The Grand Old Lady with the Colgate Smile

I'd like to introduce you to Snuffy, the Grand Old Lady of our house. My poor long suffering husband has a lot to contend with.  He is the only male in a household of  that consists of wife, four daughters, mother-in-law, two cats and a dog. He has no male support,  even the animals are female. This might lead you to believe he lives a very pampered existence but it is quite the opposite.

While my mum and the dog vie for position of seniority in the house, I"m afraid Snuffy wins hands down.

Snuffy reaches the grand age of fifteen this summer. Using the rule of thumb that you multiply by seven to get her age in people years, she is the grand old age of 105, leaving my Mum and the dog Piper as mere babes at 84.

 My four year old nephew was visiting for St. Patrick's weekend and enquired what age was Piper.Mum explained that she was 12,  in dog years that was the equivalent of 84, the same age as herself. His reply was that Piper was very old and would die soon ........and so would she!!

Snuffy

Now to get back to my old lady, she is beginning to feel her age......like the rest of us. Even my daughters, in their twenties are shocked to find themselves  rapidly approaching thirty.

Until recently, Snuffy has startled many an overnight guest who left their bedroom windows open at night.She had perfected the art of jumping up onto the roof, in the window and from there straight into the middle of the bed. She likes her comfort! This is all rather terrrifying if you are the one fast asleep in bed and she lands smack in the middle of your stomach. It is only by the  grace of God and remembering to warn people to keep their windows closed that we didn't have to summon an ambulance in the middle of the night to whisk  one of our visitors off to hospital suffering from a  massive heart attack.

Snuffy came to us on my youngest daughter's ninth birthday . She is her cat and it's obvious. Snuffy will let Lady L (my daughter) turn her  upside down and inside out and  she will still cuddle up to her.  She turns her back on the rest of us.She knows she was chosen.

I told my daughter that I was bringing her for a surprise on her birthday. Can you imagine her horror when the car turned into my friend's house, who just happened to be her teacher."But Mammy you said it was a nice surprise .....this is my teacher's house." she exclaimed in horror.  I was soon forgiven when she was introduced to three kittens and told to take her pick. That was almost 15 years ago now.

These days, we have been very worried about Snuffy because she has had repeated infections and we thought, the dreaded cat flu. She has been feeling very sorry for herself.  Have you ever tried to give a cat liquid antibiotic. We have given it to her in pill form, hiding it in sardines or chicken.. She managed to find the pills and eat all around them so it was back to wrapping her in a towel to keep those nasty claws under control and try and administer the dose. The end result of this is that if she sees me with a towel in my hand she runs, she has developed a taste for real meat and turns up her nose at cat food. She sits in front of the fridge and stares at you, as much as to say "Where is my chicken?"

Anyway, to get to the point of my story, she has had repeated infections  She would take her antibiotics, get better and then two days later would be sneezing and coughing again. Back again to the vet, who diagnosed sinusitis, not cat flu as originally thought. Now she really had my sympathy  (I have suffered with sinusitis for years, a real pain in the face) It kept recurring because she has plaque on her teeth. The only way to remove the plaque was to have her teeth cleaned under anesthetic!

So this week, she was put in the cat box, brought to the vet and job is now done. For 24 hours afterwards, she would not come near us and hid under the table. However, as she is getting better she has forgotten the trauma.....you can see the touches of blonde in her hair!

 She is getting more needy as she gets older, something that, perhaps, happens to people too. When I'm typing, she wants to sit on the keyboard and her favourite place to sit high up on my chest so I can't see what I'm doing. She wants undivided attention, all the time.

Tony Attwood  said that cats are dogs with Aspergers Syndrome. Well, not this Grand Old Lady with the Colgate ring of confidence.