A Day In the Life of Vintulapop

So,,,tornado season has officially kicked off with the blast of the siren earlier today. Yay. I found myself sitting in a storage room closet eating a piece of chicken and wondering if it was clear yet. I gave my basement TV away, and now I have no contact with the outside world when Im in the basement. Especially in the part of the house I rarely venture into ....the storage area. I hate tornado season. While I was sitting in the closet enjoying what could be my last meal, I thought about the fact that my neighbors (just moving in next door) have no basement, and perhaps I should risk my life to go next door and see if they wanted to come sit in the storage closet with me and the Vintulapop (more on the V.T.P. later). Then I started thinking about all the socks and underwear that live on the couch in the basement (hey,,it's 10 feet from the laundry room,,,that's just how I roll). By the time I finished my chicken and wondering how embarrassed I'd be for strangers to see my laundry "area"...the tornado had rolled on down the road, and it was a moot point. Still,,I should probably make an effort to clean the basement livingroom,,at least during tornado season.

So,,the Vintulapop is my little family of three (not counting myself). They're a trio of orphaned kittens that I adopted a few years ago. Not all at one time, but within a few months of each other.
Vin (Vinny) was one of 2 kittens that survived out of his litter. The mother cat died, along with the rest of his siblings. I dont know how...and the foster family didnt either. I held his brother first, then I held him. His motor started running as soon as he nestled into my arms, baby style,,,and I decided I'd give him a home. He's a gorgeous tuxedo cat, with a few neuroses. And the older he gets, the more they manifest themselves. Twice he's had to have foreign objects removed from his intestine because he's a chewer. Toys, ponytail bands, sponges, paper, the legs on a pair of my jeans....you name it, he'll try to eat it.

Tula (Tallulah) was trapped in a house that had been bug bombed twice. When we entered the house, I heard a tiny mewing noise, and followed it to a screened in back porch. She was inside a wall. She was...INSIDE...a wall. There was a hole in the sheetrock, and I believe her mother tried to get her to safety when the chemicals started to saturate the air. My uncle reached into the wall with a pair of tongs, and drug out a flea infested, tiny little thing with a HUGE voice that pierced my eardrums for 20 minutes before I drove her to my vet's office to be euthanized. There was no mother cat around, and this tiny little thing would not survive. My vet thought differently, and refused to euthanize her. She told me the kitten was MAYBE 3 days old, and I'd have to feed her every 4 hours, flea comb her several times a day to get rid of the fleas that crawled on her so thickly her skin was moving, and "stimulate" her so she could potty. Blink blink. Hey,,I work a 9 hour day,,ya know? But as it turned out,,,Tallulah's grandmother (my mom) came to feed her once a day, and I came home on breaks and lunch hour to do the other feedings and um...stimulate her so she'd potty. Im forever grateful to my vet (Dr. Melinda Chambers,,best there is!) that she refused to euthanize Tallulah. Tula is truly my baby, and I dont know what I'd do without her.

Pop (Poppy) was discovered in my parents' driveway in a downpour. She was only a few weeks old, soaking wet, and crying at the top of her lungs. Mom brought her in, dried her in a warm towel and fed her. Everyday for a week my mother told me to "just come see" her. I refused. I knew I'd end up taking her home, and I had just taken in two orphans and didnt want another. Sigh.... I finally went to see her, and of course, brought her home. The next day, I noticed she had a small limp, and because she was so small, I took her my savior vet. Annnnd she needed about 700.00 worth of surgery to remove the ball part of her leg bone that had broken off in the socket when she was apparantly thrown out of a car, or kicked pretty hard. For all the money Ive spent on the Vintulapop, I could've had a pedigreed, no neuroses plagued, pure bred cat. But...I love my little crew, and life is never boring with them.