goblinbox

In which we take a look at the blue dog for a sec.

Best dog ever, scowling at me for making her sit while I snap her picture with my cell phone.

In which this post is, like, totally ILLUSTRATED.

I lost two pounds last week, in spite of that four-slices-of-pizza debacle. I lost no inches, though, because of all of those damned squats and crunches and push-ups and shit. Nine weeks to go to achieve my goal weight.

So naturally, yesterday Adam sent me some Swedish Fish. They’re delicious superfruity fish-shaped gummi wonderfulness. They’re also 150 kcal per serving, so I am ignoring them as we speak:

Last night I went to an afterhours party at a friend’s house. She has a cat that will walk into a plastic grocery bag and let you carry her around:

I found it to be so hilarious I carried that cat all over the house. In a bag! LOLz!

This morning I took Bindu to her annual check-up. They poked her with a needle and her rabies cert is good until 2013. She has some tumors the vet thought were not fatty lipomas, but since her overall health is good for her age, I don’t think I’ll worry about them. She pants a lot, she’s nearly deaf, and she’s always rubbing her face on the floor like it itches, but she also eats well, has lovely ears and teeth, wants to go on walks, and runs up and down my bedroom stairs all day long: pretty good shape for a 13- or 14-year-old dog. I might get a basic blood panel done next month, just for the hell of it, but the vet thought she seemed fine overall.

We stopped at the store on the way home, and although I did find fava beans (yay! ful meddames!) I didn’t buy any garlic. Ooops. I made freakin’ awesome delish chickpea curry for lunch, though:

I realize that today is Tuesday, but there’s a nice disco-y Monday Morning Mix for you, if you want!

In which we’ll miss the little poodlet.

G’ma had to have Chipper, her poodle mix, put down last Wednesday.

He’d gotten despondent and the vet had put him on meds for diabetes; G’ma and my brother took turns sticking him with a needle twice a day. A week later he was vomiting repeatedly and was one morning nearly non-responsive. G’ma had my uncle take him back to the vet.

Infection in the pancreas, possibly, or cancer; followed by not eating or drinking, followed by emergent renal failure. Rather than subject a twelve-year-old dog to possibly pointless exploratory surgery, she opted to have him put him to sleep. He’s buried out at the farm in Dave’s pet cemetary.

Bye bye, Chipper-doodle, you were a wonderful, weird, and sweet little dog.

In which I’m waiting for the results of the blood work.

Bindu has a heart murmur for which she may or may not need meds. She does not have ear mites, but she did get her ears cleaned. She’s obese – she weighs 36.1 pounds, up from 29.8 six months ago – and has to lose weight. She received a parvo/distemper shot. She may or may not have diabetes for which she may or may not need meds.

They said they’d call me Tuesday or Wednesday.

I spent $150 at the vet today.

I also watched a movie, failed to do laundry, showered, went to band practice, and may or may not have put a scratch in my grandmother’s car with a bush or fence or something while parking (I’m not sure if the scratch was there before or not).

Over all, despite the lack of real trauma, a fairly high-stress day for me. Going to bed early.

Hurumpfh.

In which we visit the Vet, who Pokes Dogs With Sharp Things.

Bindu had a 10:30 appointment at the vet clinic this morning, where they poked her with sharp things.

That’s what they do at the vet, you see: poke poor, innocent dogs with sharp things.

Of course, I’ve seen this dog smack herself in the head – say, on a brick building or something – with such force that she should have a concussion, and not even notice, so I don’t know why a little 23-gauge needle would cause her to pant and shiver like her very life force is being sucked out, but I digress.

The doc and I discussed her general health – Is she eating well? (Yup.) any sudden, massive intake of water? (Nope.) problems with stairs or moving around? (Nope.) – and then he gave her a general look-over. She’s in great shape for an old dog. He took a look at her lump, then did a fine-needle biopsy and ran away to view the results under a microscope.

Good news! It’s just a fatty deposit. Not cancer. YAY!

Then he gave her a rabies booster – her last one was in 2003 – so now I can register her and pay the $10 licensing fee and she’ll be a totally legit town dog!

The whole shebang cost a hundred bucks. And on the way home I bought dog food, so now I have five dollars to last me until Friday. But at least I know my dog is healthy and doesn’t have a cyst that will explode and poison her to death.

For a creature who is effectively 65 years old, it’s really impressive that she can jump three times her own damn height.

In which I love my dog so much omg it hurts.

I’ll tell you what’s better than a puppy! An old dog. An old dog who heels like heaven.

This morning (well, afternoon, really) when I got up I decided to walk to the coffee shop with Bindu. Alas, I couldn’t find a leash for my dog, so first we hopped in the car and took a quick trip to the farm supply store, where I spent eight bucks and got Bindu a new chain and leash.

Bindu spent the entire drive with her head out the passenger side window of the jeep, her tongue lolling. At a light, a pedestrian said, “That’s a cool dog!”

I replied, “I know, thanks!” and grinned.

Anyway, we got home and began our walk up 2nd street.

My 11-year-old blue heeler bitch is so fucking good on a leash it almost makes me cry. I hate dogs who pull, so I’ve got her trained to always leave slack in the leash. She responds to slight twitches of the leash – I never have to yank on her neck. She walks always on my right (because hey, I’m left handed) and she rarely gets far enough ahead that she can’t see my feet in her peripheral vision.

I don’t even really have to hold the leash as much as thread it through my fingers so that I don’t drop it.

I always use a choke chain on my dogs, because the weight and noise tell them they’re leashed, not because I’m into strangling dogs as a hobby. Also they’re easy on and off; over the head! When first confronted with them they seemed cruel, but now I’ve been around dogs for awhile I realize an occasional choking’s probably good for ‘em.

I dropped Bindu’s leash outside the coffee shop and told her, “Stay.” When I came out, people were petting her but she was staring at the door waiting for me to reappear. On our walk home she was proud to be “working,” and her behavior and leash skills were the best EVER, I tell you.

I love my dog!

(Yes, I know I’ve posted about this before but she’s just so good on-leash I can’t help myself.)

In which that tiny little screwdriver comes in handy!

Once upon a time, I bought a little glasses repair kit. It came with a little magnifying glass, four tiny little extra screws, and this kick-ass little screwdriver all snug in a plastic case. I use it to tighten my glasses once in awhile, and I cleverly keep it someplace utterly random — my knitting bag! — where I can always find it.

I just used the kit’s little screwdriver to take the X5 apart. There it is, guts exposed! My new toy isn’t working properly at all; the screen either doesn’t respond or it responds incorrectly, and a touch screen device with a FUBAR touch screen is basically a paperweight.

I dug around here and found that the precise symptoms my X5 exhibits are common with older X5s, so I’m mid-fix as I type. Once I’m done with this post, I’m going to reassemble the thing (and then REINSTALL ALL THE CRAP I’D INSTALLED JUST A FEW DAYS AGO) and if it’s fixed, I’ll keep it. If it’s still a glitchy POS, I’ll send it back.

In other news, now that I live in town I have to register my dog [ordinance #1000 on the link] at City Hall. Which means I have to give her annual rabies shots, which pisses me off. I vaccinate my animal/s every three years because vaccines last for three years, they’re expensive, and over-vaccinating kills pets just like it does people.

Gah. I hate stupid regulations. I don’t mind paying $10 a year to license my dog, but there’s just no way I’m going to vaccinate my 10-year-old bitch for rabies each and every year, no way at all. I tell you what: there’d better be an elderly animal exemption, or my bitch ain’t gonna be legal.

In which my dog is such a good girl!

I’ve had my beloved ACD Bindu with me for a couple of days. Bread let me take her when I saw him at BoSe’s the night before last, and I walked her over to AmmZon’s and bathed her immediately, then poisoned her with flea meds.

I’ve had her at work with me, and she lounges under my desk and naps, or plays with the other office dog, Jamal, who is a gorgeous and friendly brindle pit bull.

This morning Bindu and I walked from AmmZon’s to the square to work. She’s remembered all her training, and heels beautifully. When we walked on a leash this afternoon, she left the perfect amount of slack in the lead. I love that. (A dog that pulls bugs the shit out of me, so I kick ‘em in the haunch until they stop.) If she’s off lead and we approach an intersection, she always pulls back and looks at me before we cross. Such a good girl!

Dog love is a beautiful thing.

In which we return to the vet for a third time.

Stella’s got another hemotoma in her ear. This is the third one.

It’s in the original ear. The hair hasn’t even grown back from the first surgery.

I asked what would happen if I just ignored it, and the vet said that it would eventually burst and be really gross, not to mention being unhealthy for the dog. You know, having a bleeding blood vessel like that.

So.

I will be visiting the vet again tomorrow morning to drop Stella off, and she will give me The Look and I will feel really, really bad about it, and they will put her totally under and do the same surgery they did a couple of weeks ago, and I will pick her up tomorrow afternoon and she will be stoned out of her gourd and there will be a rubber tube sutured into her ear.

And it will cost over $100.

I. Hate. Fleas.

In other news, this morning’s interview went great… in the sense that the people were really nice and it was, over all, a pleasant social experience (and I looked fantastic, if I do say so myself). I was grossly overqualified because it turned out to be a shipping clerk position and they’re not going to hire me and even if they did I’d turn it down because there’s no way I could stuff CDs into sleeves for a living and be able to stand myself.

I’m doing a wee data entry gig at WGI in the evenings and possibly during the days if they can get a computer set up for me. So: income! Yay!

In which it was really totally icky and gross! Ewh, ewh, EWH! EWH!

I went into my kitchen yesterday and something… horrible… had transpired.

I really can’t even put it together, even with the circumstantial evidence. I mean, there was some… fluid… on the counter that looked like the kind of fluid that really needs to be INSIDE of something, like, permanently. The kind of fluid that only gets outside if you’re, like, totally dead or something.

Oh, and there it is. The totally dead or something. I have no idea how it got quite THERE, exactly. Perhaps the cat ate it, and then, well, and I know this sounds far-fetched, but bear with me: perhaps the cat sat on the counter, just so, at the very edge, and, I don’t know, PUKED down into the water bowl on the floor and half missed?

The point being that on the OTHER counter, not the one with the puddle of mystery internal fluid but the other one, was a single drop of blood the size of a nickel. And below that counter, half in and half ON the stainless steel dog water bowl, were the bloody internal remains of… something.

The thing was so dead and so totally apart that I couldn’t even identify it.

Guts, floating in the water bowl. SO FUCKING GROSS. EWH!

I had to pick that bowl up and take it outside and dump it in a ditch. And then I had to clean up the counter. And the other counter. And several sketchy-looking places on the floor.

And when I was done, with my nose all wrinkled up and everything, the cat, Buz, in his little-girl voice, said, “Meow?” and polished my ankles, purring.

Purring!

He’s such a liar, that innocent-looking cat with his little-girl voice. Meow my ass. He totally and without shame wreaked deathly, bleeding havoc IN THE ROOM WHERE I COOK MY FOOD!

In other news, I have an interview tomorrow morning at 10:30 and then I’m going over to WG because apparently they’ve got a data entry project I can do. Yay!

In which I right a wrong.

I’m so self-involved apparently that I totally forgot to mention Stella’s surgery!

She was stoned as hell when Bread picked her up from the vet late yesterday afternoon — her eyes were red and droopy and she couldn’t seem to be able to focus both of them on the same object — but she survived the vet once again and her ear is slowly draining all over the place.

She’ll be on antibiotics for the next ten days; she gets two huge pills shoved down her throat every day until the tube comes out of her ear.

In which there’s dog love.

Just got back from lunch. Bread came and picked me up and we got tacos and sat under a tree at Whitham Woods to eat. Then we stopped at TSC for dog and cat food, then he drove me to the jeep. He’d already changed the tire and it was on its tiny little doughnut.

He took the jeep, I took his truck and came back to work.

Bread brought all three of the dogs into town with him ’cause he wasn’t thinking, and it’s too hot to leave them in a vehicle and too weird to take all three of them to a shop and leave ‘em in the jeep while the tires are getting changed. So I’ve got Bindu under my desk because Bread didn’t really want three of them with him. Somehow two are easier to manage than three.

Oh, that blue dog. HOW CUTE IS SHE?!?!?