Air Kitty

I think the airlines should have hand outs for people who think they really, really want to take their cats on the plane with them . The first thing they could suggest is that you should arrange for your kitty to be asleep for the duration. If this is not possible, they should suggest that maybe you have the cat put to sleep and then not worry about it at all. You can mourn on the plane. They do have drink service. They won't feed you but they will get you drunk.

Actually, Kitty was not that big a problem. He was okay about being stuffed in his new wheelie bag, he was cool with the cab... Then we got to the airport. Kitty doesn't like airports. Who knew?

The check in was fine, the counter person made friendly noises at Kitty while Kitty growled at her. I offered her the Kittys' doctors note saying he was indeed rabies free, the Kitty growled again and the woman said the people on board might want to see that note as well.

When it got time to go through security they made me take Kitty out of his box. Kitty wasn't pleased with this. I wasn't pleased with this. They wouldn't just feed him through the x-ray machine, they had to actually see the Kitty. Kitty growled.

Having to verify the Kitty nonwithstanding, Security was a lot less paranoid then it was even last year. I wasn't searched, the bag wasn't searched, I got to keep my shoes on and they never asked for my ID. No checks of anybodies anything in either airport. Last year it was like traveling through a police brutality state, this year nothing. And I was all careful and everything. I didn't even bring tweezers with me in fear of freaking out the airlines and winding up in some bunker with Tom Ridge.

Kitty was fine in the airport until we got to our gate. Then he kept himself amused by tipping over his bag. I ended up having to take off his harness because he got it all tangled with something inside the crate. Stupid Kitty.

Once we actually got on the plane he started to bleat, bleat, bleat. This worried me. He's not as loud as a crying baby, but he's still loud and you can at least stuff a bottle in the mouth of a screaming baby. There wasn't anything I could stuff in his mouth to stop the bleating. Why can't they make binkies for cats? The bleating mercifully stopped once we took off. He got lucky, he was a bout thirty seconds from becoming a checked bag. He growled at the Chicago airport, not at anybody in particular, he had heard they have a bad record with late flights and he wanted to make it clear his flight was going to be on time. We had a long walk to our gate and he tipped himself over again in route. I started to wonder if I could gate check him.

He was really good on the little tiny plane, possibly because he had to ride in my lap the whole way.

He was not pleased to see Dogger.