The Merlin Kitty

Friends, family, followers:

My friend Bridget has one of the very best kitties in the world. His name is Merlin.

I first met Merlin when my best friend was preparing to move in with Bridget and they were introducing their cats. Dash was a cantankerous, territorial, prima donna pain in the ass. He was hiding in his carrier and wouldn’t come out. I mostly expected there to be a cat fight, because pretty much every cat I’ve ever met is that way in the extreme. But Merlin just walked back and forth in front of the carrier, rubbing up against it affectionately, and peeking inside from time to time. Dash eventually ran out of growls, but Merlin never ran out of patience or love.

In all the years I’ve known him, Merlin has ben the paragon of catly excellence. He’s never a “butt” as so many cats tend to be. He doesn’t bite, claw, or scratch. In fact, he sorta seems like a cat that Catholics might want to give a sainthood to (don’t those things alone count as miracles?). He’s kind, caring, and attentive to his friend cat and his person.

But now, Merlin’s in trouble.

He has a diaphragmatic hernia. In layperson’s terms, it basically means that his liver is up near his heart (note: this is not where it belongs). Insurance will cover some of it, but Bridget is quickly approaching her cap on coverage, what with all the ER visits that it took to get this diagnosis.

Merlin will probably need an operation, and soon, if he hopes to live much longer. His quality of life has gone downhill recently, and he needs treatment ASAP.

Bridget is hoping to raise $5,000 for his veterinary care. Since she can only estimate the cost, she is offering a ballpark figure and promising this: if it ends up being more than they need, all extra funds will be donated to the Almost Home cat rescue in Denver, a cage-free no-kill shelter that provides a safe place with medical care for all cats, even the “unadoptable” and terminally ill. (They’re located right near me!)

If you enjoy my kitten blog, please consider donating to Bridget’s campaign. Every dollar helps. Bitty kitties turn into grown-up kitties, and my goal in fostering is to raise wave after wave of kitties who are as wonderful as Merlin. It’s easy to ignore the plights of big kitties because they’re “not as cute” as kittens (though I think Merlin is), but they’re the reason we foster parents go through all the trouble. The grown-ups are the ones who are our best friends and companions.

See? Told you he was cute.

So go now, and with kittens in your heart, give this week’s latte to Merlin. He could really use it.

https://www.gofundme.com/TheMerlinKitty

•••Hey, did you know? I’m fostering kittens! Come look at adorable pictures on my kitten blog! Paw-Purr-azzi•••

Backwards progress

This one’s gonna be short, faithful readers.

I have come to the realization that I need to get the gym back into my routine. There are things I can do to mitigate the paralysis that seems to come over me after the gym—but there’s no way to mitigate the stiffness, muscle loss, and declining energy levels except to start the body movin’.

In other news, I have been playing around with Blender. Although my current rendering of Jane Lane from Daria looks like a horrifying monkey-slash-nightmare demon, just doing it really strips away the terror related to trying something new. I’ve also finished all of the Christmas stockings for the spouses. Now I just need to do the chibis; but first I gotta decide on a design for them. Also I need to take a break from knitting for a while.

Gnar turned one whole year old yesterday. Little miracle kitty! So glad he picked me.

I’m actually making slow progress with my Cassidy outline again! The story keeps changing on me. How’s it ever going to hold still long enough for me to write it all down?!

Gonna hop on writing now. Else I’m wasting my time at Cafe 44 with my fellow writista Bridget. Buon viaggio!

It moves so slowly you can’t see the change

I find myself in an uncomfortably unfamiliar situation. It’s a good situation, to be sure, but it has its own dimension of stress.

As of now, I have too many creative outlets and projects.

Ever-looming, Cassidy glowers at me from the top of the fridge. We’ve agreed that she’s allowed to stay there until she wants to come down. I’ve made progress outlining my Supernatural fanfic. I’ve made a lot of progress on the first Christmas stocking. And...

There has been a zygote of an idea implanted in my brain.

Myself and a cadre of creative people have begun dipping our toes into the tidepools of creating a point-and-click adventure game. One writer, two artists, one (two?) coder(s), one producer-ish-thing. I play the part of artist and producer, huzzah! And in an effort to really sabotage myself as hard as I possibly can, I’m trying to learn 3D animation.

Good thing this game won’t be coming to real fruition for a few years, given that our 4-person team can only work on it in our free time (and everyone but me is employed). Because let me tell you, teaching yourself 3D animation is not easy or quick. The problem I’ve been running into is that the tutorial I was using was for an earlier version of Blender. When I installed the earlier version of Blender, I still wasn’t seeing the things I needed to be seeing to get the tutorial to work. Ugh.

I think I need to check out Lynda.com.

In other news, we have gotten to a place where there are no more treatment options for my kitty Squish, who has been my constant and loyal companion and friend since 2001. He’s not exactly on death’s door or anything, but the word is in: he’s in the twilight of his life. He’s only on Cirenia now, to keep him from vomiting—essentially for his own comfort and our convenience. He’s scarily skin-and-bones. But the bright side is that I am shamelessly pampering him now, which is nice for both of us. He’s already eaten most of a pound of raw chicken since last Thursday.

I’m gonna be wrecked when he goes, but I’m doing my very best to keep from being sad while he’s still here.

And off I go to knit and watch The 100. Ciao!