Cats.

Bunky had to go to the vet today, his nose swelled up over the weekend and he looks like Richard Nixon (seriously). This happened to him before, the vet said it was in 2002, but she's not sure if it's the same thing. So he has to go back on Wednesday morning for a biopsy (and a teeth cleaning while he's out). So much for the tax refund. Another bummer was picking up Spunky's remains at the vet. She was a sick stray that Sarah found, and she stayed at my in-law's house for the entire summer while my in-laws were on an Airstream caravan. Yes, she had the whole house to herself, and we had to go over there 3 times a day to give her medicine. It's only 9 miles to their house, but remember how much gas was last summer? Yeah.

She got evicted when my in-laws came back, so she came to stay with us, albeit outside. We were worried that Spunky was going to wander off, but she never made it farther than the neighbor's driveway. It was easier giving her medicine since she was right outside, and she was doing pretty well. When it got cold I made her a little shelter out of a couple of storage containers and insulation, and she liked that a lot (it was better than her cardboard lean-to). But towards the end of winter, she wouldn't eat and lost a lot of weight. It seemed so sudden. We even brought her inside, but she still wasn't eating. When we took her to the vet, they told us that it would cost around $700 just to see what was wrong, and that there wasn't a guarantee that it could be fixed. So we had to put her to sleep, because we could not afford that at all.

Picking up her remains today brought all of that back, plus it made me feel like I didn't do enough to help her. I complain about the cats a lot (we have 7 indoors and 2 permanent outside, plus a few floaters), but it is absolute hell to look them in the eyes and watch them die because I don't have enough money. This is also why we have 7 cats in the first place.

The worst part is that we never took any pictures of Spunky. I thought we did, but when I checked iPhoto, I couldn't find any. We had a cat for a day that we had to put to sleep, and we have pictures of her.

I realize that 7 cats is too many, but I can't give any of them up now. Even the one that is peeing all over everywhere.

Sorry for the bummer today. :(