A fond farewell

Yesterday was quite tough, though not so very bad in the end.

It all  happened so swiftly. I had thought that Treacle had gone downhill badly at the weekend and had tried to discuss letting him go with Mr L, who was maintaining that Treacle was improving. We had in the end to agree to differ and I made a deal with my beloved to review the situation on Wednesday and if either one of us was swayed in either direction we would take Treacle in on Friday for the appropriate course of action: check on progress plus further meds, or put him to sleep.  Overall, I judged a strong reluctance to listen to my advice.

On Monday I was surprised to be told that we were booked in at the vets the next day. I spent some time in wondering how things would go and how to deal with it. I suggested that we  ask the vet to tell us honestly if there were any signs of improvement or if we should just pull up stumps.

It was a chill day, the sun being shrouded in mist and low cloud. We had booked the car onto the boat, so Treacle was able to travel in comfort.

It was only on the boat that Mr L told me that he had come around to my opinion and agreed that the poor boy was getting worse and needed to be freed.

On disembarking in Kirkwall we went straight to our vet and were immediately shown in to the clinical room. The vet enquired how Treacle was doing but even as we were bringing her up to date she was already listening to his heart and lungs. She just came straight out with it and said that it was time and I was so very relieved that she had done that and pre-empted any discussion.

It was very professionally and sensitively done. The syringe was filled almost before we had finished nodding our heads.

He went down without a fight, as though he was grateful to embrace his sleep, and was dead before his head met the table. I have not seen an animal do that before, they normally struggle for life and take their time. Treacle clearly could not wait, bless him.

There were a few tears but it didn’t take long for feelings of sadness to be replaced by relief. I felt quite light spirited and happy after a short while. I was really pleased to know that my boy was no longer suffering.

My, how we shall miss our wicked black boy!

Birsay Farmers, Tesco and Lidl kept us busy and our minds occupied and we treated ourselves to lunch at Helgi’s in order not to have to cook as well as put shopping away when we got home

It was busy in Kirkwall and we had a hard time fathoming why the car parks were full. In Helgi’s I noted the number of visitors about. So early in the season? I mean it isn’t even the season yet, let alone early.  Then I realised that they are probably up here for the Eclipse – we are to get 98% totality. (Mr L poo-poohed my theory but retracted in the evening after reading this at the Orcadian. HAH!)

We coped with our stress in our usual manner and had a candlelit soak in a hot bath then watched silly telly (The Bridge II) on the laptop in bed whilst consuming a measure of alcohol and an inappropriate number of empty calories.

I had hoped to go out and photograph the aurora but the mist persisted all night and we saw none of the magnificent display that others had. It was possible to tell that the aurora was there only by virtue of reading comments on Facebook and determining that actually, it was not at all dark outside. The cloud had a luminous quality.

Today I am making a Beef Balti à  la Hairy Bikers (!). The sun is breaking through the mist at last and if aurora conditions repeat tonight we may have some chance of seeing it. Not so the eclipse on Friday: “Overcast”

My efforts to copy my Blips here continue but I think Dreamhost are throttling my php jobs. It’s taking a long time to get the task done but I should be finished later today.

The news on Blip is potentially good and Polaroid are set to buy the site. It should live on at least for now but it’s really a question of whether I wish to stay. Blipfoto was worth supporting as a friendly small Scots enterprise. As part of Polaroid, it may not generate the same sense of loyalty.