15 November 2012

A Hectic Morning with Pretty Girl

This morning was hectic. I was already behind on my studies for the exam, and I only had a few hours to catch up and revise whatever I managed to learn so far. It seemed doable enough.

I woke up to a weird noise. It sounded almost like a low growl. I brushed it off as the tenants snoring, but after a while I realized the sound was closer than I realized. I strained my ears and realized the noise was coming from Pretty Girl! I woke Michael up and told him what was going on. We jolted out of bed and turned on the lights. Pretty Girl was on the floor and there were small pools of blood all over the floor. You can only imagine the horror I felt. There were also spills of amniotic fluid so we concluded that she was going into labour. This came as a surprise as Pretty Girl did not show any symptoms of pregnancy whatsoever these past few weeks.

Pretty Girl this evening
The first kitten was coming out and she wanted to deliver it on the bed. My Mom would have killed me if I had let Pretty Girl do that. Before I could figure out what to do, she had already delivered her first kitten. It was not a happy moment though - the kitten was premature and lifeless. She carried the kitten into a box she likes to play with. After a while, she started to make the growling noise again and headed towards the bed. I had to make a compromise. We quickly removed the sheets and laid rags all over the bed. She jumped up, and didn't seem to mind. She gave birth to two more kittens on the bed - both equally lifeless. She went to sleep on the bed and after a long wait, we realized that she was done. By this time the room was reeking of fluids, but at least Pretty Girl was okay. I felt really bad looking at the kittens, but it struck me that this was the better alternative to letting them grow up here, where animals have to fend for themselves and small kittens were constantly in danger. Besides, Pretty Girl didn't seem to mind (she seemed quite content, in fact).

While discussing where we were going to bury the kittens, Pretty Girl got up and started eating them. It was a little disturbing to see at first, but we looked it up and saw that it was normal behaviour for cats to do so. By this time I only had half an hour to get ready for the exam! I had a new reason to panic at this point. I managed to lightly study the topics concerned, and though I wasn't able to finish my paper on time, I think I did okay.

Coming back from classes, Pretty Girl was sunbathing like nothing happened. On seeing me, she rushed over and I fed her some fish. Needless to say, she's back to her usual self again.