miss stella bug.

Everyone who meets George and Stella instantly fall in love with George. I'm serious. Even complete non-cat people find love in their hearts for Mr. George. I can't say I blame them either. He's wonderful and will love unconditionally, snuggle at the drop of a hat, and play ruefully with his sister (sometimes it gets a little too extreme and I have to intervene and give them a stern talking to). The perfect male cat, some may say. Not to mention he's got beautiful markings--so said the pizza lady.

But Stella is a little different. She's more complex, a thinker . . . or maybe just stubborn. She'll decide to love you when she's darn well ready to love you. Her affection is . . . awkward, to say the least, making petting her almost a chore. But there's something just fantastic about her personality that I adore.

Yes I realize I'm talking about my cats right now. Like a big nerd <--like that's ever stopped me from doing anything before.

Anyway, last night as I was finishing up a paper, Miss Stella, who always sits next to the keyboard as I'm typing, kept squinting her left eye like something was in it. I noticed there was a little goo ball floating around (sorry, gross), but thought nothing of it as I figured she'd blink it out eventually. Once I finished the paper, I looked back up at the little lady and her entire eye was clouded over. Instantly I panicked. My little bug was going bliiiiiiiiind! I flew into action. While my roommate googled "cloudy cat eye," I hopped on the online yellow pages and called the nearest vet to see if this was normal. And here's what I got in return:

"Hello? So-and-so's Veterinary Hospital." -bored man with Southern drawl

"Hi, I'm calling to see if there's a vet available--my cat recently has developed what looks like an infection in her left eye and I'm concerned about her, blah blah blah," -trying to pretend I'm calm

"Ohhh . . . ? Well, here's what yer gonna wanna do: Call back here around 9 o'clock tomorra mornin' and see about schedulin' an appointment with Dr. Murphy. Now, he's been kinda sick lately, but he should be around. So just set up an appointment, then you won't have to be waitin."

Huh. OK.

"Um, all right, thanks . . . ?"

"You have a nice night." -click.

Well, instead of waiting for Dr. Murphy to return to a healthy enough state to assess my cat's quickly diminishing vision, my roommate and I took action. First, we held her next to the sink and splashed water in her face. Um, strike one. Next, we sprayed her in the eye with a water bottle. Strike two. I was starting to feel like a pretty big jerk at this point. Finally, we took some advice from an online cat forum (yep, they exist) and made a saline solution (also known as salt water . . . ), soaked it in a cotton swab, then smeared it over her eye. Freaking. Strike. Three. I really can't believe she even sitting next to me right now after what I put her through last night.

Today I took her to Dr. Cramer, a young vet who wears Ropers (total flashback to third grade for me) and knows his stuff. I walked out of there with 2 kinds of eye drops to cure Stella's fancy-named diagnosis that I couldn't remember for a slice of cake. Regardless, at least this whole mess was actually legit and not like one of my previous sordid adventures.

Case closed. Crisis averted. The little lady will live to see another day.