The day after I arrived back to Singapore, my friend messaged me and asked if I was home and whether she could drop her cat off for me to foster for 1 month odd as her current place is rendered unsafe for cats.
So while I was eating my instant noodles, she messages to announce her arrival. I quickly gobbled all the hot soup and noodles down and waited for her to come up to my apartment. Tai Lang came in a pet carrier and Sharon sat for about 20 mins before heading off to meet her girlfriend.
Tai Lang was very quiet but extremely handsome. He didn't move much but you can tell he's very curious of what's happening around him.
I left him in the box while allowing the other cats at home to get used to the scent (smell rather...). Then I went around to prepare his litter box, water bowl and food bowl. Thank God I had spares. :P
Tai Lang has to be kept in the downstairs bathroom. OI... it's quite big ok. It's 2m by 2m room alright! So he can stay for the night while I have him checked in the morning and have him cleaned so that he can mingle with the rest once they're used to his scent.
Handsome isn't he?
Morning came and to my horror!!!!! This poor boy's fur are all matted!!!! Behind his ears, on his chest, under his armpits, belly, between his legs, ass, genitals, tail! His fur is so matted near his ass that poop was all stuck and caught in between the fur to the point that he has to clean his ass on the floor! (Yes, my toilet floor has smeared shit all over in the morning)
He has a "hole" just behind his ears. Suspect that his fur was cut off.
Can you see that huge ball of matt fur just 1 inch from my finger?
so much fur that I combed out
All the matt fur that I painstakingly combed out.
Not only that, I suspect he has been showered ever cos his fur has a little grimm and oil. It's so bad that he has dandruff!
His ears are not cleaned and I'm afraid he will have ear mites. Well, the color of his ear wax does indicate that he may have that but I have medication so no worries...
BUT I found out that he has lice!!!!!
OK at this moment I was pissed to the core. Here am I offering my help to foster a cat for a while. The porr boy has no home cos the couple broke up and my friend Sharon moved back to her parents and she said that her parents' place is unsafe for cats so she asked if i could help. I agreed and request for the cat to be clean and healthy and I got more than I bargained for.
This is such a case of carrying someone else's burden with the intention of helping. DUH! Why should I be shouldering someone else's problem?!?!?! LOOK. I love animals and I would love to clean up this poor boy but I feel that it's the pet owner's responsibility to take care of the cat. Besides, I have 4 cats running around at home and the youngest is on heat now and she's driving me up the world and over the fence towards insanity. So I feel that it is of basic knowledge that the cat has to be clean before entering my house. I can't afford to have lice on all 4 other cats!!!!!
I quickly arranged for a groomer to have him cleaned out. Bought him "Frontline" so as to get rid of the lice. In the meantime, I will also put medication on the rest of the cats the moment he puts his frontline on. Then I have to start disinfecting the toilet yet again and spray all the toys with the medication so lice will not inhabit in them.
Argh... sounds like a lot f work? IT IS ALOT OF WORK.
All Sharon said was Thank You. Frankly, I think sorrys and thank yous are just mere words which dont' mean a thing. This Thank You is a hell alot of trouble...
Don't get me wrong. Tai Lang is a very very sweet boy, he comes when you call his name and I think he's extremely deprived of affection... he keeps asking you to stroke him buy putting his paw on your hand. And he is also a very clever boy. He escaped the day he arrived! Managed to pry open the windown screen, crawl out of the window. Thank God I found him sitting on the stairs at the back of my house! I was in a frenzy when I went to check on him and didn't see any cat in the room (dejavu cos Akiko escaped too when she was a kitten). Ran upstairs to put on proper clothes, open the front door and something inside me told me to check my back door first. Once the window is opened, I saw him sitting there... called out his name softly and hurried to open the back door! Ad put all sorts of security defense that it took me a while to get rid of the stuff and opened the door. But the door alarm went off and that scared him off. I saw him running upstairs so I chased after him and found him at the top of the stairs. He wanted to jump down from 3rd floor and hesitated when he saw the height. Then he turned around, saw him coming up the stairs and decided to jump instead. Just then, I managed to catch hold of him! THANK GOD!
That's only his first attempt.
Yesterday, I realised that he could open my toilet windows. :( BOTH of them! I got paranoid of his escape attempts so I checked on him periodically and sat in the toilet with him while I read and stroke him at the same time. During my periodic checks from the kitchen window, I saw that the window latch was up. That drove me crazy cos I thought I forgot to close it. So I went to shut it again. The second time round, I saw that the latch was up again and this time, he was pushing the corner of the window tryin gto get it to open! The third time was at 12.30am and I noticed the latch was up again and the window was slightly ajar and he was again on the window latch pushing! I freaked out!
So Ad and I went to extensively tie all the windows together and tie them to the door stopper attached to the wall and the sink so there is no freaking way he could open the windows even if he could push the window latch up.
Can't show you the photo due to home security issues but yes, it took us an hour to tie up all the windows. :(
He's more than 4 handfuls... but we do love him alot. If Sharon doesn't want him, we''ll keep him.
Frankly, I hope that he's just escaping cos he wants to go home. This would mean that once he's settle at my place, he would give up escaping altogether. I don't want him to think that he's being tortured or kept captive. :(
Lastly, I don't want him to go showing the rest of the other cats how to open the windows.
Well, all I can say is keep praying.... Pray that God will keep them safe in our house and let them not wander off out of the house. Amen.....
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