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Three o clock in the morning and sleepless.

Me and the kitties are one.
Luella is a kamikaze love ball who hurls her fluffy body and tail at my face…(thanks) and then behaves as if I’m the coat check lady during the day, just some anonymous robot responsible for her lovely mink. This is the same feline who just yesterday escaped from the house as I was moving for the fourteenth time this month. Spooked by the sound of rearranged furniture she bolted out the side door running into the orange-outdoor-and-jaded cat Jack who startled by her stampede tore around the corner and under the house where my grey princess followed. Great. Luella is a lady in dire circumstances and unaccustomed to dirt is behaving normally given the situation. She doesn’t yet respond to her name which I altered when I adopted her as (yuck) ‘Celeste”. She is a pair of glassy green eyes in the dark.
On my stomach I inch as far under the house as I dare carefully watching, terrified she will climb into some nook and disappear. I have visions of “Rescue 911” and four fire trucks rolling up to excavate my miserable kitty from under the house.

I have a penchant for attracting hordes of firemen. As recently as November 4th when I could have been at the Obama celebration downtown Chicago I was standing on the sidewalk with my building neighbors worshipping, as my heroes were hard at work flushing out the sewer system. I had called 911 to report a strong odor of gasoline, which turns out, was the result of the illegal Ukrainian fellows illegally dumping gasoline down the drain in the garage next door where they illegally operated a construction business.

Luella’s wanders attracted to the sunlight coming in the vent from the other side of the house. I attempt to lure her out, softly cooing the name that she has yet to recognize. I understand her agony. Hoping she’d finally make her way to me, her collapsible carrier next to me…cautiously she creeps towards me. She is within arms length. I don’t want to startle her so I wait until she’s almost past me and then nab her by the scruff. Jamming her into the carrier it folds in on itself…ahhhh. Yelling to my friend, hurry hurry hurry. She’s now completely wild with fear and begins scratching for release. I can’t hold her; she’s going to rip my face off. I have to let her go. In shock I stare on my arms, seven plus holes in my left arm and several on the right where blood boils to the surface. …Luella is gone. Not under the house, not in the shed, not in the yard…. I feel sick.
She ran back into the house and rid under some blankets.
I shut the door and we rest from out labors until later when we both have forgotten our near loss…

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