It's a bad week for cats. A girl brought us her recently-acquired cat today because it was peeing everywhere and not gaining weight. She'd only had the cat a month, and had been told that it was 3 years old and "had always been thin". After a urinalysis and some bloodwork we had to tell her that it was probably more like a 10 to 12-year-old cat and was in the last stages of diabetes and early stages of kidney failure. It was awful.

Give yourself some time to recover and, when you're ready, go rescue a homeless kitty. I think the best way to show your love for a passed pet is to do well by another who needs you. I'm on my fourth American Eskimo dog; they've all been completely different "people" but they were all in need of saving and turned out to be great friends in their own ways.