kucing kurap

chicka's ringworm infection's made a turn for the worse. took her to the vet last saturday for an injection, wound cleaning and claw clipping, luckily it only costs around RM30. this time was much worse than the last. don't know how she managed to get it ... again. and it's always on the same spots, that poor thing.



for now she keeps on hiding under beds all day to avoid me stuffing antibiotic and antifungal down her throat and smothering anti-itch cream on her forehead. i have to coax her out every night so that she'll eat, drink, go pee and poop and take her meds. now she's anti-me.

and as much as she and i hate it, i had to put the stupid ugly inconvenient collar on her to refrain her from scratching the wound, making it worst. falie seems to think the collar makes her funny. and he calls himself a doctor? takde compassion langsung.



well, yeah, okay.. she does look funny.

i just realized something about my cats ...

everytime i call out keeno's name, she sticks her tounge out at me.



chicka's really prone to random fungal infection. she's having yet another 'invasion' .. for the 4th time i think. and so i've gotta fork out vet money for her this weekend. im not so worried about her, even if it looks really painful. im more worried about how much the vet's gonna charge us. considering im technically jobless.

welcome to pathetic central

i put keeno and chicka up on catster. why? cause im one of those typical proud as fuck parents who like to showcase their babies on random internet sites in the name of desperate attention fishing, not for them but mostly for myself.

anyway.. that’s not the pathetic news i was anxiously waiting to blog about. not even 6 hours after i uploaded keeno up on catster, she scored more friends that i could possibly get in 4 months of posting myself up on friendster. yes people, im officially pathetic beyond all recognition. its pathological.

but its ok though, coz in catster, im surrounded by 80 thousand people who’re as crazy (maybe as pathetic) about their little furry prozacs as i am. since a few weeks ago, it has become my own asylum. there’s my chance to rant and gloat about those two crazy furry fuckers the whole family is slaving for at home.

crazy as i can potentially be, at the end of the day i think those two godsends are the ones that keep me subdued and grounded. i love them to pieces. (as if its not obvious enough)

HOLY FLYING CAT!

im just so lucky. ive got one of the funniest most random cats ever, man. most of the time.. you'll never guess what keeno's up to. this evening, she was about to jump on the neighbour's really selamba rabbit (i say selamba coz it just casually roams around into other people's lawns and chew on grasses and drops a whole lot of shit which i think keeno might think they're her science diet pallets) when suddenly the rabbit turns and chased after her and she went off running back home like mommy's boy. buat malu tuan je! i mean .. im talking about the same cat who had a showdown with a goddamn fox not 3 weeks ago, defending chika from being dinner.

and this just in ... as im writing this.. dad's cracking open some durian beralaskan the wall street journal.

talk about irony.

depressed pussy

an awfully curious cat, and a scaredy cat, ive got the two extremes. too extreme for their own good. chicka is just one mad kitty, sometimes i don’t know what’s up her butt. the vet says she’s depressed but i just don’t understand how cats can possibly be depressed. how is is possible to be depressed when all they do is sleep all day and wake up sometimes to eat, groom, go poop and pee, and sometimes play tag with each other. what is there to be depressed about?



its not like they have to pay the bills or wake up with the cold sweats of anxiety just composing the nerves to go to work or anything nervewrekcing like that. neither do they have to worry about not fitting into that new stretchable jeans, or worry about getting predictably unpredictable periods, or worry that when and if it comes, it comes in painful cramping moody globules.

or even staying up late at night tossing and turning thinking if we’ll ever have enough money for a wedding .. you know, all those kind of depressive, prozac-popping feelings people (just being general when i really do mean myself) go through all the freaking day. i mean, all she has to do is brush up on people’s leg and be adorable to get some pieces of chicken. what is there to be depressed about? tell me.



but i just adore her, my depressed and extremely degil chika. she’s is my bundle of joy. i talk to her in baby language and she completely understands me. she'd understand me even if i was talking eskimo. if she could talk, we’d have a really good dialogue going on, talking on and on about work, boys, my stagnant friendster’s list and the OC, just comparing each other's lives.

she’s got this habit of swaying her head vigorously from side to side when she sees me coming to pet her. i take it as a sign of excessive delight, and not that she’s neurotic. no pet of mine should be neurotic as it’d reflect my failure as the mama-pet.

she’s got black paws, and some black stains on the roof of her mouth. my grandma says they're signs that she'd bring good luck and good fortune. but then again, my grandma is 60 and she’s is definitely not feng sui expert. she also have the number 12 on her chest, or 21 depending on which side she's lying. chicka, not grandma.

exhibit A.



she’s the most vain, obsessive compulsive groomer in the family. she would ritually groom herself for 2 hours per session, about at least 3 times a day. first she’ll start with her face, then her ears, then her shoulders, and her tummy, then her crotch, then her hind legs (in our family, the front paws are called hands) and finally her tail, where she’d hold it with her two hands and lick. sometimes she’d stop mid-ritual to sigh a bit, just catching her breath i suppose, before she proceeds with her tongue shower.

and her favorite sitting pose is this:



she can sit like this for seemingly forever, like a buddha, only hairier and more obscene. yes, she’s slightly cross-eyed. she’s fat and heavy too. the last time we wheigh her, she was about 5 ½ kilos. she doesn’t like to be held though, maybe she’s got problem with trust. she’d only love you and trust you when you have fried chicken in your hands.

she’s also really paranoid. really jumpy. any slightest foreign sounds, things or even stray male tabbies from outside, she’d cower and run for her life. currently, her panic room is in the corner at the back of the massage chair by the tv. for now. she’s yet to see that massage chair in action.

obsessive compulsive, vain, fat, lazy, butt-kisser, paranoid, skitzo, obstinate and depressed. where did mom get these freaks? she bore me into the world but what’s chicka’s excuse?

a cranky bitch called keeno

dad took her in one wet and cold night four aprils ago. we were still saddened by the loss of meeko, a stray wild cat we brought home from desaru. she was this pathetic looking kitten then, with scabs and crusts on her eyes, mucus oozing out her fuji apple colored nose, and a bloated worm-filled stomach. we didn’t feel any love for this poor creature at first. small, fragile and frightened but somewhat secure in the palm of my dad’s coarse hand.



honestly, my first thought was.. “pa, why the hell did you take this thing in? its so sick and ugly” but i overcame that feeling as soon as held her in my hand. “people were kicking her around at the restaurant. i didn’t have the heart. i just have to save her.” my dad said. ever the hero.



so we took her in, took care of her. i fed her baby milk formula through syringes, till her poor little stomach bloated up like a balloon in a funfair. we planned to just let nature take its course. she didn’t look like she was going to survive anyway. she didnt pooped or peed for a week. suddenly, out of the blue, like an innate habit, she waddled into the toilet on those tiny paws, and legs only about 2 inches long each. she took a dump. the poise on that kitten tugged all our heart strings.



so, the next day, we decided to give her a name because at the vets, they needed a name for the record. in a brief brainstorming session out at our front porch, she was named keeno. it was either that, or nokia. so, we took her to the vet and told the doctor that we’ve been feeding her with 2 part dumex, 5 parts water. “ahhh. no wonder she looks like she’s about to burst her innards.” the vet diagnosed. so after vaccination, de-worming and de-fleaing, we took her home with an can of expensive milk formula for kittens and eye drops and ointments.



i was in the midst of my “not worthy of love, i want to kill myself but i cant find enough sleeping pill that would do the work” phase. i was jobless, by choice. everyday i'd wake up at 1pm to watch oprah and then proceed to watch more tv till i go back to bed and repeat it the next day for about 5 months. but she gave me a purpose. she gave me a reason to wake up - usually every 2 hours to feed and play with her. she gave me a feeling that everything's gonna be alright. she made me think that i am worthy of love afterall.



eventhough she’s very sickly, she still is, she’s got an abundance of energy. one might think that we fed her with one part milk and 4 parts redbull. she’s a friendly neighborhood cat. she roams around the house and into other people’s houses and comes home smelling like a womanizer. she likes to brush up on stranger’s legs, roll around in the dirt, showing off her pink belly. she likes to ride on people’s shoulders. she likes high ground. whenever we’re busy doing chores, she’d jump on a table or the sofa or at the window sill to supervise the work. for a shorthair cat who was born in a mamak stall, she's got a pomposity of a pedigree persian. she likes to follow dad everywhere. when he’s in the toilet, she’ll wait by the door till sometimes, she falls asleep.



she poops and pees in the sink. don’t ask who picks up and flushes after her. she’s a picky eater but she eats a lot of funny food - like paraffin palettes. but nowadays, she only eats science plan. she loves jumping into empty crates and boxes and baskets. she sleeps in a nest she makes from of a beanbag. usually stomps and circles her spot before she sleeps. like a dog. and tells people to get off it if she wants to sleep. she checks on me, meowing of concern if im in pain.



she doesn’t like me much, though. i don’t know why. ungrateful. maybe its because im more attentive to chika than her. still, ungrateful. she’s one of the most inquisitive, busy bodied, meow-ative, fussy cats i’ve ever come across. She can be quite a bitch sometimes but im glad dad brought her home. i owe her my life … in a way.

pets keep insane people crazy

People with pets are crazy you know? Seriously. I say this because I have 2 cats at home. And I know im crazy because I talk to my cats. And I know they understand what I say and sometimes, in my lucid frame of mind, I swear they talk back to me, and I understand them.

Case in point:



Me : Keen. Tolong kak lisha boleh?
Keeno : *looks up at me with her iridescent eyes* mraawww..
Me : Tolonnngggg lah ajar si chika tu kencing berak kat toilet. Leceh tau hari hari nak kemas. Kak lisha tak larat lah. Boleh tak?
Keeno : *annoyed that everything just has to be about chika* maaauuurr
Me : Tolong eh keen eh? Ajar skit si chika tu. Tunjuk kat dia camner nak buang air kat toilet.
Keeno : maauuurrrrr
*enters chika*
Keeno : *looks at chicka with bottled up hatred*
Chicka : miaaaannnnnnggggggg
Keeno : mrraaawwwwwww (bodoh punya kucing! Kau yang tak reti berak kat jamban.. tak pasal pasal aku plak yang kena dengan perempuan ni membebel! Siap kau. Jap lagi aku sepak bontot kau yang besar tu ngan kuku aku yang tajam dah lama tak potong nih pas tu.. aku makan semua science diet dalam pinggan tu)


And my mom, who doesn’t really like cats, is about to lose her marbles too. (im going to hell just by writing that sentence)



Mom : chika.. chicka good girl. Pandai kencing berak kat kotak.. macam tu lah mama sayang.
Chika : miaaaaaaaannnngggg
Mom : alaaaa manjanya. Chika good girl kan? Gooooddd girrrlll. Dia pandai. *gently strokes the cat*
Chika : miaaaannnnggggggg
Mom : mama kurung chika hari tu bukan mama marah kat chika.. mama nak ajar chika mana nak buang air. sekarang.. chika dah kencing berak kat kotak dalam toilet tu biarpun papa kena teman chika.. mama dah tak nak kurung chika lagi dah.. tau?
Chika : mrraaawwwwwwwwwwww *looks up at mom thankfully and with love in her eyes*

Ah. gotta love my family. crazy or sane. the cats and all.

i change my mind. i love this picture of keeno dad took yesterday morning.

my tempramental 3-human-years old cat "KEENO". you guys see that pink patch on her flabby tummy? thats the result of her always pulling her fur out with her teeth while she's grooming. yes, thats one weird cat.

my beautiful but obstinate cat chiqa. hard to stay mad at her for more than 5 seconds. i mean.. just look at those eyes!

Oh, I forgot to mention that chiqa has now moved on. She no longer does her thing behind the furniture in the living room anymore.

Wooohooo?

No, not just yet.

She’s now doing her thing on the carpet, just underneath the coffee table, in the living room. Mama doesn’t know yet but Papa and I have been waking up before she comes down, to pick the mess up and flush it down the toilet. Gross! well...as long as mama doesn’t know it. She can be nasty if she knew. She’ll lock chiqa up in the toilet for weeks. That poor creature would be left alone in the dark toilet, meowing till she cant meow anymore…she’d be whimpering. I just dont have the heart for that.

C’mon…even baby elephants make me cry. Yes, yes..i cry watching animal planet. And no, its not funny.