Incidently ...at the vets...

I have had a couple of notes of support about this blog and I want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart. Baring one’s soul (and in my case, my teeth) is only possible with your help, feedback and criticism.

Yesterday a dear pal, D, popped by for lunch and was kind enough to help me out by driving the cat (with the off purr) and I to the vet. The vet’s waiting room is so much more exhilarating then the doc’s. People turn up with motley collections of creatures on leads and in cages and usually spend much of the time leaning over said creature speaking in baby talk. People ,and English people at that ,actually talk to each other at vets…the doggy people usually shriek at each other - mostly about anal glands and mange. Cat people are usually quieter and looking a little guilty. Cats will have that effect.
My pal and I having spent much of our early lives in Zambia where pets lives were usually quite short, tragic and bloody due to cars, snakes, rabies, parasites, starvation, infighting need I go, on are always slightly bemused by the cult of ‘pet’ in UK. We nearly fell off our seats having overheard the receptionist talking briefly to a vet about the impending testicular cancer operation ….on a hamster! The luck of birth eh?

Sunlight had found my corner and I had forgotten my baseball cap which blocks glare so I was a little blinded and just enjoying listening to D telling vastly inappropriate jokes, the most repeatable being:
'A cat and two dogs go to a bar in the Green room at the National Opera (I am embellishing here D..) and ask for a drink. The bartender apologises and says that the bar is reserved for composers and musicians… The animals look at each other with a sigh and then the first dog says
‘I Bark’
The second says
'I often Bark'
And the cat says
'And I’m de Pussy.'

And then there is a squeak and sitting next to D is a very handsome man (hmmm – suddenly she ain’t THAT blind) with a large black and white kitten on his lap. (The squeak was from the kitten not the man). Just as we are getting into a conversation about the kitten’s obsession with your man’s (he was Irish) Dyson vacuum cleaner, I was called back to pick up my poor, old, one-toothed feline who had been subjected to something people from LA pay large amounts of money for. I also paid large amounts of money for it…vets are costly! (I wondered on the costs of the hamster having his ball removed….)

The receptionist kept making funny noises at me whilst I was paying. I wondered if she had a speech impairment but it turns out she was trying to communicate with my cat. My cat, who won’t be able to sit down for several hours, just looked at her with outrage and disgust.
Sadly never got the phone number of man with kitten and Dyson. (Seemed like a good combination to me…)