The ride home from the vet was always a lot less stressful than the ride to. Even in this situation, where Freddie seemed to be feeling better and I just needed him checked over. He hated the carrier and cried the whole trip.
For the ride home, I liked to put the carrier in the front seat and unzip it so I could reach in and pet him and he could pop out and look around if he wanted. He mostly liked to lounge on the bottom of the carrier, content to be stroked while he traveled.
This time was different.
A gentle reminder of how we do things: 🐱🐶🐦
- Do not troll the diary. If you hate pootie diaries, leave now. No harm, no foul.
- Please do share pics of your fur kids! If you have health/behavior issues with your pets, feel free to bring it to the community.
- Pooties are cats; Woozles are dogs. Birds... are birds! Peeps are people.
- Whatever happens in the outer blog STAYS in the outer blog. If you’re having “issues” with another Kossack, keep it “out there.” This is a place to relax and play; please treat it accordingly.
- There are some pics we never post: snakes, creepy crawlies, any and all photos that depict or encourage human cruelty toward animals. These are considered “out of bounds” and will not be tolerated. If we alert you to it, please remember that we do have phobic peeps who react strongly to them. If you keep posting banned pics...well then...the Tigress will have to take matters in hand. Or, paw.
I started the car to get the air conditioning going, hoping to cool it off as quickly as possible. We’d only been inside about an hour, but the inside of the car had turned the approximate temperature of the sun.
Once the car was running and lukewarm air was pouring from the vents, I turned to the carrier.
“Release me,” Freddie demanded.
“Alright, alright, hold your horses,” I said, fighting a little with the velcro latch.
“I don’t like this,” he whined.
“I’m opening it,” I assured him.
The latch released, I unzipped the sides and reached in to pet him. He shook me off and popped up, out of the carrier.
His front paws left the carrier and landed on the center console. I was surprised to see that he was actually trying to get out completely. “Uh-uh,” I said, lifting him back in. “You can look out, but stay inside there.”
“Uh-uh,” he said, jumping back out.
I could see he was going to be stubborn, when he hopped completely out of it, his back legs landing on the seat behind the carrier. I shook my head. “Fine,” I said, pushing the carrier to the foot well. “But lie down. It’s not safe to stand in a moving car.”
I pushed him down and he took the hint, curling up on the seat. I looked at the seatbelt thoughtfully, but realized pretty quickly that there was no way to get it around him while he reclined. “Stay still,” I ordered, clicking on my own seat belt and reversing out of the parking spot.
We had been in the car for maybe five minutes when he stood again. “No,” I said. “Sit back down.”
He climbed onto to the center console again, looking into the back seat. “There’s a whole place back there,” he observed.
“Yep,” I said, pushing him back into his seat. “But you need to stay here.”
He sat. For a minute.
Stopped at a red light, I looked over at him. “I should put you back in the carrier,” I told him. “It’s safer.”
He walked over the console and jumped to the backseat.
“Hey!” I said.
The light turned green.
I angled the rearview mirror downward so I could quickly check on him. He was lying down, much to my relief.
“Just stay right there,” I said.
“Sure,” he said, looking around idly.
I readjusted the mirror and drove on, as safely as I could.
I slowed and came to a gentle stop at the next red light. As soon as the car stopped moving, the sound of the cat moving around drifted over to me.
There was a light thump as his front paws hit the door underneath the window behind me. I looked back and saw him on his hind legs, looking out. “The car is going to move in a minute and you need to be sitting,” I warned him.
“There are people out there,” he said.
“I know.”
“So many people!”
A clump of shedded fur floated past my face. I sighed. “I’m going to have to vacuum my car,” I muttered.
“Human!” he called out, excited. “There’s so much stuff back here!”
He had found my backseat organizer thing where I kept my spare sweater and my car wash equipment. “Don’t eat anything!” I called back.
“There’s nothing to eat!” he said. “Maybe this paper,” he added, quieter.
“Don’t eat the paper towels!” I shot back. “You should be sitting!”
I turned into the driveway and hit the button to open the garage door. “We’re home!” I sang.
He popped up on the center console again, startling me. “I know home!” he said, looking around the garage. “I like it here!”
Happy Caturday, Peeps! This is based on a true story and while I’m a little embarrassed about how very not safe this whole adventure was, I took it as a sign that he was feeling much better.