Hello one and all. We had another scare this last weekend but I think all is well again. We took our 9 fuzzies and our dog in for their yearly check ups and shots on Sat. and all were exhausted over their ordeal as they usually are but we cage them and let them sleep it off for at least half the day or until they seem more alert and willing to play. Buddy, our closterphobic (sp) one, who had been kept in a box when he was a kit, gets real stressed out when scruffed for ears and shots. He is now over 5 yr. of age and needs extra recouperation time. All he wanted to do was sleep. That's fine but by noon on Sunday we were concerned because he wasn't eating or drinking. He seemed alert but showed no desire to do a lot of moving around. I started him immediately on duck soup to eat and pedialyte and ensure to drink, and fed them to him in his cage so he wouldn't have to get up. He gladly took lots of it. This was weired but because of the circumstances we wanted to give him his space and recouperate from his major ordeal. By evening I was really concerned, took him out of his cage and he couldn't walk and he appeared to have a fever. His hind end wouldn't work. To make a long story short, we took him to the vet on Mon. and she put him on prednisone to clear his fever and any inflammation that may be there plus get rid of any pain that he may have been experiencing. This is Thurs. and he is walking and the fever is gone. He appears to be back to normal. I now have just one concern. The little brat won't go back to eating regular food and water. He's decided that he likes is new diet. I guess we'll just have to spoil him a little while longer and hopefully ween (sp) him back on to his regular diet. He's worth spoiling though. This brings something in mind that I think we need to all be reminded of. Get your kids used to duck soup and the like while they are well. This will make it easier when they are sick. As of even last year, Buddy hated this stuff. He was getting older and we knew there was no more pussy footing around. some day he was going to have to like this stuff and it may as well be sooner than later. We had been lucky up to this point. I force fed it to him a few days in a row last year because I knew that if he would only taste it, he would learn to like it. Sure enough, now he likes it and it payed off because now that he needed it, he gladly ate it and he didn't have to be stressed out even more because he hated the food. Get your kids used to it. You never know when you are going to need to feed it to them. Take care. Tryntje Miller. [Posted in FML issue 2301]