Goodbye Kitty

 Our cat, Kitty, died last Thursday.

Kitty has been a huge part of our lives since we first met her back in June of 2011, when we were living in China.  At the time I wrote about it here.

Kitty was a smart cat who could open doors by jumping up and pulling on the door handle.  She also loved getting up into high places.  She'd jump higher and further than our other cats, then look down on them comfortably smug.

Very quickly Kitty became part of the family, and when we moved to New Zealand in November of 2014 she came with us too.  Her trip took six months, as she had to social distance in managed isolation, first in Hong Kong and then in New Zealand.  She shared her quarantine hotel with Maggie, our other cat from China, and in that time they got extremely close; they'd often sleep on beds together, wrapped up tight around each other.

Kitty enjoyed her life here in New Zealand.  She'd climb onto the roof of our two-storied house and sleep in the sun, then meow at the top-floor window by my desk asking to be let in.  She figured out how to unlatch a window, and sometimes let herself out at night until we put in a more secure latch.  She was the only one of our three cats who learnt how to use our smart microchip-activated cat-flap.

We first realised something was wrong with Kitty in January, when we noticed her breathing much faster.  X-rays at the vet showed that she had cancer in her lungs, and there was nothing we could do.

As the cancer took over, Kitty climbed less and less, tiring quickly and easily.  For the past few months she stayed close to home, and during the Covid-19 lockdowns she was almost always with one or other of us, sleeping beside (or on) us as we did our thing at home.

We'll never know how old Kitty was.  We knew her for nine and a quarter years.  She was always a tiny little cat, and never grew in the time we knew her.

Kitty was a lovely, friendly, gentle cat.  We all miss her hugely, and it continues to feel strange her not being around the home with us.

Book review: The man who mistook his wife for a hat

Back at university, almost 25 years ago, one of my majors was psychology and in particular I took courses in neuroscience and abnormal psychology.

At some point in a class they must have mentioned Oliver Sacks, and out of interest at the time I read his 1985 book The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat.

Sacks, by the way, was a neurologist, and the book is a collection of chapters discussing some of his patents he got to know over the years.  The title of the book comes from the first chapter, and the man, Dr P, really did attempt to pick up his wife's head thinking that she was his hat.  He had visual agnosia which meant that he was unable to visually recognise faces or familiar objects.

Fast forward a bit, and a few months ago the children and I watched Awakenings, a Robin Williams and Robert De Niro movie based on Sacks' book of the same name.

(I highly recommend the movie, and the girls enjoyed it.)

Anyway, I thought Mulan might also enjoy reading The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat, so I requested it from the library.  I've just finished re-reading it, and have passed it on to Mulan.  (I don't expect Mulan to read all the neurological details, but I thought she might find the stories of the people interesting and thought-provoking.)

The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat is truly a fascinating read.

First and foremost, Sacks has a delightful storytelling style.  Sacks is incredibly good at humanising his patients -- they are decent, real, (mostly) normal people, who just happen to have had something happen to their brain (injury, illness, stroke, epilepsy, migraines, etc) and consequently they perceive or interact in the world differently than most people.

To me, what I find so fascinating is how our perception of the world is tied in so much with our physical brain.  A little bit of damage/change to this part of the brain, and suddenly one has a vastly different perception of the world.  Sometimes these differences are clear defects, but Sacks has a way of also opening our eyes to the ways in which these differences become a true part of who these people are.

And in doing this, as readers we are likewise prompted to re-consider who we are in ourselves.  In everyday life we often like to think of ourselves as whole and united, as individual selves in control of our interactions in the world.  These sorts of neurological case studies deeply question this perception of ourselves, and for that matter our perception of reality.

Mulan's athletics is off (again!)

 And Mulan's Interprovincials athletics competition is back off again.

A few weeks ago I wrote it was on again, but a few days ago we heard it was off again.  Too much Covid-19 uncertainty.

Mulan is grumpy!