Day 21: What do you eat at Canadian Thanksgiving?

Turkey, apparently. Similar to that of the American Thanksgiving. Though, there is less poultry-mixing (no turduckens) and a significant lack of deep-fried anything.

There was actually no work today. But I'm having a tough time getting off the beautifully clean five days a week numbering system.

We, however, did not have turkey today. 

Thankfully, Loki and I are both feeling much better after our rough and tough Friday. As such, I felt up to particularly special Thanksgiving dinner. 

Home-fried chicken sandwiches it is! Admittedly, not the best thing for me. But after three days of protein shakes, apple sauce and tomato soup, it sure sounded amazing! So far, the body is holding up fine despite the solid food interruption. Good news things. 

What else are we doing to celebrate the festive day? Why, watching all of the Harry Potter movies, of course! Man, things have really improved since 2001.

Burgess Family Infirmary

This weekend wasn't what we were expecting.

We had plans to go down to Seattle for the three day weekend. Visit Michael, see the Space Needle, visit the site of the World's Fair. All the Seattle things. 

But things were working against the Burgess clan.

I've been having constant stomach pains since Sunday night. They got worse at night, when I moved around or lied down. They got better when I ate. Sometimes the pain radiated through to my back. I finally gave in to go see a doctor on Thursday. He told me I have mild pancreatitis.

He then told us I should eat really gentle things for a few days to give my pancreas a break and let it heal itself. You know, steamed vegetables, bananas, mashed potatoes, rice. All of the things that I don't eat. Great. 

I did some internet medical research on my own and figured out that an all-liquids weekend was probably the best thing I could do for it. The doctor also gave me some pills that are essentially Prevacid to help calm down my stomach. 

After we got home from the doctor and propped me up with a heating pad, tomato soup, and tons of pillows, we noticed Loki was keeping his right eye closed. Because we weren't already up to our elbows in ailments. 

We called a vet to make sure there wasn't anything more seriously wrong with him. Initially we got the all clear, with instructions to bring him in if it didn't clear up. 

Friday night, of course, it hadn't cleared up. 

We'd already decided to stay in town for the weekend. My pain was getting worse, and walking around Seattle all weekend really wasn't in the cards. 

Loki had a trip back to the vet. He asked us a series of questions and we were initially hopeful as our answers were all "no." He hadn't been sneezing, or coughing, or itching at the eye, eating less or not drinking, there was not watery or gunky discharge. Evidently these were not the right answers and only made the vet more concerned. 

He gave Loki some drops to "freeze" the eye (still not sure what that was, but he said it would help with the pain he was having). Then he dropped in some dye that would stay in any scratches. Then he had to flush the eye with water.

Now, even with humans, flushing an eye with water is not an easy or pleasant experience. With cats, even worse. Loki hated every minute of this. The vet had a very large syringe without a needle so that he could repeatedly squirt the water at poor Loki's eye. 

The final step was to turn off all of the lights and use a florescent flashlight to look for any dye remaining in Loki's eye. To our horror, a spot the size of a pea shone bright green on his cornea. This is a corneal ulcer, one of the largest the vet had seen. Holy moly. 

He said the pain would be very harsh and it was odd that there had been no discharge. It would have started with a small scratch while he and Amelia were playing, or while Loki was grooming, or with a small foreign body, such as dust. The most important thing now was making sure that any treatment avenue we chose worked as fast as possible.

The vet brought in a gel-like eye drop antibiotic, dropping one drop into his eye and making sure it spread across the whole eye. This would need to be done every 2 hours for 24 hours, then every 4 hours for another 24 hours, then every 6 hours for 4 days. However, if there was no difference in the first 12 hours, we would need to switch to a stronger dose of two different antibiotics. 

Welcome to the long holiday weekend.

Rules of (Our) Cats

1. Though shalt not let humans poop alone. Remember, all doors open when you pull them toward yourself. So get that door open and make sure they know you're there for them. If you are Amelia, they are cornered and stationary => approach for love.
2. Check in with the humans at 3 am every day to make sure they are still alive and will feed you in the morning. This is a requirement. Every. Single. Morning. Use whatever force necessary.
3. Human-given "rules" are really just suggestion. If they're not looking, it's not even a suggestion. Do as you please.
4. The only blinds in the house that matter are the ones still covering windows. Disregard all other windows, you need access to that one, immediately, every time. Get yourself on the other side of those blinds. 
5. It is a 100% guarantee that both food bowls are different and you are being treated unequally from the other feline in the house. You had better check out both food bowls in a continuous, alternating fashion in order to ensure your complete satisfaction with meals.
6. Don't be afraid to let the humans know where you are. This could mean several things, from an obnoxiously loud meow or series of meows to engaging your claws with their skin. Your choice, really.
7. If the humans give any indication that they may need something soon, sit on it immediately and remain there until further notice. Laptops and tablets are especially high  priority, but this rule can apply to literally anything.
8. The front door is the ultimate challenge. It is to be feared or taunted, however you see fit. If you make it into the hallway, the first corner is not to be turned. Proceed to give your human a work out up and down the first hallway segment. Particularly if they are on their way somewhere, make it last, make it count.
9. The human's sleep times are merely suggestions. That doesn't mean you have to keep it down or stay in one place. Carry on with your regularly scheduled activities.
10. Engage with other cats in whatever manner you see fit. The humans know you love each other, but a test of their will is always welcomed. Hiss and scream and whap at one another. Then snuggle in the recliner for an afternoon nap.

Cats on a plane

Don't ever travel with cats if you can help it.

American Airlines only allows 5 pets in the cabin on any given flight. So call ahead to reserve carry on slots for your pets. Also, make sure you read the airline's rules and regulations on the type of crate you can bring. It must be carry-on size because it has to go under the seat in front of you. Most airlines also require that it be a hard-sided case, but that really depends.

For international travel, we had to provide documentation for both cats that they are healthy and vaccinated. These documents had to be dated no more than 10 days before travel. For us, this meant my mom had to wrangle the cats to the vet the Friday before we flew. That was an adventure. We walked away with two documents for both cats, one showing their most recent rabies vaccine date and one that was a general health document with some identifying measures (weight, age, gender, breed, color, etc.) provided by the examining veterinarian.

Ok, so you have your airline tickets, the reservation for your carry-on pets, and the proper documents for said little creatures. What on earth comes next?

You show up REALLY early for your flight.

In the day of online everything, you can NOT check in online if you are traveling with animals. You must check in at the airport. Then you have to fill out additional paperwork with the airline to pay for the animal, confirm that you are traveling with an animal, and verify that you have all of the health documents in order. Then you get your boarding pass.

CHECK ALL OF YOUR OTHER LUGGAGE. Cats may only weigh 6-12 lbs and you might be a professional weight lifter, but you have to carry that animal and the crate and your regular carry-on bag (ladies, I'm talking to you about our 20 lb every day purses) through security and to your gate and in line to get on the plane and in line trying to get to your specific seat and at the other airport when you deplane and then have to go find a vehicle. It's not worth it. If that hasn't convinced you, here's another tidbit - you are already making an enemy out of every other person on your flight by having an animal with you. Having additional luggage to rally and contain will only make this situation worse. Just don't do it Check everything. Even at an airline where you have to pay for it. Check your bags. Just. Please.

Alright. We've checked in and you handed off all your luggage to the airline. Make your way to the security gate. You need to be prepared for this. The security folks will be mildly prepared. You need to be more prepared than they are. They will spot you with your animal and ask you how you want to handle this. What they mean - the crate has to go through the x-ray machine. Your pet SHOULD NOT go through the x-ray machine. If you have a calm dog, you can probably just hold them while the empty crate goes through the machine. For cats, this is not an option. Even the calmest cat has an elevated nervous system while at an airport. Before you get to the airport, put a harness on your cat. I don't care if your cat will put up a fight, just do it. It's for their own protection, and they won't have to wear it for very long. Carry a leash to attach to the harness when you have to remove them from the crate. It'll be better if they're on a leash than just have a collar on if they freak out and wiggle out of your arms.

Tell the kind folks that you would like a private room while they run the crate. Our friendly TSA agents asked why we wanted the private room and why we couldn't just hold the cats. I told him they would probably be fine but that it would be better for their stress levels if we had a private room and that we really weren't sure how they were going to react. Turns out the guy on duty is allergic to cats so he just didn't want to be in a closed room with two of them. But he finally ushered us back to the room. We lifted each cat out, and they absolutely clung to us! Neither of them wanted anything to do with the rest of the room. Then they were each more excited than I've ever seen them to escape back into their crates.

We made it through security. Excellent. That was the tough part. Proceed to your gate as normal. Contrary to my beliefs, you do not get priority boarding if flying with an animal. Wait until your boarding group is called. Or, since you checked all of your bags (right?) you can just wait until the very end to board since you'll only need the space under the seat in front of you.

Hopefully your cats will remain calm on the flight. Ours didn't ever seem to sleep, but they remained blessedly quiet. We checked on them frequently and were always met with anxious eyes trying to figure out when they would be free.

Customs was the tricky part for us. DFW was out of Canadian customs forms, so we were not provided any on the flight. This meant we had to wait through the whole customs line until we were at the very front, then grab a form and try to fill it out without causing too much hold up. As a result of this, I scanned all the questions. The large declaration question starting with "foods, produce, nuts, berries..." goes on for several more lines to eventually contain "animals." I missed the animals part. I marked no. The customs agent was not impressed. Thankfully, she went easy on us. We clearly weren't trying to sneak them in and we had all the proper documents, which convinced her to use her beautiful mercy and allow us into the country.

We had discussed taking the train back to the apartment, but opted for a taxi in the moment since we'd all had a long day. It was definitely a very wise decision. Because then we were home. Safely. Thank goodness.