Oh What a Night!!

Good Lord what a traumatic night. It would seem that we are on a roll of "rubbish things happening".

The poor KC got very sick last night. So sick we were at the emergency vet at 2AM this morning....

We had a completely uneventful day yesterday. All went as it should and the KC came in for the night like a good girl and had her dinner and went to sleep. As she does! We were exhausted and went to bed at 9.30PM.

However at 1AM I got jumped on. The KC was mewing & fussing & crying and I tried to ignore her but eventually got up and came downstairs and realised that she had peed outside of her tray - classic cystitis signs. I then gave her a mouthful of food complete with a dose of the anti inflammatory she had been prescribed just before we went on hols hoping that would help her.

10 mins later though she was back jumping on me meowing really loudly - then she stopped moving & her tail went up & I thought  -Uh Oh - she's peeing! Lights went on & boy was she peeing! She had peed under the window (but complete with blood here) and ALL OVER me & my side of the bed! Her way of saying "Help! I am sick". Called the emergency vet, explained situation & as they could hear her plaintiff mews they said bring her in now.

However the KC is not a good traveller and the emergency vet was 30 mins away even at 2AM. The journey there was simply hell. She started crying loudly as I got her into the car. After 10 mins she was not just crying she was hyperventilating, foaming at the mouth, shaking & peeing herself some more - freaking out basically! The emergency vet said she had never seen such a distressed kitty (who hadn't been in an accident!).

She was so bad the first thing the emergency vet did was give her an opiate injection to calm her down! Then more anti inflammatories (I had done the right thing - phew) and a painkiller and off we went home, £200 poorer, with advice to call our vet first thing. We had a repeat of hell on the journey home but the opiate finally kicked in big time & at 3AM we were back in bed (under the spare room's duvet) with the KC zonked underneath our bed. 5 hours later the alarm went & she was still there - had not moved an inch!

I then called our vet. To cut a long & painful story short the KC is officially stressed. Her cystitis is stress induced!!! She now not only has the necessary anti inflammatory & pain relief medicine she also has what can only be described as Cat Prozac! I must also get a Feliway diffuser (I had a spray - not as effective apparently) and cranberry supplements for cats...!

I gave her the first happy pill about 5 hours ago with her "lunch" and she has been zonked out upstairs ever since.

Who was it who said owning animals was calming & good for lowering blood pressure??! They have never come across the KC have they?!

Why oh Why ...

.... do we bother??!

FauxSurreyHubby had a very big birthday recently and we decided to go on holiday to celebrate - yes I know - WHY? We have obviously had our good holiday quota for this decade (ah ... Swallows Nest ...  warm lovely memories) so what on earth made us think that we could have another good one? I have contacted the cottage rental people re the problems & received nothing more than an "oh dear, sorry" mail. Nothing else. Yeah. Great.

Problem 1. I called the cottage rental company ahead of booking to ask about bed quality, explaining the very bad back situation. I was assured that the beds were "medium to firm" and that the owner himself found them v comfy & indeed, he also "had a bad back" ... ah the old " I have a bad back too" empathy comment - fool that I am I fell for it. Bad back for most people means the odd twinge - I have had SPINAL SURGERY! I slip discs as frequently as Katie Price gets married.... why did I listen? Bed was dreadful.

Problem 2. We normally carry our emergency blow up orthopaedic bed everywhere just in case. However, we had a stressful start to the trip. The KC got sick & had to go to the vet on the morning we were supposed to leave ... meaning we were all at 6's & 7's and we forgot to pack the mattress. Oh dear....

Problem 3. Me & my lovely hubby are rather tall people. 5'11" & 6'3" respectively. We could never be accused of being petite or munchkin like; nor are we Oompa Loompas. But given the height of the roof beams in the main part of the house it was evident you had to be one of the aforementioned short types in order not to crack your skull or indeed walk upright without any danger of head injury. And there was NO mention of this rather restrictive feature anywhere in the cottage description. Add walking bent double to a rubbish bed & what do you get? Slipped disc by day 4.

Problem 4. The definition of Luxury. I am going to start a petition for a legally applicable definition of luxury as it seems to be very stretchy. For me, old fashioned as I clearly am, an all pervading smell of damp, heating that doesn't work properly, broken light bulbs, a collection of spiders webs, bathrooms without basins or mirrors and patterned poly-cotton sheets on the bed does NOT = luxury. But according to the website that = 5 star gold standard luxury. God help anyone in 2 star.

Problem 5. Childhood memories are not reliable. The place we went to was very near a place where I spent far too many childhood holidays. I had memories of one of the eating places being quite posh. Yes, well, posh when you are 12 and live on a council estate in Liverpool is NOT posh when you now live in Surrey & the last restaurant you went to was a 2 Michelin starred jobby. I single handedly ruined FSHubby's half century; the restaurant was like a bad café with varnished pine tables & gingham seat cushions all beautifully lit by strip lights and had freezer to fryer type food & the worst wine list ever. We should've left but there was no food in the rental house & we were hungry & hysterical .... especially when the chocolate sponge with a candle on it got delivered to the table!

Problem 6. Well Wales basically. It is perfect when the sun shines if you want to walk, sit on a beach (amazing beaches to be fair) swim, canoe, cycle etc., but when the weather is bad there's not a lot to do. On a particularly rainy day we thought we would head for a big-ish city so went to Caernarfon - saw the castle, and to be fair found an amazing (finally!!) restaurant called Blas (go - if you are ever in Caernarfon treat yourself  http://blascaernarfon.co.uk/) then thought we would have a bit of a shop; but aside from the newly refurbished tourist type shops at the docks, the shopping in Caernarfon consisted of a furniture store, an Iceland and an Asda. Most odd.

So with a slipped disc and an ever diminishing sense of humour I drugged myself to the eyeballs and we cut our losses & drove home 2 days early. To find a happy, well again KC, 400 count pure Egyptian cotton sheets on a 1400 pocket sprung orthopaedic mattress, heating that works brilliantly, and to discover that all the washing & ironing had been done by the cat sitter. Home sweet home. (thanks to Karin Akesson  for the print)