hanging on

It's been a tough week. My eldest dog, Kita, a Great Pyranese mix adopted from The Santa Fe Animal Shelter in 1993, was diagnosed with kidney disease. She's 14, has been slowing down quite a bit over the last year, but now things are very tenuous. There's not much that can be done for kidney damage, except try to keep it from getting worse. Because she got sick when I was out of town for the weekend, I've been very paranoid about leaving her alone for long periods of time (like the work day), so I've been coming in and out of town at least twice a day, leaving work for a few hours, going back, going home, up and down 20 minutes each week on Agua Fria until I can barely remember where I'm going. She's on some thyroid meds now and my vet special ordered special food that she'll start eating next week when it arrives. But mostly it's just watching her to see if she's getting worse or better. She's lost a lot of weight. She's always been a big heavy dog, but this morning, when I took her out, she couldn't make it back on her own and I was able to pick her up and carry her home.
I don't know. I hesitate to even write about this, because not everyone has the same level of feeling for their animals that I do. Lots of people do, of course…I've been mostly trying to get my work done, stay at home and not talk to anyone, to tell you the truth. I did make it out for a few hours yesterday to Frogfest, which was a nice little break and I got to hear some good music. Now I'm at the gym, to get a little exersize and check email (again, wireless at the gym, weird, but useful).
That's the news from here. Staying home so much has given me the chance to watch lots of CNN. This JonBenet story is really sick.