Today’s Philip
Tag: Philip
Allergy
I went to the pulmonary doctor this week because my primary care doctor is concerned that my asthma isn’t well controlled. She prescribed the Trelegy inhaler, which has another medicine in it compared to my other inhaler. The Trelegy inhaler is just one puff once a day, which is better than the 2 puffs twice a day the other one required.
They asked what respiratory allergies I have, and I’ve always known cat dander is one of them, along with grass, trees, mold, etc. The doctor ordered a blood allergy test and the results are a bit surprising. The normal range for cat dander is <=0.34 kU/L. Guess where my results landed? 19.40. That means I’m a bazillion times over the normal range for allergy to cat dander. Next was birch tree, at 15.00 (normal range <=0.34). Alder tree, grass, and oak tree also play a big part in causing my allergy problems. I grew up in an oak savannah surrounded by fields of grass, and we had 20 cats (outdoor) at one point and I enjoyed spending time with them. I mean, I’ve known I was allergic to cats and grass since I was a little girl (funny nobody ever said anything about the trees) but no wonder I’ve always been a mess of allergies! The asthma came along when I was 7 years old, about a year after we moved out to the country full of all the allergens. When I was young there were no asthma inhalers, and no helpful allergy meds that didn’t cause me to sleep all day. If I had an asthma attack I just had to suffer through it, until I was 11 or 12 years old and they invented albuterol rescue inhalers. Then they invented Seldane allergy pills in the late ’80s or so, and those were awesome. They took it off the market for some reason, which is too bad.
We had an aspen tree out in the front yard here for many years until half of it fell down. It was sort of two trees growing out of the same spot and the other one was leaning toward the neighbor’s, so The Hubs cut it down a couple of years ago. Aspen and birch are in the same family so it’s good that that tree is gone now. We also live in what used to be a walnut orchard with some really big walnut trees, but I am only at 0.10 kU/L (normal range <=0.34) for walnut, thank goodness, and the same for maple tree. Our neighbor has a huge maple tree that is on our side of his yard and it drops pollen like crazy all over our cars during the pollen season.
Other surprises included that I didn’t show as much of an allergy to dust mites as I thought I would, and that most of the mold allergens didn’t show much of a reaction. Whatever A. Alternata mold is showed up the highest at 6.87 kU/L (standard range <=0.34). Our valley is a fairly humid environment so fungi/mold is to be expected, but thankfully God has blessed us with a dry house. I’m concerned there may be mold in my office ceiling because of the roof leak above, but I haven’t seen any mold so far.
I had my tonsils and adenoids out when I was 5 years old because of chronic ear infections. I don’t know if those were caused by allergies or not. I remember being in the hospital eating grape Popsicles, and a lady from church brought me a Fisher Price Little People circus set. They wanted me to let a little girl with a broken arm play with some of the pieces and I remember not wanting to share, ha!
A really annoying thing about having allergies (other than, you know, not being able to breathe and stuff) is that my eyes are constantly itchy so I want to rub them. This causes bags under my eyes. My nose and the face around it is also always itchy. I have in the past gotten hives (urticaria) which caused my lip to swell up in a very strange manner. It happened at work when I was in my early 20s, and I actually walked a mile in the snow to go to the allergy doctor (I walked to work so didn’t have my car with me, and wanted to make sure the doctor saw my swollen lip before it went away). The result of that appointment was that my hives had “no known cause”. Hmph.
So unfortunately my allergies will have to stay around for awhile, specifically the cat dander allergy. Philip isn’t going anywhere that we know of, and we love him so. He is especially a daddy’s boy and would be sad if he had to go to a new home, and I wouldn’t want to put him through that. <Ahchoo! Snif> excuse me — I might just have to find a way to keep him out of our bedroom though. And I should set the Roomba to vacuum more. I do take an allergy pill (Xyzal) and that keeps some of the allergies at bay.
Also, Happy Groundhog Day! I’m up too early to know if Punxsutawney Phil will see his shadow, but I hope spring is just around the corner!
Regal
Shadows
Philip is suddenly obsessed with shadows, he has been chasing them all over the house for about a week now. His favorite is the shadow I make as I’m leaving my office. He can jump about four feet in the air to try to get my wiggling shadow fingers! It’s so funny how pets can obsess about things just like people do, ha.
Decorations
On the Saturday after Thanksgiving I decided to put up the Christmas decorations, so I brought the black and white things down from upstairs and had The Hubs bring down the tree.
Philip was very interested to assist with the decorating, so he inspected the tree:
And got an even closer look and a good sniff:
Then he checked out the box to make sure all the important things had been removed:
The Girl wasn’t feeling well so she supervised from the couch. While we were decorating, we put on a video of a Christmas scene that played Christmas music:
Here are the finished results — the tree:
Here is the front entry:
And the living room:
Philip and I wish everyone a festive and peaceful Christmas and holiday season filled with love and joy!
The Hubs and His Cat Baby
Adventures in Eating
When I was at Copper Creek Mercantile the other day buying cat food, Jen told me that they had something new. When she showed it to me I knew I had to get a can for Philip to try.
Here is what the food looks like:
Now, I don’t know if Philip’s mama kitty ever brought him a mouse to eat when they were still living outside, but Philip didn’t want this. He would barely even get near it. He jumped down and went away until I got out some of his regular, non-pâté food. He likes his food to have chunks, like real chicken or fish, and he has never been a fan of the pâté style. There really isn’t any way of knowing whether he rejected it because of the mouse, other ingredients, or the style of the food, but Philip says no, thank you.
The (House) Lion and the Lamb
This is Philip:
This is Lamby, Philip’s favorite toy:
This is Baby Philip biting on Lamby, instead of his Mama’s arms.
This is current Philip biting on Lamby instead of Daddy’s arms.
Philip enjoys biting Lamby and doing bunny-kicks. Lamby keeps our arms free from bites and scratches. Lamby is a good sport!
Meow There!
Meow there! Welcome to my blogger!! I am Philip. Mama said I could blogger today, so here I am. I am a big kitty now and I weigh 13 weight-thingies , but I used to be a little baby so Mama and Daddy still call me their little baby. Here is a picsher of me when I was a little baby, after Daddy rescueded me from the outdoors place. Before Daddy rescueded me I was living under one of his trucks where my Mama Kitty had put me, but I wasn’t having safety. Daddy put out a thing with some delishus noms in it and I came in to eat the noms and then I couldn’t go out again! Then Daddy brought me in the house place and I am now what is called a house cat! I am very speshul to Daddy espeshully because he rescueded me himself!
Here are some picshers of me when I was a tiny baby living in the outdoors place.
My Mama Kitty took good care of me and she did her best to keep me safe, but she didn’t have a house to live in or a Mama and Daddy to take care of her. My Mama and Daddy gave her crunchers to eat every day and drinks in the drinks bowl.
But guess what happened? My Mama Kitty had FIVE more little babies in Daddy’s shed! He found them and brought them in the house, but he wouldn’t let me see them because he thought I might try to play with them and I probly would have, and they were just tiny little tiny babies. Then Daddy put out some delishus noms and my Mama Kitty went in to eat them and couldn’t get out! So Mama and Daddy brought her in the house place with her tiny little tiny babies so she could take care of them. Soon Mama took my Mama Kitty and my tiny little tiny sibleengs to a place called Salem Friends of Felines. The nice ladies there took my Mama Kitty and the tiny little tiny babies to what is called a pawster home, where they got to live in a house place just like I do! Then the nice ladies found good house places for my Mama Kitty and all the tiny little babies so they could be house cats too! I was so glad when Mama told me that they were all being loved and cared for just like my Mama and Daddy care for me!
Here are more photos of me being a happy house cat:
I hope you liked my blogger!
~Philip
every day's just like starting over 