Sunday was a bad day for Artemis. My stepson and I were making much noise and mess in the office, which drove Artemis deep into hiding. I'd managed, with great difficulty to get some anti-biotics into her in the morning, though half of it went on to her, leaving her mottled with hot pink medicine droplets.

Later in the day, after a lengthy search, we finally located her in a cunning new hiding spot. I had to move several sets of old skiis, boots and poles to get to her for the purpose of rubbing her down with anti-allergen liquid. This isn't something I've done to her before, plus there was the whole STRANGE-PERSON-IS-HERE crisis. The result is that I finished the rubdown, but not without damage -- a big scratch on my chin and a painful bite on one finger.

Things were back to normal Mon. morning. Artemis showed up for her drink of water ritual, then I petted her and rubbed her belly. However, when I went down to the office later to put her in the carrier, she had vanished. I searched for ten minutes. Randy came in to help. After another five minutes, I finally found her in yet another cunning hidey hole.

She was not at all happy about the carrier, of course. She was pretty good about it, though. It was a two-hour drive to N.'s house (Randy's sister), made even longer because we had to take the extremely winding road at a much slower pace than usual. Even so, any time Randy took a sharp corner just a little too quickly, Artemis would meep out a complaint. I sat in the back seat next to her, so she could see me and get her ears scritched.

N. had the house all set up for Artemis. She'd installed a special gate to keep Artemis herded to one section of the house and to make sure she didn't accidentally get out the front door. She'd put up signs on all the other doors that read "WHERE IS ARTEMIS?", so they wouldn't forget and leave a door open. She had a nice new piece of cat furniture, food, a running-stream water bowl, a new cat bed, toys...the works.

I had suggested letting her out first in a small room where she wouldn't be able to immediately hide. N. and I settled into the laundry room, where she's put the cat box. We sat and chatted until Artemis had calmed down enough to come out of the carrier, though I still had to "help" her a little bit. We petted her up and reassured her. Artemis crawled behind me to hide. When I had to get up and leave, she crawled behind N. to hide. That was a good start.

Randy and I took his mother to lunch, while N. stayed behind to continue bonding with Artemis. We went back to her place after lunch and spent another hour helping Artemis become acquainted with her new home. She's going to be in hiding mode for a while, but she's not doing all that badly. She even ate a few pieces of food while we were there.

Since then, I've been getting long, detailed email updates. Artemis is mostly hiding under the sofa, not eating or drinking much, but she is taking treats from N. and even played a little bit with a couple of her new toys. Pretty soon she'll realize that she has the whole house to herself, that there are no other cats to bother her, that she has new doting humans, and she will be a spoiled princess.