Yesterday it was Jackie's turn, today it's Jillie's. Jackie often has a stomach upset, Jillie rarely does. From time to time Jackie will just refuse his meals. Usually his breakfast, and generally speaking, by the time dinnertime rolls around and he's had a good romp through the forest trails, his appetite is restored. He's been like that since he was a puppy. Those episodes occurred far more frequently in past years than they do now. Regardless, every time one of those days rolls around it puts a damper on us, until he regains his appetite.

Jillie seemed a little off yesterday morning, but it's hard to tell with her. She still had her breakfast; it takes a lot to have her refusing food of any kind. She had her usual appetite at dinnertime, when Jackie too decided he'd enjoy his dinner. Usually in the evening they're tired and they sleep a lot. Jillie's preference is to snooze beside Irving while he reads or watches old British short-story classics turned into films -- on his mini-computer -- or detective series out of Sweden, Germany, Britain.

Jackie usually stations himself behind me while I'm at my desk-top computer for hours after dinner and before bed, writing, writing, writing. He leaps onto the top cushion-back sofa and there he curls up into a little black furball. That sets us up for the evening hours. It was during the night that it was brought home to us the extent to which Jillie felt unwell.

Usually, they sleep soundly through the night. They often maintain one position, they're so still when they sleep. Jackie at the foot of the bed where we elevate some cushions for him because he prefers to sleep at a high-positioned angle, and Jillie beside me, forcing me over onto Irving's 'side' of the bed. When she sleeps vertically it's fine, but she often insists on a horizontal position and even though she's small, my sleeping space then becomes impacted.

When Jackie jumps down from the bed in his lithe way, we never feel or hear him. When Jillie does, in her clunky way, there's abrupt movement and a 'thump' when she hits the floor. And she did that repeatedly last night. Signalling not only that she was restless -- highly unusual in itself -- but likely to throw up. We were awfully tired, and loathe to get out of bed. But Irving's subconscious is somehow always attuned to anything concerning J&J that tends to the unusual. He wakes in a flash and orients himself to the situation.

So he kept getting up, out of bed, letting Jillie out when she wanted outside, or cleaning up after her when she threw up. He has infinite patience with them, nursing them whenever something of this nature happens, and thank heavens it doesn't happen often. I stayed snug in bed, even though whenever he's out of bed I wake, and can't fall back asleep until he returns.

Morning brought snow, although the temperature was really high at 3C. It snowed, at times heavily, until early afternoon. But the mild temperature and the nature of the snow -- wet -- ensured it melted almost as soon as it hit the ground. The ice rink that was the backyard turned into a sloshy mess, but at least it was no longer an ice rink.

With so much sleep interruption, all four of us felt drowsy, but we got on with the day. We did the house cleaning; Irving vacuumed the house while I dusted, dry-mopped the hardwood floors and washed the tile floors. Jackie was his usual self, wanting to play, while Jillie put herself to bed where she spent most of the day, sound asleep. She had refused breakfast -- hugely unusual under any circumstances.

By the time we were ready for a ravine hike, we thought better of it.  That we'd cancel today's and give Jillie a chance to recover without straining herself, even though she and her brother had signalled on cue they were prepared to get out into the forest. Getting out became moot, in any event, since the snow had turned into rain. And tomorrow's another day...