Aaaaaargh!

Let me tell you about my cat who I dearly love. He's a rescue kitty and has a health problem - a mega bowel. The survival rate from diagnosis is usually between 6-12 months and he's so far beating the odds because it's now seven years since his diagnosis.

What has kept him alive, happy and otherwise healthy is a small daily dose of Actilax. I was surprised when the vet recommended this particular laxative because it is more commonly used to treat constipation in humans but it turns out this is the standard treatment for mega bowel in cats. The problem was that with a relatively small amount being dispensed by the vet which had to be coupled with a visit to said vet every few months the costs ballooned. There's no way I would choose any of the other alternatives which would be to let him die slowly and in agony or have him put down - he's part of the family for heaven's sake - but the continual costs were a serious drain on my wallet.

Puss is a very anxious cat, too, and these vet visits were making him even more nervous. Not the vet's fault of course. They treated him very well but we think bad things must happened to him before he came to live with us, borne out by how long it took him to even allow Pisces to touch him - it was a full year for that although he became quite attached to me after a couple of months. Then the vet suggested I might be better off buying it direct from the pharmacy. Phew! It is considerably cheaper there so that's what I do now.

There's a slight inconvenience as it comes in a big bottle which makes measuring out his 0.5 mls a day dose a little problematic. I get around this by decanting some into a small jar out of which I can easily draw up the required amount and mix it with some of his favourite food. The other inconvenience is that it is very sticky and if you spill a drop it hardens. Luckily even then it can be cleaned up fairly easily with water and dish washing detergent.

So last night I was tired and decided to have an earlyish night. I was about to go to bed when I remembered the jar was nearly empty and I decided to refill it. I'm not sure why I didn't leave it to the morning but there you go. I filled the jar and put down the almost full bottle to fasten the jar lid. Didn't want to spill anything, did I. I'm pretty sure you've already guessed where this is heading, haven't you, because I then reached out to put on the bottle top and ... knocked the bottle flying. Somehow - I have no idea how - it ended up half way across the kitchen on its side and pooling out its contents onto the cook top. I may have said a few choice descriptive words as I lunged for the bottle before it completely emptied.

Pisces came running from the other end of the house - not sure if it was the bad language or the crash as the bottle landed that brought him - as I dumped the bottle in the sink and grabbed wads of paper towels to start mopping the cook top where the sticky mess was heading out further by the second and perilously close to running over the edge and down the cupboards. That was when I realised that the bottle had also sprayed some of its contents over half the kitchen on its way to the cooktop. The floor was covered in splashes of sticky goo, ditto the bench tops, while my nightgown was soaked, sticky unpleasantness coated my arms and legs and my thongs (flip flops to you non Australians) were a mess. Pisces offered to help but I figured there was no point in both of us getting covered in stickiness so I declined the offer. It took me nearly half an hour to wipe down all the surfaces in the kitchen plus even longer to wipe over the floor until I decided it was good enough to wait for a proper wash in the morning and then I had to have a shower and change before I fell into bed. I did find a few missed spots on the floor this morning and it is now mopped and clean and I even managed to clean up my thongs which were probably in need of a scrub anyway.

The moral of this story is? Well I'm not sure there is one other than to be careful when using gluey substances. I've certainly learned that lesson.