So You Wanna Be A Cat Superstar
12/29/1

Zapato had to go to the vet this morning.

She has a bad habit of urinating in the master bath on the linoleum if the litter box isn�t clean enough for her. She also has a tendency to get urinary tract infections. Since one of the ways we can tell that she has one is that she�ll start peeing on the bath mat or outside the litter boxes, and she was doing that anyway because she�s just plain bad.

Now, let me say this...Zap may be bad and pee on the bath mat and all, but she doesn�t pee all over the house. She�s even courteous enough that she knows that if she is going to barf, we�d prefer that on the linoleum near the washer/dryer or in the kitchen.

I don�t think anyone has ever barfed in the bathroom.

Zap is also no stranger to barfing. She is a glutton in the true sense of the word. We�d been changing cat foods from urinary tract health Iams to 7+ year old hairball formula and all kinds of combinations of specialised cat foods. If there is a significant difference in how they taste, Zap will binge like a champion binger in the Bulimolympics.

And unlike how I joke, when I eat out and eat too much, as I will do tonight since we�re going to Marvin�s up in Tennessee, that I�m a really bad bulimic since I�ve got the binging down but I always forget to purge, Zap will barf the undigested cat food out.

We tend to make sure we get cat food that doesn�t have too much food coloring in it also. Iams is pretty bad about this, but it�s easier to buy than Science Diet since both Hel-Mart and Target stock it.

So, Zap goes in and we have to leave her. We go set up communion for tomorrow and then go by the bank and then to McDonald�s. Right after I finish eating, my phone goes off and it�s Dr. Joanna from Jones Valley Animal Hospital.

Zap�s urine didn�t seem to contain any bacteria but did contain a few struvite crystals and a lot of red blood cells. The blood�s not visible, I should know, I�ve cleaned enough of her pee of the master bath�s floor. Stones haven't been ruled out. For now, it�s antibiotics and make sure she doesn�t get any non-deionized water.

Oh, I didn�t mention that Zap only drinks DI water [pardon the lab term]. There�s too much calcium in the city water supply and Zap�ll just make struvite crystals out of them. She has been able to get tap water lately however. She can always drink it out of the shower after we finish, which she likes to do, but lately we�ve had a tupperware moat around the cat food dish since I haven�t been able to kill these ants that are coming in.

Toilets are always closed. They even have a chococat sticker on the seat to remind you to close it.

Zap has to go for a checkup in 14 days. Hopefully, she�ll be better then.

When we got her home, Aisai and I assumed she didn�t want to be around us since we betrayed her an took her to the vet. Not so. Zapato was standing downstairs in the great room and meowing. She uses that same meow when it�s been about 20 minutes since Aisai and I have gone to sleep and she wants someone to come carry her to bed.

What�s the point of having cats if you can�t spoil them?

So I went to the stairs and looked down at Zapato and talked to her. She started coming up the stairs so I sat down on them and pet her a lot. Aisai showed up and sat at the base of the stairs and Zap walked down to her to get pats.

Zap�s now laying on the computer table here in the library, hitting my left wrist with her tail as I type.

Pado�s my little baby.