Sunshine? Avoid the Mailbox

I just got out of the shower, got dressed, sopping wet hair and barefoot....decided before I dried my hair, I'd get the mail and newspaper and bring the recycling bin up.  It's a beautiful day afterall.

I started to head up the driveway with the recycling bin and I hear RumSon calling for Yardman.  My mantra started, "please don't see me...please don't see me..."

"Hey Stapht" (understand that is how my name sounds when uttered in the Florida Cracker dialect).

Shit.

So I turn around and much to my delight, I am regaled with details of the current mental health care that Crazy Woman is under.  As I suspected a few weeks ago, she was going off her meds.  Seems in the last week or so she totally stopped them again.

Now she is one step away from permanent institutionalization.  She is violent when unmedicated and they have voluntarily locked her up as many times as they can.  Well evidently, noteworthy for those of you who do have a mental case nearby, there is a new program (12 years old) that they come to your house and shoot up the crazy, as an alternative to Baker Acting.

Just for a minute imagine how much fun that job is...300 pound woman, schizophrenic and off her meds, prone to violence and you get to show up and give her an antipsychotic shot.  Sign me up for that one.

For the record, I just said hello.  And Goodbye.

My cat dammit!

February 12, 2012

I haven't written lately, because frankly I am pissed off.  SERIOUSLY PISSED OFF at the lot next door.

The lovely creature above wandered up last year during the winter, this is the first picture I took of him in February.  I believe he wandered up sometime around the Holidays of 2011.  I say that because I lost my sweet Cali Cat in April of 2011 and remember thinking it is typical that one wandered up within 6 months of her passing.  She was the outdoor cat who patrolled our yard against usurpers. 

EVERYONE at the end of the street is well acquainted with MG (Mostly Ginger), he's quite a social creature.  Most know he calls our house home.  I am positive he belonged to someone who moved and left him behind...a foreclosure in the neighborhood next door perhaps or a house down was a rental, until it recently sold.  I suspect that house because the cat appeared right after they moved.

But suddenly in the past couple of weeks, he has been disappearing.  He's not sleeping on the chairs on the front porch; hasn't been waiting for breakfast or dinner; hasn't even been greeting me when I get home from work in the wee hours of the morning.  Then I saw it, him next door in the driveway following Crazy Woman as she does her 'fruit loops' walk around the yard.

This partially disturbed me because she has a record of sporadically feeding stray cats, but they never last for very long before they disappear completely.  At this point I should mention the dog.  Yardman has a bulldog /boxer mix that I was informed years ago, "hates cats".  So far I haven't found anything other than Dead Mama's family that this dog likes, so he is always leashed.  Ed and I call him "Cujo". 

I had noticed MG frequenting their yard, but he roams through about 4 yards at the end of the street, so I didn't really care too much, until two weekends ago when I saw Cujo chase MG up a tree.  I ran outside to rescue him.  I got there just as he was coming down, so I scooped him up and brought him inside until the dog was locked up again.  Dead Mama and Yardman saw me grab him.  So fast forward to this week.  MG was gone again, I was worried, he had not even touched the dry food I had in the garage for him.  So I went looking for him.  

He was under the POS car in their driveway.  I called him and he reluctantly came.  Unfortunately, just at that point both RumSon and Crazy Woman appeared.  That's when I got pissed (and sad).  Seems Crazy Woman was convinced MG was homeless and needed her care, so she started feeding him.  Obviously he is an opportunist, so food and PEOPLE outside all day long to pay attention to him was appealing...so he started hanging out over there.  OVER a year I have been taking care of this creature...A YEAR!  

THEN RumSon, repeatedly referring to him as "SHE"....now I admit he has a full coat and in winter it is impossible to glance and tell...but I digress...RumSon informs me 'she' is a friendly cat and Crazy Woman was worried no one was taking care of 'her', so she started feeding 'her'.  I corrected RumSon and said, I have been taking care of HIM for over a year now.  Giving him medicine, feeding him, keeping him warm during the winter....and at that point Crazy Woman wanders towards us.  She doesn't really 'engage' in a conversation, so she stayed about 30 feet away staring at the ground.  

RumSon starts telling her the cat is being taken care of and she doesn't have to worry.  He then tells me that its a good thing because "Crazy Woman" constantly opens the door and lets the cat in.  He then has to find the dog and lock it up.  Yes, knots started in my stomach at that point.  The thought of MG being trapped in that house with Cujo absolutely horrifies me.  It would horrify me if I had no connection to the cat...but this animal has slept on my pillow for most of the winter....I've bonded with him.

I'm hoping that RumSon stops buying cat food and Crazy Woman stops feeding him.  He'll just wander back over to our yard.  It's has been a week since that conversation, MG jumped up on the window sill in the kitchen like he used to for breakfast.  Maybe he is back to eating here.  I am beside myself, but I know absolutely no way to 'convince' a cat not to visit another house when that cat loves people and they are always outside, especially if they start feeding him.

All I have to say is if something happens to MG, there will be a border war at the end of the street.  

MG and General fighting for attention