Exhausting Trip with Cats

I'm completely exhausted.

I took four cats from the park to Portland yesterday to be fixed.  One was the boy kitten I caught earlier, then I caught his sister, the torti, plus an adult unfixed torti, who is likely their mom, and an older long hair orange tux male.  I knew about him, that's for sure, but he's so infrequent, I'd never caught him.  Now he's fixed.  

The young torti adult.  I was surprised to see her come out of the darkness Wednesday night and into a trap.  I did not know she was out there.  

This is the older male, now, finally fixed, at about 8 years old.

The torti kitten.  She is darling but wild as can be and three months old.

The little boy, also of course three months and wild. A tabby tux.

The night before the Portland trip, I was out there at the park trying to trap until almost 10:00 p.m. and didn't get home until close to 11:00.  Then there were the nightly chores to complete before bed.  It was after midnight when I finally got to bed.  5:00 a.m. then comes very early.

I had to be up at 5:00 to be on the road by 6:00 to get to the clinic by 7:30.    I could not find someone to go pick up the cats that afternoon, so I had to spend the day in Portland waiting for them to be ready to pick up, and I was so tired and so sleepy.

I couldn't nap in parking lots, like I usually try to do when I have to stay the day up there, waiting on cats to be fixed.  It was too hot and I also could not find one with privacy.   

Eventually I ended up at the Tualatin River National Wildlife Refuge.  I've walked there many many times when waiting on cats at the clinic.  I was hoping there would be few people there, but the parking lot was crammed.  So I walked the trails and tried to find a lone park bench in a secluded spot that would be adequate for a nap.  I never found one secluded enough from the crunchy noisy pea gravel trails.   

The area is very small, nestled between huge housing developments, industries and highways.   A Pick a Part is right next to it, and you can hear the goings on there from the trails closest to it.  Then there is a constant blare of sirens, from this road or another, near the refuge.  In other words, its noisy, city noisy.  If this is their only refuge---the poor animals and birds.  

I began to think about videos I had seen lately.  Like the one with a million people out of their cars with cameras on a sloth mom with baby on back, trying to get across the road.  It was a miracle she wasn't just creamed by all the cars, but she wasn't and instead she was being harrassed and stared at and photographed by that huge crowd of people.  Seeing it made me wish a car would blast through them and crunch their stupid cameras to pieces.  Is there nowhere untouched by a million humans?   

This was what Rock Creek looked like at the refuge.

That bright green is Duck weed, too much duck weed.  

Yuk, way way too much duckweed.

I gave up on napping finally, got a few things I needed at home, like some carpet pieces at the dollar store to repair cat trees that are shredded, that kind of thing.   I picked up the cats at 3:30 at the clinic then and got home around 5:30 after just half hour or so caught in bumper to bumper congestion on the way out of Portland, which at least was not the usual hour to two hours of it.  (trying to find the good side).  I was very exhausted and after getting home had a lot of chores to do around the house.

This morning, I returned the four cats, including the two kittens, who were three months old, to the park, wishing I had caught them when younger, but probably no one would have taken them on then either.  There are still two kittens needing caught.  

I'm going back to bed now.   I have to have my sleep.  I discovered that years and years ago.  When I don't get enough sleep, I get crabby, irritible or inappropriate in reacting with people, online or in person.  Lol.  I need my sleep!