Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Wow! Has it been nearly a month??

I can't believe it's been almost a month since I wrote on my blog. I didn't mean to neglect it. I'm not sure I can remember what's happened over the month.  Let's see..... not in any particular order:

Itsy has gone into heat and will be spayed tomorrow. Pretty Girl turned 1 year-old on the 17th and finally went into heat. We were starting to think something was wrong with her. I hope to get her fixed next month. The other dogs are fixed and she never runs loose so it can wait.  Itsy kept trying to get out and there's a feral tom cat hanging around so getting her fixed is more urgent.

Dumb Bunny is getting bigger and bigger. I just saw that the people I got him from have more to sell. I want to get a female companion for him. He's fixed and I'll have to get her fixed as well. I've had to limit him to the kitchen and his room - I couldn't handle the damage done to the carpets, books and shoes.  Putting him in the kitchen will mean pulling the throw rugs up and setting them out of his reach.  I'm down to 2 of these out of 3. He just had to nibble on and basically destroy the new $13 one. He could eat the older ones that were needing to be replaced soon.  He peed on the kitchen floor today (no surprise) but it scared me because the urine was reddish.  From what I'm seeing online, that's no indication of a problem. Rabbit urine can be all sorts of colors.

Weather has been completely crazy around here. Really really cold then much warmer only to get really cold again.  I don't know how much longer I'll be able to afford - literally - this winter.  They haven't come to do the winterization yet and I know I'm heating the underside of the house. How do I know? Well, not only can I feel the cold come up through the vents but Izzy keeps announcing herself by crawling through the duct work only to meow at a vent.  I don't know if she can't turn around and find her way out or what but she doesn't really want in. As soon as I pull the vent cover off and let her out, she goes right to the door to go back outside.

Had an appointment with a neurosurgeon up in Kansas City about my back. The MRI shows bone spurs on L5-S1 on both sides. The one on the left side appears to be pinching the sciatic nerve but he doesn't understand why it only bothers me when I lay down. He said that's highly unusual.  I guess with most people they have pain when they are standing and/or sitting and get relief when they lay down.  He wants me to try steroid type shots first and, then if I don't have any relief, he will order a new MRI with contrast.  That might show that surgery is needed. I would hope they plan on removing the bone spurs regardless.  The relief I get from getting out of bed and sitting somewhere is taking longer and longer. I usually go to the bar stool with an old footstool my grandfather made for me when I was a little kid.  I've had to move them both to my bedroom near my bed. It was getting too painful to get from my bedroom to the kitchen.

I finally saw an orthopedic doctor/surgeon today. My knees have been grinding and crunching when I do just about anything.  Going up and down ramps and stairs is the worse.  The left one has been bad for several years and the right one got bad after a bad fall last year. Note to self : Don't walk off a ladder on the wrong step. Falling 3 feet and landing on a concrete floor smack on both knees is a total bitch. At some point we are likely to do arthroscopic surgery at some point. I had it once before in the early 1990's.  My knees weren't nearly so bad then.  He gave me a shot in both knees - Synvisc One - which is supposed to be like a lubricant. When I read up on it, afterward of course, it said it's made from chicken combs. I don't like the sound of that. I really don't want to know more than that. Trying not to think about it. My knees are stiff and painful now. It could take a month before I might feel relief.  You can get the shots every 6 months. Dunno if I want more of them.  Damn it, it really really hurt.

It was a fairly nice day out yesterday - once you put enough layers of clothes on and kept moving.  I fixed the tires on my portable chicken coop but the damn thing is still hard to move. It's partly because I'm out of shape and partly because it's still really heavy.  I think I need to find a pair of skis and put the coop on them or ball-bearings along the bottom or something. It has to stay close to the ground (on the ground) to offer the best protection from wild animals. There has to be a better way to move it. Anyway, it wanted a blood sacrifice.  It got one.  It got blood from two fingers, almost three. The first was the almost one - have a lovely blood blister on the pad of my left index finger. Hurts like a bitch (and this typing isn't helping). Then the hardware cloth/wire got my right index and middle fingers. Took chunks out of both pads of those fingers (making typing much more fun).  The blood blister came from working on the tires. The others came from lowering the lid to the "free range" part of the coop.  There's a handle on it now to prevent further injuries when closing it.  I think I need to find a way to lock the lid down in case any critters figure out how to open it.

Been spending too much time on the computer and not enough time doing other stuff but that's the way it goes. Especially when it's too damn cold inside as well as outside.  Oh well.  And it's midnight and I have to take Itsy to the vet early. Oh, better go put the cat food away......