Thursday, October 25, 2007

One Stubborn Kitty


Jersey had an eventful week. Which is rare for him. Considering he gained two pounds this last year and is now a 24 pound cat I think you will all agree he does not often have an eventful or exciting week.

It all started 3 weeks ago with his annual vet exam. We learned he had gained 2 pounds over last year. And we learned he has a set of teeth that he has basically had an auto-immune reaction to. So they have to pull the teeth.

But before they pull the teeth they need to do bloodwork to make sure he doesn't have any major organ failure. So they take a blood sample and I hear all about what a sweet kitty he is.

Then, while I was in Indiana I got a call, and they said he had one kidney protien (?) that was high, but probably falsely high. So I needed to get a urine sample for them.

Well, to avoid the stress of another trip to the vet I decided I'd pick up some 'no sorb' kitty litter and give that a try. Well, they gave me about 3 ounces of this kitty litter. I think the girl that went and got it for me had never seen my cat. If she had she would have given me 30 ounces.

Needless to say, Jersey refused to use it last week when we tried it out. So rather than have him decide he'd rather go somewhere other than the litter box with the 'no sorb' kitty litter I gave up and moved on to the next option.

The next option was an ultrasound and removing the urine sample from the bladder with a needle. We had a great plan worked out - I'd drop him off on my way to work and the vet would get the sample and I'd pick him up on my way home. But Jersey had a different idea.

He was great for the first attempt. But he had nothing in his bladder. Absolutely nothing.

That afternoon they tried again and apparently he tried to eat them. So they convinced me to let him stay overnight, because surely he'd go during the night in the 'no sorb' kitty litter.

But he did not go. And he was apparently quite 'scary' for the new vet tech in the morning.

So I went to pick him up last night just before they closed. They tried the ultrasound again, and this time he was complacent, but the needle wasn't long enough to reach his bladder thru all the fat!

They let me take him home. He stayed in the laundry room last night. He went sometime after 11 pm after we went to bed. So he got to go free this morning, and go back to normal kitty litter.

Crazy cat - he held it for nearly 48 hours!! And I think he may have lost those 2 pounds due to the stress of this last week!

Saturday, October 6, 2007

Starry Skies



I started this quilt shortly after Mark and I got married. I finally finished it up this week with the binding. It is going to hang on the wall in our room. The medium blue fabric is currently my all time favorite fabric, luckily I have a little left over.

Jean McDanial of the Santiam River Quilt Company did the machine quilting for me. She always does beautiful work and has very reasonable prices as well.

We're headed up to Portland tonight, I have my '5 Mile Marathon' in the morning, then we get to spend Sunday with Portland friends before I fly to Indiana on Monday while Mark goes to class. I haven't flown for work since June - I think this is the longest travel free period I have had since I started at HP 3 years ago!