Thursday: Raven goes to the vet

On Thursday morning, around 10:00 am, Ken suddenly said to me, “Have you seen Raven? I haven’t seen her all morning.” And it was weird because I hadn’t either, and normally, she’s around doing her usual routine, eating, pooping, then sleeping in a sunny spot on a chair, or jumping into your lap when you least expect it or have shorts on. So we started going around the house, calling for her in the high-pitched soft voice that she likes. Normally, she answers right away, and comes to see what we want, but this time we went all over the house, and there was no sign of her anywhere. Ken wondered if she could have gotten outside, and he reminded me that I might have left the door open very early that morning when I went to get my shoes from the middle of the front lawn (I may or may not have had a couple of drinks), but I reminded HIM that there’s a screen door that swings shut, so no. Plus Raven HATES the outdoors. The only time she ever accidentally got out, I found her sitting on the front step looking longingly back at the door, and when I opened it, she ran right back in. Regardless, I threw on some clothes and started walking around the neighbourhood, calling for her and looking under bushes. To the untrained eye, I probably seemed a little unhinged, but I was starting to panic. What if she got out of the house, and some random stranger saw her and took her? While the joke would be on him—two litter boxes and a tendency to pee on bathmats and antique rugs—she’s a beautiful purebred Persian, and would tempt anyone. But worse, what if someone kidnapped her and held her for ransom? Ken would never agree to pay—as we all know, according to Ken, paying kidnappers just encourages them.

When I got back to the house, I was initially relieved when Ken said he’d found her. But he found her hiding under the bed in the guest room, and she wouldn’t come out. When we finally managed to pull her out to make sure she was OK, she took off downstairs and hid under the piano. One of her eyes looked weepy, and she wouldn’t go near anyone. She spent the rest of the day under OUR bed, and wouldn’t eat or drink anything. She also didn’t use the litter box all day, which, for little Miss Poopy Pants, is highly unusual. So at 6 o’clock, I insisted that Ken call the vet. We took her in a little while later and guess what? Absolutely nothing wrong with her. So when we got home, we had a somewhat heated conversation. Raven and me, that is.

Me: What the hell was that all about?
Raven: Don’t even get me started.
Me: I thought you were sick!
Raven: More fool you, then. Did it ever occur to you that maybe I was a little pissed about the way you acted this morning?
Me: This morning..? You mean when I caught you drinking out of Mishima’s tank?
Raven: You yelled at me.
Me: You were drinking out of the FISH TANK! It’s disgusting!
Raven: Disgusting? I’m a CAT! Everything I DO is disgusting. I poo in a box, I throw up hairballs, I lick my own ass. Suddenly we’re drawing the line at drinking out of the fish tank? Give me a break!
Me: Well, you were scaring the fish.
Raven: Bullsh*t. That fish isn’t scared of anything. You should hear the way he talks. He was in ‘Nam.
Me: No, he wasn’t “in ‘Nam”! God, I wish he would stop telling people that! I looked all over the neighbourhood for you—people thought I was nuts.
Raven: Serves you right. Besides, my day was no walk in the park. How would you like to have a thermometer shoved up your ass? And “subcutaneous fluids”? Did you know that means a needle in the vein? I thought for a second that it was the end. I was so freaked out that I peed all over the table! It was very undignified.
Me: I can’t believe that I just spent $229.00 at the vet’s because you were sulking…
Raven: Now we’re putting a price on love? You could at least thank me for the free urine test.
Me: You’re a jerk.
Raven: Come here and give me a cuddle.
Me: Screw you….oh, all right.

She’s fine today, back to her old diva-ish self. And from now on, if she wants to drink out of the fish tank, I’ll let Mishima deal with her. Apparently he has combat experience.

Friday: The neighbours go crazy and the cops don’t mind

Last night, Ken came in from walking Titus around 11 o’clock and said, “Some of the neighbours across the corner on main street are having a screaming match. It’s been going on for a while and it sounds pretty serious.” T and I had been watching Aliens (with Sigourney Weaver), and there’s a LOT of screaming and explosions in that movie—about half an hour too many to be honest—so we hadn’t heard anything, but sure enough, when I turned off the TV, I could hear a lot of commotion, and by commotion, I mean people screaming F*ck at each other A LOT. So we did what any reasonable people would do—we watched and listened out the windows. We couldn’t really see much, the two houses involved being a good 200 feet away and partially blocked by trees, but we could see there was a bit of a crowd. And we could DEFINITELY hear what was going on. Namely two guys (we know who they are, but you won’t, so we’ll call them Gas Station Kid and Restaurant Daughter’s Husband) going at it in grand style, while onlookers (mostly female from the sound of it) screamed at each of them, thusly:

Kid: This is why your f*ing wife left you!
Husband: Get the f*ck off my property!
Kid: You’re a f*ing asshole!
Husband: Bring it on, mother*cker!
Woman: You shut the f*ck up!

And so on. It was kind of amusing at first, but then it got a little scary, as things started to get more heated and seemed to be moving from posturing to actual violence, at which point, I said to Ken, “Do you think we should call 911?” Just as I said it though, there was a tussle, a girl screamed, someone was yelling Help!, a child started crying, and one of the onlookers yelled, “Call 911! Call 911!” so I figured THAT was taken care of. While we waited for the police to arrive, we gleaned from the continued screaming that one of the men, not sure which, had hit one of the female bystanders who, according to the guy, had come at him and hit him first, so it was technically self-defence, and that he had “never done anything like that in his f*ing life” (hit a woman? hit anyone? annoyed his neighbours? It wasn’t clear). Then we saw lights coming, and were initially relieved, but the light was green and mounted on the dashboard of a pick-up truck, which means only one thing.

“WTF!” I said to Ken. “They’ve dispatched a VOLUNTEER FIREFIGHTER to this mess?!”

I could only imagine the poor schlub behind the wheel, thinking he was going to check out a potential accident or fire, and arriving at THAT scene. Needless to say, he stayed in the truck—who could blame him? It was definitely above his pay grade, being a volunteer who didn’t actually GET paid and all—and his presence had no effect AT ALL on the street war. After about ten minutes of more screaming, door slamming, and threats like, “How’d you like it if one hundred f*cking Harley Davidsons pulled up to your door?!” (was it a noise threat? because those things are LOUD), we saw more lights. Could it finally be the police? But no. This time it was a firetruck. A single firetruck, a tanker truck to be more specific, which drove past the scene, past our house, then turned around and parked at the corner of the main street. “What do you think the plan is?” asked Ken. “Are they going to water cannon them?”

The firetruck seemed to be a little more intimidating though—and I say FIRETRUCK as opposed to FIREFIGHTERS, because, just like the volunteer vehicle, no one got out of it and it was just SITTING there—the crowd began to disperse, and people started to disappear into their respective houses. Within a few minutes, the street was silent, the only movement the flashing red lights of the fire truck. After another ten minutes, during which Ken and I had gone to bed, we could hear the firetruck leaving, so Ken went to see if that meant the police had finally shown up. Nope. Now don’t get me wrong—I have tremendous respect for the police and what they do, but in a case like this—two hours of screaming and swearing, at least one assault, children crying, and threats being made— I would have hoped the cops would be the FIRST to be dispatched to the scene, not a volunteer firefighter from town whose job is most definitely NOT breaking up mobs of angry, violent people. This morning, everything is calm, mainly because it’s early and no one is up yet, but who knows what the day will bring. One hundred f*cking Harley Davidsons, maybe.