In which the catlings are very disappointed with the staff

Well, I did promise and seeing I have been reminded once or twice, I thought I would share the catlings 'big-day-meiout' to the vets.

In a previous incarnation I was a vet nurse so am fully aware of the procedure that preludes a cat spey, including the dreaded 'nil-by-meouth' which when you are a very active nearly 6 month old catling seems dreadfully unfair, never mind down right cruel.

The usual instructions - lift all food by 11pm the night before - In theory - check
In reality?
Well........ its like this you see -  We last noted the girls tucking into their nibbles round about 9pm, then retiring to the lounge for a late evening punch up. This entails a fair bit of gallumping about and using all 20 dozen claws to scale the sides of the settee and launching off like  furry  missiles landing on unsuspecting sister-catlings/human legs/house plants or any other suitable target for maximum effect (cue shrieking in pain/anger/hysterics at these antics)
Any hoo - I digress. I walked retreated at speed into the kitchen about 10pm to lift their plates up only to be followed  closely by two now starving catlings - they loudly pronounced that.... they-were-now-famished-beyond-repair-as-all-that-playing-had-used-up-their-energy-and-now-they-needed-to-recharge-their-tum-tums'
Smiling at their hopeful little furry faces, I put their food out of catling reach.
If looks could kill......
Himself and I  rattled around downstairs for another 15 - 20 minutes before going to bed. All the while we were alternatively followed or shouted at by our furry stalkers.
'Could-we-not-see-their-ribs?' and 'this-was-not-on-and-things-better-change-around-here-immediately!'
We shut the downstairs door against the marauding ravenous wolves that our catlings had metamorphosed into and went to bed.
All through the night we could hear thumps and bumps downstairs and we knew that the catlings knew that we could hear them and they were making sure we knew that they were S.T.A.R.V.I.N.G.!

Part 2 of the instructions - lift up their water on getting up and bring them to the surgery for 9am. In theory - Check.
In reality?
Well, normally Himself goes down first and I follow about 5 minutes later and we are usually greeted by happy fuzzballs of furry fun who then trot upstairs and wake the boys. N.O.T..T.H.I.S...M.O.R.N.I.N.G...
Ooh nooooo.
Lily (marmalade) tore passed me, her legs a blurrrrrr, as I stepped out of the bathroom. She was howling a complaint over her shoulder as she whizzed into the boys room.

I could hear here jumping up and down on Youngest bed yelling at him....For kitty's sake will you get up and feed us now, our normal staff have gone on strike and we are STARVING!


Once downstairs it was like playing Russian-roulette-hop-scotch with catlings as they skedaddled around our feet alternating pleading complete famishment with issuing final demands for food and food RIGHT NOW!

Himself wished me luck as he laughingly stepped over the catlings on his way to work.

Well....... they targeted their plan of campaign directly at me. Oh dear. Their little eyes narrowed as they walked firmly towards me and continued straight..up..my..leg..ouch
Having extracted all 20 dozen claws from my thigh, the girls sat down and frowned at me.
Holly (torti) trotted off towards the kitchen. A moments silence..then.... clatter, clunk, clatter...It took me a moment to realise that the sound was the cat-food cupboard door. It took a similar time to stride quickly into the kitchen and open the cupboard door to see a cat tail disappear into the bag of dog food! As I lunged forward to grab Holly, Lily slipped in like a furry red snake and also tried to get in the food bag. I pulled both wriggling and protesting starved creatures out and returned to lift the dog food away out of kitty-reach when.....
Crunch crash! I spun round to see Holly hurling the cat biscuits out at high speed - she then threw herself out after the box, closing the gap between hungry cat and box of biscuits. I too turned (bearing in mind I am still one legged) and managed to launch myself rugby-tackle style at the box. It hit the floor and bounced, flinging out tiny brown cat nibbles in an arc of such beauty and wonderment that briefly both Holly and I watched captivated....until they all hit the floor in a tiny clatter. I grabbed the cat instead.
Noooo-oooo she howled, her paws outstretched at the biscuits on the floor. Lily was unceremonially scooped up too and both protesting cats were put in the hall while I cleared up all nibbles.
When I finally released them from their imprisonment they muttered dark things at me as they conducted a thorough search of the kitchen floor.
I went to get ready before my folks came to take us to the vets, leaving them the cat box to familiarise themselves with. (complete with comfort blankie and loads of newspaper to keep them warm and give a nice soft base) When I returned back downstairs I found the blankie had been beaten up and the newspaper had been shredded.

Part 3 of the instructions  put the cats in the box and bring to vets - In theory Check
In reality?
Lily had a thing or two to say.......Yowl, yowl, let meeeeout, woool, woooo, youil, youuuussslll, meow, yowl, woooooo, oooh, wwooooo.
Holly - well, her lips were tightly sealed and she lay down, crossed her paws and frowned.
Lilly - Yowl, yowl, let meeeeout, woool, woooo, youil, youuuussslll, meow, yowl, woooooo, oooh, wwooooo.
All the way to the veterinary surgery (bar the last mile) Lily threatened to contact the management, she said she would report us for cat-napping, she let her feelings 'paw' out and she let us know her great disappointment in our behaviour.
We handed the girls over, said our good-byes and see-you-laters and left.

Fast forward to 5pm (the earliest we could rescue the girls) and £150ish  later (gah) we brought our girls home.

Part 1 of evening instructions - don't feed your cat anything until they are fully awake, then just offer small portions and little drinks as an anaesthetic can make them feel ill. They probably wont be properly hungry until the morning - in theory - check
In reality?
Well, the return journey was a lot quieter. Just two little baleful faces.
I gave the boys the full lecture of not over feeding them and making sure they didn't feel sick.
We got into the house, carefully opened the box to let our precious little catlings and...... such a stomping and a chatting occurred. They both had to tell us in great detail exactly what had happened.
Holly guess what? they didnt feeeeeed us
Lily they did horrible things to my fur - just look at the size of my bald bits!!
Holly no body gave us anything to eeeeeat!
Lily I have these knots in my fur and I can't wash them out and they taste horrible.


I put down a tentative morsel in each plate and was pushed immediately aside with such furry force.

nom nom nom nom nom more?
so, a little more was offered....... slurp...more?
Any way you get the gist!

Part 2 of evening instructions - keep your cat quiet for the next ten days - in theory - check
ten days? ten days? ten minutes more likely!!

Oh I give up!