ferocious franklin.

catnip or greenies? who knows, but SOMETHING is causing franklin major poopie bloopies in the litter box lately - twice in one week so far. one thing's for sure, a long haired cat plus loose stools does not equal a pretty picture (or smell, for that matter). yuck.

of course, stephen discovered frankie in his super soiled state while i was busy cat-napping in our way too comfortable bed. being as conscientious as ever, he decided not to wake me from my beauty sleep and tackle the mess himself. yes, you guessed it - hooray for the dreaded BATH TIME!

now, call us crazy, but we've given our little lions the dunk many times before - but with any 25-pound animal, it does take the concerted effort of two very devoted people. between the rushing of the faucet water, getting soaked to the bone and sudsed up with kitty shampoo in addition to the necessary rough handling, it's tough going. but this time, frankie hit his limit... you would too after 15 mins! of such torture. so what would any self-respecting pussycat do? all but bite the hand that feeds him, i'm sure... all except, that is, our ferocious feline, franklin.

that's right- he just chomped down with those razor sharp fangs of his straight into stephen's right hand, sinking deep into the fleshy meat of his thumb pad. an action quite surprising in fact, considering he's the loverboy of the two and well, his breed name does say it all - copperfield the casanova. so you can only imagine stephen's cry amplify as the beast tightened his grip by shaking his head like a shark (attack of jaws!) to ensure a solid grasp. clearly he was FED UP. ouchie ouch!

after such a rude awakening, i couldn't help but to calmly assess the situation at hand - riiiiight. with franklin hovered in the corner, dastardly dripping wet, and stephen yowling over the sink holding onto his bloody hand as if it had been bitten off entirely, i didn't know quite where to begin! as he recovered from his state of shock, i disinfected the puncture wounds with some hydrogen peroxide, bandaged it up good with my handy dandy first aid kit to stop the bleeding. nurse laura to the rescue. now somewhat collected, we dashed out the door to the ER while frankie air-dried and cooled-off out on the balcony - poor poor thing.

of course, fully expecting an all night wait at the hospital, i just HAD to make a quick detour, much to stephen's bemoaning, to the closest wendy's for my usual #1, plain with cheese, combo - trust me, you don't want to see my mood with severe hunger pains! after returning to my senses, we made a straight shot across the potomac to georgetown university hospital and rolled in the emergency room waiting room with plenty of reading material in hand. we were prepared.

with only 2 other couples before us, it was still an hour wait before we were able to come back into the ER. and then another hour to actual see a doctor, get cleaned up, bandaged and boosted with another round of tetanus vaccine. all in all, stephen was a trooper, and we definitely did the right thing in coming in... in fact we ran into a fellow gracedc'er back in the ER who was one of the attending physicians on call that night - dr. morrell. once he saw stephen's hand and heard the tale, it was all seriousness in explaining all the potential complications of infection if those horse-pills of antibiotics weren't taken regularly! eek.

however, once we returned home and freed franklin from his remorse through a little reconciling cuddle, life normalized and the balance of power was restored. or at least, let's hope. oh what a night.