Speas, Squidoo, and Hello World

Hello, Everyone!

I'm sorry I missed yesterday's update. (My Blog updates every week on Mondays--usually).

Robert was in a very bad way over the weekend. He's been depressed since Ziggy went missing, but, on Saturday, he stopped eating. We kept him alive by syringe-feeding him Gerber's chicken baby food (the one that's just ground up chicken & water) and lots of water. We figured this would get us by until Monday when our vet opened back up again. Eventually Robert began refusing the baby food, but he was still taking in lots of water...Unfortunately, yesterday morning (Monday), Robert began refusing water.

We called our usual vet(s), but they were booked until Tuesday. But Robert was looking really, really bad. And, with no food and no water, we knew that he wasn't going to last.

Luckily, my mom found a pet hospital that was willing to take him right away.

This one:

The Crescenta Canada Pet Hospital.

Where Robert's life was saved by this man:Doctor James D. Speas.

Dr. Speas was able to locate Robert's problem almost immediately. Robert had an abscess in his mouth from a puncture wound (it's unknown how/where he got it) and the abscess was so big and gross that it was blocking off his throat and displaced his tongue. That's why he couldn't eat or drink anything!

Dr. Speas kept Robert over night and operated on him, getting rid of the abscess. Hooray!!

The rest of the staff at the Crescenta Canada Pet Hospital were excellent as well (at least the ones that we met anyway). And the rates were very reasonable. They went above and beyond to give us quality service for reasonable prices. We had told them that we were broke (tax season...) and they put their heads together and came up with a treatment/payment plan that we could handle.

And Robert just finished eating a bowl of food! :)

Highly recommended.

In other news, I've made a few pages ("Lenses") on Squidoo:
HOW TO BE AN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL BULLY

ROBERT THE CAT

ZIGGY, THE ANGRIEST CAT IN THE WORLD

DORIAN, THE MOST UNLIKELY PET

HOW TO GAIN FOOD AND NP ON NEOPETS WITHOUT MAKING A REAL EFFORT

I was also published in a zine called Hello, World. It came out on the 2nd, but with everything that's been going on, it got pushed to the back of my mind.

In theory, I'm supposed to print out copies of the zine and sell them for $6-$7, but I don't have any printer ink [and can't afford to buy any (tax season...)], but, as a compromise, if anyone would like a copy of Hello, World: Volume 3, I can e-mail you the .PDF and you can print it out yourself! For only $2!

My contributions were the comic "Follow Me" and the poem "Another Degree of Nine" (they reprinted my award-winning poem for some reason!).

Still no sign of Ziggy. We're still searching for her nearly every day and we've been making all sorts of phone calls. And, please, don't suggest coyotes. We've heard you and we've looked into it. And I don't mean we just walked around looking for coyotes at dusk (though we did that too), I mean we called a bunch of places about it: Animal Control, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Fish and Game, and the Wildlife Waystation. They all said the same thing: "It's possible, but not likely." The Department of Agriculture was especially helpful. They said there was a lone coyote that made it to our area (traveling through storm drains) about a year ago, but, when that happened, it wasn't just cats missing, it was people's little dogs and their chickens. Coyotes do not discriminate. Also, since Friday/Saturday/Sunday is "Party Night" on our street, and Ziggy went missing on a Saturday (when a huge party was going on!), it's even MORE unlikely that it was a coyote that took her. The D of A as well as the Pet Detective we called, thought that it was more likely to be a cat hoarder. We have several hoarders in our area, but they're hoarders of things--could they have moved onto cats? Maybe. It seems to be happening in a very concentrated area. When we fan out to do our searches, cats are still plentiful. It's in this little section.

We're still investigating all possibilities and checking the shelters daily. I'll let you know if something turns up.

Also, Happy Birthday, Vincent! Enjoy your last year as a teen!

Until next time...

--Lauren*
http://littlezotz.webs.com