Milkshake Cupcakes, Part III. Wow.  You’ve got to give Sara this: she’s loyal to her 1/2 birthday treats.  The big difference this year is our take on “big”.  This is a mini-cupcake, no bigger than a cake pop.  We had to use mini M&Ms instead of gumballs, as the gumball would have been the entire top of the cupcake.  You’re probably thinking what I was thinking: MINI’S!  Those will take half the time!  HA.  Hahahahahahaha.  NOTHING takes half the time with 6 hands, 3 bakers piping, M&Ms being snatched by tiny bandits, and let’s not get started on those sprinkles.  They are as bouncy as they are pretty.

But these cupcakes showing up for a 3rd February in a row isn’t what you knew was coming.  We finally took Max to the Vet again.  Not because we thought he’d taken a turn for the worse; he seems in perpetual “kind of worse”.  Is was simply time for vaccinations.  Ta-da!  Look Doc!  He lived!  But I knew.  You knew.  A cat doesn’t go home near death 6 months ago with no hopes of survival, gets nothing but hot dogs as treatment, and then turns a corner.  At least now we know: it’s cancer.  A huge abdominal tumor that has metastasized…kind of everywhere.  I swore I’d stop feeding him table scraps this time around.  I’m delaying the inevitable and I don’t want him to suffer.

But tonight, as I chopped up the ham for the pea & parmesan risotto, there he sat at my feet.  Looking up at me with those big, bright eyes. And I could say only one thing to my once vibrant buddy: “Here you go Maxie.  Ham.  It’s what’s for dinner.”

The cupcakes and warm day were a nice distraction.  Quite honestly, with 6 months of waiting and hoping and the cyclical weight gain and loss…we’re kind of numb.  I think the girls are emotionally prepared.  I think I am too, which will hold true until the day comes when he’s not at my feet. When the house isn’t sprinkled with his thick, white fur. Soon I’ll have 2 cats who match so entirely, I have no idea who is who. Forget the 8 year age difference, unless I ask them, I really don’t know. I tried to talk to Cy tonight about the Rainbow Bridge.  Or maybe it was Syd.  SEE?  What’s the point?! You know what goes with grieving?  Ham.  Gotta run…