Not by the hairs of my ...

We had a fun Saturday event: Chin Washing Day! Sammers had had this weird grime on his chin that I noticed about a month ago. (It's the only place pretty much that they can't do themselves and S&L don't do a lot of mutual bathing... That is, they start in often enough but it usually degrades into a wrestling match and the bathing is long forgot... Not exactly productive hygiene time.) We’re talking Serious Crud. You’re shaking your head, thinking “Again with the Susan Hyperbole. How far will she take it today?”

You do not understand.

The word “crud” was made for this day.

“Crud” had not truly lived until now.
It was on his skin down between all the little chin hairs, not dirty fur. It was really freaky-oogey. You heard me: FREAKY-OOGEY! I still can’t think about it without making a screwed-up ick face, seriously, and most of you know it takes a lot to gross me out, growing up on the farm and all that… You know, birthin' calves, castrating hogs... But I digress…

I couldn't tell if Lucy’s chin was dirty of course (sneaky dirt-hiding dark fur sparklechin) so decided I better do both of them. I bought some Ivory bar soap thinking in case they ingested any hopefully that's mild enough that it would not be bad plus I thought it would be less prone to cause some kind of allergic reaction. Then I filled up their bathroom sink water bowl with lukewarm water, got 2 washcloths out, one sudsy and one just wet for rinsing, and went to work on Mr. Sam.

Within about 4 nanoseconds the washcloth corner was Quite A Somber Grey Indeed and I had to switch spots. (See aforementioned Serious Crud; it quite boggles the mind.) It took several long minutes and I still didn’t get it all (I realized later in the evening). Sammers was so funny tho – he is the most incredibly easy-going cat I’ve ever known so he simply let me go at it for the most part, with very minor squirming and he scrunched up his face a lot... Lucy of course was another story; she turned on her Instant Mega-Shed Contact-Deterrent Mechanism (which I, happily, am impervious to yet pretty dang impressed by) but I aborted her cleansing anyway after the first few scrubbies resulted in no discernible change in washcloth color.

During the drying stage, Lucy wrangled out as quickly as possible but I got her mostly dried; she left roughly equal amounts of fur and wet on the towel. I was amazed I got her up on the sink again in fact and she looked a little incredulous herself that I would have the audacity to accost her a second time in as many minutes. Sam was gut-splittingly funny as I was vigorously toweling his chin, neck and chest where the water had run a bit - it was like it felt good for a second and then was awful for a second. He really couldn’t decide... He looked just like really young kittens when they are being washed by their mother so hard that they get knocked down by the tongue-swipes: "Oh the crosses we bear." His face was so cute and resolutely scrunchy and put-up-with-y.* Apparently I am not a very good cat-dryer though. Or else I messed up some kind of wacky fur equilibrium in the Cat Universe. Even tho I had dried them off thoroughly, for the next two hours every time I went in the bedroom expecting to find them napping, they were still studiously licking and both managed to look at me with visual Hmph!s like I should have known all the work this would create for them.

*I know, I know… Which is more sickening, the idea of Chin Crud, or my increasingly drippy Crazy Cat Lady utterances and alarmingly more frequent cat-oriented blog fodder?!... Something to mull over at your leisure… I will not be able to help you – I've got some more crud to take care of.