ugh Just got out of bed, and the SO says I need to take Tonka to the vet. He has a swollen eye, and the cleaned some yellow gunk out. He’s sitting and staring at me again, only today his right eye is slightly closed.
<sympathy> Taking a cat to the vet is zero fun. I hope the vet is kind and the figure out what it is fast.
The vet is awesomely kind. (The first vet we tried, we refer to as ‘Dr. Mengele’.) I took Tonka in first thing this morning – only to discover she didn’t open until 8:30. When she did open, she didn’t look at Tonka because the schedule was full. She tried to look at his eye through the mesh of his carrier, but he wouldn’t look at her. She asked if he’d been sneezing, and he did sneeze a few times yesterday or Wednesday night. She asked if he was eating, and I told her that he’s eating a lot. She said that’s a good sign. She suspected a cold, and wanted to isolate him until she could examine him. I didn’t want him sitting alone in a cage all day, so I brought him home. He promptly went to grab a nosh. I have an appointment for 3:00 (about 5 hours from now), so I’ll take Tonka in then; unless the SO only works a half-day, in which case I’ll ask her to take him.
Tonka’s right eye is a little swollen and runny, but he does not appear to be in any distress. He’s been eating, sleeping, looking out the window, and generally acting normally.
I suppose, if nothing else, you could irrigate his eye with saline solution.
I mean, if he weren’t a cat, you probably could.
I got nothing.
I hope Tonka gets better soon.
Thank you for that link. I just spent a half-hour looking, laughing and thoroughly enjoying this guy’s work, including Cat vs. Internet, 17 Things Worth Knowing About Your Cat, and How To Pet A Kitty. I also like his non-cat work, such as How A Web Design Goes Straight To Hell, Why It’s Better To Pretend You Don’t Know Anything About Computers (I thought of my poor husband reading that), Ten Words You Need To Stop Misspelling, and How To Suck At Your Religion. He became even more super-awesome when I saw this page about Tesla.
Thanks too phouka for the cat yodeling link. So funny! I’m going to watch their other videos too.
Tonka did not want to get into the carrier. But I’m bigger than he is. At the vet, he didn’t want to come out of the carrier. Once out, he didn’t want to stay on the table. The vet stuck a thermometer up his bum, which he didn’t care for. (I wouldn’t either.) She cleaned his eye with a wet cotton ball, and then put in an eye drop. Next she gave him an antibiotic pill. He was quite happy to get back into the carrier. Poor thing!
Tonka is still eating well, and still weights 14-1/4 pounds. We came home and I let him out. The first thing he did was go to his food bowl and start eating. I went to use the toilet, and when I came out I saw that he’d pushed my door open and was hiding under the bed. I left him there. ‘Mom’ came home, and he was on top of the covers; so I guess he’s feeling secure.
We have to give him a pill twice a day. (Oh, boy! Pilling a cat!) He needs eye drops three or four times a day for the next five days.
At least he isn’t sitting there staring at me! (I’ll remember to be careful what I wish for!)
Well, get rid of the ghost, then.
Tell Tonka (awesome name, BTW) that YOU know of a kitty who gets shoved into a carrier at 3 AM, taken to the vet, and then extracted from the carrier. Then he gets the old thermometer up the butt, and the vet pokes his tummy. Then, then, THEN…it’s time for The Catheter. Shadow does not care for The Catheter. He believes that that is HIS peepee, and peepee stands for personal and private, and he doesn’t want anyone touching his penis. Ever. Especially if a catheter is involved.
After a couple of go-rounds with pills, we now try to convince the vet to give Shadow a shot. Shadow doesn’t like to be picked up and restrained in even the best circumstances, and he knows that when we approach him with a pill or the bottle of antibiotic oral drops, it’s time to play hide and go seek.
At least Shadow has never required eye drops.
Anyway, tell Tonka that he should be happy that he’s never had The Catheter used on him.
I’m sure he’ll feel much better in a couple of days.
It’s the name he came with. 
The SO doesn’t especially like it. He’s not an ‘extra large’ cat as described on NOAH’s website, and she thinks it’s silly for him to be named after a toy truck. I told her ‘Tonka’ is short for ‘tatonka’ – ‘bison’. Anyway, that’s his name. She calls him ‘Tonka’ or ‘Tonk’. Or ‘Buddy’. Or ‘Boogie-woogie’.
I haven’t had a good look at his eye this morning, but it looks better than it did last night. The vet pilled him with an antibiotic, and we crushed one and mixed it in with wet food last night. I did the same this morning. The SO has developed a hypothesis: His ear mites caused him to scratch his ear, and she noticed he’d been rubbing his face on things. She suspects that he scratched with his hind paw after using the litter box and scratched the area around his eye, and that the infection is bacterial. (The vet mentioned it might be viral, but she gave us antibiotics just in case.) The hypothesis seems sound, and we think he’ll be fine in several days.
I still have to give him an eye drop soon though, and he isn’t going to like it. 
You can tell, Tonka, that former kitty, Raven, was so uncooperative at just peeing for the vet, that it was standard procedure to take urine from her with a needle straight into her bladder.
So, he better cooperate.
He had a traumatic day yesterday. Going to the vet – twice, since she couldn’t see him the first time – getting the anal probe, having his eye cleaned, having drops put in his eye, getting a pill shoved down his throat, ‘mom’ cleaning his eye, and getting an eye drop… But he doesn’t seem to stay offended long. He’ll go and hide (as he hid under my bed; and later, under a table), and then come out and lie by ‘mom’, all forgiven.