Day Three Hundred Nine

Chill Factor

Our Buddy Cat is stressed out it seems. Ever since the new cat, Eddie Kitty, arrived this past July, Buddy has been losing weight, hissing, snarling, and clawing at his human family, and, in general, royally ticked off--behavior that is totally unlike our usually laid back pet. Here he is at the vet this morning, being tested for thyroid malfunction and the dreaded heart worm.

Both tests came back negative, which was happy news. Then the doc said, "It's Prozac time." I thought he was joking. He said I'd be amazed at how many cats and dogs are being treated with Prozac. It was always my uneducated diagnosis that Buddy is miserable with the new cat in the family now and that this stress is having an adverse effect on his health. So our Buddy Cat needs an attitude adjustment. We're going to try the meds for a month and see what happens. The doc says it should help. The bad news is that if Buddy hasn't accepted Eddie by now, he never will. Oh well. It's always fun squirting medicine down a cat's throat. I may need a chill pill after it's all said and done.

Day Two Hundred Twenty Six

Eddie Kitty sez, "This vet stuff is for the birds!"


Eddie returned to the vet this afternoon for his temporary shots, including the Feline Leukemia vaccine. Poor kitty. He was not a happy camper. I had to keep a firm hand on him or he would have high tailed it out of there. Eddie weighed in at a whopping 2.14 pounds at about ten weeks old. His age is mostly an educated guess. He was pretty scrawny when he showed up at my house just after the fourth of July. He eats like a pig these days. I can only imagine he must have weighed less than a pound a month ago.

Grand daughter Shelby was my helper for Eddie's trip to the vet just after school. She loves animals. I can picture her becoming a veterinarian some day. After two shots in his skinny bottom and some worm meds and ear cleaning, Eddie was good to go. Little does he know I've scheduled another appointment for him in four weeks when his manhood will be stripped away (Ouch!) without his permission. I hate that for him, but it must be done. He'll also get another round of shots--most likely a rabies vaccine. Poor thing. He cried all the way to the vet but was strangely silent on the way home. Maybe he overheard me making that appointment....