Hello All:
 
The halls of Wyrdhaven are dark tonight.  On March 7, 1997, at 4:17 PM, our
eldest and first male ferret Zebulon Pike left this Earth to pass over the
Rainbow Bridge.
 
Zeb was just shy of 7 years old at the time of his death.  He was the first
male ferret we took in, and third overall (after Missy and Newone).  He was
a beautiful silver mitt with sparkling red eyes.  He loved playing in
plastic trash bags and scarfing all of the Nutrical he could beg.
 
His health had generally been excellent throughout his life, until February
of last year.  That was when a vicious strain of strep swept through
Wyrdhaven, taking the life of our beloved First Ferret (Missy) and nearly
killing Zeb in the process.
 
Zeb recovered from the strep, though it took considerable time...we thought
we were going to lose him several times throughout March and April of 1996.
The nerves in his right rear leg never did work properly after the
infection, causing his once elegant ferret gait to turn into a stumble that
greatly offended his dignity.  Furthermore, the disease seemed to aggravate
his insulonoma, turning him into a full-fledged hypoglycemic.  With his
blood sugar dipping precariously low at times, we learned to monitor his
eating habits and, when necessary, to give him dextrose shots to bring his
blood sugar levels back up to normal.
 
He *really* didn't like the shots.
 
Zeb did fairly well throughout the summer and winter of 1996, but age and
his advancing insulonoma cancers began to take their toll by January of this
year.  He got shakier, his rear legs got less reliable, and finally he had a
hypoglycemic attack in mid-January that left him blind.  This offended his
dignity more than nearly anything else, as now he couldn't see his food, and
the trouble with his legs prevented him from walking to it very realiably.
We moved him into our bedroom, and once he learned the layout of the room he
got by okay, finding his food and water with little trouble (weasels have
GOT to be the smartest animals on the planet).
 
At noon on Friday Steve came home and found Zeb in the midst of a major
hypoglycemic seizure.  Several injections of dextrose did nothing to bring
him out of it...they merely lessened the severity of the attacks...and
Colleen and Steve finally decided it was time to let Zeb go.  We took him to
our vet (Dr. Lena Roeder..best in all of Colorado) and she put him down.  He
died in Colleen's arms at 4:17 PM, and we buried him next to Missy in the
flower bed this evening.
 
He will be missed.
 
Steve and Colleen
Continually Matching Wits with Newone, Minx, Puck, Taz, Scamp, Ranger, and
Rosie
Waiting on the Other Side:  Missy, Ripple, Slinky, and Zebulon Pike
 
+==========================================================================+
|                                                        _                 |
| Steven Woodcock                                  _____C .._.             |
| Senior Software Engineer, Gameware          ____/     -___/              |
| Lockheed Martin Real3D                     <____/-_----_-    "Ferretman" |
| Phone:   719-597-5413                                                    |
| E-mail:  [log in to unmask] (Real3D), [log in to unmask] (Wyrd Wyrks)    |
| Web:     http://www.cris.com/~swoodcoc/wyrdhaven.html (Top level page)   |
|          http://www.cris.com/~swoodcoc/ai.html        (Game AI page)     |
|          http://www.cris.com/~swoodcoc/software.html  (AI Software page) |
| Disclaimer: My opinions in NO way reflect the opinions of                |
|             the Lockheed Martin Real3D--get *serious*                    |
+==========================================================================+
[Posted in FML issue 1866]