So our cat wakes up Easter Sunday deathly ill. His fur all mottled up, meowing piteously, and clearly in some kind of pain.

$1,000 worth of blood tests, X-rays, examinations, and overnight stays at the petspital and we still have no idea what was the source of the problem. Every test had the same result: Normal.

They pretty much wrote him off. At 14 years old, he's already bucking the odds for an outdoor cat.

We never did figure it out. But when he looked a little better, we took him home (better to die there than at the vet and in the company of dozens of yapping dogs), and managed to force feed him (always a lot of fun with a cat) to health. Poor sucker was emaciated.

It took 14 years, but the stupid little sucker has wiggled his way under my skin.