One problem with adopting a pet from the Humane Society is that many of them (cats, at least) have what’s called URI (Upper Respiratory Infection) when they leave.\u00a0 This is one of those impossible-to-control things.\u00a0 One cat brings it in from the outside world–being a stray, they haven’t been cured of it–and is mixed in with many other cats, including others who may have also brought the disease in.\u00a0 Those who don’t have it soon do as a result.\u00a0 Sure, some get adopted, but once the disease is there, every new arrival is likely to get it (it’s highly contagious) and thus continue the disease’s presence.<\/p>\n
When we brought Kivuli home, it was not immediately obvious she had URI.\u00a0 Soon, however, she was sneezing a lot.\u00a0 She’s a kitten, though, and it’s little more than a minor discomfort for her.\u00a0 She got a few shots at the vet the day after we got her, and soon her sneezing, sniffling thing slowed to a halt.\u00a0 The problem was Myst, the cat we already had, was now exposed to the disease.\u00a0 He got some shots, too–he was long overdue for a vet appointment–but nothing to handle URI.\u00a0 So he was soon sick.\u00a0 At almost fourteen years old (roughly seventy-two in human terms), URI is a more serious problem.<\/p>\n
At first, the vet’s office wanted to have him brought in to confirm the URI.\u00a0 We were already planning on bringing Kivuli in for an appointment, but this would be a separate thing with its own office visit charge.\u00a0 This pissed Sam off, as she was doing the calling and felt it was obvious what Myst’s problem was.\u00a0 (She was right, too.)\u00a0 So she canceled Kivuli’s appointment.\u00a0 The office called back a short time later (I answered it and was calmer than Sam might have been) and said the medicine was ready.\u00a0 That’s right, the medicine they didn’t want to sell us without an appointment had been prepared and we could pick it up anytime.\u00a0 Sam went out, got it, came back, and has given it to Myst as prescribed for three days now.\u00a0 Myst is feeling much better now.\u00a0 He doesn’t care for taking medicine, but he allows Sam to give it to him anyway, and his symptoms are rapidly going away.<\/p>\n
So that’s the short term story.\u00a0 We got the medicine but canceled a needed appointment for the kitten.\u00a0 The long term story is Sam has encouraged me to have us subscribe to a PetsMart plan.\u00a0 The cost is more than a single visit with the other vet in the short term, but in the long run it’s more economical.\u00a0 So we’ll do that and get the kitties taken care of.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, in the virtual world, I have achieved an Accomplishment in EverQuest:\u00a0 Shakatma reached level 90.\u00a0 Not only did she reach level 90, but she got far enough into it that I was able to start earning AA points for her again.\u00a0 This is not something I could do right away, as one always wants a “buffer” on a top level before sending experience towards the alternate stuff.\u00a0 The reason for this is that every time a character dies they lose a little experience, so not having this buffer means a character could lose the level if things go badly.\u00a0 Since Shakatma raids regularly and raids mean dying regularly, this buffer is pretty important.<\/p>\n
Boomshakalaka hit level 87 and Danielf hit level 86, so all of my main characters are progressing well.\u00a0 The main trio has also managed to knock out a few tasks in the current expansion.\u00a0 Meanwhile, my babies–the characters I created when they let me get more character slots–are progressing.\u00a0 Six of them are level twenty and three have reached twenty-two.\u00a0 Life in EQ is good.<\/p>\n
Also in the virtual world, Zynga has come out with a new game.\u00a0 I have already been playing their infamous Farmville game for awhile now as well as Petville, Frontierville and occasionally Zynga Poker.\u00a0 Now they have created a new game, Cityville.\u00a0 This is similar to another game I tried for awhile from another company, but I think Zynga has done a better job of it.\u00a0 It helps that many of my online friends from the above games have also been sucked into Cityville.\u00a0 These are highly social games, and having lots of friends is helpful to your progress in the game.<\/p>\n
That’s all I have for this week.\u00a0 The year is drawing to a close and things are calming down a bit around here.\u00a0 The weather has been pretty nice, unlike much of the country, although snow is in the forecast for the next couple of days.\u00a0 Weather prediction in Colorado Springs is prone to lots of error, though, so we’ll see what happens.\u00a0 See you tomorrow.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
One problem with adopting a pet from the Humane Society is that many of them (cats, at least) have what’s called URI (Upper Respiratory Infection) when they leave.\u00a0 This is one of those impossible-to-control things.\u00a0 One cat brings it in from the outside world–being a stray, they haven’t been cured of it–and is mixed in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=250"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":251,"href":"http:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250\/revisions\/251"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}