Limping Skunk and Aeon #15

So Hobkin started limping last night. He was curled up next to me on the couch napping after dinner, he hopped down to use the litter pan–and by “hopped” I mean he casually crawled down the “doggie” steps–and fosteronfilm called me over ’cause he saw that Hobkin was wobbling and unsteady. After some anxious observation, we determined that he’s favoring his left hind leg. We think. It’s hard to gauge with 100% certainty exactly which side is the culprit on a critter with such stumpy legs. But I also tried to do a check of his “resistance” strength on both hind legs by picking him up and getting him to push at my hand with each paw, and his left was much weaker than his right. I also checked to see if anything seemed broken or dislocated, and I think we’re okay on that front, too.

We’re not sure what happened. Someone’s with him just about 24×7, so it’s unlikely that he injured himself earlier yesterday without us seeing. And he was fine when he climbed up beside me. I wasn’t watching him when he left to use the bathroom, but he didn’t make any noise or give any sign of hurting himself as he was leaving; I would have noticed that. The only thing we can figure is that he injured his hind leg while he was asleep . . . which is rather baffling.

Unsurprisingly, I was totally and utterly freaking out last night. When we had ferrets, one of the first overt signs of the onset of neurological or other major medical problems was weak hind legs. But Hobkin’s appetite is fine. He’s using the litter pan fine; actually, I’m pretty amazed at how good he’s being on that front, considering he’s limping. And he doesn’t appear to be in pain. Although it’s hard to evaluate pain in a skunk. Hobkin’s almost completely silent, except for a couple notable occasions when he’s been either frightened or angry. I don’t know if skunks vocalize when they’re in distress like a dog or keep quiet like a cat. I’m inclined to bet the latter.

Going to see how he does today, and if he doesn’t show improvement or looks to be getting worse, then it’s off to the vet’s. He was still limping this morning when he got up for breakfast, and I had to stifle an impulse to rush him to the vet today. But the vet is always a traumatic experience for the little guy, and if he’s strained or pulled a muscle, it’s possible he’ll hurt himself worse from vet-related agitation.

Poor Hobkin! Wah!

Writing Stuff

Was up north visiting the mom-in-law last week. Didn’t get nearly as much done as I had planned to (I never do; I don’t know why I keep expecting to be productive when I’m there). And got zero words down on the novel. @%&^*! Well, I did edit a load of Dragon*Con guest bios for the program book. And, with the much appreciated editorial assistance of elemess, full_fathom5, and terracinque, we finished all 400+ of them. So I did get some stuff done.

New Words:
• 2.5K on The Stupid Novel since we got back from Illinois. Working title: Taijiya. Total words: 26.9K.

It is now officially the most words I’ve managed to get down on a single work of fiction. It’s unlikely that I’ll be able to make zero draft as I’m rapidly hitting the point where I’m going to have to drop everything that isn’t Dragon*Con-related. But I’d like to make 30K. 40K, of course, would be better. . .

Received:
• Notice from the fine folks at Aeon that my story, “Black Swan, White Swan,” will be in the upcoming issue, #15. Also, they listed me on the cover (*squee!*):