They really love each other...they just pretend not to

i have never written about my cats. my profile says i have cats but for all you guys know, my cats roam around without love and affection. so wrong! they are very pampered. a lot less than before the days of little bit but still, pampered. my orange cat (quincy-- named after the iguana in "Foxtrot") was my first. he is a shelter cat who was quite pitiful when we rescued him. he's the "biggest cat ever" as everyone points out when they first walk through the door and glimpse him running to the bedroom to hide under the bed. he is totally petrified of storms, vacuums, and people. he loves the people who see him on a regular basis (my mom, my friend sara, my stepdad, brian, and of course me) but he'd rather not know you if he doesn't already. my little cat (gracee--so named b/c she's grey) is also a shelter cat. her story is longer than my quincy's. i got a cat in january of '04 (i think) from a shelter about 45 minutes from here. it's a different state and in that state, animals (by law) have to be spayed and neutered before being rescued. the cat (reasy) was only 6 or 8 weeks old but they said it would be fine to spay her--they did it all the time. when i picked her out she had a little cough sounding thing but i figured hairball (stupid me didn't know 6 week old cats didn't get hairballs). anyway, that was on a saturday. the following monday they called to say she had an upper respiratory infection and were going to wait to spay her. they SHOULD have waited a full 10 days for the antibiotics to do their thing but unfortunately they did it the next day...grrrrr...we went and picked her up on that thursday. she was happy and so cute and laid in my lap and loved me. i was so excited. shortly thereafter (like the next week) she got really sick. since she was spayed, her body couldn't deal with the infection that she still had and try and heal her surgery wounds so she ended up dying. it was horrible horrible horrible. the most horrible thing! well, i got TICKED and the shelter said to pick out another cat and they'd take care of whatever costs i had incurred (it had been a lot--the poor cat had to have an iv)!! so we saw little gracee. the first time we saw her she was climbing the cage she was in and SCREAMING at the top of her lungs. she was oh so tiny (only 4 weeks old) but weaned from mommy so they let me take her (they said i'd have to bring her back in a few weeks to be spayed...uh-huh yeah right. we had it done at 8 months). we had to keep her and quincy separated for awhile b/c of worms and also quincy was 13lbs and gracee was about 2oz (or so). his paw would've squished her body. the problem with gracee was she wasn't eating right. she loved to eat but she'd only eat while you were sitting right there with her so she didn't get enough. sooooooo...she ended up being hypoglycemic. we came home from dinner one night and she was sleeping. i woke her up but she could barely lift her head. i said "b, something's wrong" he said "no she's just groggy" i said "no something's wrong." her blood sugar had bottomed out and she couldn't even hold her head up. it was PITIFUL! i was sobbing, b was trying to get her to wake up (he still thought she was groggy), my mom couldn't understand me (on the phone) b/c i was crying so hard but finally talked to b and said try feeding her. so i held up some food to her mouth and she wanted it so bad but couldn't open her eyes to see it so she CHOMPED into my finger. i had to be on antibiotics and my finger looked like the jolly green giant's. not pleasant. i still have a scar and it bothers me from time to time. we finally got enough down her that she started to come out of the funk. we had one more episode like that and then she went to spend 2 weeks with my step aunt (big animal expert) and came home like a whole new kitty. she is now perfectly healthy and also, a bit spoiled. she thinks her "place" in life is on my shoulder. she has a catnip-stuffed frog (we call him "lieutenant dan" b/c his legs are coming off--forrest gump). every night she "kills him," brings him to the bedroom, and drops him next to me and then curls up on top of me and goes to sleep. then, whenever we leave the house, she gets him and brings him to the door. she's funny with that thing!

so there's the tail of the 2 cats :)