A quick update about Spike. Our vet wanted him to go to a cancer specialist for possible chemo on the area of the leg where he had the tumor. We went to a local vet who specializes in cancer treatment, sat for an hour in her office and observed the chaos, listened to her discuss treatment options for a 15 year old cat where the option chosen depended on your budget and had them lie to us saying the vet could not see us because our vet had not faxed the paperwork. The lie was that they said they had asked for it when we booked the appointment, but they made the call when we arrived.
So we all left, and dropped in on our vet and said we would not take Spike to that other clinic. The result was that our vet, who used to do these chemo treatments, but stopped with the specialist came to town, met with her (the specialist), consulted about Spike and is now doing the chemo treatment for Spike.
Our vet is wonderful (Dr. Hinko, Animal Clinic, Santa Fe). He saved Spike's life about 5 years ago (snake attack). Dr. Hinko phones you up and talks to you himself. He even called me once from his home at night.
Spike's first chemo treatment was today. It is an injection of a chemo drug into his leg where the melanoma was. To stop it from spreading. If it spreads, he would lose his leg. He has to have one or two other treatments.
At this time of year, Spike spends about an hour a day home. 30 minutes in the morning to howl for and then eat breakfast; 30 minutes at night to eat and have a bit of lap time. We were pretty worried that we would not be able to find him in the morning to take him to the vet.
So we slept lightly. Steve heard him come in around 2am and got up and shut th cat flap so Spike and Butch were locked in (Butch spends the whole night with us, sleeping on a pillow on the floor). From 2am to 7am was on and off dozing and listening to Spike try to take apart the cat flap, the screen windows, the glass door in our bedroom.
So I am tired.
But, we had him, took him to the vet, picked him up this afternoon and he seemed fine. A bit dozy from being knocked out, but after visiting for 15 minutes, he trotted off into the yard. Things to do, people to see, I guess.
We are in the final stages of the Slow Travel contest. At this point I am wondering why I ever came up with this idea and I think the moderators would like to smack me on the head. I was posting, they were all reading. Even Steve stopped work and devoted days to reading. We have announced about half the winners and are going through the rest today and tomorrow. It is difficult to choose, because many are not apples to apples. Luckily there is a big group of us, so we are doing it by concensus. But it means lots of reading for everyone.
On Thursday the names are being drawn - that is when the fun starts - watching as people pick their prizes!!
