On March 25th, I called my mom to ask for a ride to some cat shelters in a nearby town.

CORINNE: Should we take the cat carriage?
MOM: Nah, we’re just looking for now.

We drove up to Zaandam during rush hour, which meant one shelter was closing just as we arrived. We checked out the other one, which I’d checked out beforehand online. One of their cats, Misty, appealed to me in particular. For one, she was already an adult, and was described as being fearful and requiring a lot of love and attention. Since I work at home and live on my own, my apartment is the perfect place for a Project™.

For another, she’s got a tiny spot on her nose.

When we arrived, she watched us with huge eyes–well, eye, since she was hiding–and we made soothing sounds at her. “It’s all right,” the shelter lady said at one point. “You can pet her.”

I opened the cage and she bolted to a different box. I reached out. Misty cringed. I very carefully stroked her head.

MISTY: *cri–purr?*
CORINNE: Awww.
MOM: Take the cat.
CORINNE: Wait, what?
MOM: Listen to that purring! Take the cat.
CORINNE: I thought we were just going to look. We don’t even have the carriage with us.
MISTY: Purr.
MOM: Shelter lady! Do you have transport boxes?
SHELTER LADY: Affirmative.
MOM: Take. The. Cat.

I took the cat.

MISTY: *stops purring*

Misty’s description on the shelter website had said that she’d been there for about half a year after being dropped off because she couldn’t get along with the other cats in the house. A different family adopted her, then returned her within two weeks because she wasn’t social enough and stayed in the same spot in the house 24/7. Anyone who adopted her would have to provide her with a quiet, stable environment, and not expect her to be a lap cat straightaway.

The first day, she actually did better than we’d expected–she wandered around the house sniffing and rubbing up against absolutely everything, and even allowed very brief cuddles before finding a hiding spot in the bathroom and surgically attaching herself to it.

The hiding spot was behind a bucket. It was deeply cute.

I tried to mostly ignore her that first day to let her get settled in at her own pace. I cleaned up, sat at my computer for a while, watched some TV.

MISTY: My own pace is lap time. RTFN.
CORINNE: The shelter lied!
MISTY: *purr*
CORINNE: This cat is well-adjusted! False advertising!
MISTY: *purrrrrr*
CORINNE: I can live with it tho’.

She made herself fairly comfortable over the next few days and weeks, and did not particularly seem to mind my dubbing her Terra rather than Misty.

I’ll wait till you’re done squeeing, and yes, that is a little cat tongue in that third photo. I know. I know.

Unfortunately, for all her endearing sleeping poses, high-volume purring, and insatiable love of cuddles, she’s not as well-adjusted as I initially thought. At night, she’s clingy. I don’t let her into my bedroom, so she spends forever scratching at my door and yowling. During the day, though, I can only approach her when she’s on the couch, and then only if I make eye contact and talk to her in a soft voice. The rest of the time, she won’t let me come near. When I walk through the apartment, I have to give her a wide berth or she’ll scramble out of the way. Anything within three feet is risky.

I can live with that–though I hope it improves, since this can’t be relaxed for her. Worse is her reaction to–well–anyone not me. One or two visitors, and she’s behind the couch. Not scared, but very, very cautious. If there are more people than that, like when I had my family over on Sunday, and she’s genuinely terrified. Crouching in a corner, ears flat, pitiful mewling.

Even the sounds of the doorbell or the neighbors coming home send her into hiding:

CORINNE: You are not very good at hiding.
TERRA: I am invisible!
CORINNE: Your tail. It’s like. Right there.
TERRA: Invisible.
CORINNE: I feel like you’d be waggling your eyebrows right now if you had any.
TERRA: They would be invisible eyebrows.

It’s only been a little over a month, so I’m giving it time, and hopefully she’ll learn that there’s nothing to worry about. If any of you happen to be cat experts, though, I welcome advice.

In the meantime, we’re both enjoying our evening couch cuddles.

Lastly, I should point out that–as obsessed as I am with my apartment and color-coordination–I did not select Terra purely because she matches my sexy floor.

… but gotta say, I like it.

Hello. I am currently interested in having the sexytimes.

Send help.

(Doesn’t that picture remind you of something?)

As I’ve mentioned, I’m cat-sitting for my sister at the moment. I’m looking after these pretty ladies:

We are the hottest things in Cattown.

On the left is the youngest (by two weeks), Six, while on the right is Laila (who is Six’s aunt). They’re both Savannah cats–mixtures of servals and Siamese cats.

They were born this summer, which makes them just about the right age for nature to go, “Did you finally get used to the way these cats yowl and murr? Good. It’s about to get worse.”

The week before my sister and brother-in-law left, Laila went into heat. I was beyond relieved that it passed before I moved in.

Which… you can guess what’s coming, can’t you?

Hello. I am currently interested in having the sexytimes.

I’ve owned cats my entire life but I’ve never experienced the phenomenon of Cats In Heat before–and it is both deeply annoying and deeply hilarious. I’m probably a horrible person to be mocking her when she’s so uncomfortable, but–well, she keeps me up at night with all her yowling, so I guess we’re square.

Murrrr mrrrrr mraaaaaw mrrrr? MRRRR. MRAAAAW. MOOOOWMrrrrrrRRRrrr.

She’s rolling around all over the place. The couch! The aquarium! Random boxes! On top of the heater! Earlier I came back into the room and she was rolling around on the chair I’d departed just seconds ago.

CORINNE: Still horny?
SIX: *rolls off chair, landing headfirst* MRRRRRrrrrr.

Just a couple more days, and there will be peace once more.

I’ve been very adamant about Not Falling Behind On Schedule Ever during this draft. In fact, I’ve only missed my minimum word count once, and that was a day when I had a friend over and we had far better things to do, like kill zombies, fight unreasonably large spiders, and squee over adorable robots.

But today I haven’t written a word. I could say that’s because today is April 21st, which is clearly a momentous day. Why? Because:

• It’s exactly one week until birthday. (For the curious: I will be turning my current age plus one. #helpful)
• It’s been exactly a year since I chopped off all my hair. I haven’t regretted it for a second. In fact, I’m long overdue for another hairdresser appointment. Shorter = better, y’all.)

But I’m afraid my lack of wordage can’t be attributed to either of those. Instead, it’s because I’ve been plotting. And brainstorming. And cursing. And wailing. And reconsidering my decision to keep going with this book besides all the shiny distractions being well, shiny.

But.

But this past hour I think I’m finally figuring it all out. The book is starting to feel more like Always Read the Fae Print in terms of plot construction, which is a good thing, because I’m still kinda proud of how all of that eventually came together. (An awesome person once called it “almost Dickensian”. I will confess that I haven’t read any Dickens but I’m still pretty sure that’s an amazing compliment.)

So… it’s not perfect yet. And I’ve already spotted a major flaw in the structure of the 30k I have so far that will require a lot of reworking of my opening chapters.

But things are clicking into place, and especially after struggling so much, that’s a delightful, delightful feeling.

I would hereby like to humbly thank my mascot for her support.

I have all kinds of interesting things I want to write posts about… but I’m not gonna.

Instead, I’m sharing some bullet point updates.

• Plotting is going OK. Still need some breakthroughs, but I’m feeling more comfortable with what I have so far.
• Have sidelined plotting for now in order to work on a short story R&R from a major market. (Excited: I am it.)
• That post about Merel/Femke/Imke/whatsherface? My mother is absolutely insistent that I return her to her Merel-y state. “So rename the other M-chick!” she keeps exclaiming. “Merel is PERFECT for her. None of those other names fit.” I will take it under consideration, Mom.
• Cat brought in a dead bird yesterday. That’s a first.
• Semi-hard at work acquiring a netbook to install the Pixel Qi screen I ordered — then I’ll be able to get work done outside. It’ll be magical.
• Yesterday I tried contacts for the first time in years. Getting them in took about 30-40 minutes. Taking them out… um…
• Did you know last night ended with my returning home from the doctor’s while totally high on anesthetic eye drops? Trufax.
• I am not trying contacts again.

Which brings us to today.

Which is Not A Good Day.

Like I mentioned before, both the dogs are leaving. This morning was Bo’s turn.

Tomorrow, Razzi is meeting with a different family where he may or may not stay as a trial run. So… it’s gonna be one weepy weekend.

At least I have words to keep me busy.

The good: I am now officially on submission.

Yes, that requires sparklies.

The timing is pretty cool, too — a month and a day ago, I sent out my first query for the YA version of this project. I’m still dizzy over how fast all of this has gone. Probably not something I should get used to, in this business. *g*

Unfortunately, there’s also some bad news. If you’ve followed this blog (or my Twitter) for a while you’ll probably already know my dogs, Razzi and Bo. If not, here’s a reminder. (And if so… I don’t care. Look, cute puppies!!)

These photos were taken last year, back when I had hair and looked all of thirteen. (These days, I look fifteen, thank you very much.) (Also, that cow in the distance totally shows up in Always Read the Fae Print.)

Anyway, they’re only my dogs part-time. Their actual owner works long hours, so they come over here several days a week, enjoying the extra space and attention and walking time.

Sadly, their owner is no longer capable of even looking after them part-time, and me taking them in full-time isn’t an option either. We’ll be looking for new owners who do have the time to look after them, as well as the space, inclination, discipline and experience — Akitas are tough dogs to handle.

It’s good for them — they were cooped up alone in a small apartment far too often. At the same time… They’re my bay-bees. I get weepy just thinking about losing them. So that’s putting a bit of a downer on the otherwise celebratory mood.

It helps to know that we’re going to be super-picky about selecting new owners, though, and that they’ll have a much better life this way. I’m trying to focus on that.

Oh, and writing. I guess there’s that, too.

Well, the Christmas Eve dinner is over. Tomorrow: visiting the relatives. (The ones that live alllll the way across the country. You know, a one-hour drive from here.)

So to those who celebrate Christmas: I hope you have a wonderful few days.

I’m going to keep this short and leave you with a few more photos of all the white stuff outside — or rather, the fuzzy creatures who run around in it. I took these photos today, which means that, yes, we’ve got a white Christmas! This is very rare here, and this is the first time in over a century that we’ve had more than one white Christmas in a row. Pretty epic!

Yes, his head was *that* big. And yes, I was *that* close.

Adventurous Milla in the backyard

We’ve had a good nine or ten inches of snow in the past few days, and it’s awesome.

Aside from it being all cold and wet. (I’m a summer kinda girl.)

But still, it’s pretty enough that I felt compelled to take some pictures and spam the blog. You can’t blame me for that, can you?

I actually went outside the other day. Shocker!

Amsterdam means bikes. There is no way around it.

Teeny snowman and snow-kitty!

Ice on the bus window.

Amsterdam being, er, Amsterdam-y.

… in just a few easy steps!

1. Take a cat
2. With heart/breathing problems
3. Have her panic, by, say, taking a long drive with her
4. In an overheated car

People. I didn’t know cats could make those sounds. The kind that break your heart and make you want to smother the cat all at once.

Now, my right ear has Issues with a capital I; it’s oversensitive to loud volume, noise from multiple sources, and certain frequencies, and makes it basically impossible for me to function under those circumstances.

Which means that for most of the ride I was going, “Cat. CAT. I love you. PLEASE WAIL AT A DIFFERENT FREQUENCY.”

Within a minute of arriving home, my left eye was throbbing. I’m still tensed up, even hours later. I guess it’s Milla’s version of revenge.

Also, the car broke down five minutes from the clinic.

To be serious for a minute, it really did break my heart to see her panicking so much, especially since it exacerbated her symptoms. She was panting the entire ride home. That’s not good, for a cat, especially one who’s already short of breath.

TL;DR version: this was not a fun road trip. I would like a refund, please.

As for the results of the echocardiogram… it’s not great. Nor is it as bad as it could’ve been. Her myocardium is 60% thicker than it ought to be; the cause of this is unknown, but irrelevant as far as treatment goes. She’ll need a pill a day for the rest of her life, and the length and quality of this life depends entirely on how she responds to the medication. It could just be a few days, if her condition worsens suddenly (like it did last week), but she could last years.

I’m mostly relieved, because it could’ve been much, much worse; on the other hand, I’m concerned about her quality of life. In the few months she’s lived here she’s blossomed into a wonderfully active, playful cat, and I’d hate to see her lose that.

But for now, she’s eating, she’s rolling in the sun, and obsessively licking the spot where the doctor shaved her. I’ll take what I can get!

The good news is that Milla is responding to the medication (which is intended to keep more fluid from building up in her lungs) excellently. Looking at her now, you’d barely notice anything was wrong. She’s eating well, she’s begging for attention, and rolling around in the backyard in the cutest possible ways.

No, seriously:

Not bad for a cat whose lungs, just a few days ago, looked like this:

All that white stuff on the left is fluid. The black triangle in the middle was all she had left to breathe with.

Poor kitten.

The bad news is that her improvement doesn’t mean there’s no more room for concern. We’re just fighting the symptoms here, and whatever caused this is still there. She has an echocardiogram scheduled for tomorrow morning. Hopefully that’ll shed some light on what’s going on. (Even more hopefully, it’ll be fixable.)

The last few days have consisted of:
a) worrying over Milla
b) spoiling Milla silly
c) beta reading

With a hint of TV and FreeCell thrown in for good measure. And some messing around online. Check out the ladies who’ve been occupying my headspace of late:

From left to right, that’s Lillian, whose book I’m querying; Cally, whose book I just finished; Mona, whose story I ought to be working on; and Yunupaya, whose book I am working on. When I really shouldn’t be. How did she get so loud all of a sudden?

Anyhow, these cute avatar things were made with this Portrait Illustration Maker at Abi-Station. And yes, that’s absolutely an invitation for y’all to get distracted as well. I’m nothing if not a fan of procrastination. (Shh, don’t tell anyone.)