Happy Whatevers-Yer-Pleasure Holiday to all!

That Beckham photo is one of the sweetest things ever, and I love how he’s completely passed out in it. Like, that’s the only reason those ribbon bows aren’t scattered in pieces all over the floor.

Thanks for the update!

You mentioned that Wembley’s difficulties might mean he has to be neutered. Since the problem doesn’t seem to be neurological, or pathological at all (but might be a food allergy), can he keep his balls?

I had a comment all written and ready to go about how thinking God cares one way or t’other about team sports is an awfully reductionist and trivial view of deities. But then all the Spirits of Gods Past came to me and reminded me that gods are indeed rather trivial-minded beings, with high-school levels of mental and emotional maturity; and so a God who cares enough about football to help out a quarterback now and then is not exhibiting anomalous divine behavior.

Tebow has clearly and consistently made a silk purse out of his cow’s ear talents. Maybe the Ultimate Sports Fan does hear his entreaties. I’d honestly prefer that to a God who pays attention to politics, y’know?

BTW: TBogg, can you update us on yesterday’s vet visit? How is Wembley?

Have you ever thought of putting together a coffee table book or calendar or some such of the TBogg Family Puppy Pix? Because – whether you’re a good photographer, or the boys are just that adorable – you’ve amassed a pictographic basset record of really impressive quantity and quality.

Those soulful looks never fail to make me melt.

Please let us know how things went at the doctor’s. Hoping for the best. My gods, you all deserve a break from medical emergencies!

petMD says oral eosinophilic granuloma can be an allergic reaction. What with that, and the prostatitis crisis, is Fenway’s immune system funky? Or is determining that what the study is going to be about?

My god, has it really been that long?

Thank you for sticking it out… er, keeping this place running. Take breaks when you have to, as you do from time to time; but the world would truly be a colder, less fun and less funny, without your keen snark. And glimpses of your wonderful family.

Also, and ESPECIALLY: Bassets!

I was jonesing for an update, and really looking forward to TNBB. Great to see Fenway sooooo adorably pensive, and getting healthy again. I do believe he’s gonna have a St. Satchmo face when he’s an elderly fellow.

And Wembley hasn’t lost that I-can’t-believe-this-nonsense glower he had as a pup. Though I think the glower might be a wee bit of an optical illusion, helped along by the brown spot “eyebrows.”

Wonderful boys!

Yay! Fenway is improving! Wembley is expanding! The TBoggs are getting some sleep!

Having chewed my fingernails down when there were no updates, now I, too, can go to bed.

Here’s hoping for continued recovery and well being for all in the TBoggs household.

Thank you for the update! It’s a huge relief to hear that the illness has (probably) been diagnosed, and being treated. I never heard of anyone but humans getting prostate trouble.

Keeping on with the prayers and good wishes, for the treatment to work, and for sweet Fenway to make a full recovery (well, sans cojones).

Blessings to all the TBoggses. Hugs to the humans and scritches to the hounds.

Yeah: what cbear said. Please let us help.

TBogg – it just occurred to me that Fenway might be refusing to drink because A) He doesn’t feel thirsty; tissue hydration isn’t the same thing as feeling thirsty; and B) Is he diarhetic? He might have a vague sense that drinking makes him poop liquid, and he doesn’t want to do that (his butt might hurt, if he’s had the runs all day).

IV might be better than than-mouth.

Maybe this is one of those diseases that you treat by treating the symptoms, until the body throws off the infection itself? In which case, just keep him hydrated and electrolyted?

We’re all desperately pulling for Fenway, and you, and the rest of the Family.

Please please PLEASE get better, Fenway.

Oh blast and damn. Get better Fenway! Take care, TBogg Family! Much love and good thoughts to all of you.

Reading these suggestions is like a trip down memory lane (Ellison, Sturgeon, Heinlein, Bester) and a stroll through my living room library (Bujold, Cherryh, Willis, Stross, Pratchett).

Don’t forget the Ford – Mike Ford, whose official authorial name is John M. Ford. (Was, I mean. He died a couple years ago; I cried for days.) He is noteworthy for every one of his books being completely different from every other one of his books, for doing wonderful work set in other peoples’ universes. Including Star Trek. He wrote two tie-in novels that famously broke every rule Paramount didn’t know it had about ST tie-in novels. The first, “The Final Reflection,” is told entirely from the Klingon point of view; the second “How Much For Just The Planet?” is a musical comedy that will make The L&T Casey fall over and wet herself from laughing.

But even if ST novels are out, you cannot go wrong with:

1. The Princes of the Air
2. The Web of Angels (a cyperpunk novel written more than a decade before Gibson)
3. The Dragon Waiting (alternate history set during the War of the Roses)
4. Casting Fortune (set in the Liavekian universe of kingdoms and wizardry; this is a tale of magic and revenge taking place in a theater)
5. The Last Hot Time (a take on the Borderlands universe, but with 1930s-era gangsters)
6. Growing Up Weightless – Casey MUST read this one; it’s set on Luna, 30 years after a bitter war of independence from Earth, and the main character is a teenaged son of one of the rebels-turned-statesman, who wants nothing so much as to get into deep space.

Those are his novels. There are also collections of short stories, poetry, ephemera…

Ford won *Nebula Awards* for his *Christmas Cards.* Please please read his work.