Old Man Kitty

Made sure both Pippin and DJ are already in tonight, and have bolted the door so when Maxx comes home he can't accidentally let them out in the morning.  It's just a regular yearly check up for DJ, with her shots, but for Pippin it's a special "seniors month" appointment to get a senior panel run at 50% off and the office visit comped.  Hard to believe the little man is already over 15 years old.  Seems like just yesterday he and Merry (bless his soul) were just wee little meepers who could fit in the palm of your hand!

I Can Stop Time!

Unfortunately, it's by going to work and struggling through contacts with customers who don't listen to your responses and want to provide you with all sorts of extranneous information which doesn't help resolve the matter at hand.  Ah, well, they pay the bills (sort of) and I've made it to the half-way mark of my week.  Looking forward to a three day weekend not this weekend but the one after!

Hit Close to Home

Last Wednesday morning, just as I was getting ready for my in-office shift, Maxx found a stray cat in our yard that was desperately in need of medical attention.  It had dragged itself across the lawn to lie against the house, when he went out there it managed to pull itself around to face him and that was it, no energy left to do anything else, poor thing was ice cold and absolutely drenched.

We dashed out with a couple of towels to get it a bit dried off, slid it carefully onto one and lifted it into the carrier, then sped off with it to the vet.  Poor little guy did warm up eventually, but was paralyzed in the back end and had really poor blood results showing that while he hadn't been in an accident, something serious was going on, likely some sort of toxin.

At lunch that day I rushed out and picked up some more toner for our printer, then we printed off a bunch of flyers for the poor found kitty with the vet's phone number, and Maxx was able to get out and about and hand them out at some local businesses and pet stores/vet offices in town.  Thursday morning during his running around he stopped in to visit the poor kitty, and while it was still not able to do anything other than keep itself warm at that point, when he started to pet it, it began to purr and to knead with its front paws.  I handed out a bunch of flyers that lunch in our local neighborhood, and then on Friday I checked in with the vet at the start of my lunch ... a lady had contacted them and was going in later in the day to see if it was her cat.

They called me later to say she'd identified the cat as being hers and was headed to the SPCA to talk to them about it (by Saturday morning the cat would have been turned over to the SPCA), and that's the last I've heard.  The vet was saying that likely they would have to put the poor little guy down, as he wasn't improving at all, and the blood work said that he was having some organ failure going on ... so my heart breaks that we didn't manage to save him, but I am so glad that his Mum found out where he was, so at least she would have closure.

Still makes me want to tear up and just bawl my eyes out.

Sad Stories

I keep reading this heartbreaking stories of pets that have had accidents, been abandoned, or been tortured and abused online.  Every time someone sends one to me I can't help but read it and pray for the poor wee creatures involved, but I invariably end up in tears.

I so wish I had the capability to actively help in all of these cases ... but I don't have enough spare funds to be able to help out financially ... after all, I do have to make sure I keep my babies in good health, too.

Short Night

I had a conference call this morning, scheduled to take place for an hour just after the first part of my shift ended ... so I was lucky enough to be able to part-take in the conference call, with the organizers then updating my schedule so that tonight my second half of my shift is just 3 hours and I get off at 8pm (that way it's still an 8 hour day with no overtime).

....And today is Maxx's middle of the week day off, so by 8pm he should be up and moving around, so I actually get to spend a little bit of time with him!

Yay!

This weekend we'll be heading over to the mainland to visit my in-laws.  It's funny, last time he was over Maxx ended up with a request specifically to bring Elf to visit the next time he went over.  I tell you, that little chihuahua mix is just everyone's favorite little poochie!  Must be because he's almost always smiling, and he just wants to get in your lap and cuddle.  He's much more relaxed than Imp, too, so less noisy around the kids and big dogs.

I'll have to remind Maxx to check if it's fine to take all four micro-dogs over this weekend, or if they would prefer us to leave some at home ... as then we'll have to ask for some dog sitting assistance.

We'll see.

Clock Watching

I find I watch the clock a lot ... is it almost time to log into work?  How much time do I have left on my coffee break?  Am I getting close to the end of this half of my shift?  Do I have time to do anything at lunch for stress relief or sleeping?  Is it time to get up?  Is it time to log back into work?  How much time do I have left on my coffee break?  Am I almost done for the day?  How much time do I have to make myself something decent for dinner?  Can I actually watch this show and still get to bed at a half-decent time?  I've woken up at night, how much time have I spent in bed so far, and how much time is left before the alarm goes off?

I'm calendar watching, too .... how many days left in this work week?  When are my next days off?  When are my days off changing?  Do I have any extra days off for holidays this month?  Is my vacation request going to be approved?

I guess you can tell that I need some time OFF!!!!

Yeuck!

So, yesterday we scolded the dogs, as we weren't sure which of them peed in the bathroom against the toilet.  Got scolded again this morning, gently, as we were looking at the liquid and thinking ... that looks pretty clear, if someone's peeing they're drinking an awful lot of water!

Closed the door to the bathroom and found out later this morning that we were once more scolding dogs for peeing when it was an issue with the house itself ... leaky toilet!

So, after the end of my morning shift did some investigation online, and found that it was likely a leaky wax gasket seal, and that sometimes tightening the bolts which hold the toilet bowl to the floor would seal off the gasket and stop the leak.  So, I tried that (very very carefully so as not to crack the toilet bowl).

Unfortunately, while the leak had slowed down, it was still happening, so we did have to go out and get a replacement wax gasket seal.  When we spoke with the gentleman in the plumbing section of the hardware store, however, he advised us against getting the plumber's putty to use as a seal around the bottom of the toilet bowl itself ... as he pointed out, if you get a leak from the gasket in the future, if the bowl itself is sealed to the floor, you still have a leak, you just don't find out about it until you may have had some structural damage to the house.  Never thought of that!

So, we've been working hard all evening, getting the toilet emptied out, getting the behind-the-toilet cabinet emptied, disconnected from the wall and then moved, then moving the toilet itself, cleaning it off, attaching the new wax gasket seal, putting the toilet back in place, confirming that there doesn't seem to be a leak any more before putting everything back in place, and while doing so getting a scrub down of the walls in behind the toilet and cabinet done (it's not like I've been able to access them for the 7 years we've lived in the house, after all!), now getting the cabinet and toilet tank replaced ... so we're almost done.

Fingers crossed that once we're done, we're done for good and don't find that not only had the gasket failed (when we got it out we found it was 1/4 simply GONE) and that we don't also have a cracket toilet bowl.