All good

15 days post-op for Colin the Beagle, and it’s good news. The stitches are out, and while there’s still a bit of healing to do, the vet is amazed by her progress. She’s putting weight on the bad leg, the good – ok, “better” – leg seems to be holding up well, and the biggest issue is now over-confidence and trying to do too much too soon.

She’s also lost a couple of kilos and looks sleek and mean, and the stitches coming out this morning meant that she could have a bath as well, which is something we’ve all been looking forward to.

Incredibly, with just two weeks gone, it’s like we’ve got our old beagle back already.

Thus, we’re off to Agulhas for a couple of days to celebrate, and walk – gently – around the village.
Check the ‘Gram and on here for updates.

Have a great weekend!

Beagle update

Many of you have asked for a beagle update and I feel somewhat duty bound to supply one. As her mobility improves, and her dressings come off, we’re having to employ the “cone of shame” more and more.

Not actual footage

She’s not impressed. Generally, she has that kind of look that says “When I am Queen, you will be first against the wall”, and generally, it’s aimed at me.

But aside for the misery of the cone, things are going well. She’s definitely moving around a lot more, but we still have to be careful that she doesn’t take off after a cat or a hadeda in the back garden.

Most of the time though, this is her: dozing and recuperating, mostly spaced out on her various painkillers. But she’s putting pressure on her bionic leg and she’s more concerned about the cone than her repaired knee.

Which I guess is good.

It’s another week and a bit before the stitches come out and she can lose the comedy headgear. Building her strength after that will be tough. Building her trust in us again might be even harder.

Back home

Thanks for all the messages about the beagle. We picked her up from the hospital this morning and she’s happily dozing – smashed off her face on painkillers – in her favourite basket.

Lots of hard work to come with recovery and rehabilitation, but we’ll do our best with her.

Also got permission from the team to head down to Agulhas: she might as well recover there as anywhere else, and we could all do with a few days away after a busy and stressful week.

So far, so good

We were all a bit totes emosh taking the beagle out to Paarl this morning for her op. But the news is good: things went well and she’s come around safely after her procedure. Some minor complications therein, but nothing huge, so it’s looking positive for just a couple of nights away from home.

What does that mean for our New Year plans? Well, let’s see. But more on that tomorrow.

So while we wait, life goes on here.

One child is off partying in the Waterfront: in December, nogal. There were only a couple of positives about this: I used Admyt and got a freebie, and we took the opportunity (since we were in town dropping said child off, anyway) to knock out a gentle 8km along the Prom.
Very busy. Very hot. Very sunny. Would not advise.

Safely back and straight into the pool, and now the only thing I still need to do this evening is to go into town and do a fetch and carry from the Waterfront. Hopefully all of the traffics will have gone by then, and I can just enjoy a nice drive into the sunset.

And back.

Op

Fair play to our local vets. They opened at 8am after the Christmas break, the beagle was in their rooms by half past, and by 1pm, she’d been x-rayed and we’d been given some vastly expensive options to get her repaired. We came home, had a quick family discussion, made a decision, rang the vet back, and boom: the beagle is off to Paarl for her op tomorrow morning.

In the meantime, she has been mostly sleeping after her sedation earlier, only raising her head for a biscuit and only drunkenly wandering into the kitchen for a bit of gravy.

But there is clearly a bit more energy returning as the medication wears off, so at least she’ll get a good meal in this evening ahead of the nil by mouth of tomorrow morning.

This should be a routine op, with a couple of days in hospital and a few weeks of rehab. But please hold thumbs for this next installment of Project Colin.