Kitten & I had a traumatic day yesterday.. Yesterday morning, I was giving Kitten a run-through with the flea comb. Again, I found fleas. Seeing as how it was warm and sunny out, I figured it'd be a good day to do a bath/flea treatment. This means, I get the cats wet, one by one, then spray them with flea treatment (that's meant to stay on them, but seeing as how it's poison, basically, I always wash it off afterwards), then I comb them, then shower them off and shampoo them with something yummy smelling (this week: Burt's Bees shampoo).

Needless to say, the cats don't like any of the steps of this whole bathing process. Trauma #1.

The local Pet Supermarket had their in-store vaccinations going yesterday, so I put Kitten in the carrier and took her in. When I took her out of the car at the store, I realized the carrier now smelled. Of poo. Great.

I got into the store and figured out where to go. I took Kitten out of the carrier and held her to the table with one arm as I filled out the paperwork with the other. When I finished the forms, I asked where the bathroom was. "Back of the store." "Nope," another PS employee cut in. "It's out of order." I explained the situation and that I needed a sink.

One of the employees took me to the back of the store, where he proceeded to excavate through ladders and boxes of junk six feet thick to get to the sink. "Here you go." "Okay, thanks."
I had to hold onto Kitten, lest I set her on the ground and she wedges herself into someplace good to hide.

But here comes the problem - anytime I got near the sink, Kitten started to freak out, thinking bath #2 was in store. She crawled up my back, making a nice puncture wound on my shoulder, and scratched my face and the side of my lip.

I wanted to forget about it all, to just take Kitten and go home, but knowing my luck she'd use my car as a litterbox if I tried to drive home with her running free (she did it once before). So I ended up cleaning the carrier out, one-handed, and as far back from the sink as I could be, with Kitten clutching onto my flesh with her claws the whole time. Trauma #2. The actual shots were trauma #3.

I left for the pet store in a lovely mood, freshly showered and gardenia-lotioned. I came home in a horrible mood, with horrible allergies, puffy eyes, and smelling faintly of cat poop.

Then Kitten peed in the carrier on the five-minute drive home. This meant getting her butt dipped in the bathwater so she wouldn't reek of urine. Trauma #4.

Lucky for Kitten, I couldn't stay annoyed with her because the vaccinations have made her totally wiped out. She's like the dog from Funny Farm. She literally just slept on the couch all day yesterday. Even when I broke out the treats, she stayed firmly planted on the couch. (I fed them to her there, within mouth's reach.) Before I went to bed, I carried her into my room, where she laid right back down and snoozed. This morning, before I left, I carried her out to her food dish so she would eat. Balu reports that she's back on the couch now. Aww, poor girl..  ¶ 11:34 AM