A Day at the Beach

No, I didn't go to the beach.

But getting that bad tooth pulled Friday seemed like a day at the beach, compared to suffering the pain I'd been in from it.  I think the real phrase might be "a walk in the park".

I enjoyed getting it gone.   Going to the dentist always makes me think of that Steve Martin classic Little Shop of Horrors.  And coincidentally, the dentist had rented the local theater for a night as a patient appreciation event with a showing of Little Shop of Horrors. 

He wanted to show Marathon Man, but his staff said "no" to that.

I was home again before 1:00 p.m. on Friday. 

Saturday, I set out early.  Karen was coming down from Portland.  She had 25 reservations today at the FCCO clinic up there.  We never caught 25 cats however.  We did end up with 16, which is not bad, because without a working car and with a bad tooth, I'd not been able to deliver traps for pre-feeding or much of anything else.

I picked up a Sweet Home woman who used to live up in Cascadia on the way. She knows everybody up there.  Main trapping location is a homeless camp up there but not the same one where the five Cascadians came from.  The camp is fairly clean, outside of lots of old vehicles and parts, is composed of a combined junkyard, auto repair place, plus many trailers and hutches where otherwise homeless folks live.   With lots of dogs and cats.

There were allegedly a dozen or so cats, but the number was really unknown and still is.  We caught nine cats there during the day and early night.  But we left mid day.  The cats were not out during the day, but a lot of dogs were.  They'd yap at us, go in the traps, eat the bait, spring the traps.  They were everywhere, big and little.  Pitbulls to dachsunds.  It was impossible to trap.  That's why we left.

In the meantime, I went across the river to try to catch a last cat there.  I'd already gotten six fixed.  The old lady now told me she would like five of the six already fixed cats gone.  I was heartbroken for them and panicked. What would become of them?  There is so much animal abuse, neglect and abandonment around  here.  Would they too  now be dumped up in some godforsaken wilderness to die slowly of starvation or freeze to death?   I fought back both anger and tears for these cats.

Then I determined I would find them somewhere else.  The old lady has no working car, no money and is in ill health.

I set up the drop trap, amidst the junk and trash and finally caught the one unfixed boy, a gray tux.  Then packed up the trap, as the fixed cats, unaware they're no longer wanted there, played like happy kittens with the drop trap pull string as I wound it up.

Karen, who arrived late, asked innocently if there was a restaurant in Cascadia.  Theresa and I caught each others eyes and burst out laughing.  There's nothing in Cascadia.  Karen is from Portland and doesn't know the area, or the reality, here in this county.

Once we gave up there, we headed back to Lebanon and had lunch.  Then it was off to Waterloo.  Residential colony lady had four new cats show up awhile back.  I'd gotten one of the boys fixed, then the girl, now in stunning sunshine we set up the drop trap and caught the black young male.  We tried for the shaggy tabby male but he wandered off, intent on marking.   One to go there.

Afterwards, Karen went to pick up four cats trapped by Becky in Lebanon and one trapped at an apartment complex there.  I headed back to Cascadia.

The dogs were still out and so were the people.  The idling car that plagued us all morning, parked near the only place we could park to watch traps, at last was no longer idling and spitting fumes into the air nearby.  This time, two people and Jackson the pitbull were in the car and it was trying to leave and squeeze out between myself and another car that had come in and parked behind me.  That lady had told me she'd just be a minute.  Finally both cars were gone and the dogs were all in, it was dark, the stars were out in the black sky and we started catching cats.

It also began to get cold.   I cut some handwarmers from their plastic wrapper bags, shook them up and put them in my pocket.  Karen suggested we warm the car with a candle.  I pulled one from the glove compartment while she grabbed an empty tuna can.   I lit the candle, settled its base into warm wax on the bottom inside of the can, then put it on the dash.  It was pleasant at least, to sit in the car, with the bright stars out, and the flickering candle the only light.

The final straw was when a pickup pulled in, killed its lights and I could see a form inside the truck blink on a headlamp.  He got out and went into the shop there.   And bolted when the shop security light blinked on, jumped back in the truck, backed out without lights on, hit something, and took off.  That's when we gathered up our empty traps and left for the night.  Ten cats in all caught in Cascadia.  One in Waterlo.  Five in Lebanon.   Good enough.  I guess.  We called it a night.  Karen headed back to Portland with the 16 local cats and today they are getting fixed.