Asking for It, Part 2

If Huw asked to be launched into the drink in one way, Rhadwen did this evening in another.

I try to be considerate of the kittehs. If my big calico decides the bathroom sink's the most comfortable spot in the house when the temperature's in the 90s, who am I to dispute her choice?

But sometimes I have to use the wash basin. And if she won't get out when I ask politely, a trickle of cold water can be an incentive for her to let me have the use of my property.

That happened enough times today that by early evening Rhadwen was already a pretty damp cat.

And I've noticed a brown dirty spot on her white fur that she's not been attending to.

That does it! She's getting a bath!

And she did.

I have to wonder if there's something wrong with her. She didn't scratch me at all. In fact, when I lifted her up to wash her tummy, she put her little paws up like small child that wants its mommy to pick it up.

She's clean now, but it bothers me that she hasn't done all that much towards licking herself smooth. She's let herself dry all spiky and punk, and was very happy to let me go over her with the grooming brush.

I'm hoping it's because she doesn't like the smell of the new cat shampoo. She seems okay otherwise . . . I mean, she's eating and drinking and all . . . and jumping on and off the bed and the sofa and the dining room table and everywhere as usual . . . But if she won't groom herself, that's gotta mean something's wrong.

Right?

Meaning the next thing Rhadwen might be asking for is a trip to the vet.

I Haz a Sad

Last night at 3:00 AM found me in the Kitten Room, desperately darting, feinting, reaching, clutching, missing, pleading, and nearly crying.

What brought me to so strange a pass at so strange a time?

A wee tube of flea and tick protection-- and a pink and white floofy catkin who simply wouldn't allow me to put it on her.

I'd taken care of the rest of her four-legged siblings hours before. And I was determined that I was going to dose Gwenith, too, before I went to my well-earned sleep.

But she wouldn't let me! It wasn't just that she sensed it was monthly flea dosing day, she'll never come to me, not unless I'm immobilized at my computer or snug in my bed!

Llewellyn the dog is my shadow. Rhadwen is always keen for a petting or skritches. Huw butts up against my legs until I nearly trip over him. None of them gave me any trouble with their flea and tick medicine. Why won't Gwenith do the same?

O Gwenith, Gwenith, doan u luvs ur momma? Ur moma lurvs u! Shje duzzen wun u eated up bye teh fleez an teh tix!

But no, she has to lead me a frantic chase. Under the rocking chair. Under the bed. Nearly into the box spring. Into this corner of the room. Into the other. Under the rocking chair again. And me on my knees pleading with her to come out, wondering, What Did I Do Wrong to end up with such a shy kitteh?

I finally catch her, and get the medicine applied between her squirmy shoulder blades. Which operation probably convinced her she was right to avoid me.

But what could I do?

O Gwenith, u givezes mee teh unhappee!! Ai haz a sad!!1!

FBI Update

Llewellyn and I are home from the regular vet's, and yes, the Foreign Body he Ingested on Friday was a trimming from the wool fabric I'm making a suit out of. Pieces of it were in the stool sample he produced this morning, that I brought in for analysis.

He's been eating his bland diet mini-meals hungrily and keeping them down, and was free from pain when the vet palpated his abdomen.

He's definitely acting like his old self-- including barking lustily at the other dogs in the vet's waiting room! Llewellyn, hush!

So is there a moral here?

Maybe that I should have been more diligent and finished this sewing a couple weeks ago. Or that I should be a better housekeeper and vacuum my rugs more often. Or that I should be more preemptive, and have fed him peroxide in water (the vet recommends milk, to get him to drink it voluntarily) to make him throw up the mystery object right after he gulped it down.

But I guess the true moral is, be ready for anything. Dogs is dogs, and if they take a mind to make a meal out of something, they will.

Chocolate-Eating Dog Update

Going by what I read tonight on line about toxic-level dark chocolate doses for dogs, my Llewellyn has apparently dodged a bullet. Again.

(He did this before with half a bag of semi-sweet morsels a year or more ago.)

Meaning, I haven't observed the more serious symptoms of theobromine poisoning described. Last night, I had to pull an all-nighter to work on my final AutoCAD class project, and he lay quietly on the floor under my computer chair, as usual.

Right now, he's chilling out on the downstairs sofa, just shedding, as usual.

No unusual hyperactivity, no tsedrayt behaviour; he has a regular appetite, everything is mostly as usual.

Really, I notice no effects out of the ordinary-- except a heightened urgency to get out the gate to do his business.

Which he is doing with alacrity. I won't get clinical, but going by the list of typical theobromine toxicity symptoms, it's not half as bad as it could be.

But oh my gosh, am I going to have to redouble vigilence or what? Makes me wonder if the plastic chicken fencing I got last year to keep him out of the dining room during Christmas cookie making will work this time around. He's so determined to chow down on anything quasi-edible he can get.

Though if I will leave candy and snacks on the hallway bench, that doesn't pose him much of a challenge . . .

__________________________________________

(I didn't ask the tech at the vet's about it when I dropped Gwenith and Huw in for their spay and neuter operations this evening. Being an Official Poor Person for the nonce, I'm getting it done through a low-cost program that's not patronized by my regular vet. Didn't seem right to sneak in questions about the dog when my only business with this new practice is to get the kittens done.

Though if I'd remembered the toxicity proportions better, I might have asked anyway. 3.5 ounces is really pushing it, even for a dog of Llewellyn's size.)

Kitten Milestone

I dropped Gwenith and Huw off at the vets' this evening. Tomorrow they have their operations.

To read some authors, failing to get your dog or cat spayed or neutered is tantamount to pet abuse.

But I can't help it. Having to take the kittens to get fixed makes me sad.

What on earth for?

Maybe I'm afraid their piquant little personalities might change.

(Though if I let Huw grow into a full-blown tom, his personality very well might change. And not for the better.)

Maybe I feel I'm irrevocably cutting them off from their natural development.

(Yeah, natural developments like incest-engendered kittens running around the house.)

Or maybe, maybe, it's just me thinking, sob, gulp! my babies are growing up so fast!

They're only five months old! And Huw already weighs eight and a half pounds! Gwen is over seven pounds! They're so big, they no longer fit into the cat carrier together! I had to press an empty file box into service to get them to the vet's!

And now they're getting their operations!

They're almost all grownded up!

Whahhhhhh!

I Am a (Half-Asleep) Idiot

I arrived home from work this evening to find this scene in the front hall:

Before I got the light on I was preparing to find the philodrendon and its pot in shards and shreds on the floor.

What it was was quite as bad, from a dog health point of view.

You see, I flew to my mom's for Thanksgiving, and got home last night. I bought an 85% cacao chocolate bar at the airport to eat on the plane, but it was too bitter. No problem, I'd do some cooking with it.

Or not.

This morning, after maybe two hours of sleep (up late doing homework I couldn't get to while I was gone), I did the bat out of Hades bit trying not to get to school toooooo late. I really, truly, really intended to stuff the dried banana chips and the beef jerky and the trail mix snacks back in my bookbag and take them with me . . . And I'd forgotten all about the chocolate bar in its sack, which I guess I must've shifted out of the bookbag and laid on the hall bench . . .

So ten hours later, I return home-- to food wrapper chaos. Including the chocolate wrapper that I homed in on and picked up right away. Oh, no!

If Llewellyn were a little dog, I would be freaking out. Chocolate is bad for dogs' hearts, and the darker it is, the worse. But if Llewellyn were a little dog, that 3.5 ounce bar would have done its dirty work long before I returned to the scene. But at nearly fifty pounds, the only thing apparently wrong with my greedy mutt was that he'd gobbled down every flake and chip of that chocolate and those snack foods and was still nosing amid the debris, unwilling to accept that there simply wasn't any more.

No point in making him throw up. He probably got at it as soon as my key was out of the lock at 8:00 AM. He seems okay so far. No more hyperactive than normal; in fact, he's as usual, quite content to lie at my feet while I work at my computer.

But someday, someday, that dog is going to eat himself into real trouble. And I have got to stay awake enough to prevent it.

A Sop to the Worry Demons

I called the vet's today to change Gwenith and Huw's follow-up appointment for the 11th.

We're still going for their shots and all that day, but in the morning instead of in the evening. I've had a meeting come up.

So as long as I had the receptionist/tech on the phone, I asked her, "Um, the male we were calling Tiger when he first came in, he's been having coughing spells: I notice them once every two or so days. Should I bring him in before the 11th? Like today?"

"I don't think that'd be necessary. It's normal for kittens to get little respiratory infections. They get over them."

"Well, I guess so. Yes, my big cat and I both got the flu at the same time when she was a kitten, and we were on the same antibiotic! So you don't think it could be something like feline asthma?"

"It's unlikely," said the tech. "But keep an eye on him, and if he's still coughing when you come in, let the vet know."

So, okay, that's what I'll do. Though they saaaaayyy that feline asthma is hard to diagnose and a lot of vets don't/won't consider it . . . What if? . . . . (Oh, no!) But if there are other, more innocuous possibilities, like a transient bug . . . . And yes, if Huw isn't coughing anymore in two weeks, I guess that means asthma is unlikely . . . I mean, it'd stay the same or get worse, right? . . . .

Oh, phooey, buck up, kid! Watch the little cat, see how he does, and act accordingly.

My Pet Worry Warthog

Yesterday or the day before some speaker on the local Christian station was listing ways you can test the quality of your Christian walk. Number One on the list was, "Is God the first thing you think of when you wake up in the morning? Is your first thought to thank Him for giving you the new day and to dedicate it to Him?"

Yes, that would be ideal. But this morning I woke in the guest bedroom (where I slept to work on bonding with the kittens) and my first cogent thought was about how absurdly hard and fast my heart was slamming against my ribs. It felt as if I’d been fleeing for my life up a hill.

I know what it is, of course. It’s useless worry and anxiety.

Among other things, that anxiety arose from the sight and sound of the kittens Gwenith and Huw wrestling and play-fighting one another on the floor. Three times this past week I’ve witnessed Huw seeming to hyperventilate for a few seconds, as if he were trying to hack up a hairball and couldn’t. I tripped over a video online a week or two ago of a cat doing what looked just like that, and the label said the cat had feline asthma. Oh, God, please don’t let Huw have asthma!

You can treat it with inhalers and so on. But the kittens’ pet insurance won’t be properly in effect until after I get them their follow up check up and shots two weeks from next Tuesday. If Huw has asthma diagnosed then, it becomes an existing condition and the insurance won’t help pay for the treatment.

If I say nothing and he does have it, that’s dishonest. Also, if he’s sick and gets his shots, that can be very harmful to him, as the vaccines are warranted only for healthy animals.

But if I say, "I think Huw has feline asthma," might I not then run the risk of putting the vet on the wrong track?

I guess I just have to keep an eye on him between now and then. And watch for any signs of air deprivation. Maybe he is just trying to hack up a hairball, and hasn’t got the hang of it.

But this morning, I watched the kids wrestling, and my sleep-ridden fears said "Oh, what if he doesn’t have much longer to do that sort of thing! What if his sister won’t leave him alone and sends him into a major attack or seizure!" What if, what if , what if.

So I lay there in bed at 7:30 this morning, knowing I should think first thing of God and His mercies, and concious of my galloping worried heart instead.

Well, no excuse. "Cast your cares upon the Lord, for He cares for you." Even if your cares have to do with the health of a nine-week-old barn kitten . . .