Long Difficult Worthwhile Day

 I didn't get enough sleep night before last, before heading to Portland yesterday with 15 cats.

The day was difficult on my aching joints, to spend most of it sitting in my car in various parking lots, so that when I finally picked up the cats at 4:00, I could barely move.

I had another set back.  The rescue who took a kitten from the ditch colony I caught on Christmas Day wanted to give her back, said they couldn't tame her.  She was only seven weeks of age, when they took her a couple days after Christmas.   She now can't return to the colony, since she barely even knew it.  I was told she was really wild and aggressive, that they couldn't handle her whatsoever.

Um, I did not experience that with her today.  I picked her up in Kiezer.   The ladies who adopted Dorian Gray, a male from the Lebanon colony, graciously offered to hold her the night in their bathroom, given the state of my exhaustion and pain.

Dorian got a home, once he was fixed

I had left the clinic, after picking up the cats yesterday to end up in very terrible traffic congestion, that went on way beyond the usual spot it lightens up.   It took me hours to get home.   Not easy.

I really want to avoid Portland if possible forever.

The traffic is so dense there, people everywhere, I really feel claustrophobic and like I'm in a straight jacket.  I can't deal with so many cars crammed everywhere but the worst is the bumper to bumper traffic on the freeway near and through Portland.  Guess I'm not a city person.

I arrived at the Keizer ladies house late last night, still on my way home from the clinic, to hand over Dorian Gray, the boy from the colony, who'd been fixed yesterday earlier at the FCCO.  I was so thankful to get at least one of them a home.   It's a great place for him.  They also fed me, which really helped perk me up.  Very kind ladies.  And they took the kitten for the night.

This morning, after sleeping late, I returned the cats to the Lebanon colony.  The lady was quite happy and apologetic too, as she said it hadn't registered with her that the 15 would go all the way to Portland and that I'd have to sit in my car up there most of the day waiting.   She said she would never have agreed to it, knowing the toll it would take on me, if she'd known.  Well, I survived, don't worry.

She was supremely grateful for the three bags of cat food the FCCO sent home with me to give her.   Anyhow, the difference there already is profound.  The entire neighborhood will be changed.   She explained to a neighbor how most of them now are fixed and that soon others will leave to barn homes, once found.   He too was happy.

All of this, despite the fact I'm still tired, gave me a sense of happiness.

I trapped three more there this morning, to be fixed Monday in Salem.   I came home then with the dirty traps and the three cats and unloaded all, and then took off to pick up the kitten still in the bathroom in Keizer.  

Smudge, the kitten, was quiet all the way home, but I talked to her.  I figured, really, that she was only lonely and not aggressive or that wild.   Once here, I immediately let her meet some of my cats in my bedroom.  She became so excited over it.  I pulled her out and held her and she rolled and purred and I let her touch noses with a few of them.  Oh my, how happy and excited that made her.  Then I put her in the bathroom.  She's in there now, not all wild and aggressive, just sleeping!   

What  a relief.  Photos later.  Another nap is in order.