Friday, July 31, 2009

Time for a 3-day weekend

It's been a crazy couple of weeks! Our weather has been remarkably cool for July in Nebraska, it hasn't gotten out of the 70s for a couple of days at least. Today I finally shut the a/c off and opened the windows and while I was working tonight I noticed that my nose was cold! That's just plain strange. While we've been enjoying (thriving) on our cool weather though, the Pacific Northwest has been baking with unheard of hot temperatures. I think it's been over 100 for a couple of days in Portland. I have a friend who lives there who is absolutely miserable! It usually so nice there that they don't even have air conditioning, so she's baking. See, there's a down side to working at home!

Meg has been busy working at Scout camp - so busy that she can't come home for Mirisa's shower on Saturday. Oh well, her loss. At least she's working and making some money to keep her clunker running! Just kidding Meg, I know you LOVE your car!

Speaking of the shower, I feel like I've run myself silly trying to get everything ready. It will all work out... Even the things I'm nervous about will be fine, I'm sure. Know what really pisses me off though? We put my cell number and e-mail address to RSVP - does no one do that anymore? How rude! I have no idea whether 10 people are going to show, or 35. So I order a cake big enough for 35 and we'll just have to enjoy the leftovers! But seriously, how hard is it to call someone and say either yes or no? I had 3 poeople call me - 2 yeses and 2 noes (one was a twofer). And I had 1 person e-mail me to say they couldn't come, which kind of ticked me off because it was "family" and the excuse was "we just decided to go out of town this weekend". Just decided? I sent the freaking invitation 3 weeks ago! How about, hey honey I'd love to go out of town this weekend, but it's the weekend of Mirisa's shower.... Oh well. I guess I think family is more important that everyone else does. Apparently. Oh well, you know what? I'm going to just forget it and concentrate on having a good time. Mirisa will have a good time and get some wonderful gifts and we'll be that much closer to having that little sweetheart in our family!

Sad news about Ruger... He's had some funny "spots" on his belly since about Christmas - of course I noticed them right after Sophie died, which freaked me out, but I took him to the vet and they said it didn't look like anything serious. Okay... Then one day last week Steve and I both noticed that Ruger was looking very bloated in his belly. My first thought was that he got into the garbage somewhere, but a quit run through the house showed that wasn't the case. So, I made another appointment with the vet. (God love Dr. Jesske - seriously....) The day or so before the appointment I had noticed that he was drinking more and more water too, so my initial (scary) thought was diabetes, but the tummy bloating didn't really fit with that. So last Thursday we went to the vet and his initial thought was Cushing disease. I sure didn't want to hear that! Schnapps had Cushings and although that isn't what he died from, it sure contributed to his demise. We had blood drawn - a CBC and a chem profile and Dr. J called on Friday to say that it did look like Cushing's. His alk phos, which is supposed to be under 90, was 2000! Crap. I made another appointment for him to go in on Monday for a dexamethasone suppression test, which lasted all day. They injected him with some dexamethasone in the morning and then he had to have blood drawn once an hour for 8 hours. He was so sad and scared, I hated to leave him at the vet - he doesn't like that place! (They touch his butt - which he HATES with a passion.) He was one Very Relieved Dog when I picked him back up on Monday afternoon.

Of course I was on pins and needles for the results of the test and of course I had to go to Fremont for a meeting at work and a doctor's appointment yesterday. Of course, Dr. Jesske called 4 times and I wasn't home! By the time I got home, he was gone for the day - ack! That's frustrating! I got in touch with him today and unfortunately Ruger does have pituitary Cushing's, which means there's a tumor on his pituitary gland. Sad day, because basically he has a brain tumor. The only good news is that there's a 90% chance it's benign, but it will still grow, just not metastasize. Hopefully the medication he can take will slow the progression of the tumor. Dr. J was very up front and told me that this will reduce his life span, but the medication will help. Ruger will only be 10 in August. That's not old for a dachshud. Again, sad day. I'm hopeful the medication will work for a long, long time and that he doesn't suffer very much. God, I love that Eeyore dog - he always looks so depressed and sad. I feel awful

I guess that's all the important news. Everyone else is doing fine! LIfe is good, otherwise.

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