My Muriel has been with me for 16 years (there are some photos on my
website, but she's hard to photograph - looks just like the cat on
the bag of Somerfield Fuller's Earth cat litter, for UK readers -
silver tabby shorthairs are popular with advertising photographers -
except she has deeper green eyes and is a bit fluffier).

She's got disseminated breast cancer - the primary was removed a year
ago - and doesn't seem to have long to live, but it's very hard to tell.
She hasn't lost much weight, but a few days ago developed a painful
right ear which seemed to be oozing a bit, and some weird coughs and
sneezes.  I wondered if she had pneumonia and this was the end.  But
after sleeping on our pillow last night and keeping me awake a lot
of the time with coughing fits, she came up to me today wanting to
lie on my chest (her favourite place) with hardly any breathing
troubles, and her ear trouble seems mostly gone too.  She sat looking
straight into my eyes from a few inches away and hypnotized us both
to sleep.

This kind of unpredictability is tough.  When Ishmael had cancer, he
just declined slowly and steadily, we could see exactly what was
happening.  But I really can't tell if Muriel's got days or months.

==============  j-c  ======  @  ======  purr . demon . co . uk  ==============
Jack Campin:  11 Third St, Newtongrange EH22 4PU, Scotland | tel 0131 660 4760
<http://www.purr.demon.co.uk/jack/>   for CD-ROMs and free | fax 0870 0554 975
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