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Sick Rat Leave
Dec. 3rd, 2010 04:27 pmI'm probably the first person in the history of the court transcription gulag to get compassionate leave because of a rat.
Ok, so they would've had to pay me to do nothing for two hours if I hadn't been keen to disappear, but they didn't at first know that work was going to fade away, i.e. major five-day case cancelled, right after all the paperwork had been done for it. So it was quite nice of them. I rushed home - had been feeling lousy since having to leave Cecil in the morning, when he wanted me to keep cuddling him - to find him sound asleep. He's woken up now, I got a bit of soy formula down him but only a taste; he really isn't interested, poor little guy, and a rat is quite good at stopping you applying a syringe. They clamp the teeth down and just push it away with a hand and the stuff goes anywhere but down the rat.
I'm encouraged by Charles Wallace's energy; he was even collecting newspaper and bringing it into the hammock. It's possible I gave him too much Predmix (prednisolone sp?) last night as it is a very small dose and hard to be precise with a tiny 1.0 syringe, even wearing bifocals, but I'm not much concerned with side effects as he is unlikely to live long enough for that to matter. I just want him to feel good while he's still here. He's not eating much but he will eat on his own, e.g. strawberry yoghurt and soy formula. Tonight I plan to see if he's interested in rice pudding.
He's going to have to have one of the others as a room-mate later on, probably his brother Magnus, which will make feeding him a little more complicated as Magnus, any of the healthy ones, will happily inhale any food left around, which is why they got moved out in the first place. Or Wilfred, who got neutered for aggression and is now the mildest rat in the colony, poor guy. He was a complete nutter and even lunged at Cecil once when in a bad mood. All that is now forgotten.
Thanks everyone for the encouraging messages.
Ok, so they would've had to pay me to do nothing for two hours if I hadn't been keen to disappear, but they didn't at first know that work was going to fade away, i.e. major five-day case cancelled, right after all the paperwork had been done for it. So it was quite nice of them. I rushed home - had been feeling lousy since having to leave Cecil in the morning, when he wanted me to keep cuddling him - to find him sound asleep. He's woken up now, I got a bit of soy formula down him but only a taste; he really isn't interested, poor little guy, and a rat is quite good at stopping you applying a syringe. They clamp the teeth down and just push it away with a hand and the stuff goes anywhere but down the rat.
I'm encouraged by Charles Wallace's energy; he was even collecting newspaper and bringing it into the hammock. It's possible I gave him too much Predmix (prednisolone sp?) last night as it is a very small dose and hard to be precise with a tiny 1.0 syringe, even wearing bifocals, but I'm not much concerned with side effects as he is unlikely to live long enough for that to matter. I just want him to feel good while he's still here. He's not eating much but he will eat on his own, e.g. strawberry yoghurt and soy formula. Tonight I plan to see if he's interested in rice pudding.
He's going to have to have one of the others as a room-mate later on, probably his brother Magnus, which will make feeding him a little more complicated as Magnus, any of the healthy ones, will happily inhale any food left around, which is why they got moved out in the first place. Or Wilfred, who got neutered for aggression and is now the mildest rat in the colony, poor guy. He was a complete nutter and even lunged at Cecil once when in a bad mood. All that is now forgotten.
Thanks everyone for the encouraging messages.