Tuesday, April 6, 2004 | 8:08 a.m.
Susan Snyder's column appears Mondays, Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Reach her at [email protected] or (702) 259-4082.
Max's daddy comes home today, and we're all so happy.
Max has been staying with us since his dad left for England on March 22. We made up the guest room especially for him, which included the purchase of a screen door.
Max is a cat. A cat so-named because when he strayed into the life of our friend Ken about a year ago, the treatment of his many health problems quickly maxed-out Ken's credit card. The poor little cat was starving, sick and declawed when his previous owners abandoned him.
So given the abandonment issues, Ken couldn't bear to confine the kitty to a boarder's cage for two weeks. Well, of course we'd feed Max, I said.
"OK, he needs to be fed twice a day," Ken said. "And you need to give him half of one of these pills twice a day. And then he needs this stuff twice a day too, but you do that two hours before or after his meals. Here's some extra syringes."
He handed me a tube with "LAXATIVE" written down the side. "Stuff" indeed. But syringes? Yes. For force feeding. See, Max is the only feline on the planet who doesn't care for the malt flavor. He wouldn't lick it if you smeared it on a live mouse.
It was to be jammed down his throat before or after the meals and pills.
A quick look at our schedules showed that one of us was going to have to take vacation time just to keep this animal fed. So he came to live with us and our cat, who doesn't like another living thing with fur unless he can eat it.
The screen door on the guest room allowed Max to see out of his room but kept the two felines separated while we were at work or out. He roamed free when we were home. But not right away.
The first couple of days he spent under the bed, which was fine unless it happened to be one of the four times each day when we had to shove something Max did not want down Max's throat.
It has been scientifically proven that a cat that does not want to take a pill can make its entire bone structure disappear in seconds. You can look under the bed and see the cat. You can touch the cat. But you cannot grab hold of the cat because there is nothing to grab hold of.
Did I mention that Max is no longer tiny and sickly but weighs in the neighborhood of 16 pounds? This cat eats everything but the can the food comes in. "Digestive disorder" my litter box.
We finally tried moving the bed away from the wall, which elicited a low, primeval growl that made the hairs on the back of our necks prickle. Some instinctive force from within told us to back away slowly from the cat.
Max finally grew to trust us, and the pill regimen ended last week. We ended the goop regimen on our own after cleaning the carpet (off-white) three times and washing his bed twice.
Did I mention the bed is one he commandeered from our cat, along with a catnip mouse?
Our cat has spent his time sulking in the new recliner, which he has claimed as his own in retaliation for bringing in the foreigner. He also refused to eat anything placed before him and cried piteously until in a fit of desperation I served him steamed chicken tenders ($5.99 per pound).
I should have fed Max chicken both weeks, so when Ken opened a can of Friskies, Max would look up with eyes that say, "What's this? Vomit?"
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