(Groans with exhaustion, tries vainly to pep self up)

C’mon. C’mon.

(Small squeak from #Grahamstodon who has been lurking in the doorway)

Not you

#StupidCatConvos

Pitifully begging #Grahamstodon not to attack me as I lie defenceless in bed

“when I pat you, I don’t go for the eyes!”

#catsofmastodon

🎶You’re the cat inside my house
You’re my Grahamspiration
You bring fur into my house
You’re my Grahamspiration
Wanna have you near me
As long as you don’t scratch me, Grahamy
No one needs food more than you need food🎶

#StupidCatSongs #Grahamstodon #SoftRock #SoftFur #Chicago

Just had to trim #Grahamstodon’s two weapons:

(holds up left front paw) Mean; and

(holds up right front paw) Vicious

Google sent me a notification that I've used 70% of my data allowance so I have been deleting old emails

I found an email I sent to my ex-housemate Natalya on 16 February 2009:

"In other cat news, I am planning to get a cat of my own! It will probably happen this week. If the cat is male I will call him Graham, and if female I will call her Maude. Other names I am toying with include Ian, Doug, Loretta and Myrtle."

#Grahamstodon #OriginStory

Awkward vet trip today: #Grahamstodon was once again ‘spicy’ in addition to being generally rumpled and ungroomed in a way that reflects badly on me, and I had to put up with some patronising talk of “it’s just a matter of finding the right brush”

and he got spicy and hissed because the vet patted him too much, and they had to take him “out the back” to have his Synovan injection

and then they came back in with a Plastic Bag of Shame containing the gross towel I use to line Graham’s carrier, which he had pissed on in his rage and fear.

The towel is currently soaking in Biozet which I bought specifically for the purpose of cat urine cleaning as it is an enzyme-based cleaner

I felt like a mum picking her kid up from childcare as I walked out of the vet clinic with the Plastic Bag of Shame

I tend to resist ‘pet parent’ narratives as Graham is my companion, not my child, but I must have some deep wellspring of shame dating from my own days in childcare, crystallised around the “plastic bag of soiled textiles being handed back along with their soiler”

but also the guilt of feeling like a bad parent somehow

Oh boy I am so glad I never had human children!

#Grahamstodon is absolutely pestering me for food although his cat food machine will go off any fkn second now

#Grahamstodon just did the weirdest miaow and I looked over to see if he was okay – turns out he is asleep and was miaowing in some catty dream (probably about demanding food)

The arm percher has logged on #Grahamstodon #CatsOfMastodon

POV you’re stroking his soft fur and muttering “so soft… so soft… you’re my soft buddy…”

#Grahamstodon #catsofmastodon

#Grahamstodon always wants to rest on my arms and hands. In bed I have to assume a Christ-like pose so he can choose which arm to lie on. If I’m on the couch and trail an arm off to one side, he’ll come up and sit on my hand.

At my desk he will just drape his front paws over my arm as shown below (cw: eye contact from me and my foolish #cat)

You’ve got to be careful about leaving your comfortable forearm lying about on a table next to a comfortable book

#Grahamstodon #CatsOfMastodon

Made more vet appointments for #Grahamstodon who is now known there as ‘spicy’, which lowered my crest because I’ve always been proud of how calm he is at the vet

You can’t quite see it in the photo, but #Grahamstodon has captured my foot with his front paws when I was foolish enough to extend it under the coffee table where he is lurking

#CatsOfMastodon #Caturday

Look at my beautiful cat #Grahamstodon, full of the peace of #gabapentin and #Synovan after a successful second attempt to get a blood sample at the vet

The vet took him backstage to take the sample, which made me suspect they were using some form of restraint that they thought would upset me to witness

The vet came back out to the waiting room like “well, it wasn’t easy but we got it”

I have forgotten why we were even testing his blood

I finally did it. I am in a foul mood because I’m behind deadline and yet I had to waste an hour taking #Grahamstodon to the vet for a blood test, and they shaved off part of his beautiful chest ruff and then the little bastard wouldn’t even let them do the test – he jerked backwards giving the vet a needle-stick injury, and then he hissed and batted at me

And then I got home after booking yet another fkn vet visit next week and I just cracked it that I had to carry this 6.74kg cat in his carrier down the street in 35C heat because of that selfish neighbour woman and her monster truck

So I wrote a pass-agg note

Gah, #Grahamstodon just sneezed his catty flu all over my face like a Dilophosaurus

Will I be patient zero of some heinous new purrndemic

My little buddy #Grahamstodon has cat flu and it is ridiculous but I made him ‘chicken soup’ by pouring hot water over chicken cat food

I am worried he is losing fluids as snot and tears. He doesn’t have trouble breathing but he is sneezing a lot and licking his nose

Anyway, he’s into the chicken soup; it is a trick I have used before to force him to drink, as he has to lap up the liquid to get to the chicken

Also, wet cat food is a treat for him now, as his regular food (which he loves and begs for constantly) is this expensive prescription weight-loss kibble

Because I know I must pay #CatTax here is a photo of the invalid looking ratshit, but he is purring

#Grahamstodon has cat flu and he looks so sick in this photo, which I took because he struck me as very beautiful and then I saw the photo and was like 🥴

#CatsOfMastodon

Today I am having a domestic competence day:

– did a load of laundry and hung it up to dry

– put away some clothes, bedlinen and travel bags that had been lying around messily in my bedroom

– finally glued some fringing around the edge of my living-room lampshade to fulfil my Fancy Lampshade vision

– made a slow-cooker pea and ham soup (from Recipe Tin Eats; tbh these days Nagi is my god)

Now I am sitting on the couch with #Grahamstodon and a cup of tea

My plan for the rest of the day is to work on my latch-hook wall hanging project, take Graham to the vet, and then visit my parents and meet my brother’s new puppy

No work! No work!