HOLIDAY TRAUMA
Well, it was quite a Christmas this year. Both H and Daisy our cat started getting sick on Christmas Eve. Kind of sick, where you'd reasonably wait and see what develops, hoping it will just go away. But it didn't. Both H and Daisy were worse the next day, much worse. Halfway through Christmas dinner I found myself abandoning guests and family and driving off through the cold rainy night to the emergency room of the only animal hospital open on Christmas. I had gotten up from the main course, intending to start making coffee, but one look at Daisy convinced me that she was about to die if I didn't take care of it right away.

Which, it turns out, was a fairly accurate assessment of the situation. As the strangely perky ER vet put it "Well, she MIGHT have made it through the night. Possibly. But then she'd certainly have gone blind and probably had liver damage too! So, good thing you brought her in when you did!" Yep, good thing. I must say that the emergency room of a large city animal hospital on Christmas night is an interesting place to be. All types of people there, and all types of pets, most of which seemed to have ingested things they shouldn't have: from turkey bones to ribbon to rat poison. Quite a little cultural cross-section.

Got home pretty late Christmas night and then first thing the next morning saw me driving H off to his pediatrician, where he was diagnosed with strep throat. Poor little guy. Must say he was quite a trouper about it. And thrilled to get the sickness perks of extra screens (computer/dvd/gamecube etc) time and unlimited chocolate milkshakes!

I had to leave Daisy in the hospital for a few days, though, and just brought her home yesterday afternoon, all shaved and bandaged where the various i.v. lines had kept her alive. All in all, I feel pretty much in sympathy with the way my poor Daisy looks: glad to be here, but bloodied and a little bowed, too.