A warm feeling

Sign on ATM in Vancouver BC

Hello city life

Iris enjoyed the view from our hotel room in Vancouver last weekend

Idiot ringtone

There are only 2 TV shows that we watch the same night it airs -- Amazing Race and Lost. Last night Jim and I finally watched The Office and 30 Rock from last week. Both shows were very funny. You can even download the new ringtone that Jim had on the episode.

Mothers Day gift ideas

As usual the marketing geniuses at MLB have come up with an assortment of great gift ideas for all the moms in your life. No pink bats this year though

Iris is taking a late nap today

First Moose Sighting of the Season

He was hanging out in the section just above us.

Iris wasn't sure what to think but she definitely was keeping an eye on him

(photos courtesy of Kris Chick)

Iris's first Mariners game of '09. No score after 3.

Iris's new 'do

Iris got her first haircut this weekend

I'll post more photos later this week

Goodbye Freddy

Very sadly, we had our cat Fred put to sleep tonight. After a long stretch of low-level chronic kidney failure, Freddy's kidneys failed this week, starting on Monday, I'd guess.

He'd been pretty gimpy for a year or two but it seemed to get much worse this week & he was pretty immobile for the past few days, though he did somehow manage to drag himself up the stairs & jump up into our bed one last time today--that was where I found him this afternoon. When the vet checked him out today, all of his kidney readings were about 4 times higher than the upper limit for healthy readings. He has had long term kidney issues so we've been monitoring the levels for a few years but these numbers were way worse than they were just back at the end of January, which the vet said indicated kidney failure.  Plus his blood glucose level was well into the elevated range for diabetes, which we had long worried about with Freddy. Rather than subject him to a lengthy hospital stay to try and get the kidney and diabetes under control temporarily, we decided that it was time to say goodbye to our beloved Freddy.

It was a very sad day for all of us. Iris said bye-bye to Freddy too :(

Here's one of my favorite Fred photos. It was take about 4 years ago with one of my old cell phones (which is why it's so low-res) but I think it captures Fred's personality perfectly, his whole, "this is how I am & you love me or you don't, whatev!" attitude.

Goodbye Freddy. You'll be in our thoughts for a long time to come.