Houdini Who???

Today probably rates as one of the worst days John and I have had for a very very very long time...

...after a pretty miserable night's sleep (because we were both worried about Chivers) and Minz had been desperately looking for him, we woke and were planning our day when I checked the phone to find we had had a missed call from a number we didn't recognise.  I half jokingly said perhaps it was from the vets.

John called the number and it was from the vets, it was the vet telling us that during the night Chivers had managed to escape from his cage and was missing - in fact they weren't even sure he was still in the building and wanted us to come down and call for him as he might respond to our voices.  To cut a long story short John made the journey from Droushia to the vets faster than the speed of sound and we found out that he had escaped and triggered the alarms at around 2.30am that morning - it was now about 9.30am so he had been missing for over seven hours.  We were both frantic and I mean frantic - I have absolutely no idea how parents cope when their children go missing - our world was falling apart in front of us and after all he is only a cat, only a cat but our cat and our child replacement.

Eventually we found him hiding, wedged underneath the display of cat food in the waiting room.  He was absolutely traumatised as were John and I.  All we wanted to do was get him out and get him home.  We may have been less than civil to the staff in the surgery, and I intend to go back and apologise tomorrow, but for God's sake what exactly did they expect?

We have now got him home and settled - you will probably think he looks fine and we have been over-reacting but he breathes overly quickly, he pants with his tongue hanging out, he wasn't eating and drinking, he was dehydrated and has lost body weight.  He is calmer and we have got him to eat a little tuna and drink a little water.

The vets have phoned and now that we have all calmed down they have explained what happened and there are steps they are going to take to ensure that this does not happen again.  They also arranged for one of the members of staff to meet us this afternoon with some tablets that he is to take to try and settle his stomach which will help with the dehydration.  We will monitor the situation and decide what is best for him.

Having got Chivers settled we carried on with the remainder of the day.  I had cancelled craft at Jeanette's obviously and, even though I could have gone for a while once we got Chivs home that was the last thing on my mind. 

We needed to get two new front tyres for the car and John was keen to find somewhere in Polis that we could trust.  Having looked around we decided upon the place which is opposite Mosfilos on the corner.  John was happy that the guy knew what he was doing and that he could communicate with him and, even more importantly, John and I could wait in Mosfilos whilst the work was being done.

We had not intended to have lunch out and to be honest we were not really in the mood for food but we have always loved Mosfilos with its beautiful old colonial building and the genial owner who obviously enjoys his food if his waist-line is anything to go by.  We had to wait for about half an hour so decided there was nothing for it but to eat.  This is the sort of traditional establishment where the workers go for lunch and choose the dish(es) of the day rather than there be any sort of menu.  John opted for the pork afelia and I went for the white fasoulakia beans.  We were presented with a plate of rough and ready salad: hunks of onion, tomato and cucumber with very fresh, very peppery rocket - that would have been enough for me on its own.  John said that the Afelia was absolutely NOSTIMA (delicious).

As soon as we had eaten the car was ready to take complete with two new tyres - just the tracking to get done.  As I said I had missed craft today so having got home and checked that the cats were both ok, I decided to try out some crafting at home and created a garden gecko out of some green garden wire we had loafing around and some of my glass nugget beads.

He is not quite complete at this stage, there is some bending required to make sure that when he is attached to the wall he sits properly but all in all I think he is quite a star!

We have been keeping a very watchful eye on Chivers this afternoon - we need to make sure that he isn't sick and that he is eating and drinking and is breathing steadily.  He has barely moved from the garden today which is unusual for him as he normally likes to disappear over into the field.

We had left the cat basket in the conservatory so I decided to leave the door open so that the cats could get used to it.  Both Minz (on the left) and Chivs (on the right) had a good old look at it without being scared - they can probably smell Mum's cat hanging around it - why is it then when you want them to go inside they suddenly become rigid and uncooperative?

By late afternoon both John and I sat down and reflected on the events of the day.  What a nightmare it had all been.  John decided he had the urge to get mullered and I have to say I agreed with him so we cracked open the spirits - it has been so stressful I think we deserved it.  

We are pretty much Skyped out tonight having spoken to my sister Kaye and to both of John's sisters Janice and Wendy.  We have managed to get the tablets down Chivers and he has been very good at taking them.  We both need a decent night's sleep but I am not overly optimistic except that tomorrow must surely be a better day?