Houdini and the Water Bill

I could also title this post, "How to have a stressful vacation." While our spring break trip was good in many ways, it was not relaxing. Worrisome things were happening back at the homestead. I had asked my very kind and generous neighbor to care for our cat while we were away. I hated to ask her this favor, but I was out of options. We left on a Tuesday evening and I told my neighbor we would just make sure Mako (the cat) was inside with plenty of food before we left, which he was, and that way she wouldn't need to do anything for him until Wednesday morning.

See the photo above? That's what he was doing when we left. Several eyewitnesses saw him calmly bathing himself right before we closed the door and departed. All was well.

That night, right before I got into bed, I found a text from my neighbor saying that she had seen that Mako was on the front porch that evening, so she came over and took him inside. She had to carry him because he wouldn't go in. I read her text around 1:30am her time, so I couldn't call her to say, "That can't be Mako! He was inside when we left." There is another cat in the neighborhood that looks like him, so all night I had nightmares of this other cat hurting Mako (who is missing some key defensive weapons--front claws*) or WORSE, hurting my house--carpet, furniture, etc. Eric and I laughed about it, but still worried. A lot.

The next morning we texted back and forth and she sent me a photo labeled, "This is the cat I'm taking care of." It was definitely Mako. Whew! Felt better. But it's a mystery how he got out. Again...eyewitnesses. One of them pretty reliable.

Oh...and Mako also left cat waste products in the dining room for my neighbor to clean up. Three times. So thoughtful of him. Eric is hoping he has a short life span.

Two days later, another text from my neighbor. She had discovered our water was on outside in the backyard, along with the river it had created, and wanted to warn me that the water bill might be scary. It was, in fact, most frightening. $250!!! And we don't even know who to yell at. Of course, both the boys assure us it was not them. Naturally.

Those hidden costs of vacation can really get you.

*Just FYI, we did not de-claw Mako, he came to us that way. Though, I think Eric is considering yanking out the back claws now as well.