A New Year’s Eve Close Shave (with Ginger)

This story begins from this morning when Jia-Wen and Sihui had already left for the hospital and I was waiting for my husband to get up so that we could go too.

I hadn’t slept all night last night, either due to being too excited that the baby was coming today (our first grandchild) or the iced lemon tea I had drunk had too much caffeine in it. I think it was the latter. In any case, I could not sleep all night.  That is why the previous posts were written at 3am last night – I was wide awake.

So, after my husband got up, he noticed a bulb in the porch had fused so he went out to get it changed. That’s when Ginger “gingerly” sneaked out through the front door at lightning speed.

As big and obese as he may be, Ginger can be very, very fast in his movements. It’s a matter of no more than two seconds than he would have totally and completely disappeared.

We could not find him anywhere and it was also still dark. And we had to leave already.

So we went to the hospital.

At the hospital, we check our CCTV and at 9.55am we saw Ginger fighting with Bushy White in the garden. It was one of those fights where cats flew up into the air and fur flew everywhere. The fight was over in 2-3 seconds too.

By the time we came home, it was already almost 12noon. I half expected to see Ginger in the porch, but to my disappointment, he wasn’t there.

But I saw the tufts of fur at the crime scene:

There were more white fur than ginger-coloured fur. But this did not mean anything. Ginger could still have lost the fight.

I was dead tired by then (having not slept the entire night), but I went out to search for him. Up and down the road, looked into the drains, into people’s compounds, up neighbours’ rooftops, he was nowhere to be seen.

I quickly sent an appeal to the neighbourhood whatsapp group with Ginger’s photos:

I sent the same photo to PAWS too, just in case anyone had caught him and sent him to PAWS.

Then, I checked with the chief guard if by any rotten luck, the council might have come round. The chief guard said no. Thank goodness for that.

I must have gone out to search no less than 6 times. Ginger was nowhere to be seen at all. I even did the “boiling water, with scissors on top of pot and asking the Kitchen God for assistance” routine. I figured there was no harm in doing it. Whatever works, you know. I almost contemplated engaging the services of a psychic or animal communicator for help.

Ginger, where are you?  Have you decided to run away from home? I was also worried in case he had lost in the fight with Bushy White and was injured and hence, hiding.

I locked the patio door so that Tabs and Heidi could not go out and I left Stargate2 open so that Ginger could come back to the patio.

I also enlisted Buddy’s help. He was sitting under a car opposite our house so I went to talk with him to ask him to help locate Ginger and please ask Ginger to come home.  (Buddy is a neighbour’s cat but he is kind of protecting our house now, he used to be Vincent and Zurik’s good buddy, but Ginger hates him.)

Hour after hour,  I waited, I searched, but Ginger did not appear. Finally, it was time to go to the hospital again. We went.

By the time we came back, I again expected to see Ginger sitting in the porch, but he wasn’t there. My heart totally sank this time. It’s been too many hours now. It’s not good.

Then, I went through Stargate2 and peeped in. This is what I saw:

He’s back!!!  Ginger is back!!!!

I calmly closed and locked Stargate2.

Phew!!!!!!!!!!!!

Whatever you want to eat, Ginger, it’s yours!

He had a meal of duck. It’s his favourite, but he did not eat that much too. He looked a bit traumatised.

Maybe he lost in the fight with Bushy White. Maybe there’s some injury. Maybe it was the heat from the hot afternoon.

He’s resting now. He doesn’t look so good, but at least he is home now and we can attend to his needs.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Source: https://myanimalcare.org/2019/12/31/a-new-years-eve-close-sh..

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AnimalCare is a registered society that promotes caregiving to street animals and helps in their neutering and medical needs. AnimalCare has a Medical Fund, Food Fund and Education Fund.

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