Chester got to come into the office with me again yesterday. He got to meet one of his benefactors and also get his foot rebandaged with an audience. It looked even better! It was much more clean and the red swollen part was a bit smaller. Still there, though. He got to sit for about an hour without a bandage on, but he didn't even lick at it. I figure that means it can't be bothering him too much. Tomorrow I do it all over again, so we'll see how it looks then.He continues to keep exploring more and more. Last night it was my bathroom. Usually he keeps away from there. He has a giant fit when the shower is on. It's like he thinks that room is killing us. But yesterday he explored all around and this morning he came in a bit too.
He's increasingly untrusting of any move I make. Convinced I'm going to put him in a carrier, or shove meds down his throat or wrap his foot. To be fair, I usually am. It's quite funny though, because you can tell how much he wants to be cuddled and loved, but he is terrified to let you come to him. It has to be on his terms when your guard is down. Hopefully a few months after this stops, he'll trust me to walk into my own bedroom again.
I came across this today too and thought it was cool. Maybe some of you would be interested.
http://www.moderncat.net/2012/07/22/cat-tee-mission-helps-cats-around-the-world/

I'm not home now and probably won't be for a bit so I don't have pictures for you. I'll try to get some sometime this weekend for you.
Have a great weekend at that!

I don't really have any updates for you. But I wanted to say Happy World Cat Day and leave you with this:http://www.sparklecat.com/Sparklepics3/WorldCatDay080812a.jpg

Chester knew from the very beginning that today was Vet Day. He suddenly got this look of understanding and terror on his face and ran under the bed and hid there all morning. I eventually had to dig him out after all my usual tricks failed (shaking his food bag, shining the laser pointer around, turning the light off and ignoring him, etc)
His foot looked better still under all the bandages, but unfortunately not better enough to be bandage free yet. She said another week, maybe two. Sad face. This of course means that I have to keep wrapping it, but both Gyan and Steph are in Portland at a conference. I'm not entirely sure how this will go by myself. I'm assuming pretty terribly for everyone. But also somewhat amusingly. He of course refuses to walk on his foot again after doing so well yesterday on it. 
Chester's become pretty insistent on his "nighttime walks" out into the hallway. His newest facination is with all my neighbours' doors. Yesterday he saw something (read: nothing) run under one of their doors and decided to bat at it, making a knocking sound. All I could think was "Well, this will be awkward and hard to explain if he [neighbour man] comes out" Luckily, he never did.
I've been opening the door to the less used stairwell in the building too. Chester will hesitantly enter it and go up or down a couple stairs, then run back to me where I'm holding the door. Maybe I'll get a door stop and take him on a stroll to some higher floors one of these days. I used to train animals at the zoo in undergrad, and developed a firm belief in enrichment. My apartment is tiny and sitting on the couch all day with a bit of cuddling and batting at toys just won't lead to a fulfilling life. Getting to explore new things (safely) is much more of what a cat needs. Plus I figure, Chester must have been terrified for a vast majority of his life. (I'm just assuming living on the streets practically paralyzed is scary) The fact that he's at all willing to explore new scary places should not be discouraged. And, it's everything Gyan and I dream of to be able to have a cat on a harness that you can take for walks. If that somehow comes out of this (and I highly doubt it) then all the better.
Chester's eyebrow whiskers are falling out, and a few of his nose ones too. For a few days, his pads of his paws were really white too. Well, they were white in the mornings, turning increasingly more pink as the day went on. I have no idea what those things are about. The vet chalked it up to strange things popping up after the whole near death experience thing. He's still acting fine.
So fine in fact, that he keeps gaining weight! He's up to 4.9kg The fat little cheese log. He's officially on a diet. It's funny. I spent 6 months trying to make him gain any sort of weight, or even eat. And in 1.5 months he's gained an entire kilogram. It's amazing what repositioning your organs can do for your appetite. We switched him from raw and wet food to kibbles after we found out about the need for the second surgery and how broke we were going to be for the rest of our lives, but there's a bit of money left in his account (yes, he's had his own bank account since we adopted him) from fundraising, so I think it's time to start incorporating better food into his meals again.  It's not like we can even try to pretend that he isn't the most spoiled kitty in the world anyway. Might as well keep it going.

Gyan was here for an entire weekend before having to leave again for another conference. But, that means he got to help out with a foot bandaging extravaganza. It went so much more smoothly with him here to help. And his foot is looking at least 10% better in the two days it was bandanged. So tomorrow when the bandages get taken off at the vet, it will hopefully be for the last time.
He still isn't putting weight on the foot, but I think it's more of a mental block than a physical one. If you distract him, he'll use that foot just fine.
I've been thinking a lot about our journey together and how nuts and unexpected it's all been. I think I've decided that if I had to go back, I'd do it all over again. It's so easy to say that now that everything is over and done and Chester's well on his way to healthiness, and I'm so thankful that's the case.
I think it's no surprise that I love Chester more than anything in the world, and I doubt I could love another cat as much as I do him. I also doubt that any would love us as much as he does. I'd still have to say that I would pick him over any others. I'm so thankful we got to adopt him for as much his sake and ours.
Pretty much everyone has told me that he is lucky to have come to us, for not everyone would do what we did to make sure he stayed alive. I guess that's true, but it blows my mind in a way. Yes, it's been expensive, and yes, we've both had to sacrifice things like finishing our theses quickly, tuition, and computers that turn on, and fresh vegetables. But we made a commitment to him when we adopted him. We chose him and promised to look after him for the rest of his life. It's not like we adopted him thinking we'd have him for a few months and then reassess. We wanted a cat and we waited, for years in my case, until we could afford a reasonable life for that cat. We had no idea we'd need quite so much money and we tried to the best of our abilities to make sure he was healthy, but that doesn't change the fact that we took him home with the understanding that we would take care of him as best we could.
Sure, it would have been much better for everyone if the SPCA had bothered to look into all his apparent issues, but if they had found what we had, he wouldn't be alive today. I actually can't picture that world. I can picture a world where people responsible for the well being of animals put animals as their first priority, but that's neither here nor there at this point. The fact is, they screwed up, and we had to pay, but we benefited and are continuing to benefit from it. Plus, we got to meet (if virtually so far) all of you amazing people. It has vastly improved my outlook on the human race to know that you 70 or so people care enough for some random stranger's cat to not only help him survive, but to check up and make sure that he continues to flourish.
I've never been able to comprehend the huge difference in species that so many people feel. To me, a life is a life, but especially an animal is an animal. Most of our friends, when hearing our story simply said "Well, adopt another cat." But if this were to happen to our human child, not a single person would think to say "Well, adopt another baby." I can somewhat see their point from a distance, but that's just not how my brain works. What exactly is it that makes a dog, cat, rabbit, turtle, etc less worthy of every effort to make them survive. Especially one you've committed to. Surprisingly, when I sent this website around, only two strangers suggested putting him down (Or feeing him to a snake as it may be). I was expecting much more negative feedback, but all we received was amazingly supportive feedback. So, my only hope is that if this should happen again, that those animals end up with people like you folks who have so much love and compassion for them. It certainly isn't Chester's fault he was hit by a car and he now has to live with this pain and stress, but it would be my fault if I didn't try to fix it.
As long as his quality of life is high and he is fighting, we're going to be fighting with him. I certainly can't help every pet out there, but when I bring one in, it's with the intention of forever.
 So, thank you for saying that he's lucky and all that implies, but it just makes me so sad that this is the 'lucky' instead of normal situation. 
On that note: Pictures of Chester getting rebandaged while wrapped like a burrito, or swaddled like a baby as the case may be:

And his foot. Just trust me that it looks SO much better

Rebandaging Chester's foot by myself looked a lot like this:

And then this

And finally this

Finally, I asked my friend Steph to come over and help me. So we waited like this

She held him down while I attempted to bandage it. We let him go, he ran away under the bed. When he finally remerged, he was well on his way to shredding it. So i wrapped it in duct tape. All is good now :)
I can't wait til Gyan gets back on Saturday to help with that rebandaging. Being a single parent is hard! 

But, here's a picture of his tiny chicken foot. All cleaned (well, as best I could do) and nail free

My office mates are all at a conference in Oslo this week, and I haven't been able to get any work done in who knows how long because Chester can't be left alone for long and Gyan is in North Van watching Chester's dog cousins for the week...so...I brought him with me and made him and office cat.

But what happened was more like this

all day.
He got lots of visitors, and had lots of enrichment roaming around a new place and checking out new bad guys. But he needed me by his side every second of the morning. It wasn't until around 3 that I could put him down for a nap and leave the office and do lab work without him turning on my iTunes on full blast and howling along with it. He also managed to show me a bunch of new programs I never knew I had in the 5 years of this computer's existence. What an aid to my productivity he is!
After shoving him off my computer 4 times, he finally zonked out on my stacks of paper and hasn't moved much since. Except to hold me close and make me promise to never leave him.

All in all, I did manage to get one PCR in and lots of emails written, so I just need to multiply that by about 6 to get an actual real days worth of productivity in and we'll be set. The good news is, with all the new exciting things to check out, he barely touched his bandage.

Vet check up today went well! Chester got out most of his stitches and didn't whine a bit. When his bandage was taken off, his toe toenails went with it, though. The vet wasn't concerned about that and said it was because of the high amount of moisture in the cast. She said they will probably grow back, but if they don't, it's no skin off my back. Either way, it won't hurt him once air gets there and the nail bed can harden. 
His toes themselves still look good and hair is starting to grow back in patches. The middle pad is looking alright. It's the shape it needs to be and only slightly bigger than it should be. It has granulation and isn't infected, just swollen. And once the pad is able to dry out and harden, it should go back to normal!
In order to start hardening the callouses, he is now in a much sleeker minimal bandage. He refuses to put pressure on it right now, but the vet said he will once he gets used to it. Even better, he doesn't have to go into the vet for a whole week! But Gyan and I now have to rebandage him ourselves every two days. That should be an adventure. By the time this guy is old and grey, I should be an honorary vet tech. Next week we'll decide if he gets to be completely bandage free and get to be normal for the first time...ever.
Best news of all though, Chester is off the Clavamox! No more oral antibiotics! We just have to put on some topical cream when we change the bandage. I can't tell you how excited I am about this. As long as his discharge is minimal and everything stays clean and smell-free, we just have to attack him once every two days instead of twice every day. That means we can stop giving him so many bribery treats and he can stop constantly gaining weight. I had to put the little bugger on a slight diet to make sure he didn't gain another .1kg in the four days away from the vet. He's still not overweight, but you'd never know it from this picture: 

I know it's easy enough to get there with as little exercise as he gets.
However, he is getting more these days! The last two days have been all about exploration. Every night before bed he sits at the door and stares at it until I roam around the apartment hallway with him. He's also been climbing into every cupboard I leave open. He's unimpressed with the laser pointer, maybe because he can't run perfectly yet. But none of this is retracting from his nap time. He and I are of one soul in that no one takes away our sleeping time. He just gets to do it twice as much as I do. Ah, the kitty life.

Chester is thoroughly enjoying the Olympics and cheering on Team Canada for the first time. He may have been alive during the Olympics here, but we just don't know. He may have even been born during it. Let's just go with that.
By he's thoroughly enjoying the Olympics, I mean, he's sleeping through them all. Sometimes in my closet. He somehow climbed up the drawers of my dresser and slept on top of them in my hanging t-shirts. 

It was probably to get away from me, and rightfully so. This morning we forced the little bugger into his tiny WSU jersey. He put up with it the whole time until we finally squeegeed it off of him and he ran away. And hid for an hour. Poor baby. But he had to show off his Cougar pride to honour the wonderful people who have gotten him to where he is.

But he's just so darn cute! If not incredibly uncomfortable looking. The puffy cheeks show just how pleased/angry he is.

Last night he jumped behind the couch and set up a fort in the spare blankets we keep there. He's just so exploratory these days! Either that or desperately trying to find a place to hide from us and our terrorizing him. So many meds shoved down his throat. So many jerseys forced on him. So many belly rubs. Please don't report us to animal welfare.

Otherwise, Chester's doing fine. Mostly sleeping. Just in various places. Sometimes he does this to Gyan's computer too. For hours at a time.

We had to come back to the office and pretend to get things done after Chester's check up today, so I didn't have time to take pictures of his pretty Green and White bandage. It goes nicely with his MSU jersey I got him with my parent's pop can money. (In Michigan, cans and bottles have a 10c deposit and my parents literally never take their own cans back, yet drink about 4 a day. So when I come home, I become a bag lady for a few days and it is magical.) We had tried to get him a WSU Cougars jersey in Pullman in honour of his wonderful surgeons and students, but the silly boy grew out of it before we could get a picture and I have yet to do some tailoring to it. MSU is close enough though :)
As much as you care about that, here's the Chester scoop:
His entire foot is much much less swollen. The middle (metatarsal) pad is still swollen and we're not pumped about it, but to me it looks about half as swollen as it was on Tuesday. And there's lots of healing tissue surrounding it, so there's plenty of blood flow to it and his body is working its hardest to mend himself. All this is great news. He should make a full (well, half as far as size of the foot) recovery! It just needs lots more time.
His stitches still look good and he whined very little during the bandage change. He hasn't been on pain meds for about three days and didn't need them today for the change either. His stitches should come out on Tuesday when we go back in again. That poor little kitty. I was even able to watch the whole re-bandaging without having to pretend interest in the cat food bags on the other side of the room this time. So that should tell you how well he is doing if I can tolerate his (very little) pain. Hopefully, after Tuesday he should only have another week of bandage/casts and then he is home free!
In the mean time, Chester is thoroughly enjoying having both parents home to fawn over him constantly. Four hands means so much more petting. One gets the belly, one gets the chin, one for the ears, and one for the tail base. It also means twice the necks to sprawl on. And twice the faces to paw at. Life is rough for a beloved kitty.
He's probably on his 9th or 11th life by now, but he keeps fighting. It reminds me of this song : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSorJ-SMO4M&feature=fvwrel
except that he's getting a whole lot of help coming back instead of people trying to get rid of him. Maybe that happened before in his life, but never again.


Update: I came home to Chester who ran out the door to the hallway of my apartment building. We let him roam around there sometimes and it always makes him super cuddly, but he hasn't wanted to go out since pre-WSU surgery. We paced it back and fourth a couple times with him jumping up to cuddle my hand and purring away the whole time. Then we sat on the couch and snuggled. He's back to his aggressively cuddly days that I haven't seen in months! He then ate and went out onto the porch to "look at bad guys" as we call it. All these are his normal activity circa May and before. I cannot think of any greater barometer for his progress as these are the things I'm most interested in. I did find half his bandage on the couch and had to surgical tape the rest on to make sure it stays for a few more days until the next bandage change. But I like his spunk and tenacity!

Not a whole lot to update on this front. I'm still recuperating from my week in Michigan, Gyan's still recuperating from not being allowed out of this apartment for 10 days, and Chester is happy as ever. It just feels right being back with him in my arms. Though it does make getting anything done rather difficult.

Chester goes back into the vet for another checkup tomorrow to make sure his foot is healing. I mean, I don't know what the alternative is, so he pretty much has to heal. I got out of the vet that the blood pressure crashes were indeed due to anesthesia, so any new kind of surgery is not an option. Luckily, everything is still healing, so hopefully with a little more time and love, he'll be picture perfect. He's got plenty of love here and all over the world, and now he's been bought a bunch more time, so he should be just fine.

Neither Chester nor I have done much but sleep in the last few days, a feat I know we both are fine with. Chester is completely off pain killers but still on sulphur and arnica for the swelling and skin healing and antibiotics of course for the infection in his pad. Tuesday his foot looked much better than last Thursday, so hopefully tomorrow shows even more improvement. We will let you know how it goes!