Tuesday, November 08, 2005
That's a chicken-lovin' hamster...
So far, there doesn't seem to be much difference in Tink's glucose levels. I just tested her yesterday, and her ketones are still super-high, and the glucose looked to be down just slightly. I think I'm going to try to find a way to post her test results here. Maybe I can put it in my "profile". Some way, anyway, to keep an online record of them....
Today I found her chewing on her basket-house again. She won't chew her wooden chew-sticks and she won't eat her Timothy hay, but she will chew wire and eat her basket-house. I just don't get it. I assume the basket is ok for her, being made of dried grass or reeds or some such thing. I'm also assuming that she wouldn't eat it if it was bad for her. (Do I assume too much?) She ate the whole top of the basket that way, actually. Maybe it's time to get her some new veggies.
I think I'm going to try to feeding her Glipizide twice a day, now. I'm not sure that once a day is cutting it. And if the ER part of it is ruined by the cutting of the tabs, then I probably need to feed it to her more often anyway....
It's so mysterious to me that she seems to like the Glipizide. She used to fight against drinking broth with fennugreek powder in it, but this stuff she laps right up. I'm surprised, because it looks really gross to me....the Glipizide kind of melts into the broth and forms this really sticky, stringy goop...like egg whites, almost. But bluish-red, from the colors of the tablets. I tried the broth with fennugreek, once, just to see what it tasted like....but I haven't had the courage to try this stuff!
I'm storing the crushed tabs in this tiny tupperware that used to have cloves in it. I washed it a couple of times, but it still smells like cloves, and so now the Glipizide smells like cloves, too. I've been wondering if it's really the clove smell/flavor she likes? That part smells good to me, too. But then again, who knows what tastes really good to a hamster? Do they have the same kind of taste preferences we have? Are they partial to things that taste sweet, or fried?
I gave her some chicken from the Cheesecake Factory, but I think it was too spicy for her. She took a couple of bites, but then she dropped it really fast, like a hot potato. So I guess she likes fried chicken, but not spicy chicken. I even washed it for her, hoping to wash off most of the spice. But even watered down, it must have been too much. It was pretty spicy to begin with. (I'm not sure I liked it too much, myself--it was good wrapped in the fried wonton and covered in ranch dressing, but on its own? Maybe not.)
Still, she's a chicken-loving hamster. It amuses Brett, that southern-fried-chicken-loving-boy, to no end, that she gets a tiny bowl of fried chicken every now and then, and eats it right up. I even started freezing it, so it would last longer, and she liked that almost as much. Those are her chicken-popsicles. She likes frozen tofu, too.
Well, I'm off to bed....
