I Wonder if Max Payne is the Worst Movie Ever Made? (As in: It Inflicts 'Max Pain' on the Audience)

When my wife is out of town, my sleep is fitful, and even the worst cable movie postpones the sheet wrestle. Mark Wahlberg has this little Munchkin face in this little Munchkin body. And he's the 'killer ap' cop?

Good news is I can give it one star at Netflix, which will make future choices there more like to satisfy.

No wife, no kitty. My sleep satisfaction is at least tolerable when there's a warm cat body nearby, preferably two or three. Last kitty I slept with died, and at the moment we are Catless in Gaza (a Biblical reference and also Huxley reference, I think, and thus as inviting to most readers as a slap in the face).

But back to cats. Come January we'll get a basketful.

I Thought I Could Tell the Difference Between a Male Cat and a Female Cat Two Times Out of Three

Image by law_keven via Flickr

But I was wrong. Here's the test. A half dozen friends have taken the little quiz, and someone equalled my 11 out of 20, but no one has topped it.

I guess I project or reify or anthropomorphize. I certainly fail to pick out the actual gender.

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• Downing Street cat Sybil dies (telegraph.co.uk)

Now He Belongs to the Ages: Socks the Cat, Whose Last Years Were Spent in Exile, Dead at 20

Full marks for having a cat. Full demerits for giving him away. Cute obit.

Addendum: Sock's last job, which brought him shame.

Oliver in December, Two Weeks Before He Died (Just Found the Video)

He did enjoy a good scratch, up until the last day. Good on you, little friend.



Expressing Oliver's bladder back in the day.

Did I Imagine I Heard the Words 'Studio Cat' in English?

Saving Tinkerbelle

I mean please on my behalf believe or feign belief that little Oliver can get his fuzzy butt in gear again. For today he simply quit moving.

He crawls a little, the best he can, not good enough. It's been coming these six months. In June we pulled him back from the vet's last needle when no one thought we could, but he's an old cat, 16 years, eight months, 19 days we figure.

I am not sure that the strength is there in his little body. I don't know if it's there for him to find. He cries out, and the vet said it may not be pain -- the vet does not think he is in pain -- he cries out in frustration because his nerve-damaged rear legs cannot push him, though he tries, and his front legs at last lack the strength to pull him forward.

The vet is "shot-gunning" his condition -- $409 worth of shotgunning. A vitamin B Complex shot. A powerful steroid. An enema for god's sake because his little bowel is packed and potentially toxic.

I feed him chicken soup and baby food by syringe. And another syringe with a softener for his feces and another syringe with the paste they call CalLax and another syringe with half a teaspoon of potassium.

And a steroid pill and one-quarter of a blood pressure pill. Oh, I have to squeeze his bladder empty twice a day, laying him on his side, pressing him down with my left hand, squeezing with my right as if he were a baby's toy, handling him rough, too rough, because gentle will not work because I'm on my own, and I've never done this on my own before.

He's not strong enough to struggle. And I think: Give him the strength to make me stop, at least to exact a price. Then he will be well again.

If only.

Actually, I don't want much, no miracle, no drastic recalibration of the laws of causation. I just want to keep him going for a month until E. comes home from her mother's. She left him in my care. It matters because it matters because it matters. Take my word.

'Expressing' Oliver's Bladder. A *Vet* Showed Me How to Do This. Seek Professional Instruction Once You Have Been Inspired by Our Demonstration.

Corrections:

Actually Oliver is not a young cat. He is 16. Was I concerned about his feelings by declining to state his age when the cameras were running?

Also, his problem is not just piddling in the wrong place. For ten days, he did not void; he leaked. That was when we were inspired by Sue Russell's treatment of her cat Spenser, who was paralyzed in the back parts from kittenhood, to squeeze Oliver's bladder.

Oliver is not quite paralyzed, but the video makes clear how limited is his control over his rear legs. And that poor little tail! Think of a furry overcooked noodle.

Kitty Update

Not so good. Won't eat. Use the big syringe, mix a little baby food and chicken broth and:

Voila. We hope.

An Oliver Update

The steroids seem to be helping. He is walking a little bit -- to walk at all, some limp and some drag, is better than he was doing Saturday and Sunday -- and he seems to have much better control of his bladder. Of course, Eydie and I are "expressing" -- weird nomenclature; whose sensibilities needed salving? -- his bladder morning and night *and I am getting pretty good.*

This means in a day or two: a video!

We are the Sultan

Like Scheherazade, Oliver must tell us a tale each night so that he be allowed to live another day. His tales are a bit of a dumb show, of course, for a meow can be many things but never an argument.

Tonight he dragged himself into his litter box and urinated and then -- to the wonder of all -- bumped his way up the stairs.

And then he lay down. He had done enough. For today.

Cat Bulletin

Not good. When we got home from the A's game Saturday night, Oliver could walk only with great difficulty. He'd move a few feet -- shuffle really, like an old man -- and then sit for a while. Sunday morning we called our vet hospital, which was short staffed and told us no appointments were available, but Eydie said it IS an emergency and you WILL see the kitty and they did.

So the last round begins: a steroids shot and pills twice a day. We see no particular benefit 24 hours later. The little guy struggles to move, though he is using his litter -- some of the time. I do not think life is very pleasant for him, even by cat standards, which I have never thought of as particularly exacting.

What are the parameters of cat contentment? Were those all-night snuggles essential or incidental, one of many sources of warmth in the night? It is sentimental to put off killing him, I conclude, but I think that supposing we can be rational about all things is itself profoundly irrational and more distorted and misdirected than our wild spasms of intution. (Reverse is true, too.)

So: a few more days and then the hole in the garden, the tears at the vet (where sometimes they are unsettled when a man cries) and then the good memories take hold, and we accept things as they are and let those things resonate.



Here. Look at this. These are things I've said before.

Would You Like to Read an Email? You Can Be My Secret Friend.

Teresa:

Well, bunny cat is doing better. He's pissing on his own -- sometimes in his nice litter, sometimes on the pads he is supposed to sit on because he leaks. He still leaks a little, but the amount *may* be decreasing. He is very sad because he has slept with us for 16 years and now he is locked out of the bedroom. Odd thing -- maybe not so odd -- is that we are not sleeping very well, not well at all, though I would have sworn his presence was often a nuisance.

Meanwhile, I'm finishing up grading. Question: How much extra credit should a class get that you have enjoyed teaching more than any class in recent memory? I mean, if an individual grade is a B or B+, why not an A- for charm??

Later in the day: What I did was average up the grades, assign the extra credit and give everyone they mark they got. You get an A from me it means you got an A from me.