Zoozey, Molly Bloom, and the Vet: Definitely Not a Fun Combination

4 November 2011

The highlight of my Friday was wearing my brand new hot pink sequined converse tennis shoes. I bought them yesterday because I knew I’d need something morale boosting to get me through my Friday. Because today, I had to take two of my cats to the vet.

As any cat owner knows, taking a cat to the vet is never fun. We all seriously deserve medals for getting our cats proper veterinary care. Because it is not easy. They hate going with a passion they reserve for only a few things, and they make you hate taking them even more. I speak from extensive personal experience.

I am the former owner of a “caution kitty.” Caution kitties REALLY REALLY REALLY HATE the vet. More than other cats. Caution kitties sometimes have to be muzzled or sedated just to get exams. Caution kitties, who are otherwise nice well-behaved cats, will rip you, your clothes, the vet, and the vet techs to ribbons. The owners of caution kitties get phone calls from their vets when they board them, begging you to come pick your caution kitty early.  It gets even more fun when your caution kitty goes into renal failure and has to go to the vet every two weeks for bloodwork. And I now know, that caution kitties don’t mellow with age.

Rocky is in kitty heaven now, and, because I’m insane, I now have three cats, none of whom (thank God) are caution kitties. But they still don’t make it easy. This morning I had Molly Bloom all ready to go in her harness and leash. About 2 minutes after I got her in the leash and harness, she had managed to pull herself out of the harness. I saw her running around with her collar around her head. As soon as I had caught her, Zoozey, the other cat I was taking to the vet, escaped from his cage. Clearly, they did not want to go to the vet. And Zoozey is really really hard to catch. Running away from stuff is his very favorite thing to do, so he’s gotten pretty fast. My third cat, who was not going to the vet today, wisely decided to hide under a desk. I could swear he was smirking at me as I was running around and chasing Molly Bloom and Zoozey.

Fortunately, that was the worst part of today’s veterinary experience. Zoozey glared at me from the back corner of his cage and meowed like he was being tortured.  And Molly Bloom, who is ever the energetic cat, tried to get into everything she possibly could within seconds of being released from her cat carrier. But Zoozey is all show and he was semi-cooperative with his exam and vaccinations. Molly Bloom, who had to spend the day at the vet for a test, won herself a legion of fans with her enthusiasm for absolutely everything—apparently, for Molly, even the cage at the vet is a toy for her to play with.

Molly and Zoozey are home now, worn out from their day. I’m worn out too. 

Dissertation=Insanity

1 November 2011

My office mate says that grad school is enough to make anyone crazy. I think she’s right. Who in their right mind would do willingly undertake all of the stress and the mountain of work that is graduate school? Me.

I’ve been pondering this because I’m currently writing my dissertation. I chose some really dense theory to work with. I love Homi Bhabha and postcolonial theory, but it frustrates me so much. Why am I doing this to myself? Because I’m crazy. I mean, I did willingly undertake this whole PhD thing in the first place.

With my dissertation my normal state is one of avoidance. I am really really good at not working on my dissertation. I will do just about anything to not work on it—even things I don’t particularly enjoy doing. I’ll clean, take my cats to the vet, grade, do laundry—anything but work on my dissertation.

However, for some reason, a metaphorical fire has been lit under my ass, because I have suddenly and inexplicably become quite determined to submit my first chapter and submit it soon. I spent all weekend working on it. All I did was dissertate, sleep and eat cookies. By the end of the weekend, my apartment was a mess, I had been wearing the same clothes for two days, and I was in sore need of a shower. And after all of that work, I went from having six pages to having nine—and a paragraph. All that work—and three pages.

Where is the girl who wrote a really good 10 page paper on D.H. Lawrence’s The Plumed Serpent in 8 hours? She needs to come back and stay forever and ever. Because if she were here, this chapter would have been submitted already.

It would appear that even when I’m actually working on my dissertation, I don’t want to do it. But the thing is, I do. I could talk to you about postcolonial theory, Homi Bhabha, and 19^th century England all day long. (Not that you’d want to listen) Seriously. I love this stuff. I think my idea for this chapter is really interesting. So why am I not making more progress?

Blargh. I’m just frustrated. Not a good way to start National Blog Post Month, but right now, my dissertation is all I can think about.