Update on Clifford, aka Mr X

It is with some relief that I can report that Clifford, formerly known as Mr. X is indeed doing better. (reported on in previous blog)

It is safe to say Clifford is being spoiled by his new owner, Rebecca. It's nice to have some happy news to report. There seems to be a dark cloud underneath a lot of people these days.

We still owe about $300 on his vet bill, expect an appeal in the upcoming issue of CLIFFNotes. Go to http://www.ferretsanon.com/signup.html if you don't get our newsletter.

Feeling Blue over Mr X

Yesterday as I was putting together CLIFFNotes a call came in about someone's dogs finding and hurting a ferret. Ugh!

I drove down to Chula Vista from La Mesa, picked up the ferret and went to the Pet Emergency Specialty Center in La Mesa. They gave me the red carpet treatment. Was it because we spent $12,000 there last year on the dogs? Or was it because they call me for ferret blood?

Regardless - I am grateful. The initial Sunday afternoon diagnosis was the ferret had a puncture wound on one hip. The Monday morning, after X-ray diagnosis is much bleaker, something about spinal cord damage.

This ferret, who is listed as Mr X (I'm not always that creative) had that certain ferretude. I was hoping to get off cheaply, both financially and emotionally.

The price in both regards is going to be higher. It seems these days nothing is easy. But I know the ferret community won't let me down. We'll do everything we can - and I'm going to name this ferret Clifford. Expect a fundraising effort on his behalf soon.

Everybody Seems Familiar

I've been working pretty hard today on a non-ferret issue and subscriptions for CLIFFNotes keep coming in - which is a good thing.

But everyone looks familiar. I just got a subscription from someone named Amanda. That name and email address sure look familiar. But our database is nearing the 6000 mark - so I don't know or remember that many people.

Just to take a break I decided to count (actually the computer does it) to find out what is the most popular name in our database.

Turns out to be Michael, followed by Lisa, John and Jennifer. Amanda is the 9th most popular name amongst people on our list.

I'm also always interested in which zipcode is our best. It is Santee (92071) followed by Lakeside (92040). Looking at who visits the www.ferretsanon.com website, the most popular city is West Hollywood.

Nearly 100 people signed up for CLIFFNotes last week and 20 unsubscribed. Not too shabby. The finances have been a little scary. We were down to $11 in the bank account, but thanks to some very generous people, we're firmly in the black.

OK - time for me to go back to work.