It was a day with too many cats

Let me tell you a story…..

In the time of Covid, I have let everything slip: the kids’ dental exams and check ups, the car’s oil changes and registrations, and the animals’ shots. I’d realized that all of the animals were overdue for their rabies shots. It seems as if there are lots of people in the same boat as me, so the vet’s office was booking appointments weeks out. I wanted to get all the animals up to date as soon as I could, so I booked them all at the same time. That’s 2 dogs and 4 cats!

I have 2 carriers designed to hold animals. I had to come up with 2 more, so I put a strong wired cover on top of a crate (similar to those 18 gallon totes) and used rope to tie it shut. It seemed really secure.

I thought the hardest cat to handle would be Conductor because he seems the most surprised by us moving around the house. In order to ensure that all the cats would be present for this momentous checkup, I had locked the cats in the bansch for a day and a half before their appointment day. Needless to say, they were already fed up and very suspicious of me.

When I opened the door to get the cats, there was Conductor. His face was full of questions. I coaxed him out, picked him up, put him in the make-shift carrier and tied it down. He meowed sadly. I couldn’t believe it! It was soooo easy!

I went to get another cat and Conductor squished his big fat body out of the tiny crack in the top of the lid that I hadn’t tied down. He ran up to Cassidy’s room. When I got up there, he ran to the basement. Up and down over and over again we went. We were very mad at each other and Conductor thought he might die. I locked him in the basement and gave up on him for the time being.

I thought I’d try a more easy going cat. So I got Hercules and put him in the tote. Fine. Next Ash. Fine again. Willow was so sweet, but she was really overly scared and silently stress-pooped all over herself as soon as she was in a crate. Finally, Condos again. He knew he was in for and looked at me with sad eyes. He let me pet him and tried desperately not to go in the last carrier, but he never tried to fight me.

Done! Now all to the car. Load the dogs, load Hugo and Pax. Start the car…. and the air conditioning wouldn’t turn on. It was super hot and muggy, but it was okay – windows! As I’m rolling down the windows, Ash escapes! I had learned from my mistake and tied that cover down everywhere. How on earth did he get out? I quickly close all the windows and the car is blowing warm air into our hot hot car. Hugo and Pax are yelling, “we’re so hot!”, but I ignored them and focused on getting Ash put away again. He was running all over the car, drooling and panting and making lots and lots of noise. When I picked him up though, he was always super sweet to me. I stuffed him back in the tote….he squeezed out as I was tying the lid down. I stuffed him in again and sat on the top. What do I do now? I’m in the trunk on top of a cat that I can’t get off of, in an overheating car, and I feel like I can’t do anything. I tie the lid everywhere, and put everything within reach on top, then I jump out of the car and collect big rocks from the stone wall. I open the trunk, I weigh down Ash’s lid with rocks, and Hercules’ too in case he decides to escape and we’re off!

Half way down the driveway Hugo starts screaming. Ash has squeezed his body to his belly out of the lid. But it’s tied down and weighted with lots of rocks and he’s totally stuck. It looked horrible. The worst part was that I couldn’t just lift the lid and help him, I had to untie everything first. I got him out and thought, “thank goodness we already have an appointment to the vet!”

I decide it’s impossible to contain Ash, plus he’s been through so much at this point and he needed a break. So I just drove to the vet and Ash ran all over the car desperately and drooled and cried. I drove slowly. He jumped on and off of all of our laps. This really irritated Tupelo who tried to bite him. He ran across my dashboard, back and forth. Keep in mind, I have no AC. When he ran to the back of the car, I unrolled my window, then quickly rolled it back up again when he dashed back.

We made it though, all of us frazzled and terrified. I couldn’t get out of the car when I got there so I just honked and asked someone to pass me a cat-carrier through my window. We were truly a sight; stinking of poop from Willow in a car blowing hot air and all 9 of us stuck inside with the windows rolled up.

After the appointment, the receptionist said that our crazy car-load was all everybody was talking about. I think the cats are still talking about it.