
Caturday
Another Caturday

I am really struggling today. 😦 My insurance company denied my doctor’s request for an MRI, so even though he got on the phone and argued with them, I received two separate letters “explaining” the denial. They want me to do six weeks of physical therapy in order for them to agree to an MRI. Does this sound even remotely cost-effective to any of you? Yeah, I didn’t think so. I will be writing my own appeal letter this coming week because, quite frankly, I don’t appreciate being told “Unless you have cancer…” as one of the reasons why they would be willing to pay for it. Most of their reasoning is bullshit, and they know it as well as I do. My doctor was at such a loss, because he didn’t understand their explanations, either. He asked me if I wanted to even pursue this further and I said “I need to know what is causing this and how to proceed. I don’t want to live with un-diagnosed damage.” He agreed with me, and I was glad that he’d spent a week arguing with them before calling me back. Very few doctors would be willing to do that.
My father experienced a lot of pain in his shoulder for months before finally listening to me and going to the doctor. He kept thinking, much like I often do, that he’d slept on it funny. An x-ray showed a broken shoulder and bones in his arm were also badly broken. The doctor was confused, because these aren’t normal breaks one gets without an underlying issue. Because x-rays only show bone (my x-rays show nothing but perfect bone), it was an MRI that showed a baseball sized tumor on his shoulder, which is what caused the broken bones and resulted in major surgery and reconstruction of the bones. It was a tumor that, when removed, it took additional time to get it out because it was bigger than what the MRI showed. I believe the words “It was more like a softball than a baseball.” were used. I don’t know what is going on with my neck at this point, but I do know I am in excruciating pain, experiencing a lot more paralysis (Most nights, I cannot move or vocalize the paralysis, so I just lie here, hoping it will pass. I am awake the entire time, even though it looks as though I am asleep. I’m not, but I can’t scream out for help.), and I can’t deal with it for another minute. Physical therapy will only result in me screaming the second someone touches me. This should be an interesting experience for someone trying to assess me.
There is legitimately too much stress going on in my life right now. Jumping through hoops for my insurance company isn’t on my list of “things I’d like to do”, but I am NOT forcing myself to do anything until I exhaust the appeals process.
As I sit here bone-tired from lack of sleep, feeling guilty that I can’t run errands like a normal person, I desperately want to sit and cry. Unfortunately, I currently lack the emotion to do so.
A rainy Saturday being ignored by my cats. When two feels like twenty, it’s terribly exhausting on top of the fact that I couldn’t sleep, have a migraine, and everything is dull and uninteresting to me. I hope I come back as someone’s beloved cat because being human isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. 😦
Welcome To Caturday

Today is the first Caturday in a long time where I’m just hanging out, praying for rain because I need the pressure to drop for my migraine to break a little. 😦 Cat has tried comforting me the majority of the day, sitting on me like she thinks she’s hatching eggs, but I can’t move my neck and I’m in so much pain I contemplated murdering the sanitation workers when they came to pick up the trash this morning. I was lying here at the time praying for the pain to end, and the second the truck came up the street, it was as if someone parked Times Square inside my skull. I still can’t get the noise to stop. Yes, people have to live, but am I supposed to just hide in a bunker every day of my life?!
Needless to say, this week has been AWFUL for me. I’m hoping I’ll be feeling better tomorrow for the Grand Opening of Witch City Wicks. I’ve attached the link if you’re interested in hand-crafted soy candles. BLACK Lavender is my favorite, but I’ll probably find some new ones tomorrow, providing I’m feeling okay. It might just be nice to be near the ocean.
I hope everyone is having a good day. I’ll be back ASAP with something new I’m working on.

Caturday With A Chance Of Rain…And Feathers
Cat has been eyeing the feather duster for quite some time now. I do NOT think she has a sudden desire to start dusting.

Tell Me Again…

At Kitten School

Critters
I love Cat and Kitten, but sometimes, I have no energy for their antics. Okay, most days I don’t have the energy, but I digress.
This morning, the antics began early, and I had about as much patience for it as I do for a KKK rally. I decided to put a little food in their bowls to try to entice them away from my general direction so I could lock them out of my bedroom in the hopes that I’d be able to get a few more hours of sleep. It was an epic fail.
I came back to discover that Cat was sound asleep in my bed and it was Kitten making all the noise, running around like there were ten of her. I can’t decide if she has too much energy or if we feed her too much. 😛 She zipped past me after I’d already put food in both bowls, and tried hiding under the bed. There is no sense in trying to pull a spry cat out from underneath a bed, no matter what time of day it is. I already have two healing scratches and I don’t need fresh ones.
My brain was foggy with sleep, so at the time, I couldn’t tell who was who and I didn’t care, so long as the behavior stopped. I got back into bed and thought I saw Cat at the foot of the bed. I put out a hand and immediately knew who it was by texture. She feels like silk. That’s when I thought “What a little shit!” Thirty seconds later, she was opening the door and flying down the stairs like a monkey on crack. The insane behavior didn’t stop until well after I was awake. She tormented me until I fed her two hours in advance, as if she’s ever starved a day in her life with me. It’s a little scary how ravenous she is, but I suppose many cats (and dogs) are hungry when they’re on a schedule. They probably have internal timers we are completely unaware of. They don’t greet us at the door out of love, they greet us at the door because we control the food. If they had thumbs, we’d be obsolete. They’d start adopting themselves. I’m pretty sure there are animals who could bag my groceries better than most humans, but that’s a story for another day (I mean really: Who the hell puts two huge cans of crushed tomatoes on top of a loaf of bread?! Think about that for a second before answering.).
On the plus side, I love it when they’re sweet, sleepy, affectionate, and cuddly. While I was working yesterday afternoon Kitten walked over to Cat, who was sleeping, and proceeded to kiss her head. Affection ensued. Then, they wrapped their paws around each other and snuggled to sleep. This went on for three hours before they got nasty with each other and one of them took off, but it was nice to see because as they get older, there will be more fighting, as opposed to play-fighting, and less affection. That’s how it is with female cats, even if they’re litter-mates or siblings. I’ve seen it before, I’ve lived it, and I am not anticipating miracles here. Coexistence, but not miracles.

Cat and Kitten are many things, but they’re not mean, selfish assholes. I thank God/Goddess every day that they’re not people-people, because then I’d probably find them rude and/or annoying. Thankfully, animals bring unconditional love with them. They’ll spend time with you if you’re sick or sad, they’ll check in on you, bring you toys (Maybe that’s just my two?), and give you kisses. They don’t care what you look like because they don’t have human vision. They don’t care if you have perfume or cologne on (Cat and Kitten both smell like spicy maple syrup. I have no idea how this is achieved.), so long as your skin smells like Mommy/Daddy and is consistently familiar. There is no superficiality to the life of critters. These two could care less if I have a full face of makeup on or if I’m in my PJ’s, they still love me. I swear, it’s the food thing. LOL. In all seriousness, I find comfort in that. I can be myself without fear of persecution or demands I cannot meet. In this selfie obsessed world, they are two of the reasons I am alive. I could not be more grateful.
copyright © 2015 by Lisa Marino & Blackbird Serenity LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

If You Look Into…

I thought I’d instill a bit of humor into this morning since I woke up in extraordinary pain and can’t really find my “inner peace” at the moment. Having a sense of humor helps. 🙂 I wish I could just curl up with cat and kitten until the pain passes. Alas, kitten tried throwing me out of bed at 5:15. I wasn’t swayed. I’m pretty sure there’s a photo of me next to the word “grumpy”. Bleh!
May you all have a peaceful, relaxing, pain-free weekend.
