The Duck Pond
Monday, January 31, 2005
Ill
Tired of being sick. Sick of being tired. Sick and tired of all this pain. Other than that it's all happy happy joy joy in the duck pond.
Friday, January 21, 2005
Rest in Peace Tracey, I'll miss you.
Thursday, January 20, 2005
Ph33r my brian
I dreamed last night that I was in a group of a few hundred people, standing outside a french town hall, heartily singing "The Chicken Song". If you don't know the song, it's the one that goes...
Hooold a chicken in the air,
Stick a deckchair up your nose
Fly a jumbo jet,
And then bury all your clothes
etc...
I'm still laughing to myself now, thinking about it.
Wednesday, January 05, 2005
Doity Rat
Minsc is ill, poor little mite. He was wheezing, sneezing and coughing and didn't sound in a good way. I took him to the vet last night, who was optimistic because Minsc was still very active, too much so! We were trying to hold him still so that the vet could check his heartbeat. Poor ratty got a bit spooked and kept running around and trying to jump off the table, giving little frightened squeaks. When rats are ill you're supposed to make sure they don't get stressed or it could make them worse! Minsc eventually dived up my coat sleeve and ran as far as he could until he got stuck and refused to come out. So there I was with a rat halfway up my coat sleeve (or are you just pleased to see me?). It was all very amusing but I think it was one of those situations where you have to be there. I thought I'd have to take him home like that but eventually he managed to burrow his way to the top of the sleeve and I could reach under my coat and pull him out. He calmed down once I put him back in his carry-box, where presumably he feels invincible, judging by the way he was curious about the huge dogs that were fighting outside, rather than trying to hide from them. I was given some antibiotics for him and that paticular part cost me £11.
Then it was on to Pets at Home, not my favourite pet shop but some of the staff seem knowledgeable and it's the only one open at that time in the evening. I had been told to separate Minsc and Boo to avoid Boo getting the same infection so I had to get new cage, water bottle, food bowl etc. Luckily they had hamster starter kits for £20 so it didn't turn out as badly as it could but now poor Boo is in a small cage for a week.
Then was the joy of giving Minsc his medication. The idea was to put some medicine in a syringe and squirt it into his mouth. Yeah, very good idea, in theory. Trying to hold the little bugger still and get his mouth open when you're trying to put something in his mouth that he clearly doesn't like the look or smell of is impossible. He was getting more and more frightened and stressed (remember what I said about stress?) and more adamant that he was not going to keep still. I mixed the medication with jam instead and he didn't mind having it that way. I need to find something a bit better to mix it with tonight though as feeding him jam every day is bound to give him diabetes.
