness and dealing with so many difficult issues, the constant animal abuse and abandonment around here, the tragedies and horrors. This is very tough to deal with alone.