Saturday Plushy

Maxx continues to bounce back from his biopsy on Wednesday. The catheter is out of his leg (I had to sit on him to get the tape off) and the swelling in his face has subsided substantially. He cleaned his plate last night and had some vanilla ice cream (so delicious!!) for desert. He just had some late breakfast, and he's now sleeping on the back of the sofa.

Except for his disappointment at not being able to go out to prowl, he seems fairly content.

Thanks again for all your kind wishes, good karma and mojo, and general love you all have thrown in our direction. You've made a difficult situation much easier.

Friday Update

Maxx was doing the above when I left for work this a.m. No news yet from the vet, but he ate his breakfast and seems to be bouncing back from the biopsy.

More later.

Silly rabbit

A very silly kitty does not understand why he cannot go out and play.

Yes, he's out of the closet (he must have been watching the news while I was at work) and up and about. I had to body block him with my laptop to keep him from running out the front door. He ate his dinner like a champ too.

That visit from Arthur today did him a world of good.

Thursday Update

Quick update, Maxx had an okay night and seems to be feeling better this morning. The swelling has gone down in his mouth and he seems a little more comfortable. He came out of the closet a few times to snuggle with his centaur, which certainly made me feel better.

Hopefully we'll get the pathology report back tomorrow and then we'll know if there are any treatment options available.

Thanks again to everyone who has written or commented. Your friendship and love mean the world to both of us.

Update

I think my heart is going to break. After all Maxx has been through today, everytime I go in to check on him, he just purrrrs and rolls over to get his plushy tummy rubbed.

Of course he's stoned out of his mind on morphine, but I'm still amazed at how sweet and loving he is.

I want to thank all of you for your many kind comments and emails. I am overwhelmed by the love you've extended to lion kitty Maxx and me.

Dear Media, You blow

Let me just say that all of you, the entire journalism industry, are a bunch of suck-ass idiots.

You know that what Kerry said was not an insult to the troops. You know it was a botched punchline, and yet you take republican talking points and run amok like a bunch of two year-olds who got into the sugar jar. You are an embarrassment to your profession.

When are you going to start reporting the real news and stop sucking republican dick? For fuck's sake.

If you want an apology from someone, why don't you ask why Bush hasn't apologized for causing the deaths of 2,800 American servicement over a lie?

And when is Bush going to apologize for sending them into a war ill-equipped and unsupported?

And when are YOU, the media, going to hold this administration accountable for anything?

You owe US an apology for your bullshit.

Plushy Update

Mr. Plushy is currently at the clinic in Round Rock being evaluated. So far the news is not good. After talking to me for a half hour about his syndrome, and various treatment options, the vet examined him and said, "Well, this looks like cancer to me. We need to speak to the oncologist and do a biopsy."

I am utterly depressed about the whole thing. So, today he's getting a biopsy, plus x-rays of his teeth and a chest film (in case it is cancer, to determine whether it's spread). The oncologist did a needle aspirate of his lymph node to see if she could see anything right away, and is going to do a tissue slide of the biopsied soft tissue, again to see if she can tell anything right away. The biopsy goes to A & M for histology.

They're are being extra careful with him under anesthesia because of his history, and I should be able to pick him up this afternoon.

Thanks for all the kind thoughts from everyone the past few weeks. I'll update everyone as I learn more.

Update (1:14 pm): Mr. Plushy has cancer, probably of the salivary and lymph glands. We'll know for sure by Friday, but there don't appear to be any good options.

Senile old coot

"Yes, I am a batty old coot and no, I do not have a fucking clue what to do about Iraq."

Hubble will live

At last, some good news. NASA has decided to NOT pull the plug on the Hubble Space Telescope.

REENBELT, Maryland (CNN) -- The shuttle Discovery will pay the Hubble Space Telescope a final servicing call in 2008, NASA Administrator Michael Griffin announced Tuesday.

The new plan reverses a decision made by former NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe in the wake of the Columbia disaster that such a mission would be too risky to attempt.

"We are going to add a shuttle servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope to the shuttle's manifest, to be flown before it retires," Griffin told employees at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, where Hubble operations are based. He received a standing ovation. (Watch the Hubble from space -- :52)

Discovery will be commanded by veteran astronaut Scott Altman. His crew will include pilot Greg Johnson, robotic arm operator Megan McAurthur, and space walkers John Grunsfeld, Mike Massimino, Andrew Fuestel and Michael Good.

The final Hubble mission, scheduled for May 2008, will install two new instruments, the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph and the Wide Field Camera 3.

The astronauts also will service Hubble's gyroscopes, which keep the telescope stable for high-precision pointing.

As regular readers know, Hubble is something near and dear to my heart. Beyond the pretty pictures it produces, Hubble has been the workhorse of the atronomy community for many years now, producing some truly spectacular science.

Hubble's replacement isn't scheduled to launch until sometime in 2011, which would have left a huge void. I give NASA's decision a standing ovation as well.

Maxx update

Here's a shot of lion kitty Maxx in happier days, before his little mouf got all bad again.

He sees his kitty dentist tomorrow morning, and the clinic said they will probably operate on him tomorrow as well. I'm very worried. Very worried.

Poor lion kitty Maxx

My poor little buddy. As you can see from the photo, the left side of his face is really swollen and it seems to be bothering him quite a bit.

He hasn't been eating much since last night, so I'm a little worried about him. I hope his new doctor can get him some relief.

We're all fine here

Everybody simma down now.

Just needed a break.