Chapter 1 / Sammi Jo's Rescue
This is who we are / This is what we do
On Sunday Sept 26th, 2010 around 6-7 pm our phone rang. It was the Crazy Cat Lady that lived near us. She said they had found a litter of kittens underneath their car, One was the kind of kitten we had told them we liked. A long hair Siamese Rag Doll Mix.
We walked over to check them out, Both of us talking about this kitten & agreeing that we did not need a 3rd cat right now, as the 2 we had were nearly 17 yrs old & would not handle the stress of a kitten very well at all. I was NO Fan of the 2 we had, and tolerated them only for Kelly, She Loved them Unconditionally.
When we arrived, they handed us a dirty little ball of white fluff with Big Blue Eyes. She was the runt of the litter and we could tell She was weak & needed help. She was so small She fit into the tee shirt pocket my wife was wearing. Kelly looked at Me and said, "Can we keep Her?" We both just knew that little Rag Doll would not survive the cold night if her Momma kitty did not return.
As we were walking home, Kelly had a smile and a sound in Her voice i had not heard in a few years. My wife Kelly had lost Her Mother after a long battle with Breast Cancer. Kelly's Mom Pam had passed away near Mothers Day earlier that year in May of 2010, Kelly was fighting Her own battle with a long deep dark depression from going thru the several year battle & long slow loss of Her Mother to that Terrible Monster we call Cancer.
When we got the little kitten inside and were cleaning her up, we found some blood on the T-Shirt, and on the Lil ones belly, a closer look found an open wound on her belly, we first thought maybe her belly button had become infected, or the aggressive Florida fire ants had gotten to her. We then saw something moving, There was something ALIVE inside Her Belly Button. It was a BOT FLY LARVA...!!! (Bot Fly Larva = Maggot), We then knew for sure, She was in Trouble, And so were we. Now it was 8-9 pm on a Sunday night, Slim to no chance at a Veterinarian. And if so it would be very expensive. We searched on the Internet to find info on the removal, it sounded like something we could do.
We decided to do the removal, but we needed something very sharp to lance the hole, it was the size of the tip of a ball point pen. The Bot Larva has barbs and a toxin inside it. If pulled thru the hole, it would break open and the already weak kitten might die.
Kelly had worked in a secretarial position for the Department of Corrections Since 1996 and she suggested we do what the inmates do, Make a scalpel out of a disposable razor, While She went off to the store in search of kitten milk and food. I created a scalpel with a small pair of vice scripts and a razor blade. At About 11 pm that Sunday night we performed minor surgery on a small kitten soon to be named "Sammi Jo"
We put little Sammi Jo in a basket, and slept with Her between our heads that night. Needless to say, Neither one of us slept much that night. The next morning Kelly said to Me, "I can not take Her to work with Me, You will have to take her out on the road with You," "You will have to pull over to stop & feed Her a bottle of kitty milk every 3-4 hrs." How could i say no? After all, I had just cut Her tummy open and plucked a live larva from inside Her.
Well I did it, I took Her out on the Road....... That day was the beginning of...... "Sammi Jo The Trucking Kitty"
Sammi Jo Today...... Raspberries
Chapter 2 / The Trucking Kitty (coming soon)