Hypochondria for dogs

Bailey's breath has been horrible lately.  I tried to tell her, but she didn't quite get the hint.  I gave her Greenies (doggie bone breath mints) but they didn't work.  She still reeked of dead tuna.  I was embarrased for her; not even the cat wanted to be around her.  I am sure this has hurt her playtime opportunities at doggie daycare.

Tonight I noticed a lump on her gums above one of her teeth.  Before I looked up the number to the vet (since I can't call Dr. Joe anymore...not that he knew anything...), I did what any responsible parent would do, I looked it up on google.  According to my uber-scientific research, Bailey has an "epulis".  I'm not really sure what that is, but a ferret somewhere had one that looks just like hers (google images search).  Based on my in-depth veterinary training provided by petmd.com (which is probably the equivalent of Dr. Joe's DVM degree from the Caribbean - you know the schools you go to when you can't get into a real school), after diagnosing Bailey I determined the best course of treatment would be surgery. 

Before you come running to stop me, no I am not going to perform the surgery myself by watching it on youtube.  Plus it's pretty gross (not that I've checked or anything) and I can't handle gross.  I figured I better leave this one to the people that have real degrees from vet schools in the good ol' US of A.  I went to call the vet......and they had just closed five minutes ago.  All of that time doing my self diagnosis routine and I missed the vet.  So I'll call tomorrow; hopefully I can get her in this week. 

So although I don't necessarily condone praying for pink eye (read my previous post on the perils of pink eye), I will pray that my little Bails is ok. 

Confidential psychological report

Name:  Phoebe S.
Age: 4 years old?
Date of birth:  unknown
Female

Phoebe is normal in physical appearance (height and weight) with white hair and blue eyes.

Social history:  found alone in a shed after her mom and siblings were incarcerated.  She escaped and lived alone for a short period.  She was rescued by her current home.  Bailey is her older sister.  Bailey and Phoebe have a love/hate relationship...Phoebe loves to torment Bailey and Bailey hates it. 

She has previously been treated for "crazy" with antidepressants.  She refused to take her medicine regularly.  She also showed some side effects such as bloating.

Phoebe suffers from hallucinations which make her race about the house at high rates of speed.  She also exhibits signs of night terrors by sitting in her bedroom and shrieking "MERRRROOOOWWW" repeatedly in the middle of the night.  In addition, when she is highly anxious she will resort to self-mutilation, mostly in the form of cutting and biting.  Her tail shows signs of deep cuts with her own nails as well as bite marks.  Her wounds are not healing because she keeps picking at them.  There have also been some signs of bipolar disorder, with extreme highs of crazy attacking followed by long periods of self imposed isolation in the bed's box springs.  She can become physically aggressive when provoked by my just occupying space in the same room. 

Vet visit:  $96.00
Diagnosis:  Still f*&$ing crazy. 
Treatment:  Warm compresses on her tail until my hand is amputated by her talons.  If no improvement, she will be given an e-collar to wear...which should be hilarious.

The end of the world

Glad to be in the South, y'all. 

Happiness

I read somewhere that people that feel happy most of the time volunteer their time.  All that feel goodness from volunteering improves their mood.

I put in 6 hours of hard labor (ok, painting) with Habitat for Humanity today.

I don’t feel any happier.  Tired?  Yes.  Sore?  Yes.  Still waiting on the happy.

I arrived at the site and met Ty Pennington!  Ok, not the real Ty Pennington.  He was a local version…but he looked liked Ty and was a little hyper, very excited, and has never met a stranger.  Local Ty was the site leader and he put me straight to painting the upstairs.  I had splattered paint on me within the first 10 minutes.  After 30 minutes, I had as much paint on me as on the walls.  By that point, I didn’t even try to keep it off my shirt or jeans.  There were other girls there her barely had a smudge on their hands.  I, on the other hand, looked like I bathed in paint and primer.  On the bright side, guess who was a better painter?  The messy one or the college kid afraid of getting a spot on them?  That’s right…me.  Oops.  Just lost a hard earned karma point on that comment.

I figured after putting in 6 hours of hard work for a good cause gave me 6 hours of “good” time that I could trade for “bad” time.  Bad times are when I am rude to customer service personnel (they bring it on themselves, really), or when I tailgate (if you would go the speed limit, we wouldn’t have this problem), or when I gossip at work (hey – did you hear about…wait…good points).  I don’t think my good time bank is going to last very long.  That’s why I am going back next week to paint trim and help put in laminate floors.

If only the happy would hurry up and get here….

A tale of two fish

About three years ago I bought a fish tank, two fish, and a snail for my classroom.  We were going to learn all about ecosystems – yay!  The kids named the fish Bruce and Sharkbait (after the shark and fish in “Finding Nemo”).  The two lived up to their names after Bruce (named after the shark) ate poor little Sharkbait after a couple of weeks.  Great lesson, huh?  I blamed the cannibalistic activities on the fact that Sharkbait was never really a healthy little fish and I figured he died of natural causes and then Bruce ate him.  Oh, the snail died too….

Bruce isn’t the smartest fish in the pond.  He got himself stuck in his coral tank beautification project, which forced it to be condemned and removed.  He then swam right up beside the filter and got stuck.  Idiot.  I was constantly freeing this stupid little fish from odd places.  Who would have thought that a fish would get that turned around in a one room home.

Against the naysayers who said Bruce was a cold blooded killer, I bought him some new and improved digs along with a tank-mate.  New fish doesn’t quite have a name yet (I didn’t want to become too attached in case I should have named him “Snack”).  So I just call him “New Fish”.  After putting them into their new home, I immediately figured New Fish was the special fish.  I know that Bruce wasn’t  that bright to begin with, but poor New Fish seemed to have some extra difficulties.  He can’t swim.  He just wiggles his little body and ends up doing flips in the water.  He goes upside down, backwards, and will even get so turned around that he just stops and floats belly up until his little mind can figure out where to go.  Unfortunately, Bruce immediately figured out that New Fish had a swimming impairment and turned into a bully.  Bruce would poke and run into New Fish with zeal.  He also nipped at New Fish’s little tail…which didn’t help with the swimming issues at all.

Things seem to have settled down in fish world.  Bruce will still nose New Fish out of the way…and New Fish still swims like a drunken sailor…but  I no longer fear New Fish turning into fish food. 

Leave it to the special education teacher to find two special education fish.        

 

Hmmmm....relaxation?

I have been keeping quite a bit of pent up anger in me since the break up.  I also tend to be an anxious person; if I don't have anything to worry about, I'll create something (usually a cancer diagnosis from WebMD if work isn't stressful enough).  Because of this, I decided that I am not quite ready to start relaxation medication and thought I would go back to yoga.

I don't have the money for a yoga class (or a gym that offers a yoga class).  Plus, all gyms target their yoga classes towards people that evidently do not have jobs.  I guess if you aren't working and have the money to afford a gym, life is pretty stressful for you and you need your 10 AM yoga class each Wednesday.  Bitter?  Yes.

I bought Jillian Michaels' "YOGA MELTDOWN" dvd.  Yes, it needs to be in all caps because I am inspiring myself to do it.  If Jillian yells "YOGA MELTDOWN" at me, I'll probably have a yoga meltdown.  Jillian promises me that I will lose 5 pounds in a week if I follow her routine.  To help me out, I also planned a healthy fish dinner for after my yoga-izing.

I dig out my yoga mat (this actually took 20 minutes of searching) and roll it onto the floor.  I start my DVD and begin.  As I try to move into downward dog I realize that Phoebe has staked out one end of the mat as her domain.  She is also willing to protect that territory at all costs.  Joe offered to declaw her for me, but after watching him trim Bailey's toenails I figured he would just cut Phoebe's feet off at the ankle and she is still very able to defend herself.  Ok, fine.  I'll just try to use the other end of the mat.  Phoebe doesn't take this lying down and attacks my pants.  As she is trying to climb up my pants to get the waist tie, I give up.  I made it all of 10 minutes through my workout. 

I watched the rest of the workout while sitting on the couch and drinking a glass of wine.  I may not have burned any calories, but I am a little more relaxed.

I give up..go ahead and call Animal Cops

My poor animals act as if I am leaving them to die every day when I go to work.  I get these sad little faces that look like "I only hope I am still alive when you get back...nevermind the fact I live in a climate-controlled house with a continual supply of food and water."

Today I leave but it is a special day because Bailey gets to go to doggie daycare.  I load up Bailey and gather everything I need and off we go.  My only fleeting thought towards poor Phoebe is that I hope I didn't leave my curling iron plugged in (you know, 'cause then the house would burn down...oops).  I should have given more thought to Phoebe because today I actually did leave her for dead.

Twelve hours later I return and Phoebe is not waiting at the door for me.  I call her over and over, to no avail.  I check under the beds, in the open closet, in the half bath, and no Phoebe.  I cannot figure out where she has gone.  Instead of using her hunting nose to help in the search, Bailey is dancing a jig behind me at the thought of Phoebe being gone forever.  I call my mom to wail about the missing Phoebe.  She tells me to check the closet.  But I did check the closet!  Do it again she tells me.  Ok, still no Phebes.  She then instructs me to check the other closet.  I think she is crazy because the door is shut, there is no way Phoebe could jump up, turn the door knob, get in the closet, and shut it back. 

Guess what was in the closet.......

Phoebe.  Evidently I had left her to die a slow death in the corner of my closet.  Her worst fears had come true. 

I'll wait for the Animal Cops to show up, just let me check the closets before they haul me away.