All the rain we’ve had lately has sadly exposed a water problem in our basement that’s led to mold. Actually, we had already suspected that there was a problem, but there’s nothing quite like a massive downpour coupled with the loss of power for the sump pump to really clarify the issue.
So we had a contractor come in to pull out some of the drywall to see exactly what was going on, and the good news is that it actually wasn’t as terrible as Cute W and I feared. But the bad news is that we had of course grossly underestimated how fascinated the cats would be with the project.
I thought that having a strange man in our house would be enough to keep them in hiding, but when the contractor briefly left the area to get more supplies, both Ruth and Dave ran in and proceeded to investigate, walking their cute little paws all over this mold-riddled insulation.
I realized my error pretty quickly, and I set J to work attempting to locate and lock down the cats while I went hunting for the door that once-upon-a-time had stood between our kitchen and the landing at the top of our basement so that we could have an effective, yet more functional than last time‘s, barrier between the basement and the rest of the house.
By the time I located Dave, he was literally standing on the top of a pile of moldy insulation, but with the appropriate bribes for each (catnip for Ruth, food for Dave), we were able to shoo them both upstairs and seal thing off with the door, which J helped wipe down after its long sojourn in our garage.
Then M, J, and I all captured (herded?) the cats in the master bathroom where each was subjected to a paw bath, hopefully before they’d had a chance to lick all the yuck. Both cats were deeply unhappy about the entire procedure. The are super-cute when they’re deeply unhappy.
In more pleasant cat news, I am thrilled to report that Ruth has decided to take up residence directly next to me for portions of the work day. She kept jumping behind me on my chair, which is a smidgen annoying and also a very difficult spot for me to pet her, so I moved her kitty bed over to the end of my desk. Now Ruth can nap and serve as my Emotional Support Animal as I go about my day. Except I really need to get something non-skid to prevent her from sliding right off the surface of the table when she leaps on with too much force.
