Cashews.

I love them.  That's all.

I "graduated" and passed the correspondence course.  So glad it's done!  It will take a lifetime to forget the ugliness I had to see, but I got this snazzy patch for my trouble.  M, L, & Dej all completed the course as well.  We can all wear our snazzy patches together.  And just to show how good hearted the douches in charge of the state program are, they also sent me this little handy dandy card illustrating how to release a pet from a body-gripping trap--you know, the traps that are set so safely and remotely that no pet is at risk (insert gag sound and giant eyeroll here).

Another week of the unexpected has put me behind on grading, chores, prep, homeschooling, etc.  L started screaming bloody murder Monday night, shortly after midnight.  All I could understand was something about a hole.  I was awake and reading and was just getting to the point where I could start the hour-long drift-to-sleep-process, but her scream instantly adrenalized me.  Trixie (one of the little girl rats) had a large, deep gash on her side, near her little arm/shoulder.  It was clear that it was too deep for me to repair it, and she was in need of stitches.  A call to the vet confirmed my diagnosis, but Trixie would need to be anesthetized for the repairs, and they wouldn't have the necessary staff to do that until morning. It was the beginning of a long, sleepless night.

 I cleaned the wound and tried to bandage her.  L & I spent quite a while trying to wrap her so that the wound was closed and covered and would stay so until morning, but no matter how I wrapped her, she was able to wriggle out of it.  Finally I just used skin tape directly on her fur to keep the gauze over the wound, and that worked very well.  I was trying to avoid tape on her fur, as I was concerned that it would hurt her coming off.  As it turned out, it came off quite easily and she wasn't hurt or left bald in the process.

We headed to the vet as soon as they opened, and she was put under, stitched up, and sent home on opiates for pain, so she was pretty mellow. The cut was very straight and "clean", down to the first layer of muscle, so it had to hurt like hell, and I can't stand the idea of animals suffering.  They used sub-dermal stitches and glued the outside, so we don't have to return to get stitches out.  There aren't any powerful oral pain drugs for rats, so we took her back each day for a pain injection, so I hope she didn't feel much pain in her recovery.  She's completely back to normal now.

We were really distressed about how it happened, but close examination of her cage and playground areas revealed only one possibility--the hooks that attach her water bottle to the cage.  She likes to climb up the outside of her cage like a little King Kong, and those metal points stick out and must have poked and ripped when she was climbing up.  We were relieved when we found some drops of blood on the water bottle, confirming that our theory was correct.  Those metal points are now wrapped and covered with duct tape.

We're still giving nightly footsoaks and medication to Blossom (guinea pig).  She's healing well, too, but the arthritis in her little foot still looks bad.  I'm trying to find something to give her to help with that.  I too have arthritis in my feet, and it really hurts.

I also have a sick parakeet--Sagan.  I spent hours on the phone Saturday trying to track down the drugs she needs, but with no luck.  I'm hoping I can track something down Monday.  I'm running a vaporizer in the room now, which is helping a bit, but every minute counts with birds and small animals.  It's so sweet to see Simran, her partner, stick by her side and care for her.  I'm so happy they have each other!