Fuck You, Cancer...

Almost four years ago, my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. I wrote about what an ass her surgeon was here and about my own fears of medical procedures here. I didn't write much about cancer but I did know two things: it sucks, and the treatments are hard to get through.

Because of this experience, I've innocently and ignorantly thought that this was what cancer was like: It is really, really sucky, and then it ends and you can go back to your regularly scheduled life.

I haven't written very much about my childhood best friend on this blog. I did write this post four years ago as I was expecting her to visit my appartment in the big city all those years ago.

In that post, I mentioned her mother. Her mother was a wonderful figure in my childhood, one who I admired and who I thought was very, very cool.

A year ago, my childhood best friend's mother was diagnosed with cancer. I did my best to support my friend T, and the cancer treatments ended. Hurray! Life could go on as normal!

Two months ago, her mother was again diagnosed with cancer. T (Which is what I call her in real life... My T) told me about her mother's state and level of care and I was nothing but confused. When you get cancer, you get treatment, right? And then you go on to live your regularly scheduled life.

Right?

A little over a week ago, I was at my first horse show with Sargeant and my phone kept ringing. I didn't recognize the number, so I didn't answer. The number kept calling and after the show I was left alone with a beer, my thoughts, and my ribbons and the phone rang again. I answered it and it was a voice I didn't recognize saying "Amanda?"

I didn't know who it was so I answered as though I knew who it was and the voice continued to say "I'm sorry to bother you when you're riding, your dad said you were at a show. I'm sorry to bother you..."

And I recognized the voice as my T. The girl who was my main person from the age of four through twenty two. And I knew it was her but it didn't sound like her and she continued to speak

"But my mother died this morning and I didn't want you to find out from the papers. You can keep riding, I know it's important to you..."

And I froze. I just kept saying "What? What!" into the phone.

I said I needed to be with her and to sit with her so my mother and I immediately left the barn and my mother dropped me off at her appartment. We sat in silence, numb and scared, together, drinking diet pop and smoking cigarettes, tears rolling down our cheeks in a state of terrified wordlessness that I cannot describe.

My best friend lost her mother. The girl I grew up with no longer has a best friend, a confidante, someone to shop with and someone to tell all her thoughts and fears to. Her mother was someone you could have beers with, someone you could tell about the guy you're dating, someone you could joke with, someone who made you feel like you were the smartest person in the world.

She always laughed at my poorly placed jokes, she always told me I was the smartest person she knew. She was always on my side, always in my corner and I could tell her just about anything and it wouldn't stun her. And no matter what I said, she supported every word of it. But this is not about me.

The girl I spend my childhood and teenage years with has lost the most significant player in her life.

I have no idea how to support my friend through this, how to say anything that would mean anything of value. I don't know what to do except to sit beside her in stunned silence because this is not what was supposed to happen. This wonderful, exhuberant, intelligent, caring, hilarious woman is gone from this Earth and my friend will never talk to her again.

I've deliberated over posting this since I heard of her death. Since I've known that she is gone I can honestly say that there has been an emptiness inside me, thinking of the horror my dear friend is going through.

And Then My Throat Hurt...

And I realized that The Sickness was upon me once more, and that I would curl up into a ball and not want to move for days on end, except that sometimes you have to move... like when you need to get up and go to work, or try and catch your big, stupid horse who doesn't want to come in and night and who instead runs in circles around you, preventing you from getting the halter over his head. Asshat horse.

I have a low grade fever and my throat is throbbing....

I also have a day off tomorrow to try and work for my horse show that is coming up in FOUR DAYS that we may not make it to due to issues with Zydeco that I can not begin to think about.

If we do make it, praise be, and if we don't make it, please be prepared for a litany of posts rife with teardrops and accompanied by lyrics to bad country music.

Pulling a No-Show...

Zydeco moved back home on Monday.

He injured himself at his other farm by kicking himself in the ankle. The injury has only worsened in the week or so since it happened, and so it just doesn't make sense for me to pay money to board him away from home while I can't ride him. I am very confused as to how this all happened. It seemed to go from one day to the next, with him being sore and only walked, to him being happy and ready to jump. When I last rode him, he was perfect, and the following day, we were very, very concerned about his health.

My father is currently tending to the sore in a manner in which only he can. While we've certainly had our disagreements over horse care (read: The Great Sweet Feed Debate of 2007), one thing my Dad can do is provide proper bandaging and care. Because Zydo has arthritis in his right leg, and his injury is to his left leg, the right leg needs support while the left leg heals.

I am phenomenally deflated about all of this, and I am doing my best to not fall into a heap in the depths of despair. Riding has been my thing for the last several weeks, it has been the reason I've been getting out of bed in the morning. Spending time with my horse has given me hope and inspiration and all kinds of wonderful things. And while I can't ride any more, what am I supposed to do?

I've been visiting Zydo in his stall, where he has been put on stall rest, and scratching him and talking to him. While I love spending time with my horse, wherever he is, I really just want to be upon his fine Thoroughbred back.

My coach still has several horses available for me to ride, and for that I am ever grateful. Zydo should be back to his old self within the next two weeks.

So, for now, I am just keeping positive and not falling apart entirely.

A Good Day to Feel Like Death...

My parents went away this weekend, leaving me all alone to tend to The Ranch. I took care of Tia and Zydo as if it WAS MY JOB, and damn, those horses have never faced such neglect as when they were left in my care.

I love my horse, and I even love my father's horse, the crazed and maniacal little lunatic that she is.

The problem is that on Saturday evening, I started to feel a strange scratchy feeling in my throat.

And then things just went downhill from there.

I came home from a night out on Sunday morning and fed and put out the horses, fully intending to clean their stalls properly, and even fork the cleanings from their stalls to the top of the shit pile. (See how I wrote there, 'the cleanings from their stalls'? Aren't I polite on the Internet? Usually, I would just say 'fork the shit to the top of the pile'. I love how being in the public eye makes me classy.)

Today was a snow day, and I had no intentions of going to school regardless of the weather. At ten, my mother informed me that she and my brother were going shopping, so, in hopes of scoring some free coffee, I begged to go along for the ride. We arrived home back at The Ranch in a beautiful afternoon, one of those afternoons that just screams how Spring is coming, and Damn, Girl! You should tack up your horse and ride him for all he's worth.

And instead, despite the fact that Zydo was looking balefully at me from the pasture, I got home and found myself in my warm and cozy bed, and I slept for two hours LIKE IT WAS MY JOB, and I woke up...

And then it was dark, and all chances of riding were over and gone....

And I have nothing left but to think that perhaps another such day may come. Perhaps another day will happen upon us here in The Great White North where I will feel like getting my lazy ass off the couch to spend some time with my horse.

Sadly, today was not that day.

Happy Five Hundredth Post, Blog!

Five hundred entries on this blog later, and here we are.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Life has been throwing some punches at me lately which is why I haven't exactly been profficient with the blogging. Oh, sure, part of it is due to the fact that I can't get off my lazy butt long enough to type out a word here or there... But other parts have to do with the rest of my life.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I fully intended to post something long and interesting today, for example, but because my bedroom resembles a landfill after a natural disaster, I spent a large portion of my day gazing at it wistfully. After that, I enlisted the help of my mother to deal with the hideousness that is the filth that I live in.

It was a little bit fun, though, after my mother reamed me out for creating a fire hazard in her house. Once that was over, it was kind of like playing a harmless game of '99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall', except that the beer bottles were strewn about the floor, intermingled with dirty blue jeans and no less than sixty five pairs of socks. Because I love socks.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Some nights I come home with the intention of posting, but instead I sit on the couch watching television reruns that my mother and I have purchased on DVD. My sister in law gave me the first to seasons of Road to Avonlea, a show I loved as a six and seven year old child, for Christmas. And it was funny, when I opened it, I was thrilled, and the first thought that entered my head was that these seasons would get me through my latest breakup. I automatically knew that I would rely on them to get me through this tough time.

Unfortunately, they didn't work completely, and we've had to turn to the Eighth season of ER. I'm hoping that by the time the sixth disc is completed, I'll be back to my chipper self.

If nothing else, Dixie makes a wonderfully cuddly companion to sit on the couch with, and she is always willing to lick the orange stuff that Cheezies leave behind off my fingers. If that's not true love, then I don't know what is.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SuperDad has been having some health concerns of late as well. Its odd, but the man has never had a problem until now. He landed himself in the emergency room twice and was told not to drink a single drop of alcohol until the problem was fixed. And you know what that means? Yep, I got a free case of beer out of the deal.

The problem he's dealing with now has to do with his pancreas, and we're awaiting a consultation with a surgeon and a battery of tests until we know exactly what the problem is. The good news is that this is not the same surgeon that my mother had for her last bout of medical issues, which means that I'm not going to have to don another bellaclava to do any more gas tank sugaring. Praise God.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
College is making me want to stab myself in the eye with a pitch fork. Everything about the classes I'm taking make me want to SCREAM, loud and long, until I have no oxygen left in my body, so that I simply crumple to the floor and lay in an unconscious stupor until the school day ends. I already have a frickin degree in most of the stuff I'm taking, and the process of getting exempt from courses is long and arduous, so I'm just going through them as best I can.

If only I didn't have such an aversion to paperwork, my life would be that much easier. As it stands now, I DO have an aversion to writing my name on pieces of paper beside course codes and handing them to official-looking people in the office. So I suppose the only thing I have to be angry at is myself. Sigh.

Other than that, life is grand, as usual.

When Life Leaves You With No Words...

I've been in a bit of a funk lately, not that its anyone's fault or that there is anything anyone can do about it. I just feel as though I've been overwhelmed at work and at school; I just finished working and I was stuck at my place of employment for twenty seven hours straight due to inclement weather. By the time my boss got there and had shovelled his way to the house, I was hysterical and unable to communicate anything of value. He asked me to begin calling people who could come in, and as tears rolled down my cheeks and rage caused me to shake in my seat, he simply took the phone away from me and called people himself.

I wasn't sure if I was going to post this or not, and I've been thinking about it for weeks, but the beginning of December marked a one year anniversary for me. I'm not sure if it marks a year of Sanity, or just a year since I actually purposely sought out Sanity. Regardless, it was twelve months ago that I was in a very rough place, and while I don't feel that my mood is sending me back to that very rough place, I do feel as though I've been contemplative lately, cautiously wondering what it was, exactly, that sent me there to begin with.

I've been hating my medication more and more lately, and I'd like nothing more than to stop taking it altogether. Its been a year since I started on this new wonder drug, and about sixteen months since that awful city doctor fed me near-lethal doses of another drug that quite literally drove me to the brink of insanity. Every now and then I get this urge to live medication free, and I'm not sure why, but the idea seems appealing, as though somehow being without meds would make me a member of that oh-so-exclusive club that the Sane people belong to, and just for a little while, I could play with the cool kids.

On the other hand, I've tried living drug free before and, well, it just never goes well. I think that's all I need to tell the Internet at this point.

On Soaking a Swollen Foot in Breakfast Foods...

Zydo came in to the barn limping the other day, which is never a good sign, and always a sign that hundreds of dollars are to be imminently spent on veterinary care.

My dad headed out to the feed store and bought himself some bran, which I thought was pretty wierd. I mean, if the horse hadn't gone to the bathroom in a couple days, I can see picking up a fifty pound bag of bran. But it was his foot that was ailing him, not his ass, so I was a little confounded.

Wisely, I chose not to question the methods of Steen, and dutifully stood by every day as he mixed up water, epsom salts, and bran into a thick plastic bag which he then tied to my horse's foot. Zydo was quite good, put up with these shenanigans quite well, I have to say, because if you tried to tie my foot into a bag of freezing cold, uncooked porridge, I'd probably take out all of your front teeth. And if I weighed fifteen hundred pounds? I'd likely stomp your femur into bone dust for good measure, as well.

Because he was receieving this treatment, he and Tia had to stay in for four days consecutively, and by this morning, both horses were literally climbing the walls of their stalls and trying to kill each other through the chain link that separates them. I took them out myself, something I've been scared to do without assistance (And to be honest? Dad was in the yard, and mom was right behind me) and watched them frolic and play.

Zydo was like a kitten with a ball of yarn outside, hopping through the snow on his hind legs, bucking and gallavanting around like he hadn't a care in the world. He did several flying changes, a little bit of piaffe, some passage, and some rearing up like a bronc in an old western flick.

And so, once more, the skepticism I usually hold of my dad's methods was proven wrong, and my horse is happy and sound once more.

Although I still think it is really, really strange that soaking a foot in bran mush, of all things, worked to solve his problem.

Updating on Dixie and My Perpetual Laziness...

I've neglected my blog lately not because I'm a total LazyAss but because I've been drowning in work and school. I've even been pretending to be someone who puts on clothes and gets out of the house to be social.

I did that last weekend, put on a forty dollar tank top and eighteen pounds of makeup, styled my newly-cute haircut, and walked through a perfect mist of perfume before I went out. I ended up in a bar where most of the patrons were wearing Jogging Pants. And I spent the whole night thinking, Like, where was this bar when I was all depressed and couldn't get out of bed? Because no matter how much my life reminds me of a giant pile of ass, I think I could ALWAYS make room for a public facility that promotes drinking alcohol in one's jammies.



As promised, a picture of Dixie looking hilariously pathetic in her lampshade collar. Unlike when Copernicus had her surgery, I DID NOT invite my friends over to laugh at Dixie while she got stuck on the furniture around the house. I really have matured that much in the last two years.



Dixie feels like I do about the mornings, and the Thursday after she got home, she was not pleased to be greeted by me toting a camera. She didn't have much to say to the camera, other than a pathetic, beagle-y little look that said "Please, Dear God, why didn't you shoot me behind the barn rather than subject me to this humiliation?"



She is feeling completely back to her old self again, and once more lives to lie unconscious on the couch with me. We take a nap every day together, Dixie and I, and that is how I justified a dog being worth as much money as we spent on her. I figure, hey, I never get out of the house, or go out to dinner, or take myself to a movie or buy new clothes. I come home and nap with my dog. And really, if I can get four more years of napping with my precious little Muppy Wuppy (And yes, I do call her that, out loud and often, and frequently in the presence of others) then it is an amount of money worth spending.



Here is a close-up of Dixie's incision and how beautiful it is. I've been on a farm my whole life, and I've been privvy to many an incision. And I know how my mom told me to quit calling her surgeon an ass on the Internet, and after I called him an ass a few more times, I vowed to stop.

But, we were discussing him the other day, the stupid fuckwit that he is, and I realized, Hey! It's been a long time since I called him names on my blog! And my mother and I were admiring Dixie's incision as she lay stretched out on the couch, and my mother said "Wow, that's a perfect incision. It's beautiful. I only wish my scar looked like that."

Yes, that's right. A frickin' VETERINARIAN made a better scar on my DOG than a surgeon managed to make ON MY MOTHER.

And I have to say that I'm quite glad that Dixie was in such capable hands, and that if we ever have to deal with cancer again in this family?

I'M CALLING THE DAMN VET.

More About the Hair... And Dixie...

I styled my hair ALL BY MY SELF this morning, a feat I am quite proud of. I think it would have turned out better if I had some shine spray, and if I had used the straightener instead of the curling iron, but you have to work at these things over time. I can't simply go from a girl who ties her hair up on top of her head to someone who knows what she's doing with a blow dryer IN ONE SINGLE DAY. OK? Are we clear? I am not a master of the hair-fixing appliances. NOW STOP LAUGHING AT ME.

Dixie is home and well from the vet's office. When I came home tonight, she was laying in her kennel, all pathetic and beagle-like, looking up at me as if to say "Please. Please make that visiting Basset Hound puppy GO AWAY because it keeps smelling me and if I could muster the strength to growl, I would, BUT MY ABDOMEN WAS JUST SLICED OPEN and I'm not quite a hundred percent yet."

I'm glad that my dog and I have this kind of mind reading relationship. Its called non-verbal communication and I've spent the last FIVE YEARS learning about it in accredited post-secondary institutions. So don't fuck with me on the non-verbal stuff, OK?

I don't yet have a pic of her wearing her ridiculous lampshade, or the bag of gravel that was removed from her bladder. I'm not sure how well those pics will turn out, because I don't really want to take them out of their baggie. Like, I'm all for checking out cool and interesting things, but the rocks the size of my thumb that came from inside my dog's urine storage unit?

Yeah, not so hot on digging through those.

Regardless, the stones are very fascinating to look at because they are, quite literally, stones. The gravel-y bits, you could place about thirty bazillion of them under your child's swing set. No joke.

Hopefully I'll have pics of the terrifying nastiness to put up tomorrow.

Until then, I need to end my time as an upright and conscious person because I'm frickin' tired.

Dixie on the Mend...

My parents took Dixie to the vet today. They brought her in without me and discussed treatment without me which tends to drive me batty because I need to know everything, and I need to know it now. I NEED DETAILS and without details, the exact, explicit words or actions from the vet himself, I feel like less of a human being, incapable of making a decision because I can't picture the expression on his face or the way he held his hands, or did he adjust his glasses ever? Because that could totally mean something.

Dixie, as we suspected, has bladder stones. I think they are like kidney stones or gall stones, only they have actually grown such that they take up the entire volume of her bladder and there is no room for pee in there.

The men I've talked to seem less than concerned about this condition, and I think that's mostly because men very rarely suffer from urinary tract infections. Imagine, if you will, wandering around all day with razor blades stuck in the place you pee from, wherever that may be. Then, imagine that every time you need to pee, someone pours a salty solution of vinegar and lemon juice onto that very surface. Occasionally, the feeling clumbs up into your abdomen and lower back, making it nearly impossible to walk, thing, sit, stand, lay, or otherwise do anything that requires your body to touch the surface of anything else.

Damn this whole gravity thing. It makes living with a UTI so much more difficult.

Dixie will be having surgery tomorrow. They are actually going to cut her bladder right open, remove it, take out all the stones and stone gravel (Gravel. My frickin' dog has GRAVEL in her bladder. Those are the vet's actual words.) and then place it back in.

I'll be sure to post pictures of her in her lampshade thingie, because Lord knows there is nothing like making fun of a ridiculous looking beagle on the Internet.

Not that I need to get out more, or anything.

Drawn to a Close...

Deer season is now over for me, and I have to say that I'm a little sad because I didn't get to shoot my fancy new gun at anything. I contemplated taking out a squirrel or two, or maybe a road sign on the way home, but my redneckedness only goes so far.

Davey shot his first deer this year, on Saturday while we were all out together. Dixie, my wonderous Little Muppy, brought the deer to him just as she is supposed to do. I have to say that I'm more than a little pissed that she didn't bring the deer to me, because she is after all MY DAMN DOG. He hit the deer with a perfect shot, right where all the experts say you're supposed to hit it. We ended up having to track it for a period of time through brush and prickly ash that tried to take both the eyes right out of my head a large number of times.

While we were out with Dixie, I noticed that she was peeing quite frequently, a sign that is not a good one because in 2003, Dixie almost died from having bladder stones. Several hundred dollars later, she was restored to her chipper old self. She wasn't acting like herself yesterday, and today when she came home from hunting, she laid on the couch with me feeling quite feverish and looking very pouty.

I'm taking her to a vet tomorrow to see what they can do. The surgery will cost over a thousand dollars, and while I really can't put a price on my love for Dixie, I can't make a thousand dollars spring from my ear next Tuesday, either.

I'm very scared at this point in time because if the condition is worse than it was last time, there may be nothing we can do. I fear that it has gone to her kidneys because she has an odd swelling on her back. It could just be backfat, because she is a bit of a pudgy little beagle, but I'm scared that it indicates something much more serious.

My irrational self wants to sell a lobe of my liver on the black market and fly her to some fancy schmancy surgical unit like they do on the Discovery Channel. My more rational self knows that this just isn't possible.

As soon as we get to a vet, we'll have more information to work with. I wait with baited breath until then.

You Can Just Call Me Lumpina....

Joomy totally stole my idea for a blog post this weekend. I was planning on sitting down and listing out the things that are wrong with me, because now and then, there is nothing like telling the Internet that MY BODY HATES ME. Now Jooms has gone and ruined all the fun, and I'm sure everyone will think I am copying her. I assure you, the idea for this post was IN MY HEAD long before it was every posted ON HER BLOG. I could just choose a new topic for today, but then you all would have to go a WHOLE day without hearing about my problems.

Last month I went to visit the wondrous Mal. A few days before I left, I thought I was getting sick. The glands in my neck swelled up slightly, so I took it easy in an attempt to stave off whatever might be wrong.

I went to Mal's and had a great time, glands swollen all the while. I came home expecting to endure the worst sickness of all time. My neck became stiff and achey and the glands in it remained hurt-y and swollen.

Fast Forward three and a half weeks. I've had headaches from this ailment, my neck has hurt for the last month. I see Dr. Chuck. He tells me to see a dentist. He actually seemed blithe and uncaring that there are SWOLLEN LUMPS in my body.

At first, I was outraged. My teeth felt great and there was no reason for me to see a dentist, on top of the fact that I AM POOR AND CANNOT AFFORD ONE.

Last Wednesday, I woke up with an extra hurty neck and three new lumps. I rushed in to see a dentist thinking that maybe Dr. Chuck was right. Perhaps there would be a tooth abscess and that is why the lumps showed up.

The dentist said my teeth and gums look great. (Of course they look great. I have OCD. Brushing and caring for my teeth is like, the highlight of my day.)

I called Dr. Chuck's office in an attempt to get an appointment ASAP, but it is closed until Tuesday. I did get a handy 800 number to call for after-hours medical service. So I called.

And they don't care that my neck is all lumpy either.

One of the three new lumps has disappeared altogether, but the other four are still hanging out. On Tuesday I am soooo marching myself into that office with a blanket and a pillow and refusing to leave until someone CARES that my neck is SPROUTING LUMPS IN ODD PLACES.

GAAAAAH.

Because You're SOOOO Not Sick of Hearing About My Horse...

Zydo was out of sorts this morning and upon further examination, it seems that the injections of penicillin we've been giving him have not agreed with his system. He has swelled at the site of injection to the point that this morning, he couldn't even reach down to eat his hay.

His temperature was up slightly and while my dad had already applied an ointment that worked for his horse for her swelling, the same would not work for Zydo.

Now, I don't know how many people here are swelling experts, but I've always been under the impression that for swelling you apply a cold compress for twenty minutes on, twenty minutes off. The area of swelling on a horse is typically larger than that on a human, and so applying an ice pack is a little impractical. Expecially considering that even if you could find a cold pack big enough, it would need its own freezer to keep it cold.

So I headed for the garden hose. Only, I was intercepted by my father and told that swelling needs an hour of hosing, NOT twenty minutes. Not forty minutes, not fifty seven minutes, but ONE FULL HOUR of hosing time, Dammit.

So I got the hose. And after twenty minutes, his swelling had gone down and he looked a little more Zydo-ish. But I persisted thinking that at minute thirty-five, my dad would come out and say 'Lookin' Good! To the stall he goes!'

Dad came out at minute forty-five, and I thought, sweet. I can be done here.

Oh, no. Not under his watch.

At any rate, the swelling went down and by minute fifty he was pacing back and forth to the grass growing around the barn. By minute fifty-nine he was stamping and kicking at the ground, looking perplexed. At minute sixty-two he was happily wandering through his pasture, munching on the grass.

I expect that tomorrow morning will bring much of the same and I can look forward to more hours of horse-hosing goodness.

Rest... I need Rest...

Thursday night and Friday were a whirlwind of activity for me. Friday morning Zydo had his exploratory procedure to determine what, if anything, is in his nose. The scope the vet used required two hands, and my dad was holding his sedated head up. So that left me doing the scoping of his nose. It's kind of cool, being back in the country where you get to assist on medical procedures like that. At the same time, I felt awful sticking a tube forty five centimetres up my pony's nose. His nose bled and at one point I had to leave because I can't stand to see animals in discomfort, but I only wept a little.

I did get to look in the scope and see everything that was in there... so I suppose now I can say I know my horse inside out.

The verdict is that there is not, in fact, a caterpillar or a mouse or piece of wilderness stuck up my horse's nose. He just has a sinus infection, which means that he needs shots of antibiotics for a week.

The vet also floated his teeth, which means she used a giant electric drill with a file on it and filed down his teeth so that they would sit properly. He had to have a hideous halter put on his head to cover his teeth, keep him from biting, and hold his mouth open. It was awful and he hated it.

I suppose that Zydo and I are cut from the cloth in that we're both prone to sinus infections and we both hate the dentist. However, he was a total lightweight with the sedatives and that's something I plan to hold over him forever. Like, Look here, Buddy: You may weigh twelve hundred pounds and all BUT AT LEAST I CAN HANDLE A GOOD BENDER NOW AND THEN.

Back to the Land of the Living...

I head back to CowTown today, an eight hour drive with Mal that is sure to bring much backache and irritability. I get to spend one night at home and then I have to head off again to my best friend's bachelorette weekend. We're going camping and the cam site we're going to DOESN'T EVEN HAVE HIGH SPEED INTERNET ACCESS. A travesty, I know.

Awaiting me at home is a sick pony, and if there are any young people reading this now I must say SAY NO TO DRUGS. It seems that the ever-curious Zydo has something stuck up his nose. See what happens when you go around mindlessly sniffing whatever comes your way?

They say that curiosity killed the cat, and now here I am dying of curiosity. I mean, what could he have sniffed up his nose? A stray sock from the clothesline? A piece of a toy? A tennis ball? A small rodent? I wasn't there for the initial vet check, but apparently she chuckled and said "Oh, you wouldn't believe what I've found in horses' noses!" Honey, I've been raised in a house full of boys and spent a lifetime with small children. I have no doubt that when it comes to finding mysterious things in noses, the possibilities are endless.

At any rate, Zydo now has to have a procedure whereby he is sedated and we go in and get whatever might be up there. It could just be a run-of-the mill infection, in which case he's going to need a needle in his butt every day for a week or so. If we do, however, dig something out of his nose, I'll be sure to get some photographic evidence.

Hell, for the amount this is going to cost in vet bills, I might as well frame the damn thing.

Here we are...

One house.

Two toilets.

Fourteen inhabitants.

Two babies.

Five children.

Seven grownups.

Violent 24-hour stomach flu.

You do the math.

A Berry Birthday Blog....

It is my birthday today, and for once in my life I do not long for anything. There is not a thing that I can think if that I want, not even a ridiculous thing like, say, a pony, because I ALREADY GOT ONE OF THOSE.

I did get a present though, a wonderful present that I will be forever grateful for. A lovely American showed up from Oklahoma yesterday, and before I tell you what he brought me for my birthday, I need to bash Canada for a little minute here.

Although we are a first world country here in the North, although we are considered developed, I've noticed a trend occurring that is starting to really make me wonder. Several people I know, myself included, are fairly sick and it seems that doctors don't want to go about making them better, for whatever reason. It is odd to me because when you are sick and you live in Canada, you can get to a doctor for free, and they are readily available. They have signatures and prescription pads, and the pharmacy is chalk full of yummy, drug-a-licious goodness, but they just don't seem to let the sick people have the drugs.

Now, I'm not a doctor and I never claimed to be one but it seems to me that if you are sick to the point that your lips are turning blue and you do nothing but cough a nasty, putrid cough all day, perhaps something isn't quite right. Call me crazy, but that's just the way I feel.

And so, over the phone after having seen two Canadian doctors with this ongoing issue I have, I was diagnosed with an actual illness and a lovely American Doctor wrote me a prescription, and this lovely American Gentleman brought me the medicine.

And so, my birthday present this year was the gift of good health, which is what all of us really want for ourselves anyways. What present could possibly be better than that? Asides from the beer that the Berry Queen is picking up for me AS I TYPE, what more in this world could I really ever want?

Sleepy McSleeperson....

After spending a day yesterday with a lack of oxygen flowing to my brain, I felt a little bit sleepy and headed off to bed at five to nine. This has never before happened in my life as I am usually physically incapable of thinking about bedtime before two a.m. Being a crazy person has its perks, because this way I always know the newest and coolest gadgets for sale on late night infomercials.

Obtaining oxygen still feels like a bit of a struggle, but fortunately tonight I am seeing another doctor who has already promised that he will make me be able to breathe again. I'm not sure what he's going to treat me with, like a magic wand or a potion made of frog's eyes and the toes of small children, but whatever it will be, I'm looking forward to it with glee.

I had a nightmare last night, one in which I was drowning in water that I was trying desperately to cough up. But then I realized that I wasn't in an ocean or a pool or with my head in a bucket at all; I was laying in bed. And then I realized that I wasn't dreaming at all, either, and that this was real life. I was laying in bed FIGHTING FOR MY LIFE against this thing that has caused me to cough consistently for the last ten days.

I blame the Berry Queen. If she had just sprayed more harmful chemicals on the fruit, this big would have been killed by now. And here I am, forced to resort to ALCOHOL.

We all know how much I hate it when that happens.

The Season of Sickness...

SuperNan: Cancer

Berry Queen: Multiple Sclerosis.

Berry Princess: Inability to breath or stop coughing or move in any way without inducing a coughing fit that would kill weaker souls.


It's gonna be a good one....

The sickness....

This sickness had me in its grips yesterday, had me lying on the couch in agony thinking that this is it. My number is up, and the angels are going to start singing me home before I get to find out what happens on this year's Canadian Idol.

I woke up yesterday morning, after having gone to the hospital Wednesday night in search of health, hacking up a large quantity of nastiness that for sure was going to be the death of me. I can't stand grossness in any of its forms, and when other people do gross things like cough or hack or breathe near me, I sometimes have to leave the room and cry. When my body turns against me and begins to perform such disgusting functions as coughing, I feel the need to apologize to all those around me, including Copernicus and Dixie, because no one should ever be subjected to someone else's nast.

By midnight last night I was feverish again, hot and sweaty and strewn across the couch like a disgarded dust rag, one that the dogs had played tug-of-war with and the cat had thrown up on. My hair was a mass of long, brown, sweaty mat spread out like a halo around my head. The thing is, it was not like a halo at all, more like a billboard begging somebody, ANYBODY, to please contain it because the coughing and the writhing in pain had shaken it into a great number of knots and tangles.

I thought of going back to see the doctor at the hospital again, because surely those inhalers he prescribed to me the previous night should have alleviated SOME, at least, say, s FRACTION of my symptoms and they had not. But I thought to myself, no. I am TOUGH. I am COUNTRY. I am SICK, but I will recover, because that is what TOUGH, SICK, COUNTRY people do. We move on.

And then I went to bed and while I was lying in agony, coccooned into my duvet and considering an overdose on sedatives, I thought to myself: Why is being tough so heavily weighed in this society? WOULD IT BE SO WRONG FOR ME TO CRY AND BEG JESUS, MARY AND THE SAINTS TO MAKE ME BETTER?

[Common Cold, Sick, Agony, Pain, Cough]