Feathered Friend

This morning I took my sweet Multi to have her teeth cleaned. She was not a happy camper and while I know that Dr. Mead and his staff were going to take the best care of her, I felt guilty because she was so scared. After I left her, I returned home to take care of the rest of the critters before going to work.  I was cleaning the litter boxes when Oliver got up in the window sill and started twitching and watching something outside with intense concentration. When I got to the window, I saw several squirrels running for cover and a squadron of Mockingbirds assembling. Then I saw why. See what is sitting on the back of my truck? Sorry the picture isn't great, but it's through the window and screen and the bird is approximately 25 - 30 feet away.

The Mockingbirds were taking turns buzzing and some of them actually flew into the hawk's back. I got a video, but when I played it, it seems to lurch. Some weird setting on the new camera perhaps, or maybe the playback on my laptop is wonky. I took several pictures and the video and then the camera said "out of memory" and I realized that the memory card was still in my laptop! This new camera has a small amount of internal memory to allow you to take a few photos or small video without a card (so cool!).  So I ran to the living room, go the card and thought maybe I could sneak out the side door and get some better photos. Amazingly, this hawk let me get about 10 feet away, while he was still being dived on by the Mockingbirds.

 

While I was admiring the beauty of this creature, I was also relieved that Bob was inside. At nearly 13 pounds, he is probably too big for the hawk to have gone after, but better safe than sorry.  

Multi is back at home and seems to have forgiven me. The doctor says she has significant gum disease, but no cavities.  She will be on antibiotics for two weeks. He also advised brushing her teeth (I can try!). These were his other suggestions: "You can think of using Biotene either in the water or as a gel, You can add Ester C into her diet ~75mg in her wet food daily. also CoQ10 has been shown to help at 30 mg per day in wet food." I am definitely into the Biotene idea, since it's easy and will be beneficial to all the cats and I will see about the other options. 

I am feeling quite a bit better, but am looking forward to the weekend and hopefully getting back to working on some of my projects. Of course, since I was pretty useless all of last week up until today, I have a ton of house cleaning and a mountain of laundry to do as well. At least laundry can be done while you're getting other stuff accomplished.  I really wish I had someone close by to help me get my craft and sewing stuff organized. Guess I will have to just tackle it myself.

I need to be getting off to bed. I have a Multi and a Diamond who both need some snuggling. There's one more day of work to get through and Fridays are always a little crazy.