Bring Clean Clothes

Today GLH took Max back to the vet to have his stitches removed.

When it was his turn, GLH took him into the exam room. The vet was already prepped for the task at hand. He had two assistants standing by with thick leather gloves all the way up to their shoulders. Their job was to hold Max down while the stitches were removed. (Unfortunately, the vet needed his hands free to deal with the scissors.)

Max became so frustrated that he couldn't bite them that he decided to poop and pee all over them instead. I hope they had an extra set of clean clothes on hand.

Max and Tilly have both been with us since we lived in the US and were already declawed when we moved here. (Declawing is illegal in Switzerland.) The first time I took Max into the vet, he started with a lecture about the evils of declawing.

Five minutes later he admitted that sometimes declawing is advisable.

Now when we go in, he just shakes his head and gets ready to deal with the cat he has nicknamed "Mad Max."

But Max really is a very affectionate cat. When complete strangers aren't poking and prodding at him!

Oh yeah, and never, ever, touch his belly. Not unless you are ready to dodge his teeth! He really doesn't like that.

Guess Who...

...is 6 months old today???

Teaching Cats?

Has he learned his lesson?

I doubt it.

Max came home Thursday evening. We waited all day to find out if he had "made the poop." (Direct quote from the vet.) Late in the afternoon, he did indeed make the poop and he was cleared to leave the vet's office.

When GLH walked through the door with him, Tilly excitedly ran to greet him. And then recoiled in horror.

In fact, we all recoiled in horror. He stunk to high heaven. Combination of blood and feces mixing with the overwhelming odor of Big Stinky Dog. Tilly got really freaked out and started hissing and growling like I have never seen her do.

We cleaned him as best we could with a damp washcloth (real bath will have to wait until he's healed more) and we can now stand his smell. But Tilly has not yet been able to recognize his scent and is treating him like an interloper. Which I guess is for the best for the time being. This way there is only one cat picking at his stitches instead of two. If he manages to remove them before a full week has past, he needs to go back in to have them redone.

Max has spent the last couple of days sleeping. This morning he was obviously feeling a lot better.

So he made it through this one. But I suspect if given the opportunity he would eat another Binky.

They just don't learn...

How Many Lives Left?

Max is obsessed with Global Baby's Binkies (a.k.a. pacifier, nuki, dummy, etc.) The green object in the center of the photo is a Binky.

When he is successful in getting one, it is literally a matter of moments before it is destroyed.

So we need to be diligent about keeping the Binkies away from Max. But when one is caring for an infant, it is not always possible to be aware of exactly where the Binky is at all times. Over the course of the last six months, we have lost 9 Binkies to Max.

So when Max became very sick yesterday we immediately suspected he had eaten part of a Binky, likely the one he stole while I was feeding Global Baby on Friday afternoon. (When we found it later, the nipple was missing.)

As the day wore on, he repeatedly vomited. I was hopeful when he vomited up part of the Binky. But the vomiting continued and he was refusing to eat. Even when I offered him a kitty treat. Max NEVER refuses to eat a kitty treat!

So late yesterday afternoon GLH came home from work and took Max into the vet for an emergency visit. Last night the vet performed a 2-hour surgery to remove the Binky part from Max's intestinal track.

He needs to stay at the vet's for 2-3 days because he is receiving nourishment and antibiotics intravenously to give his intestinal tract time to heal. But he should be fine. I just have to wonder how many of his 9 lives does he have left? This is the second foreign-body extraction that has occurred. And he is unlikely to learn from this event as well.

And how is Tilly? After all, they are litter mates and have never been apart since their conception.

Well, Tilly is fine. Occasionally when she wants to play she'll look around for Max. But for the most part she is enjoying sleeping in Max's favorite spots. Which Max would never let her do if he were here!

By the way, when I called today to ask how Max was doing I also asked if we could come to visit him this afternoon. After a moment of silence (likely while the receptionist contemplated how insane Americans are about their pets) she said we could call at 4 pm and they should be able to tell us when Max can come home.

I guess the vet hospital doesn't have "Visiting Hours."

Where in the World?

We currently have a Flat Stanley visiting.

Well, it's actually a Flat Trinity. But same concept.

She's already been to several places in the United States as well as France and now Switzerland.

Where will she go next?

Please let me know if you would like to host Flat Trinity's next adventure. She's quite small, easily fits in an envelope and doesn't eat anything. She only wants to explore your city and learn a bit about the people there.

Please e-mail me at global_librarian@yahoo.com if you would like to have her for a visit.

Sadness Is...

...scrapping the bottom of your last jar of peanut butter and knowing you won't be replacing it for at least 18 months to 2 years (or longer).

See, Global Baby has a Family Medical History that includes nut allergies, including peanuts.

Because he has now reached the stage where he tries to grab everything out of our hands while we are eating, we want to reduce the risk of his exposure to nuts and nut-based products. The theory is that perhaps if we remove nuts from his environment until he is at least 2 years old, he may grow past the danger stage and never develop the allergy.

My biggest question? What am I going to have for lunch from now on? Peanut butter and jelly was almost perfect, except for the whole allergy situation.

I need something that I can make ahead and leave on the counter until I am ready to eat.

Something that I can eat with one hand while Global Baby naps in my arms. (Yes, I either hold Global Baby for all his naps or take him on long stroller walks. It's the only way he will sleep during the day. Moving on...)

And hopefully something that is very healthy and low calorie.

Any thoughts? Very open to suggestions here...

Excessively Polite or Low Standards?

As I have mentioned before, I enjoy watching "A Place in the Sun." It's a show in which Brits travel to sunny locales to purchase retirement/vacation homes.

I've been watching it for a while and have noticed that the Brits tend to ohh and ahh over pretty much everything. Literally.

A decrepit house with 70's era decor leads to the comment "lovely use of space."

An ancient stone house with the roof falling in has them saying "what potential!"

An old pig sty covered in petrified manure and dead flies? "Wouldn't this make a lovely 2 bedroom cottage?"

Are these people excessively polite in front of the camera? Or do they simply have extremely low standards?

Discuss...

Updated Experience

Regular readers have likely noticed a lack of postings of late.

There is a reason for it.

And here he is...

Global Baby is now 5 1/2 months old. He started eating solids a little sooner than we had planned, mostly because he showed many of the signs of readiness and he was demanding full bottles every 2-3 hours. Once he was routinely eating more than 40 ounces of formula in a day, it was pretty obvious that formula alone was no longer enough for him.

He has also started the teething process in ernest. Which means he is not always the happy, smiling baby he once was. Sometimes he screams. A lot. It keeps his Mama busy!

And although he once happily slept through the night, those days seem to be gone. I know it is just the current stage. But when one feels as if they are constantly sleep-walking and can barely lift their head, it's easy to feel it will last forever.

But over all, Global Baby is doing well. He's just making it more complicated for his Mama to post blog updates! Especially since this is a secondary blog to our family and friends who demand regular updates or the guilt trips for living so far away with our baby come more frequently. The Baby Blog is a private one and that, along with quick Facebook updates, is where we are focusing our time when it comes to internet use.

But no worries! Our travels are about to begin again. Yes, after several months of no traveling, we are headed back to San Antonio to finalize the adoption. Then we are meeting family and friends in Florida for a week long Celebratory Caribbean Cruise. We leave the end of March.

And surely one of these days Global Baby will start sleeping/napping on a predictable schedule.

If you have any personal stories that may be evidence to the contrary regarding babies and predictable sleep times -- please keep them to yourself. I'd rather keep the fantasy alive, thank you very much!