RedBug and Ring of Fire

 RedBug has his surgery yesterday.

The tricky part was the location - just above the paw on the front leg.  The skin is tight there - so if you cut something off there isn't enough skin to close over the wound.  But the surgeon (Dr. Pottle) was able to do it.  Bug has a honkin' thick bandage covering his paw and leg up to the shoulder, and has to be kept quiet because it would be very bad to tear those stitches.  So for the next two weeks he will be confined to the bedroom, which is confusing both him and the other cats.

I already miss RiverSong.  In the mornings, as soon as I show signs of being awake, she's in my face purring.  She has the most lovely musical purr.  And then, of course, all the cats join me in the bathroom.  But we'll cope.

Now I'm waiting for the results of the biopsy in a week (Dr. Pottle said that it looked malignant but he couldn't tell.  He did say that he thinks he got everything.  But what I have to accept is that no matter what the diagnosis - malignant or benign - we do exactly the same thing, which is nothing.  Either it will come back, or it won't.  If it doesn't, well and good.  If it does, I'll have to consider amputation.  For that, I'm pulling a Scarlett O'Hara:  I won't think about that today.  I'll think about that tomorrow.   Actually, I won't think about that at all.  It may or may not be a possibility, and sweating in out now would be meaningless.  For now, I just have to give him time to heal.  He seems to be doing fine.  He's sleeping a lot, but squirms and snuggles and shows me his tummy when I pay attention to him.

A singer that I follow - Geoff Castellucci - released a cover of Johnny Cash's Ring of Fire.  I'm not a big country music/Cash fan, but I listened because he can do interesting interpretations.  So I wasn't expecting to be sucker punched in the heart and sit there weeping.  But his video storytelling was of that of an old man, having memories of his late wife.  It told my own story so beautifully.  It broke my heart, but it was also cathartic.

On the technical side, it was pretty amazing.  As he's remembering his wife, all of the candles in the background start to light up - and he gradually gets younger.  In these days where more and more things are done with computer effects, it was gratifying to see something done in real life.  Basically - started young, then bit by bit the older age makeup was added.  Which meant that they had to film it in bits and pieces, going backwards.   That's a lot for a 4 minute video.