Earleir this week a pack of unfamiliar dogs got into my yard and killed most of the semi-stray cats that we've been feeding and gradually giving away. There were about 6 adult cats earlier this year, and four of them had kittens at the same time--roughly 15 kittens all at once. We gave a few away.

We buried 11 cats when we got home and saw what happened... There are still 4 adults, and one kitten left. The rest? We can't find anywhere.

They weren't shredded, clawed... Only one cat seemed to have been damaged much--most were simply bitten on the back of the neck, killed, dropped and left. The dogs weren't hungry, bored. The next time someone tels me humans are the only creatures that murder, I'm going to punch him in his lying mouth.

The two adult cats that died were killed outside where they were keeping the kittens, to all appearances they died protecting their children. The cats all kept their kittens together, shared their milk among the group--it was like some kind of cat clan out of one of my sister's Warrior books...

Last year almost all the kittens died of deseases before the cats trusted us to help with them. Not sure if we could have helped anyway, but that was last year... This year, the kittens were all in good health. This year, we were giving them away to good homes, people were happy...

Then, this?




I went to the local SCA group's monthly populace meeting last night. When I got home, I found out that a close friend of my family passed away over the weekend. My brother called there and told my mom that there was bad news--we expected the dogs had come back while we were away... I went around counting the cats to make sure they were okay. I walked in to my mother crying her eyes out...



I have four wisdom teeth that are trying to force their way into a jaw that does not have room for them. There is nothing I can do to deaden the pain, it seems...

This has not been a good week.