A tale of a cat's tail

Let me preface this story by saying I have had many pets over the years and each one seems to come with its own story, usually a tragic one.....

So, I have a little black and white cat named Poco. She is about a year old. (Dollie if you're reading, this is your baby) She lives outside which is where the trouble begins. A few weeks ago we noticed that Poco had been gone for a day which is unusual because she doesn't stray far from the house. She did turn up; I noticed the next day while I was doing errands. I didn't think much of it until I was feeding her the next day. I noticed then that she wasn't putting any weight on one of her back legs. On further inspection I saw she had a huge gash on her leg near the joint. It was so bad I could see muscle and bone. (that reminds me, if you have a weak stomach stop reading this right now) Her tail was also matted and hung kind of funny so I figured it was broken. Did you know a cat could have a broken tail?
Well, I worried about her. Should I take her to the vet or not? I had Rex look at her when he got home. We decided to keep watching her and see how she did. I have a history of running up huge vet bills and now that I'm not working we decided that wasn't a good idea. To both of our surprise she did just fine. Her leg healed up and she started using it more and more.
This is probably a good point to interject that the cat lives in our window well. As a lot of you know, our house is built into the ground. It is a basement that we will build on to later. Because of that we have a few deep window wells. The cat took refuge in our living room window. I gave it food and water and cleaned its poo for weeks thru my living room window. So needless to say I was thrilled the day she jumped out to join the outside world.But, she came back. With the cold snap we had, it was warmer to sleep in the window. But that's okay. Its like having an indoor cat with less mess.
One evening, Rex was coming in from work and I went to the door to meet him. He was looking at something I couldn't see and started laughing. Not just a chuckle but a big deep laugh. Here is how the conversation went from there.
Me: What's so funny?
Rex: The cat.
Me: Poco?
Rex: Yeah
Me: What's so funny about her?
Rex: Her tail.
Me: What about her tail?
Rex: It fell off.
Me: What!!!!
Rex: It...fell....off.
Me: Are you sure.
Rex: Umm, yeah. It fell off.
Me: That's weird.
Rex: It's weird alright!
(See, I told you not to read this if you had a weak stomach.)
Well, don't worry. She is still fine. I mean fine like half of her tail was in my window well while she wasn't, but fine. It is gross though. She lost about half of her tail so she doesn't look like a bobcat or anything like that. But, right now the end of her tail is pretty gross. She wags it around and doesn't seem like it bothers her at all. But, if anyone came to my house they would think we abuse animals. There she is in my window wagging her little stump of a tail. But when I look at her it makes me think of one of those really gory war movies where you see the soldiers get wounded and they lay on the ground waving their bloody amputated limbs around. That's my cat. I'm hoping she'll grow some fur on her tail soon.
We're wondering how many lives she burned on this injury. At least she's okay. Its hard to be a farm cat. So, when you are having a really bad day. Just remember, it could be worse. You could be my cat.