Cat Lady

The husband and I used to take long trips during the summer time, loading up a backpack and venturing out into the world. With that, came the issue of finding a cat sitter for an entire month that we could trust, or feel comfortable asking. Our neighbors at the time were major feline fans and recommended a lady they had used to watch all their cats while they were out of town. So we gave the cat lady a call. 

As an introductory meeting, she arrived at our front door completely out of breath. Apparently the walk from her car to our front door had wiped her out. She was severely overweight and seemed to struggle with simple movements like walking into our house. She also had eye make-up that was reminiscent of Tammy Faye Bakker. It was hard to watch since we felt bad for her struggle with simple things. I also thought to myself, How is she going to be able to clean the cat box if she’s this wiped out already?? 

We continued to show her around our place and introduced her to our cats, Lex and Luther. Other than her fatigue, she seemed to love cats and noted she would keep a journal for us so we’d see when she came by and what she did each visit while we were gone. Perfect. 

So after exploring South America for 4 weeks, we arrived home to a cute journal and 2 happy cats. Yet, we also noticed that the air conditioner was blowing full blast. Mind you, we never ran the a/c since we were both raised to suck it up and not waste money on cool air, so we were a little perplexed as to why or how this appliance got turned on. 

Her journal entries reminded me of my science project notebook from 5th grade when I tried growing a plant. (Who allowed me to choose this topic???) “Watered plant” or “put plant outside for sun” were similar to her “pet kitties” or “gave kitties treats”. Until we arrived at the entry, (early on in our trip, mind you) “It was very hot outside so I turned the air on for the cats so they wouldn’t die.”

So in addition to paying for her service, which we didn’t mind doing since our cats were still actually alive, we also had a $265 electric bill for the month we weren’t even home. Being the slow learners that we are at times, we used her services a few months later. Services that got MUCH worse...