Yoda the Kitten
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Land of Packaging
So I checked the kitten in and I’m sitting next to some smelly foreigners at the gate. They are big and hairy – the gorillaest one actually has hairs sticking out through the back of his knit polo shirt. Gross. Anyway, I brought the kitten in a red picnic basket thingy we bought somewhere for like 500 yen. Nam found this free coupon on the web for a rental cat carrier so I figured we’d transfer him over to it at check-in. The staff, however, had another idea. They took the top off the rental carrier, placed the entire picnic basket (with sleeping Yoda inside) into it, padded all four…
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Kyushu – The Final, Final Verdict
I am going. I wanted to visit Adam’s village one last time anyway. Will take some nice photos I think. Local debauchery can wait until next week, for my 30th birthday. I know, I know. The world isn’t ready for my mid-life crisis. Shoot me already.
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Not
Found out we can sent the kitten by ANA to Fukuoka from Itami (Osaka airport) for 2,000 yen (20 bucks). The debauchery I cancelled in Nara/Wakayama this weekend is back on track! I wonder if the one cat per plane rule is for domestic flights as well? I’m sure gonna miss the little carpet-shitter.
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Hand Carry It Is
I’m planning to carry the little booger all the way to Kyushu this weekend. I’ll pass him off to my sister, drink some Kyushuvians under the table again, eat some Aso beef-on-a-stick, and come back on a return flight for work and a new chapter of Talking with Myself. That’s my temporary plan, anyway. Yoda will be a good American, I just know it. He fucking hates the Taliban. Oh, in case you haven’t noticed: I’m on a blogging binge today.
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My Little American
MIRACLE OF MIRACLES! If all goes according to my master plan, by this time next week Yoda the kitten will be on US soil, forever! We (as in, “Nam”) are working hard to have my sister hand carry him back home next week. Today, the vet announced that Yoda’s eye has completely healed (as in, “sealed totally shut” – he’ll never see out of the eye, but it won’t kill him, either) due to our daily eye washing regimen and, I suspect, also the fish oil capsules I’ve been splitting with him. (He loves the fish oil. I merely tolerate it. But we both have disgusting breath for a few…
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Growing Pains
The kitten grows as I type these very words. The trip to the vet two days ago showed his growth rate as what I thought to be impossible. The first time we weighed him, he was 220 grams. The second time, only six days later, he was 330 grams! His eye is getting a lot better. The goopy stuff leaking from the burst eyeball cleared up as a result of daily eye washing, medicated eye drops, and the antibiotics course we feed him. Sight will never be restored to that eye as it is too damaged, but some of the coloring has been restored – it was previously just a…
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Kitten Update: I need your advice
The cat is permanently blind in one eye. The eyedrops received at the first trip to the vet worked for his right eye, which is now normal, but the left eyeball has burst like a rotting grape. Eeew. Poor Yoda (now his official name since we are very unlikely to find a home for him with someone else) is in pain when his eye needs to get flushed with sodium wash. We have to hold his little kitty paws as he mews in pain. Absolutely heartbreaking I tell you. At this point I have stopped hating society as a whole for abandoning this little baby (the vet says he was…
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He lives!
Kevin reminded me in the comments that I left everybody hanging. Well, the kitten made it through the night. Sorry for the crappy photo, I’m not used to the new phone’s focus. But you can see that he looks a lot better, right? And I have dubbed him, alternatively, Yoda, Gollum, and Kurozuke, or kuro-chan for short. Why did I give him horrible names? Well, he’s completely adorable until you look him in the face. His eyes are rolled up and outward, with a protective pink sheath still covering the lower hemisphere of his eyeballs. The effect this creates is hard to describe, but let’s just say this cat could…
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Nary a Chance
I am sitting in the dark well aware that I have brought this upon myself and yet cursing fate for having been put in this position again. I haven’t slept because someone is keeping me awake: Let’s not kid anybody, this is one of the un-cutest kittens I have ever seen. Skanky, weak, and noisy. My sister and I fished him out of a rain gutter last night, where he nearly drowned in the torrent of rainwater flowing down the hill. He was shivering and weak with exhaustion. I wish I could be more positive but I don’t know if he’s old enough to make it without his mother, and…
