Calypso Moves to Wayside School

[tiger_spot]

Calypso's died. I mentioned a while back that she'd developed a brain tumor. She'd been pretty stable for a month or two; she could get around, although she fell over a lot, and she was interested in food, although not very good at eating it. About Christmas Eve, she started to look out of it in a new and different way. Yesterday morning, she was lying on the floor of the cage, about room temperature. She sure looked dead, and I couldn't find a heartbeat, but she was still breathing and twitching occasionally. We figured it wouldn't be long, so we wrapped her up warm and kept an eye on her. She remained creepy zombie rat, with no detectable heartbeat or body temperature but occasional breathing and other tiny motions, until well after dark. And then she stopped.

I have pretty much done my mourning in advance on this one. I am impressed she hung on as long as she did, and I hope she was reasonably comfortable.

(At Wayside School, dead rats live in the basement. She'll fit right in.)