Monday, September 18, 2006

I Have a Question...

I could sure use your thoughts on a question I'm pondering.

I'm catsitting for the Abramowski 17 (cats, for those of you who don't know who the Abramowski 17 are). Tammy has taken a job out of state, but until she can find a place to live where they'll be accepted, she's leaving them in her house in Kzoo, and I'm going over once a day to feed the fish, play with the cats, scoop litters and put out food and water. (Don't ask why the husband isn't doing it.)

Tammy has said she'll pay me to watch the cats since this will probably be a relatively long-term deal - at least a month, and maybe more. She originally planned to board them at the vet's, but that was going to cost $3000 a month.

My question is, what is an acceptable amount of money to ask her for? I don't want to screw a friend or get greedy, especially since she's been out of work as long as I have and is just starting a new job, looking for a new house, and traveling a lot between her new home city and Kzoo. Plus she's trying to get the Kzoo house ready for sale, arm-wrestling the husband and trying to pack all at once. The last thing I want to do is provide more stress.

On the other hand, I am looking after all of those cats, taking out the trash and taking in the mail, and driving 17 miles round trip daily to do it. (I was curious, so I checked.) Not that that's a big distance, but I do generally spend 1-2 hours taking care of the cats and in transit, so it's not like I can stop in and run out again most days, but I enjoy playing with them - they're really all sweeties. She has catsat for Luki in the past and I've catsat her cats before, and we generally don't charge each other, but because this is long-term, she wanted to pay me this time.

Any thoughts on what I should request? Thanks!

3 comments:

Michael said...

250 dollars a week. That should cover your costs and time for being there and food/litter/etc.

Michael said...

yeah, maybe Blake's right.. more in the line of 175. I was just thinking it's nearly a full time job to take care of 17 cats. And Tammy, I know you're a good person and all and you want a good home, but that's a dangerous number of kitties.

Laura said...

Look, I didn't write that blog post to open Tammy up to criticism over her cat decisions. They are for the most part rescued and they are all well cared for and very sweet (even Al has warmed up to me!), and she is a great cat mommy.