I HAVE CUSHING'S DISEASE!

A dog with hair loss and a
potbelly due to Cushing's

On Monday, I had to spend another boring, icky day at the vet's office getting tested for Cushing's.  Today Dr. Griswald called Mom and said I "probably" have it.  But Mom and I think it's more than probable, because I have so many of the symptoms for it.  Well, except Dr. Griswald said there were some other things that I might have instead, but since those things are likely to be worse than Cushing's, Mom and I like to think that Cushing's is what I have.

So we have been doing some in-depth research on this illness, and I am going to try to tell you something about it.  But the information we read had lots of big, long, medical words in it, so it's a little hard to understand, at least for me.  And Mom only went as far as Biology 102 in college, so it's a little hard for her to understand, too.  But we think we have mostly figured out how this disease works, so here's our explanation.

Adrenal glands

There are these glands, and they are called the adrenal glands, and they sit right on top of your kidneys.  And what these glands do is they make this hormone stuff called cortisol.  And what cortisol does is it helps your body deal with inflammation and stress and allergies.

But sometimes a little tumor starts growing, and it might be on one of your adrenal glands, or else it might be in your pituitary gland, which is way up in your head.  And this tumor screws everything up so that your adrenal glands make way too much cortisol.  Then what happens is you might get a bunch of symptoms, and here's a list of them:

  1.  Hair loss
  2.  Thin skin
  3.  Potbelly
  4.  Loss of muscle mass
  5.  Not having any energy
  6.  Excessive panting
  7.  Enlarged liver

  8.  Drinking more water
  9.  Peeing more
10.  Being hungry all the time
11.  Getting diseases and infections because your immune system doesn't work right

Anyway, about 80% of Cushing's is caused by a benign tumor on the pituitary gland, and 15% is caused by a tumor on the adrenal gland, and 5% is because the dog was taking steroids or other drugs for too long, like happened to my brother Gabe.  And out of the 15% that is caused by adrenal tumors, about 50% of those tumors are cancerous.

Pituitary gland

The scientific name for Cushing's is hyperadrenocorticism, which is a hard word to remember and also to spell, so it's easier to just say Cushing's.  The reason it's called Cushing's is because in 1932, the first doctor to describe the clinical syndromes was an American surgeon named Harvey Cushing.

The next thing I have to do is I have to go on Monday to spend most of another boring day at the veterinary clinic.  I have to go on Monday because that is the day the radiologist comes, and she is going to do an ultrasound on me.  This is mostly to look at my adrenal glands and see if they have any tumors on them, because if they don't, then my Cushing's is what you call "pituitary dependent."  If my Cushing's is "adrenal dependent," the doctor can maybe fix it by doing surgery and taking out the tumor.  Or maybe they take out the whole adrenal gland.  I'm not sure how it works.  But one of Aunt Cheryl's dogs, Gracie, had this done to her, and now she is all cured of Cushing's.

But like I mentioned before, only 15% of Cushing's is due to a tumor on the adrenal gland.  If mine is caused by a tumor on my pituitary gland, I will just have to take medicine for the rest of my life, which we hope will make me feel better and make my hair grow back.  But there can be some side effects sometimes.  Which is better than not treating it at all, because if you don't treat it, here's what you can end up with:  hypothyroidism, pancreatitis, diabetes, seizures, hypertension, congestive heart failure, blood clots, and liver and kidney failure.  Yuck.

Mostly it's middle-aged and older dogs that get Cushing's, with an average age of 10.  I don't like being lumped in with all those "old" dogs, since I am only 8-1/2, but nobody asked my opinion.  Some people think that girl dogs get Cushing's more than boy dogs do, and also that spayed or neutered dogs get it more often, but these things have not been proven for sure.  Some breeds seem to get Cushing's more than others, including poodles, Yorkies, beagles, Boston terriers, boxers, dachshunds, German shepherds, golden retrievers, Labrador retrievers, Scottish terriers, and most other kinds of terriers.

Another dog with hair loss
and a pot belly due to Cushing's

So that's my sort of simplified explanation of Cushing's, and I hope I didn't say stuff that was all wrong because of not having a medical degree or anything like that.  After I have my ultrasound on Monday, I will probably have more news for you.

Oh, and Dr. Griswald said I don't exactly have leptospirosis, but I might have been exposed to it, so I have to go back in 2 or 3 weeks and get tested for that again.  Sigh.  It's always something!

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CASSAVA

The cassava is a very useful and important plant in places like South America, Indonesia, and especially in Africa, where my distant basenji cousins live.  When it grows, it makes a bunch of tuber-type roots under the ground, sort of like potatoes.  This is the part of the plant that is eaten the most, but you can also eat the cassava leaves or feed them to your cattle and goats.

The scientific name of the cassava is Manihot esculenta.  There is evidence that people were already eating wild cassava plants in central Brazil all the way back to 10,000 years BCE.  In the 16th century, Portuguese traders brought cassava and maize to Africa, and these plants soon became important crops for the African people to grow.

Cassava is also called manioc.  In South America, it is called yuca, but this is not the same as yucca, which is a different plant.  Cassava likes to grow in places where the weather is hot.  You can start new plants by just cutting the stems of old plants and sticking them in the ground.  It is an easy crop to grow, and it will do okay even if the soil is poor or there is a drought.  Cassava is full of calories, protein, fat, carbohydrates, calcium, phosphorus, iron, and vitamins B and C.  In some parts of the world, cassava is the main thing people have to eat, and if they didn't have it, they might starve.

You can make all sorts of things out of cassava, including starch, flour, tapioca, and an alcoholic drink.  Every ethnic group has different traditional dishes they cook with this plant, but usually they are some kind of bread, cake, pudding, or porridge.  Cassava leaves can be pounded and made into a sauce or stew.  Just don't eat cassava raw because it can make you very sick or even kill you!  The reason for this is that cassava has cyanide in it, and if you don't cook it or soak it or ferment it before you eat it, you can get pancreatitis or goiter or partial paralysis.

Cassava porridge

Cassava leaves are used as a medicine to treat headaches, high blood pressure, pain, arthritis, fever, wounds, diarrhea and beri-beri.  The boiled bark can help you get rid of intestinal parasites.  Also you can make cassava into laundry starch or glue.  The tops of the cassava plants can be cut when they are still young and then dried in the sun for a couple of days.  After that, they can be fed to livestock, and they are a good source of protein and roughage.

Nigeria produces the most cassava in the whole world.  Many farmers who used to grow maize now grow cassava because cassava has a bigger yield per acre, and it will grow even if there is not much rain.  Also there is a bunch of research going on to make cassava into an ethanol fuel to burn instead of oil and gas.  And at Ohio State University, scientists are using genetic engineering to grow cassava plants with bigger tubers.  They have made some plants already with roots that are 2.6 times larger than regular cassava roots.  If more, bigger cassavas can be grown, then there will be more food for hungry people.  And that's a good thing.

Cassava heavy cake

I don't know if any of my basenji cousins ever eat cassava or not, but maybe sometimes their people give them some porridge or stew, if there is any to spare.  Personally, I think the porridge would be yummy, but best of all would be the cassava cake.  I think I'll ask Mom and see if she will make some for us.

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CESKY TERRIERS

Cesky Terriers were invented in Czechoslovakia by a man named Frantisik Horak.  They are also called Bohemian Terriers, but that is because they come from the area of Bohemia, and not because they live a Bohemian lifestyle.  Cesky is what the Czech people call Bohemia, in case you were wondering, like I was.  And the way you pronounce cesky is "CHESS kee."  You have to pretend there is an "h" after the "c," even though there isn't one.  Anyway, the Cesky Terrier is one of the 3 newest breeds that the AKC just recognized in June.

So here's how the breed got started.  Mr. Horak, who lived in Czechoslovakia, wanted a dog that could hunt in packs in the forests of Bohemia, and that could also get into skinny places such as dens and burrows.  So he crossed the Sealyham Terrier with the Scottish Terrier.  And by 1949, he had a terrier that could be used to hunt foxes, rats, rabbits, ducks, pheasants, and even wild boar.

The Cesky Terrier has short legs, drop ears, and a natural tail.  It is a tough, muscular dog with a long, silky coat.  The coat colors are usually some shade of gray, all the way from charcoal to platinum.  Puppies are born with black, black-and-tan, or brown coats.  Then by the time they are 2 or 3, they have their lighter adult coat color.

The height of a Cesky is between 10 and 13 inches at the withers, and the ideal weight is between 16 and 22 pounds.  Ceskys are groomed so that they have a bushy beard, mustache, and eyebrows.  Their hair is cut with clippers and not by stripping the old coat out by hand, which is how a lot of terriers are groomed if they are being shown.  A pet Cesky has to be clippered about 4 times a year, and a show dog has to be done more often.  The hair is cut short on the top, with longer hair on the stomach and legs.

Cesky Terriers make good family dogs because they like children.  They are calmer than some other kinds of terriers, but they are still playful and fun.  Of course, since they are terriers, they like to chase things and they also love to dig.  Ceskys are smart and easy to train, and they also make good watch dogs.  They can be a little timid around strangers, so they need to have good socialization when they are puppies.

The only health problem that Ceskys have is that they might get something called Scottie Cramp Syndrome.  This makes them walk in a funny way, but it is not the kind of disease that you can die from.

A Cesky groomed for the show ring

At the time when the breed was being developed and was getting to be more popular, the Communists were in charge of Czechoslovakia.  So when Mr. Horak kept getting lots of mail about Ceskys, the secret police got worried and visited him to see what he was up to.  In 1963, the breed was recognized by the international dog show group, the FCI.  By the 1980s, breeders started thinking that their Ceskys didn't look like the original dogs that Mr. Horak bred, so they crossed them again with Sealyham Terriers.  In 1987 the first Ceskys were brought to the U.S.  Mr. Horak died in 1997, by his new breed was pretty well established by then.  It is now recognized by all the major kennel clubs in the English-speaking world.

So that is the story of how we got Cesky Terriers.  You will probably start to see more of them around, now that the AKC has recognized them.  For some reason, people seem to like those short-legged terrier types with beards that drag in their food and water dishes.  But if you ask me, basenjis are much, much cuter!

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MY LIFE AS A CAT, by Charlie

Chloe and I have been living here for 14 months now, and we are making reasonably good progress toward our goal of taking over the household.  Of course, the main obstacle continues to be Mom.  We are trying to train her to be our slave, but she is very obstinate and slow, in terms of adopting the proper attitude and learning the proper skills. But we cats have lots of patience, besides having 9 lives, so we are sure to prevail in the end.








Ever since we first came here -- well, ever since we started coming out of our room on a regular basis -- we have felt it was one of our main responsibilities to check and make sure Mom is still alive, especially when she is lying in bed.  So we often stick our faces in Mom's face to find out if she is breathing.  So far, she always has been, which is good, because we don't want her to wake up dead someday, like our first mom did.

The only problem is that Mom does not really like a nice kitty face sniffing at her in the middle of the night.  She says our whiskers tickle her and make her have to rub her face so that the tickly feeling will go away.  This seems silly to me, but that's what she says.

I guess it goes without saying that life would be lots better without those dumb dogs around, but I don't know how we can get rid of them, so we just have to make them at least respect us.  The three boy dogs are really not too terrible, and they pretty much ignore Chloe and me, but that crazy Piper is always coming up and sniffing at me like she wants to be best buddies or something.  I find that notion totally preposterous, so I am forced to hiss at her to make her keep her distance.

Barry is maybe the nicest of the dogs, in spite of calling himself the Alpha Dog.  I even let him get on the bed with me sometimes, or I sit on the office floor just a few feet from where he is sleeping.  So far, nothing terrible has happened in either circumstance, so I'm beginning to think it might be safe to do these kinds of things.

I like to sleep with Mom at night, although I don't usually spend the whole night in bed with her.  In the winter, I liked curling up under the covers with her, but now it is very hot summer weather, and cuddling is not such a fun activity.  But with the ceiling fan running, it's usually cool enough that I can sleep next to Mom without getting overheated.  Chloe sleeps with Mom sometimes, too, but not nearly as much as she did in the winter.

And speaking of Chloe, she continues to be naughty, but she's more careful now about doing her naughty stuff when Mom can't catch her at it.  Every morning when Mom and the dogs first get up, Mom opens the back door to let the dogs out, and Chloe runs outside, too.  She used to just sneak out a few feet from the door, but now she goes all the way across the patio.  The reason she goes out there is to eat some grass.  It's like every single morning she has to have her little grass salad before breakfast.  At bedtime, she likes to go out on the patio and hunt bugs under the floodlight.  Mom is trying to be more careful not to shut Chloe out of the house.  I don't usually go outside, myself, although I have ventured cautiously out on a few occasions.  Mostly I like to go in the basement when Mom is doing laundry.  One night she didn't notice I was down there, and she shut the door and then went to bed.  I had to meow and meow until she came and let me out of the basement.

Anyway, that is just another example of how much training we still need to do with Mom.  If she had any good sense, she would just leave the basement door open all the time, so that we could go down there anytime and snoop among the cobwebs.  Another training project we've undertaken is trying to get Mom out of bed earlier in the mornings, but we've only had moderate success with this.  At least she now gets up at 6:30 instead of 7:00, but it took a lot of work to make even that small change in the daily schedule.  Those lazy dogs don't seem to care how late Mom sleeps -- well, except for that tall dog, Nicky.  He usually needs to go outside and pee by 6:30, so he's actually been a pretty good ally in helping us train Mom.

I could go on at some length about all the goals Chloe and I have, but I think I will leave those for another blog entry.  I just remembered that Piper said I should tell you that she is having to spend the whole day again today at the vet's office, so you had better feel sorry for her (which I don't, personally, but if you want to, go ahead).  Today Piper is getting tested for Cushing's Disease.  I'm not sure why it's an all-day affair, but it is.

The results of Piper's bloodwork from last week didn't tell us exactly what is wrong with her, but Dr. Griswald talked to an internist, and the internist said maybe Piper has leptospirosis.  So the lab is testing for that, too.  Mom read about leptospirosis on the internet, and she didn't think it sounded like what Piper has, but what does she know?  She's not a veterinarian, after all.  The results of Piper's urinalysis didn't show much of anything except a low specific gravity, which means that Piper's urine is dilute and watery.  The bacteria culture hasn't finished growing yet, so we don't know if Piper has a UTI or not.  If you want my opinion, I think she's basically lazy and is just trying to get some attention.  But don't tell her I said that!

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CHINGLISH

Chinglish is what happens when someone who usually speaks a language like Chinese or Japanese translates something into English.  Most of the time, you can understand what they are saying, but it might come out sounding kind of funny because they use the wrong words or put words together in the wrong order.  Mom says that when she writes something in Spanish, it is probably sounds just as funny to people who grew up speaking Spanish.

Anyway, Mom has some pictures from when she was in China, and she also found some examples of Chinglish on eBay, and she said I could share some of them with you today.  So here goes!

This was a sign on a railing:

And here is one on a shop:

This is from eBay:

As you know, the Chinese has long history around the world. You can see this item was carved very wonderful. This item was craved all by hand, so wonderful item ! It is a typical artware of that time. And it is very important and significance for investigating the old chinese culture. if you win it you will get good lucky. it is very wonderful. It is in good condition, no crack and no chip. Look at the pictures you can see the shape is very well. If you are Chinese antiques collector, please do not miss so better chance to get it.

And so are these:

Personal Introduce: 
I am an honest businessman. I believe that Honesty and credit standing is the best policy. Although I am an new seller on ebay,  But I have played Antique for many years. I live in Shanghai of china, And I have a big antique store in China, we always personally went to countryside for collect country Antique. So my cost is cheaper than others. I would like to make much friends by ebay for my future business. If there's a chance we can cooperate, I will give you a good price.  Thanks.

My dear friend. Very grateful to you and your purchase selection. If you are satisfied with the item received. Please give me a positive feedback, if you are not satisfied with the goods received or break. Please do not let negative or neutral feedback for me, This is very important to me. Feedback = life! . Please send an e-mail told me. I can answer you within 24 hours. You will receive a refund of funds (in full). Thank you very much. Much blessing you and your family. I am honest. Please believe me and continue to buy. If you have any questions. Please E - mail to me.

Here is something very scary-sounding that was for sale on eBay:

Formidably Execution Bronze Arrowhead

And this one is for old people:

Orient The elderly Walk Copper Dragon Head Crutches

Here is one more sign:

If you like signs and stuff like this, you can find a whole bunch of them at the engrish.com site.  And I hope today you will stay away from naked flame and get good lucky!

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DODO BIRDS

Dodos have been extinct for a long time, like since about 1690.  They are very famous for being extinct, so people say things like "dead as a dodo" or "go the way of the dodo."  There's a lot we don't know for sure about dodo birds, like whether they were fat, like in most of the pictures of them, or whether they were really thinner and more able to run fast.

We don't even know for sure where the name dodo came from.  The Dutch people who were the first ones to describe the birds, called them walghvogels, which means "wallow birds" or "loathsome birds."  They called them this because dodos weren't very yummy to eat.  Later on, the name dronte was used for the birds, and this word is still used for them in some languages today.  But the word dodo itself might have come from the Dutch word dodoor ("sluggard") or dodaars ("knot-arse").  The birds had a knot of feathers on their hind ends, and that is why they were called "knot-arse," which I think is a very funny word.  Mom says it sounds like somebody who is anal retentive, whatever that means.  But anyway, some dictionaries say that dodo comes from the old Portuguese word doudo, which means "fool" or "crazy."  And this might be right, because nowadays we call people dodos if we think they are kind of dumb or silly.

Dodo birds lived in just one place, which was the island of Mauritius.  And in case you don't know where this island is, I found a nice map to show you that it is in the Indian Ocean, east of the big island of Madagascar, which is off the east coast of Africa.  No one is totally sure how the dodos came to be there, but scientists have done a bunch of DNA testing, and what they found out was that dodos are very distant relatives of some pigeons from Asia.  So they think that some of these migrating pigeons got lost on their way to Africa, and they decided to just stay in Mauritius.  Which was a very good decision at the time, because there was plenty of fruit to eat and no predators.  And over time, the dodos got so they couldn't fly, because they didn't need to, and they made their nests on the ground.

The dodos were about 3.3 feet tall, and they weighed 44 pounds.  When the first explorers arrived in Mauritius in the 1500s, they thought the dodos were stupid because they weren't afraid of humans.  But the dodos might not have been stupid at all.  I think they were probably very clever and curious, and they   just didn't know they were supposed to afraid of humans.  In 1606, Cornelis Matelief de Jonge wrote descriptions of Mauritius and the animals and plants there.  Here's what he said about the dodo:

Blue parrots are very numerous there, as well as other birds; among which are a kind, conspicuous for their size, larger than our swans, with huge heads only half covered with skin as if clothed with a hood. These birds lack wings, in the place of which 3 or 4 blackish feathers protrude. The tail consists of a few soft incurved feathers, which are ash coloured. These we used to call ' Walghvogel,' for the reason that the longer and oftener they were cooked, the less soft and more insipid eating they became. Nevertheless their belly and breast were of a pleasant flavour and easily masticated.

When people started coming to Mauritius to live, they brought dogs, pigs, cats, rats, and macaques with them.  Macaques are a type of monkey that usually lives in Asia or Africa.  Anyway, all these new animals found the nests of the dodo birds, which were on the ground and easy to get to, and ate the eggs and baby birds.  Meanwhile, the humans hunted the dodos, but they might not have done a whole lot of that since dodos weren't very tasty.  But what the humans also did was they cut down the forests where the dodos liked to live.  And after a while, the dodo went extinct.

But then guess what else happened.  There is this tree in Mauritius, and it is called the Calvaria tree, and it lives for hundreds of years.  And many, many years after the dodos went extinct, people started noticing that the Calvaria seeds weren't sprouting, so when the old trees died, there were no new ones to take their place.  And finally people figured out that this was happening because there were no more dodos around to eat the Calvaria fruit and poop out the seeds.  Because it turned out that while the seeds were inside the dodos, their hulls got partly digested, and this made it so the seeds could sprout.  But then somebody figured out that turkeys could eat the Calvaria fruit and this would help the seeds sprout, just like what used to happen with the dodos.  So the Calvaria trees did not go extinct, even though they almost did.

So that is the sad story of the dodos that went extinct, and also the story of the Calvaria trees that didn't.  And it all goes to show that when you mess with one part of nature, you might be messing up something else that you never meant to mess up at all!

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MY HORRIBLE, ICKY, BORING DAY

Yesterday I had to spend the WHOLE DAY at Dr. Patricia's office, sitting around in a cage.  And the reason I had to do that was because they wanted some pee from me, and they wanted to take it out of my bladder with a needle.  I hate it when they do that because it hurts!  But they were determined to do it because Mom thinks I have a UTI, which stands for urinary tract infection, and that's something else that hurts!

The worst part was that I had already been to Dr. Patricia's office the day before yesterday, which was Monday.  And when we went there, we had to wait like an hour before we saw the doctor because there were two emergencies.  And then when we saw the doctor, it was not Dr. Patricia.  It was a different, new doctor who just started working there, and her name is Dr. Griswald.  We don't know what her first name is, so we have to call her by her last name.  I don't even know if she has a first name, but Mom says it very likely that she does.

Anyway, Mom took me to see Dr. Griswald because Mom is worried about me, as usual.  Mom has been worrying for a long time about how thin my hair is getting, and also about how I don't like to go for walks or do much of anything except sleep and eat and write blog entries.  Also I am losing muscle mass, and I can't jump up on the bed and on other high places, but I can get on the sofa just fine.  Then last week, Mom suddenly noticed that I had these sunken places above my eyes.  Gabe used to have that, and the doctor said it was because he had been taking prednisone for several years.  But I don't take prednisone.  So Mom got all worried and made an appointment for me at Dr. Patricia's office.

When Mom told Aunt Cheryl in an email about all my symptoms, Aunt Cheryl said maybe I have Cushings Disease, and she sent a link for Mom to read about Cushings.  Which is what Mom did, and sure enough, I have a whole bunch of the symptoms of Cushings.  So when Dr. Griswald was examining me, Mom said she wondered if I might have Cushings.  But Dr. Griswald said there were several things that could cause my symptoms, so she wanted to get a bunch of blood work done first, before she tested me for Cushings.  She said she was the most concerned about my flabby muscles and also about my UTI.  Then after that, Nurse Alison dragged me into the back room and took a bunch of blood out of me.  They also tried to get some urine, but I didn't have any for them just then, which is why I had to go back yesterday.

So we don't know what's going on with me yet because the blood test results won't come back until maybe Thursday.  But I just have to say that I think it would be much better for Mom to spend her money on dog treats instead of on having me get stuck with needles!

But that's enough about me, at least for the moment, because now I'm going to talk about Nicky, who also had to spend the day at the vet's office yesterday.  Nicky had a little growth kind of thing on the underside of his tail, and Dr. Patricia thought that the growth thing should be cut off.  So that's what happened to Nicky yesterday.  And now he has a pretty blue bandage, which makes me feel kind of jealous, because I wish I had a pretty bandage on my tail, except I think I would like pink better.

Anyway, yesterday evening, Nicky just kind of hung out and slept on the living room floor, with his little blue bandage on.  Of course, most evenings he sleeps on the living room floor, so the only thing that was very different was that he had a blue tail.  Saturday he has to go back and get his bandage changed.  Mom is not supposed to take it off of him because it is meant to keep poop from getting into his wound.  We don't know how many stitches he has, because we cannot look under the bandage.

Now I will just tell you one more thing, and it's very sad.  My mom's friend, Aunt Karen, had a golden retriever named Dodgie, and he died on Monday from cancer.  It was even sadder because Aunt Karen was in New York, visiting her sister, and when she left Kansas City, she didn't even know that Dodgie had cancer.  The vet thought he just had a pinched nerve in his neck, but it turned out to be a nasty tumor, and the cancer had got into other parts of his body, too, but nobody knew about it until it was too late.

So now Dodgie is at the Rainbow Bridge, with lots of other dogs and cats, including Gabe.  And maybe someday we will all get to see each other again.

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