Work-arounds and Do-overs

[hrj]

At some point in the next few hours SK will show up to help me try to make the Surviving Garments interface behave the way it's supposed to. In the mean time I've started putting together a work-around that isn't as powerful (or nearly as elegant under the skin) as the envisioned goal, but that will work for the immediate purposes. And, after all, this is going to be an evolving project, so it doesn't matter if it "isn't right yet" ... right?

And at some point today, possibly before SK shows up (if the bathroom becomes available in time) I'm going to shampoo the cat. Yes. Shampoo the cat. The flea collar isn't working well enough and she's being driven crazy. On top of which she's getting patchy fur, possibly as a reaction to the fleas, but I think more likely that she's just grooming neurotically and wearing her skin raw. (It doesn't help that, with the warm weather, she's decided to shed massively all in a lump. I've bumped the hairball medicine up to daily.) In any case, I have to do something for the poor dear, and for all the trauma, I've found that flea shampoo is quite efficient at the task.

The cat has lately taken to living on top of the scanner/printer which, with all the shedding, is not doing my hardware any favors. It's funny how she gets fixated on hanging out in one particular spot for a week, and then the next week it's a different particular spot. I shall have to post my theories of cat-ionic reactions that explain this sort of behavior.

Comments

flea collar

[dame-cordelia.livejournal.com]

Some cats are allergic to the flea collar itself. I no longer use them on my cats. If the patchy fur is anywhere the cat's neck where the collar is, beware.

Re: flea collar

[hrj.livejournal.com]

I know that she was having a bad reaction to some of those "oil on the back of the neck" flea treatments. But she'd been wearing her current collar for several months at the point when the current problem started, and the "patches" aren't right at the neck -- in fact they fall nicely in those areas she's most able to groom easily. This is why I think at least 50% of the problem is neurotic grooming with the rest including a flea reaction and entering the (excess) shedding season. I think at least part of the neurotic grooming is that she's bored. After she had her surgery last October, I decided it was time for her to become a permanent indoor cat as opposed to being allowed to go in and out at will during the daytime.