Do They Really Need to Use THAT Word?

Tomorrow morning I will get up early (well "early" is a relative term...early during the school year is anything before 5 am, and early during the summer is anything before 9 am!). Oliver needs to be at the vet's office around 7:30 for his neutering.

When we were there two weeks ago, they gave me an estimate for the procedure and right there in black and white was the word. I know what neutering means for a cat or a dog, but do they really need to be so blunt about it? When I read it, I immediately squeezed my legs together (even though I'm female, I can still have compassion for male organs) and thought, "OW!" Yes, right there it was...CASTRATION.

Apparently Oliver got wind of what's going on because after spending most of his time inside the past several days, he saw a very slight opportunity for escape this evening, and OUT HE WENT!

Backing up a little, we've been keeping him inside so that he will be used to it after his neutering tomorrow. We've been letting him out at night, but last night we kept him inside. We've been trying to get him to use the litter box, but so far either he hasn't gone potty or we've missed seeing him use it. We haven't discovered any "accidents" so we're just not sure if he's going or not. We put him in there, and he immediately jumps out. This afternoon he went in on his own and Joey and I noticed but we wouldn't look at him directly because we thought it might make him jump back out if he knew he was being watched. However, out of the corner of my eye I could see that he was just sniffing around (hey, that's a start at least) and then he got out.

We let him outside this afternoon to see if he would go potty, but he only lasted almost 2 minutes out there. It's been in the 90s here the past few days and the humidity is really bad too. It's been fairly miserable. I was reluctant to let him out because the alfalfa field on one side of us was cut the other day and the hawks are flying around. Today they were baling it. On the other side of us, work is beginning on Ted's sister's new house. They have the basement dug out and I couldn't see what all they were doing down there today. So I didn't want Oliver to be in any danger, but I knew he needed to relieve himself. If he constantly holds it in, well, that can mean trouble for him and we certainly don't want that to happen.

So he stayed out for almost 2 minutes, then meowed at the door to be let back in.

Early this evening, right after dinner, we gave him a bath, so that when he gets home from the vet tomorrow he'll be clean and it will be fine to let him hang out on the bed and stuff, even though we've pretty much been doing it anyway.

He was NOT crazy about his bath. Find me a cat who is. Afterwards he just let me hold him in a towel (that we naturally warmed up in the dryer first) for a little while.

After he decided he'd had enough of being held, he got down and Ted said he was going to walk out to get the mail.

WHOOSH!!

Oliver was out the door and GONE! He only stopped for a few seconds to roll around on the grass, then he disappeared around the corner of the house.

Ted went after him and even tried to crawl under a truck over at his brother's house to reach Oliver, but as soon as he got close, Oliver ran out the other side. He walked quickly along the buildings on the farm and over toward some other homes. Ted lost sight of him and came back pretty upset. We were out back looking for him and Ted said, "You should have seen him. He was so happy to be out in the grass. He's an outside cat and we shouldn't be trying to make him an inside cat. He's gone for good. I just know he is. Don't be shocked when he doesn't come back."

This is Ted's way of dealing with things. He's a pessimist for the most part. I said that he would come back like he has been every night since he first showed up, and that he could be trained to be an indoor cat. I know that's the safest thing for him too.

Joey was at class tonight (yea for summer classes, yeah, right) but Alex, Ted, and I kept checking the doors for him, and listening for him to meow. Eventually Ted went to bed and Alex went to his bedroom. I was in the living room watching TV, but we all kept going to different doors looking for him. Joey had come home and he was concerned about Oliver too.

I felt pretty strongly that he would show up in the morning.

Suddenly I heard Ted get out of bed and open the door in our bedroom. I thought he was just looking for Oliver yet again, but then I heard a meow. Ted walked out with Oliver and didn't say a word, but put him on my lap.

I really think Ted wasn't able to say anything. He's much more attached to Oliver than he wants to let on.

But the important thing is that Oliver is back home now, and unbeknownst to him, is about to castrated tomorrow.

I hate that word.