With Lilly passing away, and Norbert in the end stages of cancer, it has been somber around our house to say the least.  I tore down the two condos, put them in the garage, and then moved Norbert into my office since it is carpeted and would be easy for him to get around.

I started talking about going to a breeder to purchase a little Holland Lop after Norbert passed away.  I had decided I would only have one bunny going forward, since having two bunnies who hated each other like Norbert and Lilly had, was horrible to manage.  I  had also decided on a Holland Lop, since my first bunny, Duster, was a Holland Lop and was fabulous and friendly and outgoing, and I wanted that personality again.  Norbert and Lilly, who were both dwarfs, were great, but they were very standoffish.  They were fine being handled, and didn’t nip, bite, or try and get away, but you could tell they tolerated the handling, they didn’t enjoy it.  I loved them anyway, and let them have their space.  I always knew my next bunny, if there was a next bunny, would be a different breed and have a different personality.

Apparently, the “Animal Shelter Gods” heard me say “purchase” and “breeder” in the same sentence, because a week later BFJ called me from work (he is an animal control officer) saying, “you’ll never guess what I picked up stray today at the middle school”.  It turns out he had picked up a fairly young little lop, which had been running around in the bus lane.  Since I was heading out of town on business and would be passing by the shelter anyway, I offered to drop off a bag of bunny food, and take a “look”.

I arrived at the shelter and was soon standing in front of a cat cage in the clinic.  The cutest little black lop hopped to the front of the cage to check me out, took some food out of my hand, quickly decided I was no big deal, and then proceeded to dig in her litter box spewing the contents all over the place, after which she flopped out completely in the mostly empty box in utter adorableness.  Several things struck me:

1. She was completely unfazed at being in the shelter – amazing

2. She was very outgoing and friendly – yay!

3. She was young, probably just 4 months – yay!

I decided to take a few days to think about adopting her, but the short story is that two days later, BFJ dropped her off at my house after work, and since then it has been nothing but bunny love.

She is everything I wanted in a bunny, friendly, outgoing, and LOVES attention.  Her funny antics keep me laughing constantly.  The way she runs around in her corner of the living room jumping, playing, and shaking her little ears and doing happy little binky’s.

Even Ben is starting to understand the enchantment bunnies can have on you.  He thinks she’s funny too, and the fact she hops up right up to the side of the x-pen demanding pets from anyone who’s close enough to pet her, is giving him a different perspective of bunnydom.

For me, Zoe was just the shot of sunshine I needed, even though at the time I didn’t realize I needed it.

Welcome home Princess Zoe, our little ray of sunshine

I am excited about seeing the movie today, and the party going on tonight at the Bob Bullock History Museum sounds like fun.  Yay Star Trek!

Let me just tell you, 4 dogs, a bunny and a bird, means lots of laundry.  I washed all the dog beds, bunny beds, the birds bedding, and the cover that goes over the bird cage at night.  Then I lugged all the dog crates outside for a good scrub and air dry.  In between, I was running into the garage and bagging up the 20 pounds of duck necks I’d bought for the dogs as it was thawing out. (Can I just tell you I hate big frozen blocks of animals parts that I have to thaw and dig through?  YUCK!)  Once the crates were drying and most of the bedding was finished, I scrubbed out the bunny condo, collapsed it down, and moved it into the garage.  Then the dining room got vacuumed and mopped, all the dog beds were put back together, and the crates brought in from outside and put back.  Once that was done, my office where Norbert is now living, was vacuumed and his litter box cleaned, plus, I got him fed and medicated with both his antibiotic and pain meds.

Besides duck necks, I made veggie slop and thawed out a tube of beef organ blend, and got them partitioned into ice cube trays for easy small dog portioning day to day.  I thawed out a 20 pound tube of ground turkey, and got that reorganized into smaller portions, while also roasting a chicken for dinner, with spaghetti and a salad. I cleaned up the dinner mess, then fed the dogs, cleaned THAT mess up, and then FINALLY got a chance to read some of my new book.  Whew!

The good news?  All the dogs are clean and have clean beds to sleep in, my kitchen is clean, there is lots of frozen dog supplies accessible and ready for feeding, and I feel good that it’s all done.  Hopefully, next Sunday won’t be quite as busy.  Tonight?  The master bedroom and bathroom, and a continuation of laundry, except now it will be human laundry.

Well, it’s been 3 months, Lilly has passed on, and Norbert is now living free in my home office.  He is slower than he used to be, but he’s also 8 years old, which is senior for a bunny, and has one front leg he doesn’t use.  He is still eating good, and can get his move on quickly when I come in with his meals.  So now I’m beginning to have guilt.  I feel like I should have had his leg amputated.  It’s been three months and he’s still doing as well as he was in January.  Which is pretty good for an old bunny.  If I’d had it done, he would be recovered and and his fur would be growing in.

I talked to JH yesterday to get his thoughts since he tends to be my sounding board for things like this.  He doesn’t judge me about spending lots of money on what most people feel is “just a bunny”, but is honest if he thinks I should move forward or not based on the quality of life the animal in question will have.  I think I have decided to take Norbert to the vet when I get back from my business trip, and talk to the vet again and make a decision.  Right now, I’m leaning towards having the amputation done.  I think it will give him more room to move around, get rid of what is basically a useles leg, and get rid of that lump growing on his side.  Then, once the vet is in there, we can tell what the status of his cancer actually is, and get a better idea of time frames.

However, I’m still hesitating because am I doing this for him, or because I just lost Lilly, and thought of losing him so close behind her is terrifying?  Am I contemplating throwing all this medicine at him hoping for some kind of miracle, when really I should leave him in peace?  My biggest fear when I make these types of decisions for any of my animals, is am I doing it for them, or am I doing it because I’m a selfish human and can’t bear to let them go?

Thoughts?  Comments?

UPDATE:

The Vet agrees with the decision I made three months ago to not ampute Norberts front leg.  So we are going to leave him be.  On another note, since he has been so sneezy, and then got snotty while I was in Peru, we did a culture and started him on some antibiotics which seems to be helping.

My whole life, I have been a HUGE reader.  There is a scene in “Anne of Green Gables” (the movie) where Anne’s teacher, Miss Stacey catches her reading during geometry class, and her book gets confiscated. That was me, I had many books taken during class, though I always got them back at the end of the day.  (As a teacher how do you tell a kid she can’t read?)

I read anything and everything I could get my hands on, and my favorite book store was the “Book Nook” in Central Lake, Michigan.  We had a summer home there and when I was growing up I spent enormous amounts of time there talking to the guy who owned the store, and making piles of books I wanted to buy.  It was a used book store, and I loved the smells of the old books, and the towering shelves filled with stories waiting to be read.  Many mornings friends would call the cottage looking for me, and my mom would tell them I was in town at the book store.  When I got finished at the “Book Nook” I would spend the rest of the day at the end of the dock reading whatever treasures I’d purchased.

Well, the “Book Nook” has been gone for several years now.  I am living in Texas, and I only get back to the cottage once a year to read at the end of the dock.  Which meant that in the past several years my reading declined to the point where I was hardly reading at all.  About a year and a half ago, my friend ‘K’ pushed me back into the reading arena.  She is a huge reader, and was tired of the fact I wasn’t keeping up with her like I used to.

Well it worked, and for the past year and a half, I have been reading like a fiend, catching up for lost time, and I can’t believe I went that long not reading.  I am once again burying my nose in a book every night, who needs T.V. anyway, after dinner until bed time.  Since my books were starting to accumulate all over the house, my husband had this great idea to build me a “Book Nook” in the corner of the living room.  With a bunch of book shelves, and my favorite chair.  I’m in heaven.  It’s perfect, and was the greatest idea ever. However, my books are quickly out growing my shelves, so something will need to be done.  I haven’t decided quite what yet.  I’ll keep you posted.