Nimbus Rex

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Gatos Hot Tub

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Gilead Hosts a Racoon

This little nocturnal guy is out playing around in the middle of the day! Very unusual. I hope he is not sick! He is making quite a scene outside our little cafe!


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Ducks

These are some ducks that hang out in the marsh by the Bay Trail, where we both walk Maxine and feed the Project Bay Cats.

Project Bay Cats

This is one of the cats we visit and feed through Project Bay Cat. As you can see, he is happily fed and enjoying the grass and beautiful sunshine.

Key Lime Maxine Runs the Beach

Taj Mahal

Felix enjoys a morning snooze in the Taj Mahal.



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Max Runs on the Beach

On our long Sunday walk we found two little beaches where Max can go off leash. She surprised us by doing one of her long, fast sprints back and forth across the shore. She runs so fast it's hard to get a good picture!






Max's new favorite beach -



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Max Visiting Project Bay Cats

This is the bridge by our house where some of the cats from Project Bay Cats live. We took Max for a long walk yesterday.







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Lulu Gets Ready to Read the Sunday Paper

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Saturday

Was beautiful here, Maxine enjoyed a day in the park!



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In Loving Memory of Ellie Shilton-Lloyd

Here’s a few quick words about our diva, the queen of our house and our first baby. She had a great nose, and managed to catch her fair share of ground squirrels and gofers, although she always was a little surprised by that and never quite sure what to do with them. Although she was clearly the house alpha, she always wanted to hang out with the biggest un-neutered pit bulls at the park…we joked that she took after my sister in her propensity for liking men who would only be bad for her. Steinway, our boy dog, was the perfect canine pack mate for her, because he never challenged HER right to pick which couch to lie on and the fact that she should always walk on the right. My favorite game to play with her was to get the Audubon stuffed birds (with “real bird calls”) and squeak them from behind my back. Her puzzled, expressive face would scrunch up as she tried to figure out how a bird got in the house, and apparently was calling from my butt.

This picture is from Christmas 2010: hard to believe that she already had a well advanced brain tumor. We had noticed in the past month that she was getting a little more growly than usual, and was not as quick to jump in the car for trips to the park. We took her to the vets about 4 weeks ago, thinking it might be arthritis, and were prescribed zuberin. However, about a week ago she stopped eating as much, and started sleeping more. When we came home Sunday night, she was lying on the floor and wouldn’t get up, even for a walk. When she finally did get up, after much coaxing, it was obvious she was having trouble walking, and almost fell over. So we rushed her to the vet hospital. She stayed with them overnight and the next day, and they couldn’t find anything wrong, although she seemed to be in pain if you touched almost any part of her body. By Tuesday morning she was in obvious pain and crying out, so our vet got us in to UC Davis and we rushed her up there from the vet hospital she had been at. Even in the car ride, she had deteriorated greatly, and an MRI showed that she had a massive tumor in the center of her brain and it had metastasized to her spine - the docs were amazed that she hadn’t shown symptoms of severe impairment before now! The tumor was inoperable, so we asked them not to bring her out of the anesthesia from the MRI, as that would only bring her more pain, and said our good byes.

In loving memory of our companion of 11 years, we love you and will miss you!