Wow, Rudy, I'm sorry to hear about that. And what a pretty cat. I know they mean so much to us. We recently went to Colorado to visit my parents for Christmas and left our three cats at the house in New Mexico. They were well taken care of and had plenty to eat and drink. But our youngest, an 18-month-old male black cat, died for no apparent reason. He just crawled up into the chair, laid down and passed away. We got home and my 10-year-old daughter found him. Our four kids cried their eyes out, and our first night home was spent burying and mourning. It's bad, but what was worse is that nobody seemed to care that we'd lost this precious part of our family. My mother-in-law just said, "well now you only have two cats, so that's more normal." !! Well, I'm here to tell you that I really feel for you. My whole family does. I think it's cool that you've already had so much heartfelt response to your venting, as you put it. We pray for people and their animals, so we'll add you and your buddy to our prayer list. John