Ewwww - gross.

I have recently adopted a cat. Well, a kitten. She was found in a dumpster and I agreed to take her off the hands of the woman who rescued her. Her name is Asha, and here she is:



Adorable, no?

She's not the first cat I've owned. She's not even the first stray I've found and adopted. She is, however, the frist one to give me a communicable disease. Sigh. Yes, my friends, I have contracted that childhood bane - ringworm. I thought only little kids got it. Apparently not.

I noticed a strange red mark on my ankle about a week ago. Thought it was a mosquito bite. Noticed another the next day on my leg. Then another on my other leg. Then another in a place I was pretty damn sure no mosquito has ever had access to. So I looked on-line (what did we ever do without google image search?) and was dismayed to discover pictures of my spots and explanation that ringworm is not a parasite, but only a fungus. Oh, well that's a relief. Essentially, I have athlete's foot on my body. Or jock itch. The same treatments are used for all three, so pick the most amusing one.

I bought some cream at Target, started applying it and hied myself and Asha to the vet today. They took her in the back to run her under the blacklight that apparently makes it easy to identify where the ringworm is on a cat and therefore treat it. The vet returned to the room with a rather awed (and, I think, disgusted) look on his face and told me that my adorable calico kitten turned into a green, glowing ball under the blacklight. He gave me gloves to use when handling her, told me to isolate her, disinfect my house and get to a dermatologist. Again - ew.

So now Asha is all alone on the back porch, crying to be let in to cuddle. Everything in my house has been either thrown in the washing machine, vacuumed or lysol-ed. Some have had all three treatments. I have to take her back to the vet *three* times in the next three weeks to be dipped from head-to-toe. I know that in the end, ringworm is easy to treat and will be gone quite soon but can I just say ew one more time?

No good deed goes unpunished, right?