Cat 4

The smallest kitten deteriorated badly overnight.  He caught the upper respiratory infection from his mom and sister, and with his compromised immune system it hit him hard.  This morning he was too weak to move, and he was gasping for breath.  atara found him face-down in his blanket, gasping for breath, with his face encrusted with snot and mucus.  He was in pretty rough shape last night when we tried to feed him, literally gagging on his food and spitting out more than he swallowed.  I don't think I need to tell you how heartbreaking it is to see a little creature suffering like that, so we did the only humane thing we could.  We dropped him back at the shelter this morning, where they agreed that he doesn't look like he's going to pull through.

It's not like we had him long enough to grow really attached, but it was still very hard giving him up.  The worst of it was that it was like reliving Bit all over again.  We did all that we could, but sometimes all that you can do simply isn't enough.  I guess this is something that we're going to have to get used to if we plan to foster cats for the shelter.  Many of the cats that they foster out are ones that need extra care to nurse them back to health, and sometimes they don't get better. 

Gouging

Gas just hit US$4.99 per US gallon here today.

[Edit: Okay, it's not quite as dire as I thought. I've since found out what the idiots at these stations have done. The price is actually 115.5 per litre, but since they OMGBBQ can't possible drop the .5 cents off the end, they dropped the leading dollar instead. Thus instead of simply listing it as 115, they listed it as 155. Gah.]