BOXCAT

Arriving at Carol's just before  8 on Tuesday morning to pick up a cat for neutering, I found this box on her front step. Noting the small airholes, I picked it up and shook it gently with hearing any cry or detecting any movement and immediately feared the worst. Inside was this frail little thing.

Later that day I took it to Roker Park Vets for a checkup. It's a neutered male, barely about ten, skinny with fur in tats, poor teeth, and didn't like being picked up though was happy to be stroked. It had messed itself in the carrier but that might have been because of stress. So, take it back, give it some TLC and see what happens.

What happens is that he hasn't eaten or drank anything since yesterday and appears to be quietly dying. Carol feels she has let it go on long enough and in half an hour we're taking him to be put to sleep.

We don't know who put him on Carol's doorstep or anything about him as there was no note. Were they just getting rid of a problem, or couldn't afford to pay for treatment, or just couldn't face seeing him slowly dying? Never know.

But there's been more than Boxcat. After dropping off the cat for neutering, I picked up Andrea and a rabbit, then a lady and her dog and took them all over to Vets4Pets at Fulwell. After taking them home a couple of hours later I was back sorting out my study which has had new windows put in and been redecorated which meant all my books, CDs, DVDs, and graphic novels were piled in boxes and dumped in my bedroom and now it was time to start getting things back together, a process which taken until today to nearly complete.

Anyway, mid afternoon and after picking up bedding from the shop, I went to see if the owners had managed to get the cat which savaged my hand into the carrier I left. They had and here she is.

So, with her in the van, I picked up the now neutered young male from Williams & Cummings, dropped him off at Carol's where I collected another cat to go to Roker Park Vets. That done, I picked up Andrea, went to a house to collect an 8-week old fostered out bulldog cross -all cuddly, lickey, and bitey, and sorry no pics- to take to Vets4Pets for his first injections. After dropping off Andrea and her sister at their home, I took the puppy back to its home and then went to my home where I had twenty minutes to get changed to go out for a 60th birthday meal for Big Ian  one of the shop's mainstays (as opposed to me who is known as Susan's Ian; there used to be another Ian whom I thought of as Driver Ian but others as Chip On His Shoulder Ian). The pub -the Seaton Lane Inn-  is about four miles away and used to be about one step up from a spit and sawdust place when I used to go about 35 years back for the real ale. Now it's a top class small hotel and restaurant and the food was very good indeed.

I'm only about an hour and a half back from taking Boxcat to the vets to be put to sleep. All the way there he came out with a quiet sound like a miaow without the 'm'. He lasted barely seconds after the injection and never even reacted when the fur on his leg was shaved and the needle inserted. Poor thing.