Vacation-Take Two!

Today was a random day at work. This morning, I have very few appointments. Someone walked in with a cat that they believed had been hit by a car. [In my original entry, I was going to go into some detail about the cat, but its probably not appropriate for the general public.] Then someone else brought in a pigeon which freaked me out. I gave it an injection of dexamethasone and shortly thereafter, it died. It was pretty much in shock when it came in and me freaking out probably didn’t help calm it down. After sitting around the office at Newville in the afternoon, which included time to vaccinate my cat, I went and removed stitches from a horse’s muzzle. I had sewn up the horse a little over two weeks ago for a laceration on its nostril. The cut was about 1 ½ inches long and about ¾ inches across making a nice little flap. The unfortunate part was that it was likely that the cut was 24 hours plus old making it risky to put back in place. Some sedation, lidocaine and stitches later, the horse’s muzzle looked relatively normal. Today, I was met with the distal end still being unattached. Apparently, the very end had lost its blood supply and pulled away from the stitches leaving a small notch in the horse’s nose. I talked to the owner about how it looked and told her that I could try to fix the horse cosmetically but overall, it didn’t look too bad. They agreed and now we just have to hope that he doesn’t get the little notch caught on anything!

So Joe asked today if we were free in November. He was asked to be a groomsman in one of his friends weddings. Hi s friend is getting married in Arizona and inviting very limited friends-Joe is one of them and by default, I go too. (I seriously asked Joe why I was invited!) I later asked Joe if he felt guilty for not having asked this guy to be one of his groomsmen. He said he did a little. I told him that it didn’t have to be an eye for an eye-the best analogy I could come up with for that you don’t have to ask someone just because they asked you. However, if Martha doesn’t ask me to be a bridesmaid, I’m going to be pretty angry! When I said this to Joe, I realized that Martha is my oldest friend. (Brad and Erick, too!) I don’t have any childhood friends; I’m not friends with anyone from high school any more. I’ve known and been in constant (though sometimes sporadic) contact with Martha (and Brad and Erick because we don’t want any hurt feelings, but not Frei) for almost TEN YEARS! I love it. I love Martha. She’s so great.

I have to take the fantastic car back to the dealership tomorrow for stuff. I’m not certain what stuff. Then I have to do some painful dealings with Crazy Tina With The Funny Accent at the insurance company. The dealership is supposed to give me a loaner but if its not going to take more than a couple of hours, I’m just going to stay there. I have Super Phone Too to entertain me and I’ll bring my Nook.

Finally, vacation take two! Because all of our money (and I do mean close to all of it) was put into this new car, we have limited fundage for vacation. Both of us have already taken the time off for mid-May so it would be a shame to waste that time or spend it laying on the couch. Seattle is out but Ocean City, Maryland is in. Less than 5 hours away, and we can eat lots of crabs. And see the ocean. And see the ponies on Assateague! Yea, Misty! It’ll be good times. Yum, seafood. Of course, there are lots of other drivable options. Now to make something for real. It’s the OC, baby!

Grown Up Decisions and Procrastination

Well, first, on the veterinary front it seems that the black cloud of bad luck that had hung over the clinic for the past few weeks has lifted. Things have smoothed out and are going much better than previously. The string of bad luck did make March go much faster.

My amputations from two weeks ago got their stitches out and look great. Thursday was my 8 surgery day but it was decreased to 6-two pregnant cat spays, one cat spay, one cat spay with declaw, one cat neuter with declaw and a dental that Alyssa knocked out while I did the spay/declaw. Next week, I have two dog spays and a dog neuter with a hernia repair.

In terms of grown up decisions, Joe and I were forced into purchasing a new car. Unknown to us, there are strict regulations on cars with salvage titles from out of state that need to be registered in Pennsylvania. Joe’s car passed its safety inspection after $900 was put into it. Then apparently, it had to be inspected a second time because of the salvage title from Missouri. And that inspection it failed. Bent frame, broken door handle, something with the airbags, wrong size of tires…The car is only worth probably what we put into it. So now forced into buying a new car, we went to look for cars on Saturday after I got off work. We decided to start with the two car places on the way to the dog park. Everything starts on the way to the dog park. At Bob Ruth Ford, there were a couple of cars that we looked at-a Ford Explorer and a Mercury Mountaineer. We drove both and after much internal struggle, decided to buy the Mountaineer. It’s a 2006 model with about 29000 miles on it. Its pearl white with tan leather interior. Its loaded. FULLY LOADED. DVD player? Check. Heated seats? Check. 6 disc CD player? Check. Automatic running boards that I crack my shins on? Check. Seriously, name something and it probably has it. We did manage to trade Joe’s car in for $200. Poor Turdcel. So now I have the Mountaineer which has a V8 so it can pull a horse trailer and Joe has my Jeep. I miss my Jeep.  I really see the Mountaineer parked with a small horse trailer behind it and tied to the horse trailer are two immaculately groomed ponies with probably a small girl running around.

Joe is freaking out about the money situation now. We now have an additional $650 or so a month in bills between the car payment and pony boarding. Joe needs to relax and I will take care of it all. It will be fine. (Additionally, I learned that I have a really good credit score. That is if I don’t let Joe on any loan applications.)

Speaking of the ponies, they will come this weekend provided it doesn’t snow too much. I haven’t bought any supplies yet. I need to get that order in and hope its here by Saturday. Also, I was looking for a foot locker that K Mart was supposed to have but didn’t. I need to order it too. Tonight. Pony brushes and foot lockers.

Because of the car loan, there is a really good possibility that we won’t be going on vacation. Or at least not a long distance vacation. I had just decided on going to Seattle too. So now, we may be driving someplace closer-Washington DC for several days, Canada. I don’t know. I’m going to have to figure out the books. And ideally, save some money for the wedding. Where ever the wedding may be.

I made another grown up decision. I decided not to go to my high school reunion. I was agnonizing about it for a really long time. I'm not sure why. I haven't spoke to anyone from high school in a really long time and frankly don't want to. Of course, me wanting to go to my reunion in any way is just to show off all the cool things I've done. The problem being that 1) our class was this mix of over and under achievers anyway, 2) I graduated high school wanting to be a vet and suprise, suprise I am and 3) I just feel that people would be looking down their noses at me anyway (despite the fact that I'm a DOCTOR!). And the other thing, the plan is a winery for the day (putting aside the fact that I don't really drink, especially not wine) and then afterwards a party to repeat prom night. I didn't go the the prom night party nor did I know anything about it until 10:30 that night when my class split with the exception of me and some of my friends. The thing about wanting to relive the prom night party is that we're not 18 anymore. We're adults. Let's act our ages.

Little known fact-Fresca Black Cherry Citrus has potassium citrate in it which is a powerful diuretic. Its given to people (and Dalmatians) for urate crystals. When I drink this soda, within four hours, I have to pee every five minutes. Now, I feel that part of this is mind of matter. Right now, I’m conquering it.

I also started my compost bucket. Its rapidly filling. I didn’t finish it though. I still have to put in the filter.

Its gotten cold here. The spring time warmth has disappeared. It was supposed to snow this morning but luckily didn’t. I can’t wait for spring to stay.

On procrastination, I have like a 1000 sewing projects that I need to either start or finish. I have a seersucker dress that is in the final stages and has been for just under a year. Jeans that need hemmed, a tank top that needs to have the straps shortened, a half sewed scarf, a clothespin bag that is currently sitting on my sewing machine, a half stuffed cat. I really like making pillows and want to make lots of them. I also have a plan to make a fabric plant based on something I saw on Etsy. There’s always nice stuff from Etsy including stuffed guinea pigs and stuffed deer. One day, I’ll be dog free and won’t want to watch as much TV. I don’t see that happening anytime soon though. Sigh.

Bad Luck

Its been a rough couple of weeks for everybody at work. My last new entry talked about some of the trouble I had with bulldogs crashing and having to do amputations (which as far as I know, are doing really well) by myself. Additionally, Max the grayhound I saw on emergency a month ago crashed on the table a couple of weeks back during his amputation surgery. Max had a rough go of it after I saw him. Two surgeries before going in for an amputation. It was too bad. I really liked Max even though I only saw him once. But after walking the blood donors, I have a fond spot in my heart for greyhounds. There were other dogs that crashed and some that were put down on the table for various causes not to mention the euthanasias we normally have. Then too I had two cats die at home over a weekend. Hopefully, this spell of bad luck will clear up and things will get back to only a few things dying every week. And hopefully some of my eight surgeries on Thursday will cancel. Preferably the large dog spay.

Adding into the bad luck, I found out just the other day that I won’t be able to have my wedding at Ellis Library. Apparently, to the surprise of the woman I was conversing with and the library director, they aren’t allowed to rent out the space to outside parties. I guess the fact that I’m an alumnus and spent 9 years and nearly $200000 at MU doesn’t matter. Now I need to figure out what the next plan is. I really don’t know what I’m going to do. St. Rose? Someplace else in Columbia? Maybe we should just elope…

On a random note, when I go to the ‘next blog’ feature on my blog, I always get a cluster of like blogs. I had a series of ones about exercise and more often a bunch about people’s families. Is that what the future is? Writing about husbands and naked babies and dogs and all of the things that little kids do? Should I be writing about fiancés with nipple rings and stupid things that my dogs do like they are my naked babies drooling on everything? That’s what they do anyway.

The weather is pretty nice lately. The heat is off upstairs. I ordered some flowers in the mail. I’m excited for spring.

I have my vacation dates nailed down but not if Joe can come. And where we are going is up in the air too. Seattle seems like a front runner but also seems very boring-Spaceneedle, Starbucks, Pike Place Market, and a crazy donut shop. Not much else. Not enough for a week. Maybe we could go to Canada.

For The First Time...

In my career, I felt like I didn’t want to be doing this any more. For real. There have been days when things weren’t going well and it just seemed that being a kindergarten teacher would be such a better career. Wednesday, for no reason in particular, I found myself in a room looking at someone’s pet and thinking, ‘boy, I really don’t want to be here right now.’ Not the ‘don’t want to be here right now’ you feel when you’re sick or tired or aggravated or a 1000 other things but the feeling of ‘this isn’t right and I hate it.’ Now, this feeling passed rather quickly, I felt okay today, I felt okay last week even after doing two (TWO!) amputations by myself with only Fossum and the techs for help and even after I had a dog crash and die during appointments!

So looking back on last week, with the exception of hating my job for an instant, it was a pretty eventful week. Tuesday, Jenn Savini came to town. We ate thai food and then went on a tour of the clinic. I made a lasagna and she went home. Wednesday, I didn’t have to do any large animal appointments in the morning because Dr. Farrell forgot and took the vet truck with him someplace. I sat around the clinic before getting bored and making Joe come and get me. His car was in the shop for new tires and brakes. We also got some confirmation from my mom about bringing the ponies up to Pennsylvania which was good. Thursday, I had not one, but TWO amputations to do on young cats. One was a forelimb amputation because of a brachial plexus avulsion and the other was a hindlimb amputation because of a broken leg. Both went really well despite warnings that they could die. Thanks. Then like I mentioned earlier, I had a bulldog come in for vomiting and respiratory distress. It wasn’t really in respiratory distress but you could see its typically elongated palate billow over the epigolltius with each breath. I gave two shots and then as I was getting meds together, the dog keeled over. We tried everything to get it back, but wasn’t able too. It was terrifying. Friday, I worked at both clinics. Today, I found out that two of the cats I saw died over the weekend. WTF?  That night, I sewed up a laceration on a horse’s nostril. Saturday, I went on two large animal calls and while on call over the weekend answered one question about puppies pooping worms, goats with broken horns (who I saw today), started to go out on a calving call only to be called back as I left my house and saw a limping dog. Very slow weekend, for that I’m grateful.

Because of all of the deaths of patients, because of all the craziness, because I’m neurotic, I’m very stressed out right now.

And I’m stressed out because suddenly, I’m going to be spending an extra $300 a month on the ponies not to mention the extra gas.

And then the landlord called today because he got my note saying that we would let him know in March or April about moving. I don’t know about moving. Ideally, Joe and I would move to a house in Newville but is moving just to be in Newville worth the hassle of moving our ugly furniture without having a place for the ponies? Apparently, some of the neighbors are moving and there are people interested in our unit. I told him we hadn’t really started looking but it has seemed difficult.

Spring is really starting to come to Pennsylvania. We had lots of rain on Thursday; that and the melting snow has flooded lots of things. The Conidoguinet (I’m not sure how its spelled; I call it the corndog) Creek has really risen and is over its banks at lots of places. All of the low spots have water sitting in them. Our yard is starting to flush green. I’m excited to fertilize it and put out fresh mulch. Maybe this weekend. And plant some more bulbs or something. Of course, I don’t want to do that if we aren’t staying for at least another year.  I’m still obsessive about the compost pile. Mostly though, the one under the sink. There’s coffee grounds everyday to go in!

You may have heard about the fire last week here in Pennsylvania. It made national news. A Mennonite family lost seven children. The wife was in the barn milking at 10 pm when a 3 year old girl came out to tell her there was smoke in the house. Her husband was driving a milk truck down the road. The wife was pregnant with their 9^th child too. What a tragedy. Anyway, as much of a tragedy this was, Westboro Baptist Church out of Kansas was going to protest the funeral. Why? Why is this crazy whack job group protesting the funeral of 7 innocent children that belong to one of the most peaceful religions ever? Here’s the press release from the church. It says that the children were raised by ‘blind, godless parents’. WTF? Since when is a Mennonite family godless? It seems as of today, that they aren’t going to protest so all of the counter protesters shouldn’t show up either-this is according to the state police. Such a shame.

I ordered a dress from ModCloth on clearance the other day. It was well over $100 originally but I got it for just over $40 including s/h. I had to wait a lot longer than I intended. The dress is navy with acorns printed on it. It’s a little bit too big-or I imagine it will be. I haven’t tried it on. It’ll look really cute with a red or pink scarf. ModCloth has lots of really cute apartment stuff too-Eiffel tower teapots, owl things, etc...

Needless to say that because of the devastation in Japan, Joe won’t be vacationing there anytime soon. The State Department came out today stating that US citizens shouldn’t travel to Japan. Since Joe’s vacation is canceled, I was figuring that Joe and I could now go on vacation. Its looking to be sometime in May. Joe isn’t sure he can get the time off which I think is really unfair that he was completely okay with taking time to go to Japan but not for vacation with me. We haven’t decided on where. Portland and Seattle are strong contenders with their exotic donut places-Voodoo Doughnut  and Frost Donuts respectfully. Fort Lauderdale being that its warm. Canada since we both have passports. California because there would be lots to do. Maybe just a trip to NYC. Joe doesn’t seem impressed with the idea of that.

In yet another wedding update, it still looks like we’re going to bite the bullet on the library. Nothing has been really been set into concrete but its still looking promising. The hardest part will be getting the rental furniture-chairs, stage and all the decorations-flowers, birdhouses, etc put up two hours in advance. I probably won’t be able to do it but will be freaking out that it won’t be done right without my strict supervision. Yes, I’m willing to admit that I will be a Bridezilla. The other thing is that when my mom is coming to bring up the ponies, I asked her if she was going to stay around and shop for wedding dresses with me. (Have I mentioned this before?) She said she couldn’t but may come up for a 3 day weekend later. Poo. I really need to get started on looking for a wedding dress. As well as sending out save the date cards but NO ONE in our families has sent me ANY information. Its super frustrating. The other thing…Joe told his mom this and she said that she would come up and go wedding dress shopping with me. Is it crazy to be trying to plan a wedding from half way across the country? Is it crazy that I haven’t really started planning or losing weight?

Bridesmaids Dresses and Used Car Salesmen

Welcome to March blog readers (Martha)! Its nice of you to join me. Hopefully, all is well where you are and that you feel the spring in the air! I do! Its supposed to rain all day tomorrow-I’m thinking Gone With The Wind and popcorn with the dogs followed by some dog free time sewing. I’ve got several projects planned-a St. Patrick’s day shirt, a little bag for clothespins.

Anyway, first some stuff about my day today. Finally, a Saturday off! March appears to put me back onto my normal Saturday work schedule with the exception of being on call the second and not third weekend of the month. That only sucks because I wanted to take the dogs to a dog costume contest on that weekend. Also, I think that Jenn Savini was off that weekend so we could have hung out. Maybe during the week.

Okay, this morning Joe and I got up and went to Harrisburg. Today was the day that I was going to buy a bridesmaid’s dress for Tiffany’s wedding. Joe had to come with me (even though he didn’t put in much input) because I have no friends. We got there and it was a sheer mad house. The consultant picked out seven dresses for me to try on. I only tried on six because one I couldn’t even get zipped. I didn’t really like it anyway. I then got measured for the dress. I was then informed that my bust measurement put me at a size 10, my waist at a size 12 (which is what I tried on) and my hips at a size 16! I ended up ordering a size 14. Within forty minutes, I had purchased a bridesmaid dress for Tiffany’s wedding. Its nice. This is what the dress looks like except that its going to be wine with champagne trim. I kind of like the colors here.

After the dress trying on, we went and ate some Chipotle. I love Chipotle and apparently everyone else does too. I’ve never been in one where I didn’t have to wait in line for some amount of time. We ate then went to look at cars. We’ve decided that a new used car purchase is an option for us. Something that we are looking for in the next couple of months. A new house in addition to a wedding isn’t going to happen but I think that a car is possible.

We went to a Toyota/Jeep dealer because Joe said that he’d rather go through a big dealer than something like Uncle Bob’s Backyard Motors. Once there, Joe asked if he could take the lead on this. I told him sure, because even though we were really looking for a car for me and that Joe would be getting my car, I decided that I could play the role of the woman.

We were hustled into an office by Reggie, an infectiously enthusiastic black man in his late ‘50s. (This detail about race is important here in a minute, trust me.) There he wanted to know what we were looking for (an SUV) and what we would be trading in (a 1996 Toyota Turcel with 165,000 miles, which got us the ever useful favorite Pennsylvania phrase-‘it is what it is’). Joe at this point, jokingly said that he would pay them to take his car. Then Reggie said ‘that’s mighty white of you.’ (Joe and I both instantaneously shut down. I wasn’t sure why until we discussed it in the car. What a racist thing to say!) Then he wanted to know what our price range (from there on referred to as our price point. Ugh.) was. It was too low. So he showed us some cars that were about $6000 above the arbitrary number Joe and I set to spend on a car. At that point, he suggested we do some more research into what we wanted and what we could spend. I jumped in now and explained that we were from Missouri. And that in Missouri, $9000 would buy us a very nice used car. I gave the example that when three years ago (I think its actually been more.) I bought my ’98 Jeep Grand Cherokee, I paid about $6000 and that I had seen ads for the exact car (mileage, age, features) here in Pennsylvania for about $8000-9000. How could that be? So now our options are that Joe continues to drive the Turdcel till it dies (prolonged by the new brakes its getting on Tuesday) or we figure out how much we can really spend a month on a car payment in addition to rent, bills, horse boarding, saving, etc, etc!

After being traumatized slightly at the car dealership, Joe and I went home and then took the dogs to the dog park. Joe worked to give Mary pneumonia by making her play fetch in a creek. After that, we came home and ate KFC and now we are sitting around watching Chopped! Reruns and writing blogs.

Hmm…what else. You may remember me mentioning, Max the grayhound with the broken leg that I saw on emergency. Well, Max got referred to a surgeon to put his leg back together and they referred him somewhere else. The owners called to ask if we trusted the second clinic. We had no problem with it. So they went. And this week, the owners noticed Max licking at his toes, that the bandage was wet and it smelled. Taking him into our clinic, it was discovered that his skin over the bone implant had rotted off! The whole thing was infected, the bone plate was lose and the bone still as broken as when I saw him. He was promptly referred someplace else and went into surgery. I called Friday and left a message about how sorry I was and that I hoped Max was doing well. Poor dog.

Friday, I also diagnosed a hernia in a chiwawa. The owners were totally unaware. It may of occurred when the dog fell off of the porch. Also, I continued to be Dr. Death on Wednesday. In six days of working, I euthanized eight animals. All of them needed it in one way or another but it still doesn’t make me feel any better.  

On the marriage front, I finally got some more information regarding renting the room at Ellis Library for the ceremony. Its going to be over $2000. Joe says to go for it. I’m not sure. I still have to look into costs for renting chairs and a small stage as well as set up. And decorations. And a reception hall. I also need guest lists! Guest lists people!

I put in for a vacation in April or May. Joe is still trying to decide if he's going to Japan. I want to go on vacation with him which is going to be difficult financially. Top contenders for place are Canada, Seattle, California and Fort Lauderdale. I also inquired about going to AVMA in St. Louis. I knew it was going to be difficult because of Tracy being out on maternity leave but I wasn't sure that it would be impossible. Besides, AVMA being in St. Louis would be a great opportunity for me. CE, time to see my family, time to see my friends, time to do wedding stuff, it being free. Unfortunately, its not going to happen. TH has his vacation right at that same time. Ugh. Low man on the totem pole. At least everyone was apoligetic about it. Which isn't going to stop me from complaining.

Finally, my mom is harping on me about moving the ponies. I think I mentioned it before. She’s pushing for all three ponies to come which just throws a whole wrench into the thing. Two fit nicely in a stall. A third would have to be pasture boarded for cost purposes. This means it needs to get here before the grass gets too green so it can get used to eating grass 24-7, being with large horses, being outside in the weather, and getting used to hotwire. I told her that I really only want to take two ponies. I asked her when she could come up. She was like whenever. My real question now is if she brings the ponies, is my mom going to stay so that she can go dress shopping with me? Or is going to bring them and go home? Joe suggested that his mom and Casey pick up the ponies and bring them out here using my parent’s trailer. Once here, Jackie would go dress shopping with me. Everyone, but my mom wins! Joe and I haven’t in depth talked about the ponies. I guess it doesn’t matter. I really need to look at the budget. And my time budget.