a rare moment

Pepper and Bean chilling on the couch:

sick cats, long nights, and great big seas

A 'meh' weekend...Friday was spent burning a sick day and getting further behind at work, had to stay home with Bean [who wasn't doing well]. That set the pattern for the weekend: keeping an eye on her, trying to get her to eat, medicating her, cleaning her up when she needed cleaning, trying to give her plenty of chances to stay quiet.

Sunday night was an attempt at a more normal evening: Will and I headed to Santa Cruz to see Great Big Sea. It was weird being there, seeing Alan's shoulder-length brown hair and realizing it hasn't changed in years. Many years. Then I thought about just how long I've been going to see the guys in concert, and realized it's likely been fourteen or fifteen years. Wow. Which started me thinking about life back then, and Ope and Kristen visiting and Ope getting so excited about this Celtic group he wanted to share with us, only to have me run to the CD collection and pull out their album. He was a bit disappointed that he wasn't the one to do the introducing, but then he realized how awesome it was that we'd been drawn to the same group, and we had an awesome time playing the album, trying to sing along with 'Mari-Mac' and 'End of the World' [and failing hilariously].

GBS still has it...same three core guys, Alan, Sean, and Bob, singing their hearts out and having a blast. Venue was a bit odd, seats instead of an open dance floor, but everyone came together and stood up and danced, in spite of the chairs. Their voices are awesome, they played the classics, the crowd pleasers, and some new stuff. They closed the evening by coming away from the microphones, standing on the edge of the stage, motioning for the crowd to quiet down...and then singing an amazing acapella song. No mikes, no instruments, just the guys singing in beautiful harmony to a very receptive crowd.

Can't wait to see them come around again. Can't believe how many times I've seen them come around already. And I can't believe the changes my life has gone through, and that a little band from Newfoundland has been one of the constants through an inconstant time.

Thanks for the soundtrack, guys.

fun with anesthesia

I hate anesthesia. Or rather, I hate the effects of coming back from anesthesia. They are hitting Bean hard...her systems are waking up, and with a vengeance. She's having a rough morning, which means I'm having a rough morning. Add in antibiotics that are known to upset her systems even more, and it's going to be a fun, fun day.

the power of xrays

Got a call from the vet...they reviewed Bean's xrays [taken as part of her super-uber-exam], and it turns out that some time in the past, she had some pretty serious surgery on her back right leg. It's call FHO [femoral head ostectomy], and essentially the round ball head of the femur is totally removed, and the femur is left to create fibrous tissue in the joint instead. We think it was a result of the dog attack I was told happened to her when she was younger [before I adopted her]; the leg was either broken or severely dislocated, causing bone-on-bone contact and damage to the hip. The intense pain could only be alleviated by an FHO procedure.

So now we know why she has that weird sashay in her back leg...no ball in the ball-and-socket joint to keep her leg aligned.

Weird.

monetary, emotional, and moral dilemmas

By the end of today, I will have spent almost $4000 on Bean's medical costs, in less than one month [ouch]. Her recent IC flare-up, the resulting emergency room visit and overnight stay, the annual check-up right after that, and now as part of the dental cleaning [involving sedation], they found that she had "resorptive lesions" on three teeth [a genetic condition in which the enamel is absorbed back into the body, exposing the root and causing pain and potential tooth fracture]. Only treatment: extraction surgery. It's not the same as decay, which can have the treatment put off for a while...it's something that should be done as soon as possible. And since it's full surgery, it's not cheap.

The timing is rotten...one of those "if I'd known, I wouldn't have done x, y, or z" situations. It's not just the money [though that's a hard one, especially since I'm a "single income household"]...there's also the time factor. While Will is awesome, and has gone above and beyond with pitching in, I'm still a very self-sufficient person, and it's hard for me to just let others take over things that are my responsibility. So I'm juggling work, the cats, and a thousand other things that need my attention...and sadly, it's not enough. So trying to prioritize and just let some things fall away, which sucks, and hurts my organized, retentive, "I can do it" soul.

Keep trying to remind myself: breathe in, breathe out. [Sighing is breathing, right??]

thank you

Veteran's Day...thank you, da.

back to reality

As some of you folks know, I've been lucky enough to pretty much drop off the face of the earth for a bit...took an honest-to-gourd vacation, went to Disneyland with Will, did a lot of motoring, and basically got to relax and go completely offline and chill. So if you've sent me emails, IMs, text, voicemail, carrier pigeons, or postcards, I'm way, waaaay behind in answering...working my way through the backlog, along with catching up at work.

Vacation. An awesome concept, great while you are in the midst of it, but utterly sucky to have to return from. Phooey on reality.