No, around here, we have a lot of woods, deer, deer ticks, and doctors, in that order of desirability. ') You can't shake a stick here without hitting a doctor. We have a medical school in town which my son is now attending (very nice to have him nearby again, but I'm sorry he picked medicine), and a huge hospital trying to make a name for itself nationally (and failing). It's weird raising kids in a place where all your kids' friends have one or two doctors as parents. But it worked out.

Isn't it ridiculous to make such a fuss about a cat bite? You have to wonder what they did 80 years ago when someone got bitten... maybe their mouth flora became more pathogenic since then.

@medica Oh, indeed. Half of me thinks I'd have been fine either way. But the other half is fine with doing the antibiotics. Might as well use them before they don't work anymore.

I went out and bought a whole lot of probiotic yogurt today. Feels good to eat that. I think I'm going to continue even after the antibiotics are over.

Side note: Bosco decided to try and chew on my arm again. This time I was wearing a fleece so he only got fabric. But I have to cure that crap tout de suite. I don't want to be taking heavy antibiotics every other week. He's losing his lap privileges for a while.

I'm not sure how deep he bit me the other day. There are two fang marks and between them a row of middle-teeth marks, which makes me think they must have sunk in pretty far. But if they had gone in an inch I'm sure I would have been in some serious pain. Part of me thinks he only broke the epidermis. It did bleed more than I would expect for a single layer puncture, though.

Also you'll be glad to know that i found cases today (spare time brushing up on the topic) that would have had you racing for your second drug, so we're very good. But Bosco has to learn it's not ok, and bonne chance with that.

Praises to the flying spaghetti monster that he didn't get your wrist or hand.

o, btw, I was rereading what I wrote and was mortified to call you an old fat! :-O Who does that?! I meant you old fart! (j/k).

There's the wound. The mark on the bottom is directly over the radius, so I don't know how it could have gone in too far without hitting bone.

The outer edges are 2.22 cm apart, which corresponds with the distance between the points of his fangs. The abrasion in the middle is difficult to explain unless he did really dig in.

And there is the culprit, looking all innocent.

"You can't say for sure it was me because I'm wearing a mask."

Anyway, not a tabby. I don't know what you call a black-and-white cat.

Most of the time we're best buddies. He sits in my lap while I'm watching TV or reading, and loves to be petted. He's done the "love mauling" thing before, but his bites were always fake.

But three times lately, including the time in question, he has seemed to get his blood up. He started to maul me, so I pushed him out of the lap, whereupon he charged back up and bit my arm as though it were prey of some kind.

I guess we just have to face the fact that cats are really wild animals at heart, no matter how domesticated they seem.

Lessons from The Oatmeal

@medica I do fart, but I'm not fat. ~40th percentile BMI. Anyway, I knew what you meant.

Wow, that's an impressive bite. Really. I don't know that I've ever seen one as bad as that, and bites are some of our bread & butter, so to speak. The closer to the hand, the more risk of hitting something other than soft tissue. The wrist and hand bites are the worst in terms of deep tissue infection; some of those get ostoemylitis or worse.

One thing about being a doc that it is drummed into us from day one to think the "worst thing first" and adjust 'backward'. Whereas nature works the opposite way. We have a saying for that too: "When you hear hoof beats, don't think of zebras." So many sayings.

Anyway, how does one train a cat not to bite? No more love mauling for Bosco (he really does look innocent), I guess. I've had 13 cats in the last 20 years and not one of them was a biter, so I never had to deal with that.

Lest you think I'm a cat lady, it was purely accidental. :) When the kids were small, God knows why, I started a farm. So, one day at the feed store, one of my kids (we were in line) was talking about getting a cat. So the guy behind us (he didn't look like a liar) said he had some kittens he need to give away because their mother got hit by a car. So, yeah, if we wanted a kitten, come on over and choose.

We got there, and they were maybe between one and two weeks old? They were so cute, and we knew that whichever one we didn't take was going to die. The guy was a pig farmer and way too busy to bother, and said they hadn't eaten since the day before when she was killed. :-/ So we took all 4. Fed them with eyedroppers, had to rub their tiny butts with a warm wet washcloth to get them to pee and poop, the whole thing. They were the best cats ever.

Anyway, we also had at one time over 40 ducks, a hundred or more chickens, goats, guinneas, peacocks, pheasants, quail, geese, dogs, rabbits, and I'm sure I'm leaving a lot out.

It was a wonderful life.

Anyway, we're down to two dogs and no cats. :( I think alot about getting one.

Mt kids love The Oatmeal. :) I like him; His cat stuff is funny. I truly believe that my youngest (son) would not be fantasizing about buying a Tessla now if not for The Oatmeal.

Oh, btw, when was your last tetanus shot? A few days ago?? ;)

CU.

@medica Tetanus booster was in September, so I'm OK.

But the little bastard just bit me again. Just now.

I'm pretty sure it's not love mauling now. It's aggressive behavior when he thinks I should be putting out some food.

Trying to get my attention.

I love him dearly, but if he's going to do that crap he can go back to the shelter where we got him. I can only tolerate so much antibiotic treatment.

I don't know what to do.