my sick chinnie....

wednesday 23 Feb 2005
this morning i looked at my chinchilla cage, and noticed that the skinniest black chinchilla was lying at a place that he usually doesn't lie at. and when i tried to play with him, he was very listless and didn't move much. this is a HUGE sign that the chinchilla is sick when he is usually quite jumpy and reacts to me. So i quickly took urgent leave for the day and brought him to the vet....

the vet said that quite a few people have brought in their chinchillas recently because of the weather. it is a little too hot for them lately and so they will get heat stroke or heat stress. the vet put him on the floor to observe his movements and noticed that he was walking sideways, or rather wobbly, or rather un-coordinated. but he noticed that he pee-ed and poo-ed so he said that it's not at the late stage. so it also means that he has a higher chance of recovery.

basically chinchillas might or might not recover from heat stroke. because a stroke to them is like our human stroke. where it affects our daily co-ordination and thinking. basically, they will get brain damage. and that is what happened to my chin. my first chin died of heat stroke so i know fully well how one behaves when it gets heat stroke as that memory is etched in my head forever, which is also something that i regret. a lot. anyway, there is nothing that the vet can do to help the chin, not even an injection. only some supplements to strengthen the poor dear. so in total, my vetinary fees costs a whopping $86.

brought the stoned chin home who just lied at the same spot of the carrier from the vet clinic to back home. he was too blur to even know what i'm feeding him and just drank the medication and water without any struggle. [this is super rare for any chinchilla case] so for the first half of the afternoon i was worried sick about him as his body suddenly jerked and he made these weird weird noises.... and not to mention he didnt move at all and only leaned to the side of the carrier. he could not even sit up properly. it was a truly heart wrenching experience and i felt so helpless then.

by evening, he showed more signs of improvement and slept in my air-conditioned bedroom for the next 2 nights. the 2nd day, the tip of one of his ears curled back slightly [must be the curse of bunny! :D] which i suspect that is the effect of the stroke and slowly, he managed to sit up by himself, then stand up on his legs only to escaping out of his carrier when i was using the computer, to find him standing next to me.

last night he was waaay too active for me and started moving about his carrier noisily and making his weird noises again. but when i checked on him, he looked fine! so after numerous times of waking me up with his noisiness, i decided to pick him up, and threw him back to his cage with the other 3 furry friends. all this at 4 something in the morning. ugh.... had to stay and check that the rest do not bully him though. and from this morning until now, he has made tremendous progress and is happily sitting on top of the tunnel like snoopy now. *phew!

thursday 23 Feb 2005
met bunny for dinner at lido and ate until the kfc zinger burger was going to spill out of my mouth... and the mad woman still wanted to go gelare and eat her waffles and ice cream! so we walked for a while at the isetan supermarket and saw a huge snow man made out of styrofoam with a nice proper set of scarfs and buttons.... and when we opened it, it was used to hold......... instant noodles. i swear the japanese think of everything on earth....... so anyway, bunny wanted to look for her drink in the cold section where both of us nearly freezed our toes off and she insisted on finding some jelly with NATA DE COCO inside.

during dinner, the local ipod seller sms-ed me to arrange to meet at far east to pass me the ipod that he was going to sell to me. so bunny and i walked there and sat at gelare until she was a little more hungry to stuff some ice cream down her stomach. i only managed 2 tiny sized bites of the waffle and ice cream. in the meantime, the ipod seller came down with the ipod and his 5 year old kid who was explaining to bunny something about the ipod. condition of the ipod was fairly good and the ear phones have not been used yet! and he gave a free rubbery protection for the ipod which retails for $59!!! waaaa... but so ugly. i want my chio arcylic casing lor....

ok i now need to figure out how to transfer songs............... wwwweeee......