The Catfish Story

We have gotten a lot of questions about this whole catfish fiasco, so I figured that while I wait in the outpatient surgery waiting room, I would fill everyone in.  It all started last Friday when I was at work and I got a panicked call from Chris saying that he got hurt by a catfish and needed me to meet him at the hospital ER.  As most of you know, this is no my first go the the ER call that I have had since dating Chris (the jack hammer experience).  I, still a beginner fisher, have no idea what harm a catfish can do, but Chris sounded bad so I rush to the ER.  Thankfully Debbie, Chris' co-worker, decided to stay late and was able to drive him to the hospital.  Once I get to the hospital, Chris tells me the story of how this even happens.  Chris went with some of the guys from work to play mini-golf and on his way back, he noticed that the tide appeared to be perfect for cast netting.  So he grabs his net and a bucket and heads to the dock to get some shrimp.  This is the first time he has ever decided to cast on his own, since he just learned how to cast a cast net.  I had just taught him how to cast net and crab in the last few months, that right a yankee taught the southerner the art of cast netting.  He casted his net a few times and was "pulling in a lot of shrimp" and also so other small fishes.  In his net, he also caught a few small sea catfish.  He kicked a few off of the dock and then went on to collect the shrimp that he intended to be our dinner.  As he reached down to pick up a shrimp, he accidentally stepped on one catfish that he missed when he was kicking them off the dock.  As soon as he stepped on it, the catfish fin barb jabbed him in the side of the big toe.

Here is a picture of our not so fun friend the Sea Catfish

 

He was only on the dock with a bucket and a net and couldn't get the catfish off of him.  He had to wait until a boat came to the dock to borrow some pliers to cut the fin off of the fish, so he wouldn't have to take the whole catfish to the ER.  Sea Catfish barb are poisonous and very painful.  I would have never guessed this, but when your husband is that guy screaming in the ER room in pain, you know it has to be bad.  I was thankful that Debbie was able to get him to the hospital fast and that they nurses got him back to a room quickly (we quickly realized that they got him back to a room so quickly, because all of the ER staff thought it was "so cool"to have a catfish fin hanging out of the side of your toe...not so much for Chris.  In walks the ER doctor, which we will refer to him as Doogie Howser, because he was all of 20 year old and entered the room by saying (in a surfer/stoner voice) dude that's cool!!  It all went downhill from there.  Doogie dug and cut and dug some more to get the barb out but just ended up breaking it off deeper inside his toe.  He then said I don't think I got all of it, so you may want to go see a doctor on Monday. They cleaned the wound with some tap water and a washcloth and gave him an antibiotic and a few pain meds and sent us on our way.  Let's just say Friday night, Saturday, and Sunday were rough. Thankfully, we go to church with some amazing people and one of those people is Dr. Beth Fletcher, who agreed on Sunday, to take care of Chris at 7:00 a.m. Monday morning.  She was fantastic!!  She had spent Sunday evening doing research on sea catfish, their barbs, and how to treat for them.  She cleaned his wound out, tried to find and remove as much of the barb as she could, gave him stronger pain meds (since the hospital ones were not working), another antibiotic and wanted to see him back on Wednesday. So he spent the next few days laid up on the couch with me cleaning the area 3 times a day because catfish are seriously one of the most disgusting, dirty, and gross animals on the planet.  As most of you know, I hate feet and Chris will tell you that he knows I love him because I have cleaned his toe so many times in the last few days.  Honestly, I have to pretend it is a finger to make it happen, but I have made it happen.   On Wednesday, we went back to see Beth and thought this would be the end of our crazy catfish journey.  NO SO MUCH!  When she looked at the wound again, she noticed something really small and sent us for x-rays immediately.  She requested the results STAT!  Which I know they say STAT on all of those TV shows and it sounds cool, but when you are carrying doctor's instructions with STAT on it, you know it is not good.  A few hours later, the doctor's office called and said we needed to go to the foot orthopedics surgeons office immediately, they were waiting on us.  Thankfully, we know this orthopedic doctor pretty well since he had done my first surgery on my left ankle, he handled Chris' foot when he dropped the jack hammer on his foot, and now this.  He is a good doctor and after more x-rays we were scheduled for surgery on Friday to remove the barb.  So here I sit waiting for Chris to get out of surgery. 

It is really weird to be on this side of the surgery, since I've always been on the cutting side of things.  It's hard to believe that I could have married someone just as or more accident prone than myself, but it happened.  Chris swears that he became more accident prone since he met me, but I tend not to believe that.  I say that because if you have ever heard his mother talk about Chris' short lived Olympic diving career you would believe he has always been this way.  At the age of 2 or 3 he was watching the Olympic divers on TV and decided he was going to do become a diver and he was going to use the bathtub as his training pool.  Needless to say, all his training was going well until his head hit the faucet and he had to get stitches.  Diving career...over.

Just got called back to talk to the surgeon, Chris' surgery went well and he is in recovery.  The surgeon removed another inch of barb out of his foot.  That is crazy since the ER doctor removed about a half inch already.  The surgeon said he had to make a larger incision that he expected and Chris will be really sore, but he will make a full recovery.  Thank the Lord!!

The lesson of this story is that Catfish are no joke and very dangerous!  We will be staying away from them for a long time.



The Life and Times of Surf Owen Boomer

On Tuesday, March 6, 2012, I lost one of my very best friends and beloved cat, Surf Owen Boomer.  I got Surf in June of 2003.  I moved to Jekyll Island to work at Summer Waves and they had me staying at a house in the wood that had lots of bugs, lizards, and frogs.  Being from Ohio, I was not used to all of these animals outside, let alone inside.  I had never had a cat before in my life, but I knew that cats killed these things, so it seemed like a good idea.  Someone at Summer Waves told me about this adorable kitten that someone dropped off at their vet's office.  I called and went to see if this kitten was a good fit for me.  I fell in love with this little kitten that the vet's office called Marley Bob.  They said he was so friendly and loved to be social and active with all of their patients and families.  I left the vet with my very first cat, Marley Bob.  The first thing I wanted to do was change my new pets name.  I thought about it and asked everyone I knew what they thought would be a good name for my new furry baby.  I wanted something beachy, since I was living at the beach.  I decided on the name Surf Owen Boomer.  The name Owen came from when I was in college, I had a cybercat named Owen and Boomer came from friend that wanted me to name Surf after the football player.  Surf was not a baby kitten, he was a little older, he was gray with darker gray strips, and had huge ears.  Since all of my family and friends were in Ohio, Surf and I became incredibly close.  He had such a crazy personality. He loved when I would hold him like a baby and he would head butt me and purr.  He would also love to lay across my shoulders and hang out, needless to say, I learned how to do a lot of things with a cat laying on my shoulders. I swear I didn't get a full nights sleep that entire first summer of our lives together because every time I would move in my bed, he would attack my feet.  It was one of his favorite games.  I may have gotten a little more sleep when my parents came and visited that summer, because he had way more feet to attack that week.  He was not like any other cat I had ever heard of.  Surf loved water, absolutely LOVED water!  I found this out one afternoon when I was taking a shower and I was rinsing the shampoo out of my hair and I feel this wet furry thing rubbing up against my legs.  My eyes were closed and of course I freak out thinking it was a raccoon, but to my relief and surprise it was Surf just hanging out in the shower with me.  After the end of the summer we moved out of what I called The Jungle House.  We then moved onto a small horse farm with a friend of mine.  He had a gray cat named Athena.  Surf and Athena became fast friends.

Surf and Athena Wrestling

  They loved running free around the farm together and play fighting.  To be honest, I'm surprised that Surf didn't die when we lived there because he used to swim in the marsh right next to our house, which had alligators in it.  I really thought he was going to get eaten at some point.  We then moved into an apartment by ourselves.  Surf liked the high cabinets that he could watch everything from.  He always loved being in the highest place he could climb to.  It must have been the Abyssinian in him.  It was a tough adjustment for Surf because he had to stay inside all of the time and he had to leave his friend Athena.  After about a week, I decided that he was so miserable without Athena that I needed to get another cat. I went to animal control and found a small, gray, Russian Blue kitten that looked almost exactly like Athena.  I brought Coral Blue home that afternoon and after a little adjustment, they became best of friends. 

I realized that I had over the years become a cat lover, but only gray cats! While living in our apartment, I had to spend almost a month wearing hats or wraps to bed because Surf would sleep on top of my head on my pillow and lick and chew my hair off around my forehead.  Needless to say bangs were not my best look, but I didn't really have a choice.  Our other issue with apartment living was Surf trying to escape to go play outside every single time the door opened, so to avoid him getting ran over in my apartment parking lot, I taught Surf how to walk on a leash.  The kids at my apartment loved playing with him when he was on his leash.  I then got a job in Jacksonville Beach and we had to move.  Let's just say neither cat was happy about the move, but Surf made it known he didn't like the move.  I thought he would never go back to the sweet loving cat I remembered, but eventually he did. Surf loved spending time on the screened in porch, he had tones of bugs to tract and eat all from the comfort of his porch. Everyone loved Surf because he was so social and had such a great personality.  While in Jacksonville, I had to have my second ankle surgery and my parents came down to help me out.  My mom ended up staying with us for 6 weeks.  During that time, Surf was my constant babysitter.  Every night when I went to bed with my feet prop up, Surf would sleep on my chest while I slept and when my mom would come in to check on me and give me my medicine, Surf would get up and go to the bathroom and get a drink and when my mom went back to bed, Surf would climb back up on my chest and keep an eye on me.

 He was so sweet.  My mom had a fun time dealing with Surf during this time as well, he could be kind of wild and stubborn, so they sometimes butted heads, but that was just Surf.  After my surgery, I started dating Chris and even though Chris goofs around and says Surf didn't like him because he swatted him in the eye, Surf really did like him.  To be honest if Surf swatted you in the eye, he loved you.  Just ask my mom and Ava.  We then moved from our scary San Pablo apartment to Ponte Vedra Beach.  The new apartment had the most room and Surf and Coral loved all of the room.  We only stayed there a few months before we moved back to Brunswick.  We moved in with Chris and his 2 cats, Emma and Pepper.  Talk about a tough adjustment, it took forever, but everyone settled in.  Surf and Coral were still the closest and were always together either playing or snuggled up sleeping. Surf loved all of the room we had in the new house and all of the high cabinets he could watch from.  Chris and Surf worked out their differences and Surf would even head butt Chris and sleep in his laundry that came straight out the dryer.  Chris always said my cats were too spoiled and you know what, they were, but I loved them so it didn't matter to me. Chris and I then adopted a yellow lab puppy named Shells.  Surf was so not a fan of Shells.  Surf didn't like the fast pace of Shells or being chased by her.  Surf  was not going to let this puppy run the house, that was Surf's job.  After a few swats, Surf had made it clear that he was the alpha male in this house.  The funniest thing ever was when Surf was in the kitchen and Shells wouldn't go through the kitchen without me walking with her, as a buffer, because she was afraid of Surf.  Our 50 lb dog was afraid of our 9 lb cat, who would have ever thought.  On February 14, 2012 I took Surf to the vet because he seemed like he wasn't feeling well.  I had no idea that they would tell me he had cancer and they thought he would only have a couple more days to live.  I was devastated, but spent the next 3 weeks making Surf's live as wonderful and comfortable as I could.  I also tried to prepare Coral as much as possible for her best friend to not always be there. Sadly Surf lost his fight with cancer.  Since I had moved here with no family or friends around, he became my family and friend.  We had been through the good and bad together.  No matter what would happen, he could always make me smile and feel better.  Though my family situation has changed over the years, he has and always will hold a very special part of my heart.  I will always have many funny and wonderful memories of one of the best cats I could have asked for.  Surf I will miss you and love you always.