25 August 2010 - Martin
August - the final month of the short South African winter and I can feel the dread of the approaching summer turning the blood in my veins to ice; in fact it simply fills me with incipient hysteria: if summer turned the blood in my veins to ice my problems would be solved - well - in that regard anyway. I'm not well; quite what's wrong with me I don't know: as all my sources of transport appear to have gone awol I've been unable to get into town and see the doc, but today - thank God - I feel that there's life in the old girl yet! The symptoms have been similar to tick bite; nausea, appalling ...read more

20 July 2010 - A Special Friend
My beautiful Candy died four days ago. She suddenly went down hill, although the previous week she had shown signs of improvement. I took her into the vet, who took more x-rays which showed that the tumour had increased in size and nothing more could be done for her. Up until then her quality of life had remained fulfilling. She came for her walks, lay in the sun and was content. But suddenly she changed, literally over night, and as I would never allow an animal in my care to suffer, I knew the time had come to say good-bye to my precious girl. I held her as her life ebbed away; she looked ...read more

12 June 2010 - Candy
I'm feeling very sad - again - but for a different reason. My beloved Candy is very ill and the outlook doesn't bode well. A few weeks ago she began having trouble keeping her food down. She'd eat half her dinner - with great gusto - then go outside, bring it up and start all over again, with the same result. I took her straight to the vet who discovered a 'mass' inside her rib cage which is pressing on her oesophagus and causing her to choke. It could be cancer, which I think we both suspect, or it could be a very virulent type of worm which I of course am hoping for. In order to find out ...read more