My Friend’s Dog Died

My friend called me up a couple of evenings ago to inform that his dog just died. I felt very bad because I know how it could be but he was fine with it. In fact, he said that he was kind of relieved that it ended because for the past year, the dog had been suffering from a sickness that humans know as lupus. It’s like cancer of the blood and her immune system broke down and sort of attacks her own good cells.

It was quite painful for the dog, though she did not show it, and my friend’s family and my friend had to decide if she would be better off being put to sleep. That is every pet owner’s nightmare. My friend decided not to put her to sleep so the sickness just dragged on.

In a way, I am glad that he called up to talk to me and showed that he is concerned about me coping with the loss of Dino and allowed me the opportunity to compare the death of Dino and his dog. Really, there’s no escape from such things is we want to keep a pet. My friend still has two dogs, but those are his mother’s responsibility, not his. He has also sworn off keeping pets. SIGH!

Pet Food Recall in the US

I have been so bogged down by health concerns of my monkey and myself that I did not even know of the recall of pet food in the United States until Paul told me about it. He is an animal lover and so am I.

Now that he told me about it, I vaguely recall reading about pets in the United States dying of liver failure due to tainted pet food. A search on the internet brought more news reports on such an unfortunate incident.

There was a recall of a long list of pet food recently and it seems that all food on retail shelves now are free to consume. Once confidence is shattered, do pet food companies think that our security will be restored so easily?

In this incident, it is said that only canned food distributed in North America were affected and those in the rest of the world are safe. But for how long?

I remember a few years ago, there was a recall for Pedigree dry dog food (kibbles) because the manufacturing plant in Thailand was contaminated. We had to throw away the food and send in the empty packages. We were only partially compensated, caused us, the pet owners to lose money AND risking the health of our pets. I was of course not happy with that incident and how the issue was handled.

I can't even begin to figure why businesses place profit above all things as if pets are "just" animals.

At The Vet's

I spent so many hours at the vet's last week that I've seen so many animals that people rear and the domestic accidents that happened to them.

There's the monkey which was scaled by hot water. According to the owner, he has two monkeys and these two are so naughty. They played with a kettle of hot water and one got scalded.

And then there's the macaw who was slashed at the breast by the blade of the ceiling fan. Oh my, that was terrible. Luckily it did not slash his neck!

And again, another case of a bulging eye dislodged from the eye socket. If you remember, there was one case of the toy dog which had the eye dislodged by the neighbour's dog. These two cases really have put me off keeping dogs with bulging eyes FOREVER.

And the classic one was an Ah Beng who brought his 3ft tall (standing on all fours) dog who wore a S&M metal studded fake leather collar. This one came to be boarded.

Well, it's interesting to be at the vet's but it's not where I wanna be!