Cat Eyes---A Cat Woman's Photos: 10 Local Cats Fixed Today (I Think)

I took nine local cats up to the FCCO to be fixed. A tenth cat was supposed to have been fixed at Heartland, an Albany stray male. The person helping him out says he'll have a home if he is fixed. So I hope she got him over there.

I slept a very long night last night, going to bed before 8:00 p.m. so I was well rested today. I was rested enough to tackle something I do not enjoy after dropping off the cats at the clinic--looking for some pants at thrift stores, namely--Value Village.

I finally got two pair of used jeans. They're not frayed and don't have holes or stains, which is more than I can say for any of the jeans I currently own. I don't like shopping. I put it off until I am living in rags.

I don't have money for clothes anyhow, so that gives me good reason to put it off. I have odd long narrow high arch feet too, which are not feet that should be on a poor person, since finding shoes for my feet is really tough. I usually own one pair of tennis shoes, one pair of boots that can hopefully last at least a decade, then a pair or two of flip flops. I wear the tennis shoe type daily until they fall off in pieces. By then I hope it's summer when I switch to flip flops or go barefoot. I'm not a person that cares much anyway about having fancy things. Someone gave me a bag of black T-shirts right after Christmas that they did not want, and I've been wearing them pretty much every day since then. They fit just fine. That was a real blessing to get those.

Then I went back to the clinic and picked up the cats, who were done early, thank goodness, and came home. Seven boys and two girls. The two girls were one from the riverside business, in Corvallis, and the stray Albany mom, mom to that cute little bottle boy I took to Heartland, when I took the two seed warehouse black boys. She's been in a hutch in my garage since last Monday. Now she's fixed and can go back. The couple will continue to feed her.

Two of the seed warehouse boys have been here awhile, since last Sunday night, and they are aching to get out of confinement. So they will be very happy to get out of here. All three black cats from the warehouse were boys. Then the five from the riverside business colony in Corvallis, four boys (two of them kittens) and one girl.

I was trying to get just the adults there, but three kittens knocked over the drop trap on themselves. One slipped out a hole in my netting. I then found many holes in the drop trap netting. It's falling apart too, like everything else I own. I kept the two, then set it up again and dropped it on two adult males and a female. The other female and male took off and so did other kittens, but five was good enough. I was worn out and anxious to call it a day.

I go home though and the warehouse calls me, says there's a cat in a trap out there. I tell her how to check for an ear tip. I'd already called a worker there and asked him to close the traps but he had not done so yet. The woman checks and claims the cat does not have an ear tip. So I go all the way back out there. I'm worn out because I was out there until midnight the night before then got up that morning at 4:30 a.m. to go back out. Had no luck though, just caught lots of already fixed cats again.

The cat turned out to be already tipped, she just hadn't seen it. Those tips can be hard to see, first time trying to tell. But then I spot the Siamese and her kittens. One is in bad shape with eyes running and shut. I try, for an hour, to fish him out of pallets, that are tight together with heavy huge hundreds of pounds bags of seed atop them. I fail and am bummed, knowing the kitten will not make it.

Two River Business male kittens fixed today.

River business female fixed today.

And then, from the River Business Corvallis colony, also two black males fixed today. In all, five big black males were fixed today, counting the three from the seed warehouse.

2nd Corvallis river business black male fixed today.

I come home, exhausted, but at peace with it, knowing I gave it my all. I went to bed early. So I got a great nights sleep and nine and maybe ten more cats were fixed today. Tomorrow, most will go back to their cat families and I'll be back at it, trying again, trying to stem the tide of overpopulation, seems a lot like plugging holes in a dike with a finger, a broken finger at that.