Posts from the ‘Bob’ category

More light and shadow

This afternoon.

Bob.

Light and shadow.

*** 8 days, maybe more…90-93F. The nights cool to upper 50/low 60’s. BUT, we are having a Yellow Jacket year… I have traps made of meat hanging from skewers over soapy water in mason jars and have been drowning over 100 yellow jackets daily. I fear for the boys being stung – especially Bob, so we’ve all been inside except for a couple of hours in the morning. Bear and I go out – carefully – at noon and dinner and then at 9-10 ish p.m. And I take Bear for some Jeep excursion when I can break during the day. Hurry up, Fall!!

Saturday morning lie-in

It has been hitting 90 during the day and forecast to continue. But the air is very dry so we drop into the 50’s overnight, making morning prime time to be outside.

By 8:00 a.m. this Saturday morning, we were back inside.

After breakfast, some of us went back to bed…

Most of us went back to bed.

At first separately.

But then together.

Saturday morning lie-in.

Life experience

It has been 2 1/2 weeks since our last vet visit (Bob and I re Bob’s ear infection).

We went today.

The last round of medication resulted in a slight setback.

We regrouped and will go back to the injectible but slightly risky medication.

Dr. Clark and I jointly had a case of nerves re the injectible but in hindsight we are kicking ourselves as it was kicking the bugs.

The road not taken…

While the ear infection is not life threatening, it was making Bob’s quality of life kind of “sucky” (that’s 40 something Dr. Clark’s words :)!! )

This latest setback is nothing like the worst we saw – (minimal, in fact) but no one wants to go back there so…

Dr. C and I agreed to “suck it up” and go back to the injectible med with a once a week blood test to monitor Bob’s kidney/liver stuff.

Bob has been going on about his normal routine. It is only us humans that are having anxious moments.

Have I learned nothing from past experience???

Gah!

The continuing saga of Bob’s ears

The last we left our story, Bob had undergone an ear roto rooter kind of procedure and the resulting gunk was sent off to the lab to see if something could be grown that would help target a new medication.

Something(s) did grow and it was two odd/rare/hard to kill bacteria but we have an ear drop weapon picked up today and have commenced on another round of attack.

Meanwhile, the first drug was one that was effective against one of the bugs, hence Bob’s feeling better, being less wobbly and progressing to being my snuggle buddy once more AND using his litter box vs the pile of litter sand. Yea.

Not only that, but as Mr. Bob is feeling up to getting on the bed, he has also been feeling up to giving Bear a bit of the ole stink eye…just on general principle.

Onward.

Bob’s good news

It’s Thursday and like the past several weeks, Bob went to the vet.

But today was for xrays to look at the inner ear bone pockets (there is an official name which I can’t remember) – to see if there was fluid and gunk. If so, a surgery was set for Monday to open, drain and culture whatever it was, via openings under the chin. Yuck.

The good news is the xrays showed the bone pockets absolutely clear!

Dr. Clark then used a teeny catheter to extract what gunk he could from the middle-outer ear and see if it grows something that can be identified and targeted. He also did another even more thorough flush while Bob was sedated. Meanwhile we will continue on the drops but no surgery and most likely another round of whatever antibiotic is indicated by the culture.

The light box/cat house has been officially turned into Bob’s cat cave.

When we arrived home from today’s ordeal Bob got a drink, followed me out to the garage as I was unloading Bear and a few groceries, followed me back inside, got a bite to eat, used his litter box and then went to bed and started cleaning up.

The cleaning up is a great sign. When he was the most ill, he just didn’t. That he did today, so soon after sedation – wonderful!

AND, I think he is hearing more after the cleanout!

He’s still a bit wobbly but that could be the sedative.

“Srsly. Another trip to the vet and it is “to the moon” for you. But, I’ll have a bit more of that salmon, please.”

Srsly, Bob. I would be very pleased, as would my VISA card, if we didn’t have to go to the vet for awhile :) !!