Tuesday, September 03, 2002 Well, last night I found something that Lola really likes. Baby food. I don't know why I hadn't gotten any sooner. I've gotten cans and cans of cat food for her to try. She likes the Nutro veal pate. But all of the catfood needs to be processed, the baby food doesn't. We got six jars of Gerber 2nd stage. Two veal, one each of turkey, beef, chicken and lamb. Last night, even though it took two tries, she ate an entire jar of veal baby food. So far this morning, she's eaten a jar of chicken and a half a jar of beef. And she also ate catfood, Nutro lamb with some Hill's A/D mixed in. That's more than she'd eaten in an entire day the past week. She is slowly putting on weight, she weighed six pounds ten and a half ounces last night. Maybe she'll put in on a little more quickly now that we've found something she'll eat. She's not drinking much, though. We bought some unflavored Pedialyte yesterday, but she turns her nose up at that. I'd really like to see her drinking, but I know she's getting moisture from the canned foods she's eating. One minute she looks really bad, the next she looks like she's feeling much better. One of my concerns is her hard stools and last Friday, I bought some Petromalt for hairballs. Not that I think she has any hairballs, but I hope that it helps loosen her stools. And she likes it. And Sunday, we bought some Nutrical, to give supplement the little she's been eating. She isn't fond of the Nutrical, but she loves the Petromalt. I've also decided to add a half a vetasyl cap to her morning meal and the rest to her evening meal. I do not want her getting constipated like she did after she had her surgery a couple of years ago. That almost killed her.

And yesterday morning, I found a huge puddle of bloody urine in the garage. I have a feeling it was Boney, because of the area I found it in. I watched him closely yesterday and his pee was fine. The reason I thought it might be him was because Sunday, he fell a couple of times. Once, here in the office as he tried to jump up on the desk. He usually comes up via Brian's chair. But the chair had another cat sitting on it and Boney couldn't get a good shot at the desk and when he jumped, he slipped on the edge. The desk is glass, so he couldn't hold on. Later, he was going from sofa to sofa in the family room when he stepped on a wobbly table, where I used to have the phone (which I moved last week for Brian). The table fell over, Boney with it. It wasn't a long drop, but it couldn't have been any good for him after the earlier fall.

The weather has been miserably hot. We ran the air conditioner three days in a row, which we haven't done all summer long. Sunday, it got over 105° and it was muggy. It has cooled off and this morning was the first morning that there weren't a bunch of clouds in the sky when we got up. Today will be warm, but nothing like the past few days. And I'll be down at the pool, that's for sure.

I've started having hot flashes. Or "power surges" as I like to think of them. I've had to sleep on the sofa with a fan blowing on me. That seems to be the only thing that works. I've tried going to bed, but it's unbearable. Which reminds me, I never made my appointment for my yearly exam. Guess I'll do that this morning.

The ferals are doing okay. Meezer has been coming up to the door the past couple of days. Last night, Brian asked if he wanted to come inside. Meeze didn't move until Brian actually opened the door. A couple of times there was food left outside, but the last time it was covered with ants and that's a good reason why they wouldn't be eating. Ish. We still want to get Meezer and OC in. I see OC around more often during the day. I wish he'd stay. I miss Meetoo like crazy. I was just so used to seeing her. I even said her name this morning when we got back from our walk.

Had a problem with the Bronco this past weekend. I guess the radiator isn't in good working condition and because it was so hot here, the Bronco's motor got especially hot. At one point, it stalled out at an intersection. It wasn't a long stall, it started right back up, but we couldn't run the air conditioner. As a matter of fact, to take the heat off, we ran the heater. Argh! Here it is, well over a hundred degrees, in the middle of traffic, the heater on and I was having power surges. What a pleasant time! A real memory for me. *lol*

Well, the day is almost done and I still haven't finished. Lola seemed to be really uncomfortable for a while and I tried feeding her. Food seems to make her feel a little better. Because she's not drinking much water, I've decided to use the Pedialyte to thin out her food. So far, she seems to not mind.

Boney is fine now and I haven't seen any other cat who seems in distress. I hope everyone is okay. I really do wish they could talk when it was so very important.

Friday, September 06, 2002 Well, so far, so good. Lola is still here. The vet gave Lola two weeks to live, two weeks ago. She's slowly putting on weight. She eats about three jars of baby food a day. I'm supplementing the little she does eat with NutriCal. And she still likes the PetroMalt. This morning she was much more active than she's been in a while. I've been sleeping on the sofa still because of my power surges. It's much cooler in the family room than the bedroom, a much better breeze from the window. Anyway, this morning, Lola actually came over and lay on me, something she hasn't done in almost a month. I've been concerned about her stools, but this afternoon, she left a nice one by the doghouse. I've realized that she hurts by her tail, a place that she's had problems with for years. I called the vet's office Wednesday morning to see if there was any sort of pain killer for her, but the vet said if she's in this much pain, he advises that she be euthanised. Well, I guess that river runs by my house, the one called "De Nial", 'cause I just don't feel it in my bones that she's ready to go. I just don't. I guess after all I went through a few years ago with her anorexia that I'm thinking this is the same thing. I did get her to drink a considerable amount of tuna water this morning. I really would like to see her drinking more fluids, even though she gets a lot through all of the wet food she's been eating. I've been giving her a homeopathic remedy, Arnica Montana, about three times a day. She's been laying on something green at all times, because green is a healing color. I'm also burning a sage candle, which is green. And we're listening to lite classical music or new age. Soft stuff, soothing stuff. She doesn't seem to mind and she's napping nicely. We were supposed to be going to Disneyland Sunday night and stay at the Grand, but we postponed it to later in the month. Brian has much to do and he knows I'd be a basket case, not being sure of Lola's status.

We're supposed to have some rain today. Well, we were supposed to have some yesterday. Then it was supposed to be last night. When we went for our walk this morning, we did get sprinkled on, but not much at all. There was some thunder a little bit ago, but nothing since.

We've stepped up our walking, since it wasn't taking us the full half hour each morning. Now, we're trying for two miles, at least. And I'm doing it! I thought I'd have a hard time, but I'm not. These walks are really good for us. We're in better spirits, too. I did kind of joke to Brian yesterday about those exercise endorphins. While we were walking up Icky Hill, I asked "when should I expect them?" I was ready for some of that feel good stuff.

All the out fronts are still around. We've not had much success with trapping, though. These guys are extremely trap wise. I hope that holds true as well for coyote wise. There was an article in today's paper about the prevalence of coyotes throughout the United States and it basically said we're not going to be rid of them, so best learn to get along with them. Foo on that. I still hate them. And the more there are, the deeper my hatred.

Well, it's starting to rain. Think I'll go sit in the other room and listen to it come down. It's been a long time.

Monday, September 09, 2002 Lola seems to be holding her own. I gave up on the Petromalt, because it's petroleum based, which doesn't aid in digestion and she needs to get as many nutrients possible from her food right now. But Saturday, Brian and I went shopping. First to breakfast, then over to Henry's, a local market that carries organic foods and homeopathic and natural type of aids. We bought two books on natural health care and also a jar of acidophilus and a bottle of slippery elm. Slippery elm is supposed to help with constipation by soothing the intestines and reducing inflammation. Yesterday was the first I gave her any and she seemed to be doing a little better this morning. And she's most definitely resting easier. I also found a fresh poop from her in the litter box and it was still hard, but much less hard than before. So, I hope this will help her to feel better. She's still eating and only a few times has she lost any weight when I weigh her at night. She quickly gains that back, plus some. I do wish she'd be bigger on drinking, but I know that the baby food she's getting has plenty of moisture in it. So, I'm still on watch and wait.

The weather has gotten warm and muggy again. I'd be outside by the pool, but the neighbors are finally doing stuff to their house and there are workmen on the roof, pulling it off. Not that I think they'd be up there watching me, but I just wouldn't be comfortable. And here I sit at the computer.

I got some more games up at Benny's. Paid for the license, too. I had to email the script author and he checked my site over to make sure how much he'd charge me. Technically, I've got a commercial site, one that has affiliates, but he said that since I didn't have ads on all of the pages, he'd just charge me regular person cost. I had to laugh. I don't think I've gotten anything from an affiliate in a while. I got a notice from IGive that I had made $4.00, but they never sent a check. Maybe they need a minimum amount. Right now, the only affiliate that I can depend on getting anything from is Amazon and that's because when I buy from them, I buy through my affiliation. So, I get money back on money I spend. And I use it as a gift certificate for merchandise. Well, the games have high score options and we had a really hard time getting them to work. It took all day with the author changing the sign in script. He finally figured it out last night after I'd shut down. I set them up this morning and they're up and running. Check the update page for more details on which games are new. I'm seriously considering just a page for new games, ones I haven't added to the shelf yet. I have all of those flash games to put up, too.

Because of the rain, we've had a horrible ant problem. But since it's drying out the ants are moving back outside. I hate ants.

Brian went up to Ranchita to turn in his claim to the Forest Service for damage. I could have gone with him, but I felt better being down here with Lola. And because of the workers next door, Junior is all weirded out, so he's inside right now, laying by me.

I just went into the other room to check on Lola (she's in one of the condos) and I started petting her. She actually started to purr! Kewl! I hope this is a good sign, I really hope it is.

Oh, I have to keep my shower door closed now, because of Boney. He really likes to drink from the tub faucet, but he doesn't have the balance he used to and he falls trying to get in or get out. I can't have him hurting himself. He'll just have to drink from one of the four bowls of filtered water or from the filtered water fountain. He's got it so rough.

We saw all five of the outfront cats last night. Meezer and OC, SpotTee and Repete and the last kitty here was Angus. I just love seeing all of them. I don't know where Meeze is right now, the guys next door have him a little freaked out. I would think he's up under the Mustang.

Well, I think I'll go work on the store some more.

Thursday, September 12, 2002 Lola is gone. We had her euthanized this morning. She died at about 9:55. I said yesterday if she weren't better by Friday, I'd take her in. She didn't want to eat last night. And this morning, she looked really, really bad. She tried to eat a little for me, but she turned her head away. I knew. I knew she was ready. When Brian woke up at six, I told him it was time. We talked about her when we went for our morning walk. I called the vet's office at a little after eight and made the appointment for 9:30. The vet came into the examining room around 9:45 and did a light check over of her. He had the drugs with him. He was surprised that she'd put on almost two pounds, but after he felt her, he said that a pound of that was most likely from the mass that had grown so quickly in her abdomen. As usual, he sedated first, then administered the lethal injection. Even though she was under sedation, she growled, which brought a small chuckle from him. "That's our Lola" he said. Lola never did like being stuck with needles and made sure everyone knew this. He said she's probably hissing at the angels.

Lola, September 3, 2002, about 8:30 am

While we were waiting for the sedation to take effect, the vet talked to us about Lola's cancer, saying that it's almost unheard of for a cat with her kind of cancer to survive as long as she has. He called it "alimentary" and when I came home I did a search and found this on the vetmed website:

"Alimentary : This form is usually seen in older cats and is typically of B-cell origin and arises from the gut-associated lymphoid tissue (GALT). Half of all feline alimentary lymphomas are found in the small intestine and about a quarter are found in the stomach. The mesenteric lymph nodes are often involved and a palpable mass or masses can be identified in the abdomen. The typical reason for presentation to the veterinarian is vomiting and diarrhea, often associated with chronic weight loss. Alimentary lymphomas can be confused with IBD when musocal biopsies are submitted for analysis.

As was suggested before, treatment of cats is often unrewarding. Chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation therapy have been used in the past with varying results. Chemotherapy is the mainstay of treatment, even in the presence of macroscopic disease. A complete response can be achieved about 60 - 70% of the time and the median survival time for these cats is about six months.

Since Lola has been with us over two years since her initial diagnosis, I'd say she beat the odds. After she'd passed, the vet let me feel the mass. It was horrible. It was very, very big. He said he was surprised she'd eat at all. But he went on to let us know that we'd done everything right for her, there was nothing more that we could have done if we'd wanted to.

Before we went, I called the place that does the cremation and made the arrangements for them to pick her up. So, that was all taken care of. I'm sure she's on her way right now. Her ashes should be back next week.

Godspeed my little Lola. We'll miss you ever so much.

At about 11:30 last night, on my way to the bedroom, I saw a cat on the patio. I opened the door and he came bouncing in. It was Opie. Last night, Brian heard a cat trying to get out the catdoor before I had all of the cats in. He thought it was Lola, who came walking back into the house after he heard the door being banged on. I guess it wasn't Lola, but little Opie. He was happy to be inside.

The weather has warmed up again. But its not so humid, so I guess I won't be to uncomfortable cleaning house. I didn't do much while Lola was here, because I didn't want to stress her with the sound of the machinery. But now I can do all that I've put off. I just wish I felt like doing it.

There are some new people in the neighborhood. Down the street and around the corner. And these people have a couple of big dogs. And these people seem to have a hard time keeping their dogs in their yard. This past weekend, Brian was outside and chased them off when they say Meezer. And yesterday morning, they were loose again, and up in our yard. Meezer ran across the yard and out of sight. I saw him flash by, then I saw a big black dog in our yard. I went running outside shouting at the dog to get out, go home. He ran down the street with his dog buddy, into the yard where Boomer lives. The dogs started teasing Boomer, who was chained up to the back of the owner's truck. She chased the dogs off of her yard. If I see those dogs loose one more time, I'm calling animal control. Boomer's owner told me she thinks they let the dogs run in the morning. That's fine if they live on their own fifty acres, but they don't. They live in a house on a street with other houses in close proximity. And poor Meezer, he didn't come back until yesterday evening. Because the people right next door were working on their house all day. I'm sure he kept hidden until he felt it was safe.

Well, I guess that's it for now. Light a candle for my sweet Lola, for safe passage.

Sunday, September 15, 2002 No sign of Meezer this morning. When I first checked outside, I had to chase a dog out of our yard, this morning, shortly after five. *sigh* I hope he just ran up the street and is in hiding. OC was across the street at Chuck's house. He came over for food, that I opened just in case Meeze could hear it. I hope he's okay. Now that Lola is gone, I can put my energies towards catching him, provided he's still around. I'm just sick to my stomach right now. I got dressed and put some shoes on and walked in the direction where the dog ran after I yelled at it (I'm sure it was a dog because I saw a collar and it was a black dog). The same street those other two dogs live. But I didn't see anything, it was still too dark. I walked up there again later with no luck. If I can find the house where those dogs live, I'll call animal control. They were out again yesterday, too.

Since Lola has gone, Gracie is spending more time in the house. Gracie moved into the garage a couple of years ago. Brian thinks that it could be because of Lola. Maybe Gracie could smell the cancer or something and she didn't like being in the same area. Anyway, Gracie is coming back in, as lovable as ever.

The store should be up shortly. I got all of the product information up yesterday, then found out last night that the store I've got doesn't work with PayPal. But the company who sells and installs the script has another (that wasn't available when I got my store) store that does accept PayPal and works as a gateway. And he also told me about another credit card processing website that doesn't charge a whole lot to take credit cards. So, I signed up with them. I'm hoping the store is back online by this evening.

It's ten am and Meezer still hasn't shown up. Of course, they're still working on the house next door, so it's possible he's still in hiding up there somewhere. *sigh* I guess what I'll be doing today is just waiting. And watching. And wondering. And worrying. I hate this.

Well, the store is up and running. lvdesigns. It's set up to take most credit cards and PayPal. Brian went to the property this morning. I gave him a haircut and I could tell he was in a strange mood. I really think he needed to get away. He worked his butt off yesterday, mowed the lawn, got the new glass in our bookcases in the family room (really nice, I'll post pictures on the remodel page). Leaded glass, to be exact. And he finally put the cord for the replacement thermometer for the weather station through the wall and not out through the window and the screen. In the process, he did ruin one of the cords, but that's easily fixed and luckily, I think it's the one for the rain gauge and I don't see any rain in the immediate future.

I've been laying in the sun this afternoon and it feels really nice. I can feel myself relaxing and recharging. Tomorrow, I'll start on cleaning the house. And be waiting for the orders to come rolling in. (Yeah, right.)

Monday, September 16, 2002 Well, Meezer is okay. He's not living at our house anymore, though. It looks like he's moved back across the street. I can't say that I blame him with those dogs chasing him every morning, it just wasn't safe for him here. I didn't see any dogs this morning, I haven't seen the big dogs since Saturday, I think. Just that one early yesterday morning and I think it was a different dog.

I had a scare yesterday. Lucky slept most of the afternoon and last night, the third eyelid was up on her left eye. I put in some ointment, but it didn't help, this morning it was just as bad as last night. Then she seemed to be having a hard time laying down and was generally uncomfortable. So, this morning at a little after eight, I called the vet and was told I could bring her in at ten. Which I did. Something I did last night was to look in my cat health book and one of the causes of what her eye was doing was cancer. I was just sick and didn't sleep well at all. What are the chances of tortie number three getting cancer? It was a horrible thought and one I just couldn't shake.

Anyway, it turns out to be pretty simple. Horner's Syndrome, caused by one of four places on the body. Head, ears, throat and chest. The vet checked her out, checked in her ears. She has a horrible case of ear mites. Really bad. He cleaned out her ears and put special drops in them to kill the mites as quickly as possible. And because of the infestation, she may have an inner ear infection, which causes the Horner's Syndrome. So now she's on antibiotics, just in case she's got an infection. He said that it usually takes about a month to resolve. And I have to treat all of the other cats for mites as well. Great.

So, that's the update for now. I have to go work on processing the catnip, need to get it all done and bagged before it loses potency.

lisaviolet is fifty something, married with no kids, takes care of lots of cats, likes taking photographs, loves Southern California weather and spends altogether too much time avoiding her responsibilities.

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