A Few More Things

First, I think this picture of Mortimer is just too cute and must be shared. 

He has decided that this particular chair is his spot and spends most of his resting time in it.  He definitely doesn’t have a couch potato personality, so he still spends plenty of time running around, playing, and getting into things. 

Since there were some questions about the Bethlem journey experience from my last post, here’s a little more information about it:

The church that holds it is huge.  When you go inside, there’s a little foyer where they find out how many people are in your group, and you’re given tickets (it’s entirely donation-based) with a family name.  Then you go into the main part of the church.  This year, it was crowded, so everyone sat in pews.  They had someone playing Christmas music, and there was a big screen at the front where the family names came up.  When your family name comes up, you go to the back of the church, and they take you down an elevator.  Someone in modern clothes greets you, gives a brief spiel about what to expect, and encourages you to open your heart to the experience.  Then you walk down a hallway, and that’s when the Bethlehem experience begins.

You’re greeted at the city gate by a census taker and a Roman guard and asked how many people are in your family.  Then you go into the city and walk through it.  There are various market stalls, and you stop at each one.  They also have real herbs and spices, so it smells incredible!  There are also a couple of beggars along the way, which is where you can make a donation to the fundraiser.  Each stall is a little different; some of them talk about how crowded the city is because of the census, some of them talk about prophesies and strange things happening, a few mention seeing a young couple and that the woman was heavily pregnant (as you walk through, you learn that she had the baby the night before), and some are really funny with couples bickering or someone being determined to make a sale.  When it’s time to move on to the next one, either a Roman guard comes and yells to move along and clear the street, or the person at that stall says you have to see what the next person has.  The props and costumes are incredible.  Almost at the very end, you stop at the inn, where they tell you that they can only offer you food and drink because all of their rooms are full, and that they even have a couple who had a baby in their stable.  The last stop is the stable, where there’s a couple with a baby, and they tell you a little about Jesus.  After that, there’s one person collecting alms for the poor (one final opportunity to donate), and then you exit to outside. 

It's a lot of fun.  I absolutely love doing traditional Christmas activities since I didn’t get to do them growing up.  Nick’s family went almost every year when he was a child, so there are a lot of good memories associated with it for him.  I can’t imagine the time and effort that goes into making it all happen.  Nick looked it up online, and there are hundreds of volunteers, usually about 15 families with a baby up to three months old (I’m no baby expert, but I’m assuming at that age, dressed in a plain white outfit, they can probably use boy or girl babies), and various farms that bring animals.  It seems very appropriate for Christmas time that so many people work so hard to make it happen and that so many people give generously to the fundraiser. 

Finally, in case you’re wondering about the chickens, since I haven’t posted about them in a while, they’re still getting their snacks from me.  They’re eating more now that it’s cold (not just snacks; our neighbor said they’re going through a lot more chicken food since it has been cold). 

The free-range chickens are very persistent in making sure I remember their snack every day.  Here’s a video of them enjoying some tortillas.  

How It Started and How It’s Going

It’s hard to believe, but it has been five years since we brought Mortimer and Charlie (then known as Malmo and Copenhagen) home as our short-term fosters.  They were so little!

They were only supposed to stay with us for two weeks to ride out Hurricane Florence and the aftermath.  But we couldn’t give these little guys back and risk them being separated.

So, here we are, five years later.  They’re still incredibly bonded. 

And we have no regrets over failing as their foster family.  I can’t imagine our family without these two.  

Howard’s Glucose Rollercoaster

I’m still catching up with some things I meant to post about last year/earlier this year but haven’t gotten around to yet.   So, here’s the story of Howard’s glucose rollercoaster.  

The day after Duke died, I couldn’t find Howard when I got up, which was unusual.  Howard is generally very enthusiastic about breakfast and greets us when we get up most mornings.  If he doesn’t do that, there are a couple of places he likes to sleep, and he can usually be found in one of them.  Finding Howard isn’t usually difficult, so I knew something was wrong.

I found Howard in the cat room (where we keep their food, litter boxes, and lots of random things).  He was behind a laundry hamper, half in the closet, not moving.  He wasn’t exactly asleep, but he wasn’t fully awake either.  I picked him up, and he felt colder than he should have.

I gave him corn syrup, per Dr. D.’s instructions.  She told us from the beginning of Howard going on insulin to rub corn syrup on his gums if it ever seemed like his glucose was too low.  I wrapped him in a blanket, put him in a carrier, and called Dr. D.’s office to say we were on the way.  

Dr. D. was off that day, so Howard saw Dr. L.  They did a glucose test right away.  Howard’s was 20.  It should be between 120 and 300.  They also checked his temperature.  It was 98.  It should be between 101 and 102.  

Dr. L. started Howard on a glucose IV (one of the vet nurses used to be a paramedic, and she was able to get his IV in right away) and warm fluids.  They also used some type of warmer on Howard that blew warm air under his blankets.  

Howard perked up relatively quickly, and they offered him food, which he very enthusiastically ate.  Dr. D. came into the office in the meantime (she seems to come in most of the time when she’s supposed to be off).  Dr. D. and Dr. L. decided they wanted to keep Howard for the day so they could closely monitor his glucose.  He dropped (though never as low as 20) several times throughout the day, so they recommended that we transfer Howard to the 24-hour/emergency vet since their office isn’t staffed at night anyway, and with it being December 22nd, they weren’t going to be open much longer.  

So, I picked Howard up and took him straight to the 24-hour vet.  They were extremely busy, so by the time a vet came in to talk to me (nurses had been in and out checking on Howard), it was the night-shift vet, Dr. H.  We’ve seen Dr. H. before, and we really like him.  I’m always nervous at the 24-hour/emergency vet because we’ve had a few vets that really seemed like they went into the wrong line of work.  But Dr. H. has always been awesome.  I was so relieved to see him that I almost cried.  

Dr. D. and Dr. L. had apparently passed on that Duke had just died the day before because Dr. H. mentioned that right away.  I had told Dr. D. and Dr. L. that Howard had been eating a lot of Duke’s food over the past few weeks.  Duke wasn’t eating much and was losing a lot of weight, so we were trying a lot of things to get him to eat.  He liked chicken and rice, so we mixed chicken and rice with his food.  He still wasn’t eating all of it, and Howard was helping himself to Duke’s leftovers.  Most cats would have just eaten the chicken.  Howard isn’t like most cats.  He was eating the dog food, the chicken, and the rice.  Obviously, after Duke died, we didn’t set his dinner out, so Howard had no dog food or chicken and rice that night.  

Dr. H. said that normally stress and grief tend to raise glucose, but in some unusual cats, it can lower it.  Everyone agrees that Howard is an unusual cat!  Dr. H. said that in addition to the stress and grief of losing Duke, Howard was probably picking up on us being sad and stressed and the extra stress of Duke being sick right before and Nick having COVID.  All of that,  plus not eating dog food, chicken, and rice (which would tend to raise his glucose), probably led to the crash.  

Dr. H. suggested a FreeStyle Libre monitor for Howard.  If that sounds familiar to you, it’s the same one that’s used for humans.  It’s a continuous glucose monitor.  There’s a little sensor (we’re told people usually put it on their arm) and a monitor that scans and records it.  For pets, they like to put it on their back, near their shoulder blades; basically somewhere that they can’t mess with, and it’s not likely to get caught on anything.  They shave a little patch of fur and put it on.  

Here's a picture of Howard with his sensor when I got to visit him while he was in the hospital.  He didn’t seem bothered by it at all.

With the Freestyle Libre, they were able to check Howard’s glucose without doing an ear stick.  He was pretty sick of being stuck by then, and you really can’t blame him.  Most of the time, you can scan him without even waking him up.  They checked Howard’s glucose every hour for the first 24 hours.  Dr. H. had me bring in his food and insulin and let me bring in his blankets. 

The plan was to give Howard a very low dose of his insulin once his numbers stayed at a high enough level for long enough, then make sure he didn’t go too low again.  It took a few days to get there, but Howard came home on Christmas Day.  Definitely the best Christmas present we’ve ever gotten!  

Here’s a picture of Howard under the Christmas tree the day he came home.

Initially, they wanted us to scan Howard every two hours.  It worked out well that we were off/home for Christmas because that was rough.  Once Dr. D.’s office opened back up the day after Christmas, she took over managing Howard and had us email the numbers from the scanner every day.  For a while, he was getting one unit of insulin about every 36 hours, then 24 hours, then 12 hours.  We kept up every two hours of scanning for several days.  Dr. D. finally told us to stop before we wore ourselves out.  

The sensor lasts somewhere between ten days and two weeks, so Howard has had several sensors.  We all wanted to make sure he wasn’t headed for another crash.   Howard was the first kitty at Dr. D.’s office to have a sensor, but now she has lots of patients with them.  Howard, the trendsetter!  

Eventually, Howard started getting really agitated over having the sensors put on, so we all decided on a break.  He was running a little high, but Dr. D. thought that was better than risking another crash. 

Howard had his regular checkup in late June, and his glucose was high, so we opted for another round of Libre sensor monitoring. 

A few weeks ago, his glucose started fluctuating wildly.  It would drop down as low as 60, then within a few hours shoot up to over 400, then drop again.  

Dr. D. believes that Howard is experiencing Somogyi swings.  You can read about it here, but the short version (at least for cats) is that somehow, the insulin contributes to the body, causing itself to drastically raise and lower glucose levels.  So, we took Howard off of insulin, and his glucose has stayed much more stable.  Howard has diabetes and asthma.  The diabetes is likely caused, or at least contributed to, by all of the steroids to control his asthma.  But, since breathing is vital, we can only limit the steroids so much. We’ve also lowered his steroid dose a little more.  It may have to go back up in the fall (allergy season) and/or if he starts having breathing problems.  

During all of this, Howard also started experiencing severe gastrointestinal issues.  Dr. D. isn’t quite sure why, but thinks it may be due to an injection of a newer drug to help with arthritis.  The G.I. issues Howard was having are one of the rare side effects of the drug.  So, we’ve opted not to continue using that one.  He’s currently on some medicine for his stomach and has started talking probiotics.  Fortunately, all of the medications can go in Pill Pockets or be mixed with food, so Howard doesn’t mind taking them. 

Howard is also starting to have some kidney issues, likely caused by a combination of age and diabetes.  It’s not terrible yet, but we don’t know how long that will last.  He’s seventeen, and I know we’re lucky to have had him this long, but it still feels like being punched in the gut to think about his time being limited.  I feel like I don’t know how to exist in a world where I’m not Howard’s mom.  I had Howard before I met Nick.  Nick and I are coming up on sixteen years together in September, so Howard has been in his life for a long time, too.

Dr. D. offered us a referral to the specialist, but after talking with her, we’ve decided not to go that route.  Howard is very patient and good at the vet, but he seems to be reaching his limit for how much poking and prodding he’s willing to put up with.  And, in talking with Dr. D., there’s not a fix for the kidney issues that are coming.  There are only short term solutions that likely come at the cost of creating other problems to manage.  It really feels like we’d be doing it for us, to buy ourselves more time with Howard (which is so incredibly tempting) at the cost of his quality of life.  

Because of that, we’re not pursuing treatment of the kidney issues.  We’re managing the diabetes and asthma as best and least invasively as we can, and we’re honestly evaluating Howard’s happiness and quality of life.  Right now, he seems happy.  At seventeen, he’s not very active, but his behavior hasn’t changed.  One of the vet nurses described Howard as a watcher and said he likes to be in the middle of the room and watch everything that’s going on.  That’s very accurate.  He spends most of his time on the fluffy cat bed in the living room, keeping an eye on everyone’s comings and goings.  He cuddles with Frankie, and he’s very enthusiastic about his food.  He seems happy and doesn’t appear to be in pain.  He still wants us to pet him every time we walk by, which we’re more than happy to do.  

Howard’s quality of life seems good for now, so the plan is to keep his as happy and comfortable as possible for as long as possible, and love him as much as we can while we can. Howard still loves to cuddle with Frankie, is very enthusiastic about his food, and loves to be in the middle of everything.  

Bloopers

I enjoy photography; for as far back as I can remember, I’ve always loved taking pictures.  I especially love taking pictures of animals.  With one dog and six cats, all of whom are ridiculously adorable, I have no shortage of photo opportunities.

What I do have a shortage of, though, is cooperation.  Sometimes it takes dozen of attempts to get one great picture of one of the fur kids.  They have a tendency to move, look away, or blink at the last minute.  Sometimes this results in some very cute blooper pictures.  So today, I give you a few of my favorite bloopers.  

Duke Has Cushing’s Disease

After Emma’s Cushing’s Disease, I truly hoped it was something we’d never deal with any of our pets having again.  Unfortunately, that hope hasn’t come true. 

We boarded Duke at his vet’s office when we went to Folly Beach in the fall.  We've always loved boarding the dogs there because the vet is very hands-on.  More often than not, it’s the vet himself walking, feeding, and playing with the dogs.  It’s sort of like a week-long vet visit/observation period for the price of boarding. 

They’re also perfectly fine with you calling to check on your pets, and they usually text us updates and pictures.  When I talked to Dr. M. on the third day, he mentioned that Duke’s water consumption was excessive and that he wanted to do some tests. 

I know that excessive water consumption is a sign of Cushing’s Disease.  It happened with Emma and was really the first symptom we saw.  I should have put it together with Duke, but I didn’t.  My first thought was diabetes.  Dr. M. has lectured us for years about Duke’s weight.  I thought we’d finally have to get strict about Duke’s food. 

After the first round of bloodwork, I knew exactly what Dr. M. was looking for.  The results were similar to Emma’s years ago.

Dr. M. did all of the bloodwork necessary to confirm Cushing’s Disease and was able to diagnose Duke.  He just couldn’t tell us, for sure, if it was the pituitary or adrenal kind.  He’d already referred us to the specialist for imaging.  He was just doing everything possible ahead of time since the appointment was months out.  We were waiting for the specialist, Dr. V., who had treated Emma.  We’d had an extremely bad experience with another vet in the practice (she misdiagnosed Emma and cost us time with our girl; you can guess how I feel about her) and wanted to stick with the vet we knew we liked.  Meanwhile, Dr. M. was in contact with Dr. V. about the test results he was getting and was fairly sure Duke had the adrenal Cushing’s, not the pituitary like Emma had. 

Because of Dr. M.’s diligence, we were able to make Duke’s first appointment with Dr. V. for all of the imaging needed to determine whether the Cushing’s was adrenal or pituitary.  We also knew what our options were likely to be, so we had a little more time to plan.  Dr. V. was great with Duke, and they did all of the CT scans and bloodwork they needed. 

Dr. V. was able to determine immediately that Duke’s Cushing’s is the adrenal kind.  He has a mass on the right adrenal gland.  She told us that from what she could see on the CT scan, Duke was a good candidate for the surgery, but she wanted a radiologist to look at to be sure.  That took a few days.  Dr. V. called with the results and told us that Duke is a good candidate for the surgery to remove the adrenal gland and tumor.  The outlook with treating it with medication instead of surgery isn’t good. 

We talked to Dr. M. (because we always talk to our regular vets), and he agreed that surgery is in Duke’s best interest.  He said it’s a highly specialized surgery, and not one he would perform himself, but one he felt confident in the surgeons at the specialist practice doing.  Dr. V. isn’t a surgeon, so she won’t be the one doing Duke’s surgery. 

Duke was scheduled for surgery on Monday, January 17^th, with Dr. A., the surgeon Dr. M. is familiar with.  Unfortunately, because of all of the snow and ice in western NC and upstate SC, the specialist vet’s office was closed on Monday, and Duke’s surgery was canceled.  He’s now scheduled for surgery on Wednesday, January 26^th, with Dr. S.  

Dr. M isn’t familiar with Dr. S. but says he’s confident in any of the specialized surgeons there who do this kind of surgery.  He also said the surgery needs to happen as soon as possible.

I talked to Dr. S. on the phone three times yesterday, and I liked her.  I had some questions about some problems Duke has been having, and she said that Dr. V. was more qualified to address them since Dr. V. treats diseases.  Dr. S. talked to Dr. V. and called me back within 10 minutes.  Dr. V. and Dr. S. wanted us to get an appointment with Dr. M. for Duke to get checked out and have some bloodwork done.  Getting a call back so quickly was huge.  I feel like that means the vet cares when they communicate and work to get answers.  I also liked that she immediately involved Dr. V. when she thought Dr. V. would be better able to help Duke.  The third call made me like her even more.  She called to make sure Dr. M. was able to see Duke since all of the vet’s offices were behind due to the weather.  If Dr. M. couldn’t fit Duke in, she wanted to make sure they got him in at her office.  Dr. M. was able to see Duke, but I really liked that Dr. S. called to make sure.  I always feel better about a vet who seems to see him as Duke, the three-legged dog who loves to catch birds and rabbits and steals lasagna, not chart #12345.   

Oddly enough, Duke will have to go on steroids for a while after the surgery.  Apparently, the adrenal gland that’s left takes some time to start functioning properly, so dogs who have the surgery go from way too much cortisol (Cushing’s) to none/not enough (Addison’s Disease).  Dr. V. will be the one managing Duke’s medication and aftercare, which is good since we know she’s good and very communicative. 

We’re told that Duke will have to stay in the hospital for a few days.  There’s a risk of blood clots and complications in the first week or so after the surgery, but after that, it’s usually all good.  The specialty clinic is part of an emergency clinic, so they have 24-hour staff. 

Of course, we’re nervous.  Duke’s our boy, we love him, and he has already been through so much. 

The silver lining in all of this is that we have a great regular vet.  Dr. M. was able to get things started to get Duke diagnosed much earlier than he might have been otherwise.  We’re also fortunate to be within a reasonable drive of a specialty practice and that we have a vet we really like there.  I’m also so incredibly grateful that the adrenal Cushing’s  Duke has doesn’t suppress his appetite the way the pituitary Cushing’s did with Emma.  Duke has always been a total pig, stealing food every chance he gets.  It would be devastating to go from that to begging him to eat something, anything, the way we did with Emma. 

Assuming all goes well, Duke should be completely back to normal after he recovers.   We just want him to be healthy and happy.

A Long Catch-Up Post

 I know it wasn’t a very realistic hope, but I was kind of hoping that things would be a little more normal by the time I posted again.  Nope.  Not even close.  It seemed like North Carolina started off fairly strong, compared to neighboring states, in taking COVID precautions.  But now, despite all of the pleas from the experts, we seem to be on a crash course to disaster.  I don’t know of anyone now who hasn’t had a close friend, family member, or co-worker have COVID.  But enough about COVID.

Duke

We painted and re-did the floor in our kitchen in October.  We postponed our annual Folly Beach trip to next year, but still took the week off of work. We both have a lot of paid time off accumulated, so we decided to take the week and do the kitchen project.  

And that’s probably the last house project we’ll do for quite a while!  It took much longer, and was much harder than we expected.  You know how people complain that romantic comedies paint an unrealistic picture of relationships?  Well, I think that’s nothing compared to the lies Lowe’s and Home Depot are selling in their commercials.  The couples in those always look so happy during their projects.  They have on nice clean clothes and are smiling at each other.   There’s none of the covered in sawdust and paint and seriously re-thinking being married to someone who wants to blast whiney 80s music, or doesn’t know the name of every single tool.  Anyway, that’s my take on who sets couples up for unrealistic expectations.  

Fortunately, both of us, and our marriage, survived the kitchen project.  Here’s a progress picture.  I haven’t taken a finished picture yet because I only think about it once I’ve started cooking, and I’m so messy, I don’t want to take a picture of that.  You can at least see the colors.  Almost everything was a very ugly beige before.  

Painting in progress.

I’m still crocheting mask adapters/extenders.  There was a lull in people asking for them for a while, but people have started asking for them again, so I’ve been making and mailing them.  If you need one, let me know in the comments.  

Mask Adapters

We had a health scare with Tara in October.  It turns out that she has bladder crystals and has to be on a special diet.  She had to have an ultrasound to look for crystals (which the vet suspected) or stones, and to rule out any kind of mass.  Due to COVID, the vet’s office isn’t allowing people into the office, so we had to wait in the parking lot when Tara had her ultrasound.  One of the vet techs came out as soon as it was finished and told us, unofficially, that there were no masses, but the vet would be out later to tell us that officially and talk to us.  I wanted to hug her!  Every other time we’ve had a pet have an ultrasound, the news has been devastating, so we were pretty nervous.  I thought it was so sweet of her to come out and tell us the good news right away.

Tara has to be on a special diet, and we’re limiting her stress.  She’s a very timid cat, and is afraid of almost everything, so limiting her stress isn’t the easiest thing.  It has taken a lot of trial and error, but we seem to have figured out the food situation for her.  There are three different kinds she likes, for a few days at a time, so we have small bowls of all three brands of dry food out for her, and we alternate the brand of wet food every day or two.  Tara is also currently living in our bedroom, away from the other cats.  She seems to have no desire to leave!  Howard goes in and hangs out with her (and eats the special food he’s not exactly supposed to have) every day.  For now, it seems to be working.  We’re tossing around ideas for later on, but for the moment, she’s happy in the bedroom.

Doesn't she look happy?

We didn’t host Thanksgiving this year.  I was very disappointed about that, but I believe we made the right choice.  We did still get to drop off the meal for the hospice house, though.  I wasn’t sure if they would want us to, so I wanted until the week before to ask, since things seem to change so quickly.  The lady I always coordinate with was incredibly nice.  She said a few people had asked if I was bringing the meal, so that made me happy.  They aren’t allowing volunteers inside, but said that as long as we were okay dropping the food off at the door, while wearing masks, they would love to have the meal.  We were more than happy to do it that way.  We now have an uninterrupted streak since 2016, so I was thrilled not to miss a year.

Everything went smoothly with the drop off.  We’re normally able to use a cart they have, but couldn’t this year, so there were a lot of trips back and forth to the car, but nothing was spilled or forgotten.  We ended up talking to a very nice lady in the parking lot.  She was nice, but made me cry.  I’d like to go one year without crying! 

Two older couples that we’re friends with were also staying home for Thanksgiving, so I offered a drop-off/pickup of food for them since I was already cooking and it’s practically impossible to cook Thanksgiving dinner for only two.  One couple came and picked up desserts.  We talked for a few minutes through the glass door, which was strange, but also nice.  The other couple lives just down the street from us, so we dropped off desserts and sides, and they sent some different desserts and sides home with us.  It was a fairly warm day, so we sat out on their patio, six feet apart, in masks, and talked for a while.  Again, it was weird, but nice to see them. 

Like so many people, our Christmas plans look very different this year.  We’re not doing our usual trip to my sister’s.  We talked to her and to Nick’s mom and step-dad and all agreed to forego gifts this year, since we can’t be together, and plan for an insanely huge celebration next year.  Everyone was happy with that idea, so it’s nice that we’re all in agreement.  I imagine it would be very stressful if the people you normally celebrate with are taking a different approach from you.  

We haven’t even put up our Christmas tree this year.  Neither one of us felt especially motivated to on Thanksgiving weekend (when we normally put it up), and then we were sick (NOT COVID, we both had negative tests) for a while after that.  Then it just reached the point of not being worth it to drag everything out for such a short time.  It’s weird not having the tree up, but that’s 2020.  I did put up some wreaths on the doors, and we’ve been listening to Christmas music, so there’s some Christmas spirit here.  

The only Christmas shopping I’ve done has been for my chemo/senior buddies.  Their packages have all been shipped and delivered.   Caroline helped with the wrapping and packaging.  I decided on mostly small things that would fit in a stocking, so I hope they like everything.  We also did a family package for my buddy who’s married and has a young son and a dog (the dog toys were from Duke and the cats to her dog).  I asked Nick’s mom if the family package would be weird, and she said it wouldn’t.  Hopefully they’ll like it.  We included a DVD of Home Alone in it, which the kids next door LOVED, when they were the same age as her son, so we’re hoping his taste is similar.  

Caroline "helping"

I’m still working from home, as it seems a lot of you are.  I’ve worked from home longer than I worked in the office before we shut down.  And it has already been over a year since I started the new job!  I still love it, even if it’s a little weird working from home, so I’m so glad I made the switch last year.  

I think those are the highlights of what I’ve been up to since the last time I posted.  So what about you?  Any home projects?  Are you working from home?  What have you been up to for the past couple of months?  

I’m almost certain I won’t post again before Christmas, so I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas, or a happy holiday.  I hope you’re all safe and well.

Our Hurricane Roommates

The local animal shelters have really stepped up to help out the shelters on the coast.  Lots of local rescues had multiple transports to the coast to then take animals to partner rescues up north.  Some of the shelters in areas with mandatory evacuation orders were able to send all of the animals in their care to other shelters.

This represents so much progress.  For years, many of the shelters on the coast had no choice but to euthanize a lot of animals ahead of catastrophic storms.  Now, thanks to rescues in multiple states reaching out to help, that’s not nearly as common.  There’s still a very long way to go, but there’s definite progress.

The shelter we adopted Duke, Tara, and Cookie from asked for temporary fosters for all of their animals until next Friday, due to the bad weather we’re expected to get from Florence.

Initial forecasts had the remnants of Florence arriving in our area tonight, and into tomorrow.  Now the forecasts have Florence, currently moving at two miles per hour, arriving tomorrow night into Monday, and basically stalling against the mountains.  They say we’ll start getting some wind and rain tonight, but our major impacts will be later.  We’re told our area will likely receive six to twelve inches of rain, with some areas getting up to fifteen inches of rain.

Malmo, a.k.a. Motimer

The shelter is in a flood prone area, so they wanted the animals out in case it floods there.  If it doesn’t flood, they can be a stopping off point for animals being transported up from the coast, or from the coast or midlands of South Carolina.

It has been quite some time since we’ve done any fostering, and while we’ve made the decision to never bring another dog into our home, we still want to foster cats as we’re able.  This seemed like a good time to make the leap, and get back into it.  Every animal out of our local shelters frees up space for an animal from the coast, and generally allows the rescues here to divert more resources to helping the shelters on the coast.  We signed up to temporarily foster two cats and were told we’d be matched with two cats based on our application information.

We went to pick up our cats after work on Thursday, and were sent home with Malmo and Copenhagen.  They’re about 10 months old, and full of energy.  They also seem to be very bonded.

Neither one of us are very fond of their names, so we’re calling them Mortimer and Charlie while they’re here.  Cats don’t exactly come when they’re called most of the time, so we don’t think it’s doing any harm.

Copenhagen, a.k.a. Charlie

We’re currently keeping them separated from the rest of the pets, so they’re in our bedroom.  Thursday evening they only really came out to eat, and spent the rest of the time under the bed.  We heard them wrestling, and playing with some of the toys.  They just didn’t seem very sure of us. 

By Friday evening they were starting to warm up to us, and started to come out and let us pet them.  They’ve also decided that sleeping in the bed and cuddling with us some is kind of nice.  They definitely like the food here, and they seem to love the toys we’ve given them.   

We have no plans to go anywhere this weekend since the weather is supposed to be so bad, so we’ll be able to spend a lot of time playing and cuddling with them.   It’s not a bad way to weather the storm.

Thrifty Thursday - Free Revolution Doses

As I’ve said before, we use Revolution for Duke and Chuzoo’s heartworm and flea prevention.  They’re much cuter than a box of Revolution, so I thought I’d take the opportunity to share pictures of them on the way back from visiting the Poinsett Bridge.  Pretty much any excuse to share pet pictures works for me. 

In case you’re not familiar with Revolution, it’s applied topically once a month. If you use it for any of your fur kids you probably know that they’ve had an ongoing deal where you get two free doses when you buy six doses. 

We’ve always bought the six doses at a time.  The vet we take the dogs to is over an hour away, and I don’t mind making the drive to take them there, but I don’t want to do it once a month if we don’t have to.  So we typically buy six doses, get the two free, and don’t have to worry about getting more for eight months.  It’s dosed by weight, so Chuzoo and Duke are on different doses.

We had to take Chuzoo for an appointment last week, and while we were there we learned that this is the last month that Revolution will be offering the free doses.  Apparently they’re switching to some sort of rebate program in February.  Our vet’s office didn’t have a lot of details about it yet, but seemed to think it wasn’t going to be as good or convenient as the free doses.  It also seems like there may be some issues with the rebate program that will have to be worked out. 

We could have waited until next month to buy more Revolution for Duke, but we decided to go ahead and buy it while we were there.  It saves us a trip, and we were able to get the two free doses.  We just bought Chuzoo’s last month, so we’re well stocked on his.  Hopefully by the time we need to buy it again they’ll have worked out any issues with the rebate program.  If nothing else, our vet’s office should know the ins and outs of it by then, so they can tell us what we’ll need to do.

If you’re a fellow pet parent I’m sure you know how nice free doses of a monthly treatment are.  And if you’re a fellow pet parent who happens to use Revolution, you may want to go ahead and stock up this month.  If you know anything about the rebate program I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments. 

So what about you?  Is there anything you buy several months worth of at once to get a month or two free?

I’m Pretty Sure We Feed The Pets Better Than We Feed Ourselves

Have you ever seen the things that go around Facebook periodically, poking fun of how some people feed their pets better than they feed themselves?  They usually say something along the lines of “The dog had organic free range chicken for dinner.  I had a frozen pizza.” Or maybe something along the lines of “The cat had poached salmon for dinner.  I had instant ramen.”

I always find them funny, and I can identify with them in a lot of ways.  I know a lot of people, myself included, who usually put a little more effort into feeding their fur babies well than they do in feeding themselves well.  I’ve realized that’s definitely the case for me during some of the food recalls.

Happy Day!

Have you heard about the potential issue with romaine lettuce right now?  Nick’s mom sent us an article about it early on.  While we have ultimately made the decision to stay away from romaine lettuce for the time being, I have to admit that wasn’t my first thought.  Initially I was focusing on things like the fact that there haven’t been any reported cases in North Carolina, that the CDC hasn’t issued an official recall, that we need to eat more vegetables, and that salads are an easy way to do that.  Finally we decided that it’s just not worth the risk, and we’re holding off on eating any romaine until there are some better answers as to what happened, and some assurances that it is safe to eat.

This is the one I’m really not proud of.  Do you remember when Blue Bell ice cream had the big recall a few years ago?  They completely shut down the factory, people were told to get rid of their Blue Bell ice cream, and you couldn’t buy it any grocery store.  Sam’s Club even had an automated system calling members who had purchased Blue Bell ice cream telling them not to eat it, and to throw it out.  For the record, I think that’s the saddest automated call I’ve ever received.  I had two gallons of peppermint Blue Bell ice cream sitting in the freezer. 

Well, Blue Bell is my absolute most favorite ice cream in the world.  With the exception of Graeter’s, I usually just pass on ice cream if it isn’t Blue Bell.  It’s that good.  I’d rather have no ice cream at all than what I consider to be a mediocre substitute for ice cream perfection.

Anyway, during the Blue Bell recall I was incredibly tempted to keep right on eating the ice cream.  Add in the fact that a small Blue Bell black market sprung up online, and the temptation was nearly impossible to resist.  Ultimately, Nick was the voice of reason on that one.  And he was nice enough to be the one to throw away the ice cream we had.  It would have broken my heart to put Blue Bell ice cream down the drain.

Happily, they’re back in production, and it has been available here since the end of 2015.  My friend Alex is also a huge fan of Blue Bell, and we always text each other whenever we find one of the harder to find flavors.  I took this picture of it and sent it to her the first time I saw it back in stores after the recall.

Pet food recalls have been an entirely different story.  You don’t want to know how many hours I’ve spent researching pet foods, which brands are affiliated with each other, who has had recalls, and anything else I can think of.

Any time there has been a recall on a brand we’ve been feeding our fur babies, I have immediately thrown it away and switched them to a new food.  I’ve also contacted various pet food companies who have had recalls and informed them that due to their recklessness they’ve lost a customer for life. 

Our poor vet’s offices probably dread hearing from me any time there’s a pet food recall.  If it’s a brand we’ve been feeding, I always call and ask if the fur kids need to be seen, what we need to look out for, and ask for a recommendation as to what to feed them.  On a side note, this is one of the many, many reasons why we always take our vet’s offices something at Christmas.  They deserve it after putting up with me.

During the height of all of the dog food recalls, I think it was 2006, I seriously considered switching Emma over to a home cooked diet.  I talked to her vet about it, and he talked me out of it on the basis that it was extremely complicated to do right and ensure that she would be getting all of the nutrients she needed, and that it would be very expensive and very time consuming.  He felt that I would be biting off more than I could chew, and that Emma’s health could suffer for it.  I listened, and went with a brand of dog food he recommended.

One of Emma's bison dinners

Ultimately, we did switch Emma to a home cooked diet for a short period of time, with our regular vet’s blessing.  It was after she was diagnosed with Cushing’s, and we were trying to manage the various symptoms of that.  Her vets put us in touch with a veterinary nutritionist who created a diet for her.  It consisted mostly of bison and sweet potatoes. 

Emma’s home cooked diet was everything our vet warned us it would be.  It was expensive, it was time consuming, and it was a lot of work.  Not every grocery store carried bison, it never went on sale, and cooking, weighing, and measuring her food took a lot of time and effort.  There were a lot of nights we’d cook Emma’s special dinner and then open a can of something for ourselves, or pick up fast food.  She was definitely eating better than we were for a while. It was worth it, and even though the home cooked diet didn’t provide the results we were hoping for, we both felt better for having tried.

So I think it’s definitely fair to say that in some ways we feed the pets much better than we feed ourselves. 

What about you?  Have you ever been tempted to eat a favorite food that is part of a recall?  Do you put more effort into feeding your pets than you do into feeding yourself? 

Three Legs, Ninety-Five Pounds, and Zero Limitations

You may remember if you’ve been around for a while that our dog, Duke, “only” has three legs (or as some like to say, is a tripaw).

Duke

You might think that a three-legged dog might have some difficulty getting around.  Or that at least you wouldn’t have to worry about a three-legged dog going over a fence.  You would be wrong, however.

You might also think that a ninety-five pound dog certainly wouldn’t be able to go under a fence.  Again, you’d be wrong.

On a side note (and if you’re looking for something to be right about) you might think that ninety-five pounds is more than Duke should weigh.  In that case, you would be absolutely right. We’re working on it.

Anyway, when we first moved into our house, and we adopted Duke, we didn’t have a fence.  We were finally able to get the backyard fenced in a couple of years ago.  (If you’re still keeping score, and you think that fences are expensive, you’d be right.)  We had a choice between the traditional (and slightly cheaper) four foot fence, or going with a five foot fence.

The first escape area, fixed

We opted for the five foot fence.  My parents’ yard had the traditional four foot fence, and we had all seen Duke stand up and drape his one front leg over the fence.  He never jumped my parents’ fence, but also never had any real incentive to.  Their backyard is easily four times the size of ours, and they don’t live close enough to restaurants for Duke to smell them.  We do.  We live just behind a main road.  On a windy day, it smells like Burger King is grilling in our backyard.  Duke adores food, so we thought he might jump a four foot fence in pursuit of fast food.

We never leave Duke in the backyard for very long, and we never leave him outside when we’re not at home.  He loves playing outside.  He rolls in the grass, chases (and sometimes catches) birds and rodents, steals the occasional vegetable from the garden, and generally seems to have a great time in the backyard.  There’s no real reason for him to want to leave.

During the summer he added digging to his repertoire of backyard activities.  He dug near the back porch, he dug near the raised beds, and a few weeks ago he started digging at the fence.  We weren’t thrilled about the digging, especially not the digging near the fence, but we really didn’t think he’d be able to dig a hole large enough to squeeze himself out of.  Especially not with one front leg!  We were wrong.

Duke’s first escape was a few weeks ago.  He dug, and used brute force to mangle the bottom of the fence enough to squeeze himself out of.  He just ran around to the front of the house, and met Nick on the front porch.

That night we went to Lowe’s and bought some wrought iron fencing (the kind that gets buried on the bottom).  Nick put that up over the hole, and zip-tied it to the fence to secure it.  We thought the problem was solved.  Surely a three-legged, ninety-five pound dog wouldn’t dig out of the fence twice.  We were wrong.  Again.

Duke’s second escape was scarier.  He ran off into some woods near our house.  We both walked the neighborhood looking for him.  When we came back to the house to get the car to go drive and look for him, he was just sitting in the carport waiting for us.

We found the new hole the next day.  It was in a different section of the fence, but he had done basically the same thing; dug a hole and mangled the bottom of the fence enough to squeeze himself out.  The second one had to have been a really tight squeeze, but he managed it somehow.

We fixed the second hole with the same wrought iron fencing and zip ties.  It seems to hold, but it’s not a viable solution for the entire fence.  We walked the fence and stacked bricks in any areas that looked like they might be conducive to Duke’s digging/mangling escape plan.  It’s a temporary fix at best, though.

The second escape area, fixed

We’re not letting Duke play in the backyard unsupervised until we come up with a better solution to keep him from digging out.  We haven’t decided for sure what we’re going to do.  We really thought a five foot chain length fence would be enough to keep a three-legged dog in.

We’ve thrown around the idea of some kind of electric fence on the bottom, but that’s likely to be cost prohibitive.  We’re considering planting roses along the fence line, but aren’t sure that would be enough of a deterrent.  We’re also throwing around the idea of putting concrete along the bottom of the fence, so he can’t dig out.  Doesn’t that sound like a fun project?

So what about you?  Do you have any brilliant ideas to keep a dog from digging out from under a fence?  Is there an obvious solution we’re just missing?  And, if you meet a three-legged dog, don’t pity them, as long as they seem happy and well cared for.  S/he probably gets around better than you think!

A Very Belated Introduction to Chuzoo

First, please don’t blame me for the name.  “Chuzoo” is something my parents came up with.  They like cutesy/weird names.  I was very nearly the victim of one of my mom’s cutesy name ideas.  Fortunately for me, my dad changed his mind about going along with it.

They were told that Chuzoo was half Chihuahua, and half Shih Tzu, so they decided that “Chuzoo” (pronounced like “chew zoo”, with no space, say it really fast) was a cute play on those breeds.

He wrapped himself up like this.

Fortunately, in spite of having a ridiculous name, Chuzoo is a very sweet and happy little guy.  He absolutely adored Emma, and he loves Duke, which works out well since he came to live with us in August.

My parents were getting ready to move into an apartment, and decided that Chuzoo would be happier living with us, since we have a fenced in back yard, and he would have Duke to play with.  He had stayed with us before, whenever my parents went out of town, and always seemed perfectly happy at our house.


Chuzoo quite happily moved in with us at the end of August.  He seems to love living here, and Duke is thrilled to have a dog buddy again.  The more the merrier, right?

Joey

We’ve added another cat to our household. I know, I know, we’re pretty much crazy cat people at this point. Joey was already in the family, he just didn’t live with us until recently.

My parents adopted Joey over eleven years ago. He and his litter mate Harry (who now lives with my sister’s best friend) were dropped off at the feed store where my sister worked. I’m not sure if you can tell from the picture, but Joey is missing his back right leg.

Joey had the leg when he was dropped off, but it was mangled, and bent the wrong way. My parents saw him and wanted to save him. My mom loves all cats, and Joey’s plight really spoke to my dad because my dad has severe back and leg problems. He couldn’t stand the thought of Joey not getting the treatment he needed.

So Joey became my parents’ cat. We named him after Joey on Friends. We were all addicted to the show, and we decided that everyone loved Joey, and that our Joey was going to need that to get through everything. He had multiple surgeries in an effort to save the leg, but it was just too damaged, so the vet ultimately recommended amputation. Joey gets around fine without the leg, and most of the time people don’t even realize at fist that he’s missing a leg. He’s so fluffy it seems to hide it a little bit.

Recently my dad’s back and leg problems have become much worse. He has a degenerative spinal disease, and his mobility is becoming more and more limited. He will eventually become wheelchair bound, though he’s hoping that doesn’t happen for a while.

Joey’s favorite hobby is doing figure eights around your ankles. He likes to be right underfoot, and wants to be touching you at all times. This wasn’t good for my dad since his balance isn’t very good. After falling over Joey a few times, they decided it would be better if Joey moved in with us.

He’s adjusting well to life with us. He already knew Emma and Duke from all of the times they’ve visited their grandparents. Joey isn’t overly friendly toward other cats, but everyone seems to have declared a truce (though it’s uneasy at times). Like his namesake, Joey loves food, and is always happy to be given treats. He also loves to be held and cuddled. And I think he likes it here.

When “Failure” Makes You Happy

Do you remember Duke, the dog we picked up from the shelter to foster almost a year ago?  We “foster failed” during the summer.

When Duke came to us, he was heartworm positive, and had a damaged paw.  He made it through the heartworm treatment (which took almost six months before we got the negative test) and into our hearts while he was going through that.

He just fit in perfectly from the beginning.  We love him, Emma loves him, and he does well with the cats.  We had to keep him! 

Duke’s front right paw was damaged when he came to us.  It was initially thought that he’d had a broken leg that didn’t heal properly, but when they did more testing they determined that it was nerve damage (no one has any idea how it happened, and unfortunately he can’t tell us) and that the leg couldn’t be saved. 

His leg was amputated about a month after his negative heartworm test. He went in for the surgery on a Wednesday morning and came home on a Thursday afternoon.  The first few days were rough.  He was uncomfortable, he didn’t like the bandage, we had a lot of trouble keeping the bandage on, he kept messing with the IV site, and we had a terrible time dealing with that once he licked it to the point of having a sore.  But we got through it!  My friend Crystal came and stayed that weekend to help with him.  Nick is an EMT, so is really good at changing bandages, and I became fairly decent at it myself by the time it was over.

During the process of his leg amputation and recovery Duke managed to become a little bit of a local celebrity (or at least had a “15 minutes of fame” thing going on) when the shelter started a chip-in to try and raise some of the money for all of his treatment.  He was very popular at the vet’s office, I tracked his progress on Facebook, people we barely knew were asking us about Duke’s recovery, and I ended up bringing him to work to meet some people.  That grew, and he ended up visiting a few different departments.  Duke loves people and attention, so he basked in his fame. 

Things have calmed down, and we’re happily a six fur kid family.  We have noticed that Duke seems to get some extra attention whenever we take the dogs out.  There’s just something about a three-legged animal that seems to make people want to pet them and meet them.  Duke is fine with that because he loves people.  And food.  And people have food! 

So we totally “failed” as foster parents with Duke, but we couldn’t be happier to have failed.  He just fits in and completes our furry family.