Bob and I went to see this play, 110 Flights at the university. Unlike most of the theatre department performances, it was written by a student, and she also plays one of the two characters. As a student effort, it was impressive; the acting was great, and the writer has potential. The set was the best of any I've seen at the university in the past couple of years; in fact, it was as good or better than at professional companies. But in terms of the story itself, the ending was dismal, many of the issues it raises were addressed in a very immature fashion (it was clear that it was written by someone without much life experience), and at times it was downright offensive, in a personal way. Oh well -- we have paid at least five times more for tickets to a performance at a bigger company and been insulted too.

Rudy is almost done with antibiotics and so he had another urinalysis yesterday. He still has blood in his urine. This was not a surprise, because although it is not bright red, sometimes I can tell in the snow that there is still a trace in there. He seems otherwise fine, as he always has been. Any other symptoms are very slight. This is a dog who has always acted half his age.

Anyway, the vet recommends that he go off the antibiotics for two weeks, and then he wants to take a sample right from his bladder, and see exactly what bug in his prostate is causing the infection. This is pretty much a standard procedure for resistant urinary track infections, and bladder or kidney stones, cancer, etc. have already been ruled out. It is not that big a deal, but still, I am not happy, both about Rudy still being sick, and about the next procedure.

Yesterday morning, when I had to catch the urine sample, he was not cooperative - he kept hopping along in the snow as he peed to make it hard for me to collect it. Then he ran behind the shed to finish so that I couldn't get to him at all. He never did this in the past. This bothered me, as we always tell ourselves that we have to make choices for the animals - something like becoming overweight isn't in their control. It is our fault, and we have to be the ones to solve it. But now it seemed to me that he was saying loud and clear that he didn't want any more human intervention. His life, his choice. I think the ultrasound experience has totally scared him, when he used to be happy and fearless at the vet.

Well, I am happy about the break from antibiotics, anyway. I am going to work on building his immunity naturally. Then in two weeks I'll see how I --and he?-- feel.