Friday Cat Blogging

Smile!

Design on My Dime

If I am going to start putting real thought into the living room - such as "How in love with the couch am I? Is seventeen years enough of a return on my investment? Is that sexy red couch on craigslist in downtown Raleigh my real hearts desire? And is it still available" or  if a new-to-me couch is too scary, "How expensive are slip covers anyway? And is it important that they are nice slip covers?" Answer, "very". If so, how expensive are custom slip covers? Answer, "very".

The next question, "Why are online painting tools such bitches?! Why do they make it so hard?" I tried out two and both times I was very unsatisfied, I did learn though that I like shades of darker gray better than shades of lighter gray. The darker grays are just richer and more satisfying for me than the lighter directions. I think a darker shade would also look better with the curtain fabric.

I have to be careful of the space being too contrasty or looking awkward or just being too, too. I wish the online tools were more user friendly or I was better at following directions. They look very easy right up until you start playing with them and then they suck and I get frustrated and  that doesn't help me with getting a vision of my design direction. I may have no direction. I can't tell.

I don't think the room will got full-cave, you never want to go full-cave, because when the room gets painted, the wood work is going to go high gloss stark white - and there is a lot of wood work in the room. My biggest fear is that it will ultimately look very Fall-Winter 2014-2015, but I might be all right with that..

Admitting you have a problem is the first step

I hate the winter. I don't hate it because its cold, I resent it because its cold, I hate it because it gets dark too damn early and aggressively compresses my schedule after work.

Today I had to go to Sams, less than two miles from my office, to pick up meds for the dog. I hurry over there and wait in a line of me while the pharmacy clerk did something that involved not helping me while we burned daylight.

Since I had all ready missed my Dog Walk window, I decided to make a pass around the store to see if there was anything I needed. I found that I needed a tub of blueberries large enough to sate the third worlds needs for blueberries.

For a super food they are really low key, no capes, no flash wheels, no cool toys. I like that in a super thing. They keep it real. I finally made it home and decided since I could not walk, that I should eat something other than blueberries and so I made dinner. It was good.

Dog and I watched TV and then, feeling I needed to get some exercise, I went to Target to return an overpriced and unneeded phone charger. I stretched my legs and then took us to Wally World to pick up dog food and as it turned out, a mid-sized bag of cheetos. The unsung mayor of Lowcarbville ( really, you can eat more two pretty good handfuls and not sin at all). I didn't walk in to Wallyworld to get cheetos but what can you do? Wally World! Sadly, what happens in Wally World doesn't stay in Wally World, you have to bring the evidence home with you. And on your fingers and teeth.

Wally World is not for the weak of will. Or maybe it is, maybe that is the reason for Wally World, it where your weak will gets explored and discovered. Your weak will gets a great work out at Wally World.Wally celebrates your weak will.

You never know how weak your will really is until you pass that display of deeply discounted pajama sets. You don't really need any more PJs and frankly, the selection is thin and they are all kinds of ugly and when did they start using upholstery fabric for sleepwear anyway? But they are so cheap! and maybe you need them and when are you going to see PJs made from indoor out door carpet again? or that pair made from fiber board? If all that is too much, how about a glow in the dark nighty? or a safety orange bra? Or maybe you should just go gaze upon the 48 count electric blue cup cakes?

Wally World, stocked with what you don't want, don't need and can't live without.

Newness

Meet the fabric for the new living room curtains!

Its not nearly as shiney in real world. In fact, looking at my swatch, I'm a little concerned that it might be a little drab and muddy under my lights- however it looks smashing with my furniture, so its still a win. There will be day when I run across the perfect hot pink book shelf or orange coffee table and life will be even better. I could become friends with electric blue. When the dog sheds, I can call it a design decision.

I'm going to have a close as possible to silver walls, I will also be on the look out for gray carpeting. Clearly, I am redecorating my house to suite my dogs fur. I checked and twelve years is the cut off for keeping your wall color, I did not know that, but it s rule, you have to change it up at least every decade so that you can better date those unmarked holiday pictures.

Its not  all going to happen immediately, the fabric is going to be the first step but it won't be turned into curtains by my Mom for a while. I'm going to wait for my tax return to get most of the painting work taken care of slash done by professionals. That means that once that ball gets rolling it will roll fast and will get done in one day and done well, as opposed to the many, many days it would take me to do the work badly. The paint on the wood work is in terrible shape and getting it taking care of is a good investment in the house.

Change is good.

Soup Police

I've spent my evening dancing attention with this bad boy. I think it tastes  and looks alright - that's right, it features broccoli  and peppers...  it's a haute courture  soup. My chicken soup is not found off the rack.

What it does not have yet is noodles. I bought some but it looks like they are going  to be a first thing in the morning addition .

Does  it need noodles? I am a noodle fan but the carb count is stress causing, I did  but the lowest carb variety  I could, but  still. My kingdom for 100% wheat soup noodles! I looked at three  different  stores and no love!

Trader  Joe's was the least helpful. They aren't  a low carb environment, radical vegans have a home  there but carnivores who are trying to keep it healthy need to look elsewhere. Wal-Mart  had a better selection!  You really have to check yourself when Wally World has a wider selection of  noodles than you do.

Monday

I had a great weekend! I may have found my drapery material for the living room, I did my laundry early, and I finally watched a netflix movie I've had sitting around since the beginging of October! Netflix thinks I lost it! Ha! I didn't lose it I was just too lazy b busy to watch it. It was better to pay rent month after month for it then to just give up and admit I wasn't going to watch it for oh, three or so months. If you don't watch what you have in a timely manner , you are paying rent for it.  Monument Men was pretty good - even if it moved faster than it should have, I think it was a little rushed, and now I want to read the book.

And that was about all I did all weekend.

I took some walks, logged some time on the exerbike and slept late. It was probably the perfect weekend.

The cat doesn't like being in the same room as the dog, but he makes allounces for rooms that also contain the dogs wet dog food. Also, check the sharing and caring that Rocket is dishing out. yes, there is a smudge on the lense, I'll fix it,

Friday Cat Blogging

Friday

I worry that I don't get enough alone time with the cat. I walk the dog multiple times over the day, we hang out in front of the TV together and we go places together in the car.

The cat and I just don't spend as much time bonding  and this troubles me. I feel we should have something that we do that is just ours .  I have a couple of cat dancer things and those are fun but  I don't see the cat really spending hours  a week  bonding with me while he cavorts. He's not much into cavorting.

I wish that I could take little kitty for walks! I think he would be an awesome walker - if he would wear a harness, if he would walk with the harness on, if he would tolerate being outside,  while walking and wearing a harness. I don't see this happening, he is not Tex in many ways. I think there are too many if's there to ensure success. He is also not another cat.

 I think that Tex would have liked Rocket, eventually, I know he would have not been afraid of him as a wee puppy and he would have taken advantage of his size in a big way. He brought Daisy to heel very fast, I'm pretty sure that Rocket would have posed no problem for him at all. They would have gotten along.

It would also help if he was more open to being around the dog, he seemed to like Daisy well enough and they lived together for several years. I wonder if he somehow doesn't want to betray his relationship with Daisy  by being friends with Rocket? Animals really live in the now so I'm not sure how possible it is that he is protecting a memory. I just really wish he was more comfortable with being close to Rocket, sharing space with him. I would like to hang out in front of the TV with them both. Sigh.

Phone Sex

My phone is not feeling well. It is feeling weak and frail and its has a really hard time following conversations. It gets tired really fast. I plug it in and instead of charging it actually discharges! Is there a cream for phone discharge?

What I want from my cell phone provider is to get a new phone. I have gotten replacements in the past for much less annoying problems and now that I have a problem thats making me very annoyed, I get nada. I have gone to two different stores, the first was grossly unhelpful and the second was unhelpful in a less gross manner.Neither wanted to do anything about my phone problem.

I went to a new store today, a nicer store. They made an attempt to help me but not really. My chief complaint is that my phone will not take a charge from a charger. Any charger, well, except for the bent one at work, that one it will make sweet, sweet phone loving with. No other charger on the planet. It is its soul mate. Both are damaged but they find perfection in each other. Its very romantic

The charger at the store worked. It must also be bent. They have a whole drawer of variously bent chargers and the Dom they hire to work the desk just knew that my model of phone likes it very bent. They knew how to scratch its itch! The store told me to go buy a new, uptight charger and that would solve this problem. Chargers do not come out of the box with the right degree of bentness that my phone requires to find real satisifaction with a charger. My phone is too kinky for Target and the phone store knew it.

Perverts.

I left the store and did what they wanted and brought the uptight charger home to perform for my phone -  when my phone was left unsatisfied, I  called customer service. I got off the phone with them before I ended up on some training video about how to deal with The Difficult Caller. I also don't want to waste good, sharp sarcasm on  dull people who only want to stick to a script! I wanted to tell them We are off book here! This is the world of Improv! I'm going to take you to the river!  You can get saved, or you can get drowned.

I'm going to call back...

Best Friends

What do dogs think about all day? Why is my dog always so ready for bed in the evening? Does he have a really fulfilling inner life and an active imagination? Does he exhaust himself under the weight of his vibrant thoughts?

Without the danger of the animal actually expressing itself to us, what kind of knowledge do they have? They could know everything Who does God talk to? Who does He work idea through with? Who is Gods sounding board? Could it be dogs?

Why not? They don't have a translatable  language, really, I know its possible in a laboratory setting to kind of suss out the dogs emotional response to given stimuli but they can't understand specifically what they are saying. God could  constantly be sharing everything with these creatures and who would know?

He isn't going to talk with anyone from the ape kingdom, they can be taught sign, He isn't going to visit with dolphins because they would tell everyone everything! They are all ready speaking with picture boards  and are trainable as assassins- Who can he trust?

Dogs.

True, dogs can be trained to kill, but they can't be trained to kill specific individuals. They can be trained to tear off the limbs anyone who smells funny, or is carrying a very specific item, or anyone running from them, but they can't be told Hey, I need you  bring me Steve Whatsits femur, he lives at 5555 East Street. He has a green chevy. Go.. We just can not communicate with them effectively and they have no reason to help us translate dog into human. They talk to God, they don't need to talk  to us about their feelings. And they are not going to explain electrical surges from beyond Saturn to us either.

So. A dogs day.

Wake up, take a good pee, move the bowels, eat some food, sniff some stuff,  brown bag lunch with God,bark at some suspicious dead leaves, explore the meaning of life with God, go back to sleep, wake up, take another good dump, chew the hell out of that toy, sniff some guys crotch. Discuss more stuff with God, go back to sleep. Eat some kibble, take a pee, move the bowels, sit down meeting with God, take a nap. Chew some toy,  go back to bed.

Rocket is always ready to go to bed. It doesn't matter if we walked six miles or if we didn't make it further than the car port. He is exhausted. What is he thinking about? Man, I peed like a racehorse today! I took a good dump every four hours and I chewed the living hell out of that toy! I am so totally spent.

Why is he so tired? Massive, heavy thoughts all day! Really good, really long meetings with God  two, three times a day! Rocket and the other dogs are privy to the secrets of the cosmos, the cures for cancers, where all those people go who just disappear, why mental illness, where do things go when they just seem to evaporate,  why is there evil? why are people just so mean sometimes, why pain? why airplants? why aren't flowers plaid? why aren't there green people?

Dogs aren't only man's best friend... Its the only explanation of how a creature that sleeps eighteen hours a day can still take a nap with you on a dime.

Tuesday

So how did I spend my three day weekend?

I cleaned out my bathroom cabinet and now I can find ten of my twenty-seven hair squishies! I did laundry! I shopped a Chinese market and made shrimp soup from scratch!

After I finished patting myself on the back for that, I made myself a steak, first time ever, and while it was over cooked, it was okay and now I have learned something. Mostly, that you can not ruin a piece of $2.56 meat, but that I can not ruin a better piece too.

I got deeply annoyed by a fabric store- I found some ncie fabric, it was on sale and I was happy with my choice, until I was informed at the register that the fabric wasn't available. This after standing in three different lines and getting annoyed by literally every single person I shared airspace with. There are people with way too much stress in their lives and who have over-prioritized the role that fabric plays in it. It is also a wise idea to not aggravate the lady with the scissors. Just don't, she doesn't need to make those kind of  life choices for either of you  on minimum wage.

 I gave my phone last rites - it survived, but I feel its days are numbered.

Dog and I took walks and slept really late and watched a lot of TV and went out to dinner with a friend.

Friday Cat Blogging

What lurks under your bed?

Oscar (tm) Nominations 2015

Best Picture:"American Sniper"
"Birdman"
"Boyhood"
"The Grand Budapest Hotel"
"The Imitation Game"
"Selma"
"The Theory of Everything"
"Whiplash"

Best Actor:Steve Carell, "Foxcatcher"
Bradley Cooper, "American Sniper"
Benedict Cumberbatch, "The Imitation Game"
Michael Keaton, "Birdman"
Eddie Redmayne, "The Theory of Everything"

Best Actress:Marion Cotillard, "Two Days, One Night"
Felicity Jones, 'The Theory of Everything"
Julianne Moore, "Still Alice"
Rosamund Pike, "Gone Girl"
Reese Witherspoon, "Wild"

Best Supporting Actor:Robert Duvall, "The Judge"
Ethan Hawke, "Boyhood"
Edward Norton, "Birdman"
Mark Ruffalo, "Foxcatcher"
J.K. Simmons, "Whiplash"

Best Supporting Actress:Patricia Arquette, "Boyhood"
Laura Dern, "Wild"
Keira Knightley, "The Imitation Game"
Emma Stone, "Birdman"
Meryl Streep, "Into the Woods"

Best Director:Richard Linklater, "Boyhood"
Alejandro González Iñárritu, "Birdman"
Bennett Miller, "Foxcatcher"
Wes Anderson, "The Grand Budapest Hotel"
Morten Tyldum, "The Imitation Game"

Best Foreign Language Film:"Wild Tales," (Argentina), Damián Szifrón, director
"Tangerines" (Estonia), Zaza Urushadze, director
"Timbuktu" (Mauritania), Abderrahmane Sissako, director
"Ida" (Poland), Paweł Pawlikowski, director
"Leviathan" (Russia), Andrey Zvyagintsev, director

Best Screenplay (Adaptation):Jason Hall, "American Sniper"
Graham Moore, "The Imitation Game"
Paul Thomas Anderson, "Inherent Vice"
Anthony McCarten, "The Theory of Everything"
Damien Chazelle, "Whiplash"

Best Screenplay (Original):Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, Jr. & Armando Bo, "Birdman"
Richard Linklater, "Boyhood"
E. Max Frye and Dan Futterman, "Foxcatcher"
Wes Anderson, "The Grand Budapest Hotel" (Story by Wes Anderson & Hugo Guinness)
Dan Gilroy, "Nightcrawler"

Best Cinematography:Emmanuel Lubezki, "Birdman"
Robert D. Yeoman, "The Grand Budapest Hotel"
Ryszard Lenczewski and Łukasz Żal, "Ida"
Dick Pope, "Mr. Turner"
Roger Deakins, "Unbroken"

Best Costume Design:Milena Canonero, "The Grand Budapest Hotel"
Mark Bridges, "Inherent Vice"
Colleen Atwood, "Into the Woods"
Anna B. Sheppard and Jane Clive, "Maleficent"
Jacqueline Durran, "Mr. Turner"

Best Makeup and Hairstyling:Bill Corso and Dennis Liddiard, "Foxcatcher"
Frances Hannon and Mark Coulier, "The Grand Budapest Hotel"
Elizabeth Yianni-Georgiou and David White, "Guardians of the Galaxy"

Best Original Score:Alexandre Desplat, "The Grand Budapest Hotel"
Alexandre Desplat, "The Imitation Game"
Hans Zimmer, "Interstellar"
Gary Yershon, "Mr. Turner"
Johann Johannsson, "The Theory of Everything"

Best Animated Feature Film:"Big Hero 6"
"The Boxtrolls"
"How to Train Your Dragon 2"
"Song of the Sea"
"The Tale of the Princess Kaguya"

Best Documentary Feature:"CitizenFour" - Laura Poitras, Mathilde Bonnefoy and Dirk Wilutzky
"Finding Vivian Maier" - John Maloof and Charlie Siskel
"Last Days in Vietnam" - Rory Kennedy and Keven McAlester
"The Salt of the Earth" - Wim Wenders, Juliano Ribeiro Salgado and David Rosier
"Virunga" - Orlando von Einsiedel and Joanna Natasegara

Best Documentary Short Subject:"Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1," Perry Films
"Joanna," Wajda Studio
"Our Curse," Warsaw Film School
"The Reaper (La Parka)," Centro de Capacitación Cinematográfica
"White Earth," Weary Traveler

Best Film Editing:Joel Cox & Gary Roach, "American Sniper"
Sandra Adair, "Boyhood"
Barney Pilling, "The Grand Budapest Hotel
William Goldenberg, "The Imitation Game"
Tom Cross, "Whiplash"

Best Original Song:"Lost Stars" from Begin Again - Music and lyrics by Gregg Alexander and Danielle Brisebois
"I'm Not Gonna Miss You" from "Glen Campbell: I'll Be Me" - Music and lyrics by Glen Campbell and Julian Raymond
"Everything Is Awesome" from "The Lego Movie"
 - Music and lyrics by Shawn Patterson
"Glory" from "Selma" - Music and lyrics by John Stephens and Lonnie Lynn
"Grateful" from "Beyond the Lights" - Music and lyrics by Diane Warren

Best Production Design:"The Grand Budapest Hotel" - Production Design: Adam Stockhausen; Set Decoration: Anna Pinnock
"The Imitation Game" - Production Design: Maria Djurkovic; Set Decoration: Tatiana Macdonald
"Interstellar" - Production Design: Nathan Crowley; Set Decoration: Gary Fettis
"Into the Woods" - Production Design: Dennis Gassner; Set Decoration: Anna Pinnock
"Mr. Turner" - Production Design: Suzie Davies; Set Decoration: Charlotte Watts

Best Animated Short Film:"The Bigger Picture," Daisy Jacobs, director, and Christopher Hees, producer (National Film and Television School)
"The Dam Keeper," Robert Kondo and Dice Tsutsumi, directors (Tonko House)
"Feast," Patrick Osborne, director, and Kristina Reed, producer (Walt Disney Animation Studios)
"Me and My Moulton," Torill Kove, director (Mikrofilm in co-production with the National Film Board of Canada)
"A Single Life," Joris Oprins, director (Job, Joris & Marieke)

Best Live Action Short Film:"Aya," Oded Binnun and Mihal Brezis, directors
"Boogaloo and Graham," Michael Lennox, director, and Ronan Blaney, writer
"Butter Lamp (La Lampe Au Beurre De Yak)," Hu Wei, director, and Julien Féret, producer
"Parvaneh," Talkhon Hamzavi, director, and Stefan Eichenberger, producer
"The Phone Call," Mat Kirkby, director, and James Lucas, writer

Best Sound Editing:"American Sniper"
"Birdman"
"The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies"
"Interstellar"
"Unbroken"

Best Sound Mixing:"American Sniper"
"Birdman"
"Interstellar"
"Unbroken"
"Whiplash"

Best Visual Effects:"Captain America: The Winter Soldier"
"Dawn of the Planet of the Apes"
"Guardians of the Galaxy"
"Interstellar"
"X-Men: Days of Future Past"

For more info:

• oscars.org (Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences)
• oscars.com (Official site of Oscar telecast)
• Complete CBSNews.com coverage: The Academy Awards
• Complete CBSNews.com coverage: Movies

© 2015 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Blanket Weather

33 degrees and rain is a perfect weather! For spending the entire evening with your dog and an electric blanket on the couch watching moving images on the TV. If you are feeling peckish, it is also the perfect weather for peanut butter cookie making and eating.

Look it up.

Its cold, damp and all around icky. If it were a degree or two warmer I might go shopping for nothing just to get out - but, its just cold enough that it doesn't need a reason to get slick and I don't really need to play chicken with Mother Nature. I'll just bow out and let her win. She gets to feel superior and I get to feel warm and sloppy. It works for me.

Every once in a while the dog lets me know he needs to go outside and we go outside, quickly and then we watch more Diners, Drive In's and Dives.  If I get tired of Guy Fieri,  maybe I'll check out my Kindle.

And I'll eat my cookies, nom, nom, nom.

Today

I finally took the indoor Christmas decorations down and put them away.

Before

So pretty! So festive!

After

Sigh


I also made an extraordinary greek inspired chicken pot pie. I even made my own cream sauce and now? I'll never buy cream-of-whatever again!  All it is is a white sauce and I know how to do that and I can flavor that into whatever I need it to be. Broskey gave me the best tip ever for the cream sauce - instead of using butter to mix with the flour, use the grease from the baking of the chicken to flavor the sauce! Worked like a charm.

The house kept itself busy by hiding things from me. It ate the TV remote - I spent days manually turning the TV off!  Its 2015, this is wrong. I'm sure, I could use the satellite remote to turn it on but I had to walk back and forth to the TV when I needed to turn it off and that involved having to find the manual on and off button on the TV -  and they do not make those easy to find.  It also ate the dogs leash, forcing me to use  a leash I am not as fond of!  And then I had to use it for like, three walks! Life is sooooo unfair! I had to turn off the TV manually and use a leash I don't like  as much. Has anyone ever suffered so much?

I did finally find both, but the damage was done. I'm scarred.

Priorities.

Oops! I watched  the new line up on Fashion Police chat awkwardly about the Golden Globes instead of writing an entry. I will absolutely write one for tomorrow. Promise.

I'm sure it will touch on taking down Christmas decorations and how I have abandoned the e-collar for Rocket because he can remove his bandage quite well with it on, so why keep it on? Its supposed to prevent bandage removal and there he goes just removing his left , right and center while wearing the collar. Damn.

2015 Golden Globe Winners

8:13 - JK Simmons, Whiplash Best Supporting Actor Drama

8:15 Best Supporting Actress TV series or mini series  Joanne Froggett, Downton Abby

8:23 - Best Mini Series or TV Movie - Fargo

8:25 - Best Actor in a mini series or Drama - Billy Bob Thornton Fargo

8:37 - Best Actress in a TV series mini series or Comedy - Gina Rodriguez, Jane The Virgin

8:40 - Best TV Series Comedy or Musical - Transparent

8:48- Best Original Score - The Theory of Everything

8:51 - Best Original Song - Selma

9:00 - Supporting Actor TV series or mini series or TV movie - Matt Bonner, The Normal Heart

9:06 - Best Actress in a Motion Picture, Comedy or Musical -  Amy Adams, Big Eyes

The dog just decided he needed to be on the other side of the couch

9:13 -  Best Animated Film - How to Train your Dragon II

9:19 - Best Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture - Patricia Arquette, Boyhood

Kristen Wiigs' dress is kind of awful

9:30 - Best Screen Play -  Bird Man, multiple writers credited.

9:35 - Best Actor in a Comedy or Musical - Jeffery Tambor, Transparent

9:43 - Best Foreign Language Film - Leviathan, Russia

9:48 - Best Actress Mini Series  or TV Movie - Maggie Gyllenhaal, The Honorable Woman

9:55 - Best Drama TV- The Affair

9:57 - Best Actor TV Series Drama - Kevin Spacy, House of Cards

Clearly, you don't play Kevin Spacey off. #longspeech

Cecil D. Demille Award - George Clooney

Best Director Motion Picture - Richard Linklater, Boyhood

Best Actress is a TV Series Drama - Ruth Wilson, The Affair

Best Actor Motion Picture Drama -  Michael Keaton, Birdman

Best Motion Picture Comedy or Musical - The Grand Budapest Hotel

Best Actress in a Motion Picture Drama - Julianne Moore, Still Alice

Best Actor Motion Picture Drama - Eddy Redmyne, The Theory of Everything

11:01 Best Motion Picture  Drama - Boyhood

Friday Cat Blogging

Kitty gives this new year a big raspberry.

Cold

I walked the dog Wednesday night and came away with the knowledge that I had just set the bar for Too Cold to Walk The Dog. I learned from this. I already knew that it was only going to get colder as the week went on and acted proactively by decided that Thursday was going to be a doggy daycare day and there would be no walking of the dog in the Too Cold.

Wednesday night I also learned that my sneakers are not houses for my feet, my sneakers are in fact, screened porches for  my feet. I went to Wally Wednesday night and lost sensation in my feet from just the car to the store! I thought my sneakers were made of  heartier stuff but I was wrong. I wonder if they sell winter weight sneakers? Is that even a thing? I hadn't noticed this earlier because I had worn my heavier, leather work shoes on our walk, Thank Gawd, because if my feet had been that uncomfortable I'm afraid they would have made like a Somali pirate and turned the trip around. I have enough problems making decisions as it is without my brain being blindfolded and tied up in a closet.

Thursday dawned as cold as they said it would be. I wisely did not walk the dog in the 13 degrees and instead took the dog for I had hoped would be a  very fast pee in the 13 degrees - in which even a very fast pee took too long! I went through my entire Rocket, Pee!  Just Go Pee Now!, sample lyric Now, go  here! go now! Right Now!, all the lyrics are basically versions of that sentiment -  song four or five times before he popped a squat and put me out of my misery. For a bald dog with no body fat he seems remarkably comfortable in the cold. I am not bald and have considerably more body fat that he does and I wanted to die. He thought it would be fun to walk the fence line and see if there were any bunnies around.

Rocket went off to daycare and for once did not pass blood or hurt himself! We are now 1 for 1 there! Whooooo! One Day in a row! without an accident or blood loss! Having! A! Dog! Is! So! Much! Fun!

I am Charlie

Dog Tape

I redressed his wound and it looks good, and it might be a little smaller than it was. I was hoping for  it looking "gone", but we're not there yet. It isn't infected but it hasn't formed a scab yet either, I think ideally it should be open to the air to really dry out and scab over, but that isn't practical with a dog. I guess I could leave it open at night but I'm afraid he would find a way to go rogue and beat the collar and further damage the damage.

Maybe this weekend I will try him with it uncovered and see what happens. What would be really great would be if were gone by this weekend it was healed up and it wouldn't need to be bandaged and I can put the collar away again. I'm going to send him back to daycare on Thursday and without his collar on, but maybe with more duct tape?  The weather is supposed to get really frigid and awful by the end of the week and I know we won't be walking and he'll need the outlet. I think I'll send the collar with him but hopefully by then we can try him without it. Maybe during the day on the weekend I could try him without the covering? I think that would speed healing?

Adventures in Dogland

I had a very good entry yesterday ( and since I wrote it on my damnable phone, it disappeared into the ether). I wrote out the whole travale of Rockets injury and my  super quick education in doggy first aid and why exactly a trip to the vet is so expensive - Answer, a dogcentric bandage will run you $5! for a bandage, before the vets mark up! If you buy something specifically engineered for the pet market, its going to be expensive because dogs and cats lick everything and everything that touches them has to be lickable and suitable for healing tissue damage and stick or not stick to fur. You can't really use a people bandage on a dog because of the fur issue and fur is a major issue in doggy first aid. There is also the compliance issue and dogs are non-compliant in a big way.

There is "non-compliant" and there is Rocket. There was a bandage on Rocket, it was a very nice vet applied bandage and it was so nice that lasted over night - which is almost a milenium in dog bandage time. I was also Eyes On the dog for the first 24 hours - nice work if you can get it , but time moves on and I had to leave him to his own devices. I did tell him to leave it alone and I would give him a cookie when I came home! Whee!

He tore it off  immediately and spent the day licking, biting and generally making the wound worse. The next day I took him back to daycare so they could take over the Eyes On role and while he was there, the daycare guy found blood in his stool! and made another call to the vet, and so I made another trip to the pharmacy and he's on more antibiotics, he's like a holstein now! and so now I had to worry about him bleeding from both ends - front foot and well, the other end.

And so he decided that too much attention was being paid to his ends. he decided that he didn't have to go to the bathroom anymore and would just be bleeding from the front end for a bit thankyouverymuch. For three days. I should add that I was feeding him less because of the whole blood-in-the-stool issue and for at least a couple of days, I was a little late in feeding him anything at all so his schedule was a little bit off and of course, two rounds of antibiotics, so maybe it wasn't entirely his fault he just stopped for a few days. He finally became unstopped and stopped bleeding, at least from that end.  We both feel better. At least about that end.

I decided that he wasn't going to leave  his other end alone, so I pulled out his  very humane blow up E-Collar. Its very nice and if he had messed up a back foot, it would have worked out, I think. However, he messed up a front foot and the blow up collar doesn't work for injuries on the front of the dog. I think they should have mentioned that somewhere "Only good for injuries occurring on the back end of the dog, not for use on injuries occurring on the front end of the dog"  It turns out the humane collar is so humane, like many humanitarian gestures, it hardly effective at all and may do more harm that good. It mostly makes you feel better about your dogs injury, it does not aid in the healing of the injury.

So after going through multiple bandages and watching the wound, if anything, get bigger, I pulled out a vintage E-Collar from a dark corner of a dark closet. It was my late nephdog Gootches and most likely was also used by Daisy at some point along the way, probably at many points along the way. So its venerable and has some family history to it - its a family heirloom!

Its awful and the dog hates it and its kind of bent up and makes me feel bad but it absolutely prevents him from destroying the bandage and messing with the wound. If I hadn't been such a pansy at the beginning, the wound would be almost healed up and done by now and he would be out of the E-collar and back to his happy self.

And someday, I will pass it on to my niece or nephews dogs...

I just looked at the date and January 5, is the anniversary of Texs' death. Sigh.

Happier New Year!!! Yay 2015!