Back in the beginning of January I made the resolution to post on here at least twice a month. As it is now mid March you can see how well that resolution has gone. Much has gone on here on the Unfarm since I last posted in (oh, the procrastination, the embarrassment!) November. Here are some of the updates which I hope to be following up with more in depth posts.
An out of sorts sort of year: The whole of 2014 was unusual in that much of what we traditionally do each and every year did not get done. I had planned on taking Axel and Maia camping but my sister couldn't come out here from Colorado during the summer and I know too well Axel's desire to be near me that I feared if I attempted a solo trip I would come out of the campground showers to find him sitting outside the building waiting for me, having left an Axel-sized whole in my tent. In addition to a lack of camping there was a similar lack of berry picking. I don't think we went out once that summer. Usually we visit local farms to pick most of our strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, and peaches. In addition, we had a bunch of home improvement projects planned that never got done. Let's hope we can get at least a few of them done this year - if not I think the chances are pretty good that someone is going to fall through the rotting pile of wood that we call a deck (the result of building a deck out of wood in a climate that is nearly perpetually wet.) As it is we have roofing tiles nailed to the deck to keep us from looking like a cartoon character who has stepped on a banana peel, windmilling our arms as our legs slide out from under us on the algae/slime that no amount of scrubbing and washing seems capable of reducing. The year went out with a fizzle as well when we failed to decorate gingerbread houses and bake our usual assortment of cookies and candies to give out to friends and relatives. We did manage to make a batch of fudge, some butter toffee, and rocky road but that's about it. No sugar cookie decorating, no cranberry coconut cookies (they are actually much tastier than they sound), and no chocolate covered cherries. We barely even decorated the tree for Christmas. Let's hope that this year is better than the last one.
Addition, then subtraction, then addition again: No, I didn't take a math course at the local college (child, please!) I bought a pet mouse back in August and named her Bernadette. She was a secret mouse in that Dad knew nothing about her (I figured ignorance was bliss.) Unfortunately she died after about a month (here is where that subtraction comes in) and I decided to get a new mouse (addition) and name her Caroline. In November we finally told Dad about our secret mice. He took it surprisingly well.
Another addition: The Saturday before Christmas we decided that we needed to add another dog as Axel seemed somewhat down since his friend Stella died of cancer recently and we know that Maia probably wouldn't be around much longer having just turned 19 years old and the thought of having only one dog seemed too lonely to bear so we added Scout, an 8 week old pointer mix from the Maui Humane Society. He was adorable which was good for him since puppies are, as everyone knows, rather obnoxious.
A loss: On January 3, 2015 we made the tough decision to put Maia to sleep as she had started whining, unable to get comfortable and her quality of life was diminished. It is never easy to make that decision but we try to do what is best for our little ones and I want to make sure that it is understood that it was not motivated out of a desire to reduce any "hassle" on our part. She got to leave with all of us (except Liz, who had gone back to Colorado already) around her.
A gain: We discovered that Axel likes having a dog to walk with but doesn't really care to actually play with anyone so we decided to add another dog for Scout to play with - enter Molly, an unknown small dog mix who is supposed to be about the same age as Scout (about 4 or 5 months old.) Two puppies at once. Clearly we would be good candidates to enter some sort of in-patient psychiatric facility.
Another loss: In February we lost Sakari, the last of our original three chickens. She was my personal chicken and would have been 11 years old this spring. She got a sort of throat infection and despite treatment she was unable to beat it. We had been hoping she would make it to old age - 11 is actually only middle aged for a chicken. Poor Penny is on her own for now.
And yet another loss: Just a few days ago we lost Basil to a gut upset. I have come to hate gut upsets in rabbits as they have taken several of my little ones now. Basil was an especially sweet little bunny who was the best cuddler of the group and preferred to spend his time out of his cage next to me so that I could pet him the whole time - he would actually demand it if I stopped for more than a minute.
Showing posts with label resolutions. Show all posts
Showing posts with label resolutions. Show all posts
Monday, March 9, 2015
Tuesday, May 28, 2013
Long overdue updates from the Unfarm
I made a resolution at the beginning of this year that I would make posts more often. And I know that most resolutions get thrown by the wayside by mid January, or early February if we are very good. But despite that history, I really did have every intention of keeping this resolution. Things got a little bumpy at the beginning of the year, as you may remember, when Maia had a health scare, but after recovering from her surgery she had more energy than she's had in a long time and it looked like it would be smooth sailing from there on out. And it was. For her.
But as I drove home from work on the evening of January 29th, I got a call from my parents that Kita was acting strangely. I rushed home long enough to call the emergency vet to give them a heads up and run out to the car with drooling, panting, unresponsive Kita. There was nothing the vet could do. He was ready to go (which was confirmed by our AMAZING animal communicator, Karen Anderson, who we LOVE) and we couldn't hold him here no matter how much I may have wanted to. The hardest part of living with animals is knowing that you will, in all likelihood, outlive them and you will have to watch them as they slip. I lay on the floor at the vet's office, with my nose resting against Kita's, trying to let him know I was there for him and would not leave his side. And then the vet gave him the injection, and he left. It was hard - incredibly hard - to lose this dog who had been part of our family for roughly 16 years. I kept expecting to see him come around the corner, or be sleeping on his dog bed on my bedroom floor, or pass his leash hanging on my wall.
But one of the advantages of having multiple pets, for me at least, is knowing that all the other animals still need me and I can forget my loss, to some degree, by taking care of the rest of the animals. And we weren't without dogs - Maia and Buddy were still with us, although Buddy seemed to feel Kita's absence and spent the time after the loss moping around the house and showing little interest in his regular activities. About a week after Kita died I decided that Buddy needed to get out of the house and go for a walk with me and Maia, even though he didn't show his usual exuberant whippet energy. We got part of the way down the street when he stopped walking. He simply refused to go any further, despite several attempts to get him to change his mind. I finally gave in and took him back home and he went right back to bed. At about 6:50 that evening Mom noticed that his gums were pale and suggested we call the vet. They told us to bring him in right then, even though they were closing in 10 minutes. At the vet it was discovered that his red blood cell count, which should have been in the 50-60 range was down to 8, a number the vet described as "barely compatible with life." From there I rushed him to the specialist vet 40 minutes away and he was submitted and getting a blood transfusion within the hour. We were told by Buddy's internist (yes, he had his own internal medicine specialist) within the next couple of days that Buddy had IMHA. Immune Mediated Hemolytic Anemia. Basically, his body was destroying his own red blood cells, for reasons unknown. And more good news: it was a non responsive type, which is harder to treat. But we went all out - transfusions, regular blood counts, multiple night stays in the vet ER, special diets, and enough medications that we had to create an elaborate chart to keep track of when he needed his 13+ medications each day. I even tried alternative treatments. He went to a holistic vet, he got acupuncture, and he received reiki and shamanic healing from an amazing friend of Karen's. We spent one month fighting for Buddy, and over $10,000 to give our six year old dog every shot possible. I wish I could say that it worked, that Buddy finally began to make a turn around, that he is sleeping on the floor behind me as I write this. But I can't. In the end, Buddy became unresponsive and began panting hard one night. I rushed him to the specialist with my brother where they said he may have thrown a clot and they might be able to get him through to the morning if they intubated him, sticking a breathing tube down his throat. I decided that we had to let him go. He had told Karen a couple of weeks earlier that he was tired and ready to go but we hadn't been ready to let him go yet, and he seemed to be showing some improvement. I couldn't stand the thought of him dying there, in the hospital, with tubes down his throat and all alone. So I kissed him and hugged him and stroked his face as they gave him the injection, and then he left. Just like Kita, and only two months and two days afterward. And five short days before his seventh birthday. Driving home at 3:30 in the morning, it struck me as appropriate in some way that I had been the one to bring him into our lives, with a car ride together after picking him up at four months old from the breeder's house several hours away in Kennewick, Washington, and I was with him on his last car ride, as he left our lives that night.
Kita we had expected. We didn't like it, but we saw it coming - he had lived a long, full life with us. But Buddy. Buddy was so young, and so full of life such a short time ago. And now the house felt like a canyon - like you could scream and you would hear an echo with the emptiness of this place.
Two days after Buddy died, I checked in with him and Kita, via Karen. They were both feeling great and Buddy was raring to come back soon. He said he felt like he hadn't gotten to finish his time with us. But in the meantime, he said, he had sent us a gift. A dog at the local shelter was meant for us. So I went that very evening to get Axel, our newest addition to the Unfarm. He is a large dog - about 95 pounds, and black with brown markings, a Husky-Shepherd mix (so like Kita it's almost uncanny!) and ten years old. He probably didn't have much chance of being adopted with that triple threat: big, black, and elderly. He had, in fact, already been adopted and returned to the shelter once before. As I was filling out the paperwork for adoption I was given the highly encouraging news that Axel also had separation anxiety and should he ever be left alone he would proceed to destroy the doors, windows, couches, gates and any crate we might put him in. This gave me a great deal of trepidation, but not nearly enough to doubt Buddy's wisdom.
We have had Axel for over a month now, and he has turned out to be THE perfect dog for us. He is gentle, calm, friendly, quiet, and he LOVES going on walks and for rides in the car. We have also discovered that he has little to no separation anxiety with us and my fears (and the ominous predictions of the adoption counselor) were largely unfounded. He certainly does not enjoy being left alone, but he tolerates it just fine. He also has loads of energy and doesn't show his age at all. And the cherry on top? He grew up around chickens and cows so he behaves perfectly around all of our various "snack sized" pets. We could not have created a better situation if we tried. Thanks, Buddy.
So the drama was over, and life on the Unfarm settled back into a comfortable, if slightly lonely, routine. Until exactly two weeks after Buddy died, when Aspen went to the vet to address his bladder leakage. I had to leave him there for the afternoon for x-rays but went back in the evening to pick him up and hear the damage (Aspen has had several bladder problems in the past and they tend to run at least $1000 each and involve at least one overnight stay at the emergency vet per occurrence.) When I got to the vet they told me to head back to the visitor's lounge. This was unusual - definitely more kidney stones. Sigh. It was not kidney stones. It was worse. He had a heart murmur. And was in kidney failure. And the cancer we suspected he had, had now spread and was filling his abdomen. He was uncomfortable and at 17 years old, even if we decided to be aggressive in our treatment, it would not buy him a lot of time. I held him, bundled up in a blanket, and kissed his little gray nose (enough times to annoy him, most likely) and whispered in his ear as the vet gave him the injection to send him sailing away from me.
Three losses of my little ones in as many months. Can you see now why I avoided this entry? I did not want to admit that we had lost so much, so many animals that spent their days and nights with us, who kept us company and made us laugh and comforted us when we needed it. So many days I won't get back and so many experiences that were yet to come. But here it is. Written down for everyone to see. And in reading this, I hope that they might live on again, even for a short while, in you.
But as I drove home from work on the evening of January 29th, I got a call from my parents that Kita was acting strangely. I rushed home long enough to call the emergency vet to give them a heads up and run out to the car with drooling, panting, unresponsive Kita. There was nothing the vet could do. He was ready to go (which was confirmed by our AMAZING animal communicator, Karen Anderson, who we LOVE) and we couldn't hold him here no matter how much I may have wanted to. The hardest part of living with animals is knowing that you will, in all likelihood, outlive them and you will have to watch them as they slip. I lay on the floor at the vet's office, with my nose resting against Kita's, trying to let him know I was there for him and would not leave his side. And then the vet gave him the injection, and he left. It was hard - incredibly hard - to lose this dog who had been part of our family for roughly 16 years. I kept expecting to see him come around the corner, or be sleeping on his dog bed on my bedroom floor, or pass his leash hanging on my wall.
But one of the advantages of having multiple pets, for me at least, is knowing that all the other animals still need me and I can forget my loss, to some degree, by taking care of the rest of the animals. And we weren't without dogs - Maia and Buddy were still with us, although Buddy seemed to feel Kita's absence and spent the time after the loss moping around the house and showing little interest in his regular activities. About a week after Kita died I decided that Buddy needed to get out of the house and go for a walk with me and Maia, even though he didn't show his usual exuberant whippet energy. We got part of the way down the street when he stopped walking. He simply refused to go any further, despite several attempts to get him to change his mind. I finally gave in and took him back home and he went right back to bed. At about 6:50 that evening Mom noticed that his gums were pale and suggested we call the vet. They told us to bring him in right then, even though they were closing in 10 minutes. At the vet it was discovered that his red blood cell count, which should have been in the 50-60 range was down to 8, a number the vet described as "barely compatible with life." From there I rushed him to the specialist vet 40 minutes away and he was submitted and getting a blood transfusion within the hour. We were told by Buddy's internist (yes, he had his own internal medicine specialist) within the next couple of days that Buddy had IMHA. Immune Mediated Hemolytic Anemia. Basically, his body was destroying his own red blood cells, for reasons unknown. And more good news: it was a non responsive type, which is harder to treat. But we went all out - transfusions, regular blood counts, multiple night stays in the vet ER, special diets, and enough medications that we had to create an elaborate chart to keep track of when he needed his 13+ medications each day. I even tried alternative treatments. He went to a holistic vet, he got acupuncture, and he received reiki and shamanic healing from an amazing friend of Karen's. We spent one month fighting for Buddy, and over $10,000 to give our six year old dog every shot possible. I wish I could say that it worked, that Buddy finally began to make a turn around, that he is sleeping on the floor behind me as I write this. But I can't. In the end, Buddy became unresponsive and began panting hard one night. I rushed him to the specialist with my brother where they said he may have thrown a clot and they might be able to get him through to the morning if they intubated him, sticking a breathing tube down his throat. I decided that we had to let him go. He had told Karen a couple of weeks earlier that he was tired and ready to go but we hadn't been ready to let him go yet, and he seemed to be showing some improvement. I couldn't stand the thought of him dying there, in the hospital, with tubes down his throat and all alone. So I kissed him and hugged him and stroked his face as they gave him the injection, and then he left. Just like Kita, and only two months and two days afterward. And five short days before his seventh birthday. Driving home at 3:30 in the morning, it struck me as appropriate in some way that I had been the one to bring him into our lives, with a car ride together after picking him up at four months old from the breeder's house several hours away in Kennewick, Washington, and I was with him on his last car ride, as he left our lives that night.
Kita we had expected. We didn't like it, but we saw it coming - he had lived a long, full life with us. But Buddy. Buddy was so young, and so full of life such a short time ago. And now the house felt like a canyon - like you could scream and you would hear an echo with the emptiness of this place.
Two days after Buddy died, I checked in with him and Kita, via Karen. They were both feeling great and Buddy was raring to come back soon. He said he felt like he hadn't gotten to finish his time with us. But in the meantime, he said, he had sent us a gift. A dog at the local shelter was meant for us. So I went that very evening to get Axel, our newest addition to the Unfarm. He is a large dog - about 95 pounds, and black with brown markings, a Husky-Shepherd mix (so like Kita it's almost uncanny!) and ten years old. He probably didn't have much chance of being adopted with that triple threat: big, black, and elderly. He had, in fact, already been adopted and returned to the shelter once before. As I was filling out the paperwork for adoption I was given the highly encouraging news that Axel also had separation anxiety and should he ever be left alone he would proceed to destroy the doors, windows, couches, gates and any crate we might put him in. This gave me a great deal of trepidation, but not nearly enough to doubt Buddy's wisdom.
We have had Axel for over a month now, and he has turned out to be THE perfect dog for us. He is gentle, calm, friendly, quiet, and he LOVES going on walks and for rides in the car. We have also discovered that he has little to no separation anxiety with us and my fears (and the ominous predictions of the adoption counselor) were largely unfounded. He certainly does not enjoy being left alone, but he tolerates it just fine. He also has loads of energy and doesn't show his age at all. And the cherry on top? He grew up around chickens and cows so he behaves perfectly around all of our various "snack sized" pets. We could not have created a better situation if we tried. Thanks, Buddy.
So the drama was over, and life on the Unfarm settled back into a comfortable, if slightly lonely, routine. Until exactly two weeks after Buddy died, when Aspen went to the vet to address his bladder leakage. I had to leave him there for the afternoon for x-rays but went back in the evening to pick him up and hear the damage (Aspen has had several bladder problems in the past and they tend to run at least $1000 each and involve at least one overnight stay at the emergency vet per occurrence.) When I got to the vet they told me to head back to the visitor's lounge. This was unusual - definitely more kidney stones. Sigh. It was not kidney stones. It was worse. He had a heart murmur. And was in kidney failure. And the cancer we suspected he had, had now spread and was filling his abdomen. He was uncomfortable and at 17 years old, even if we decided to be aggressive in our treatment, it would not buy him a lot of time. I held him, bundled up in a blanket, and kissed his little gray nose (enough times to annoy him, most likely) and whispered in his ear as the vet gave him the injection to send him sailing away from me.
Three losses of my little ones in as many months. Can you see now why I avoided this entry? I did not want to admit that we had lost so much, so many animals that spent their days and nights with us, who kept us company and made us laugh and comforted us when we needed it. So many days I won't get back and so many experiences that were yet to come. But here it is. Written down for everyone to see. And in reading this, I hope that they might live on again, even for a short while, in you.
Friday, December 31, 2010
Happy New Year
Here it is, 11:35 on December 31, 2010: less than thirty minutes before midnight and how am I ringing in the New Year? By writing this blog. My brother is out at one of several parties he'd been invited to but I am choosing to stay here on the Unfarm with the animals. (In the interest of full disclosure I should probably say that I wasn't actually invited to a New Year's Eve party as all the people I know are animals, and most of them already live here on the Unfarm with me - but that's fine with me: I don't get along with people nearly so well as I get along with animals.) So here I am, at home, trying to finish my massive to-do list before I go to sleep (another classic case of I-think-I-can-handle-it-itis, for which I am well known - it is rare occasion when I tackle a project that I actually have a reasonable chance of completing.) I have decided that instead of (or most likely, in addition to) spring cleaning, I will clean (and even dust) my room, do all my laundry, change the sheets on my bed, and try to catch up on my workout so that I can start 2011 fresh tomorrow morning. Unfortunately, I spent most of the day procrastinating so now I have an unreasonably long list of things left to do and I am quickly running out of time to accomplish them.
I also need to write out my resolutions, which will probably include trying to make a dent in the massive pile of books I have yet to read (I did manage to read at least 12 of them this year but I probably also bought close to that many, if not more, new ones.) Books are my one weakness. I generally hate collections, but I will admit to having a fairly large book collection - but in my defense, many of them are reference books having to do with animal health and art techniques. The only problem is that I am now running out of room for all my books. I have four bookshelves (one of which is an IKEA shelf almost as tall as the ceiling) but they are now all at capacity and it will take a small miracle if I am able to rearrange them enough to fit in the new ones.
Fireworks. It's midnight.
I will probably have several things on my list of resolutions, but one of the most important goals is to lose weight. I know, I know: everyone makes that resolution and very few people keep it - if I am being completely honest, I made that resolution last year and didn't manage to keep it, so we'll have to see if I'm able to do any better this year. I am not looking forward to a weigh-in tomorrow as I have been eating fudge and butter toffee and cookies for the last few weeks. I have a terrible sweet tooth and I have discovered that if I try to simply limit my sugar intake, I generally go overboard and my self-imposed limits are usually out the window before lunch, so this time I'll try going cold turkey and cutting out sugar (in the form of candy, cookies, ice cream, etc - it would be too difficult to eliminate all sugar from my diet) altogether. Whether or not I will manage to keep any of these resolutions, however, will have to remain to be seen. I will try to keep you updated as to my progress on my goals, but whatever the animals have been up to lately is usually far more interesting than whether or not I lost a pound or finished reading Think Like A Cat yet.
So, as a special treat for New Year's Eve, here's a sneak peek at some upcoming posts from the Unfarm. First, a report from the field: we took all three dogs - even Buddy - up to the mountain for some post-Christmas snowshoeing (by which I mean that we were on snowshoes and the dogs were barefoot: we tried giving them little boots to wear but the dogs had them off within minutes.) And secondly: what do you get when you mix Buddy, a low table, and a bag of carob chips accidentally left out? Hint: the answer is not pretty.
I also need to write out my resolutions, which will probably include trying to make a dent in the massive pile of books I have yet to read (I did manage to read at least 12 of them this year but I probably also bought close to that many, if not more, new ones.) Books are my one weakness. I generally hate collections, but I will admit to having a fairly large book collection - but in my defense, many of them are reference books having to do with animal health and art techniques. The only problem is that I am now running out of room for all my books. I have four bookshelves (one of which is an IKEA shelf almost as tall as the ceiling) but they are now all at capacity and it will take a small miracle if I am able to rearrange them enough to fit in the new ones.
Fireworks. It's midnight.
I will probably have several things on my list of resolutions, but one of the most important goals is to lose weight. I know, I know: everyone makes that resolution and very few people keep it - if I am being completely honest, I made that resolution last year and didn't manage to keep it, so we'll have to see if I'm able to do any better this year. I am not looking forward to a weigh-in tomorrow as I have been eating fudge and butter toffee and cookies for the last few weeks. I have a terrible sweet tooth and I have discovered that if I try to simply limit my sugar intake, I generally go overboard and my self-imposed limits are usually out the window before lunch, so this time I'll try going cold turkey and cutting out sugar (in the form of candy, cookies, ice cream, etc - it would be too difficult to eliminate all sugar from my diet) altogether. Whether or not I will manage to keep any of these resolutions, however, will have to remain to be seen. I will try to keep you updated as to my progress on my goals, but whatever the animals have been up to lately is usually far more interesting than whether or not I lost a pound or finished reading Think Like A Cat yet.
So, as a special treat for New Year's Eve, here's a sneak peek at some upcoming posts from the Unfarm. First, a report from the field: we took all three dogs - even Buddy - up to the mountain for some post-Christmas snowshoeing (by which I mean that we were on snowshoes and the dogs were barefoot: we tried giving them little boots to wear but the dogs had them off within minutes.) And secondly: what do you get when you mix Buddy, a low table, and a bag of carob chips accidentally left out? Hint: the answer is not pretty.
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
In the bleak midwinter...
Ah, December 30. Christmas is over and I managed to accomplish somewhere around 90% of the things on my list. I did not manage to get the kitchen trim or crown molding done, and the dogs still haven't had their baths and won't be getting them for a week or two yet as Kita just had surgery to remove six fatty tumors from his head and belly so he can't have a bath until the stitches are out in ten days or so. I managed to finish all my shopping at the last minute but I decided to do a somewhat simplified route for the gift wrap (read: the gifts were wrapped, but nowhere near the level of Martha Stewart's wrapping. And I am perfectly ok with that.)
And although I am glad to finally be done with all the shopping and wrapping for another year, I am sad to see Christmas go. Not so much because I miss the gifts or the food (we have a special breakfast menu that we only use once or twice a year) but because I miss the season. Up until December 25 there's this huge thing to look forward to: decorations are set out, lights are up on the houses, people are - for the most part - pleasant and giving, families spend time together and everything seems somehow brighter.
After Christmas you have until New Years, give or take a few days, and then all the decorations get put away, the lights pulled down and stored, and there is nothing to look forward to. Just three months of cold, grey, bleak weather. I can't even look forward to snow, at least not on a regular basis. Any snow that shows up here is, for the most part, a pleasant surprise and short lived. We had an unexpected snowfall yesterday but by this morning all that remained was slush on the sidewalks that makes it dangerous to walk three exuberant dogs.
So here we go, entering the hardest part of the year. And it will be especially dreary this year as I am headed back to school (for the zillionth time) and am signed up for the oh-so-exciting classes of Statistics and Intro to Accounting. I can hardly wait. School-wise, spring doesn't look much better: I have to take on campus classes of chemistry and microbiology, with labs. There are few things I hate more than lab classes. Sigh.
Speaking of things I've been dreading brings me to January 1st. The day that all my resolutions go into effect, including the one to weigh in at the beginning of every month. It will, in all likelihood, not be pleasant as I have been munching on the four basic food groups all this month: chocolate, ice cream, cake and chips. And I have been using my current cold as an excuse to avoid my workouts.
I just realized that I've been rambling on about just about everything except my animal family here on the Unfarm. So what can I tell you? Minna continues to wiggle out of her diaper most nights, leaving me a mess to clean up in the morning - but both ducks have at least been staying in their corner as opposed to fly-jumping onto the rabbit cages in the morning. (Knock on wood.) The chickens have seen snow before and weren't particularly pleased to see it again. The ducks had not seen it before but didn't seem to mind it much - it is, after all, just another form of water - especially today when it melted and left puddles everywhere. Kita was excited to see the snow but unfortunately wasn't up to playing in it much as he was still recuperating from his surgery. Buddy the Wimpet will take snow over rain, if forced to choose one, but would much rather deal with the heat, and Maia doesn't care what the weather does as long as she gets to sleep on the bed during the 23 hours and 45 minutes that she isn't outside every day. I attempted another bonding between TJ and Jojo yesterday. It failed - I'll allow you a minute or two to get over your shock. [Humming a little tune...] Mynx was sad to see her mom go home yesterday but she has decided that her routine here isn't so bad and Aspen has discovered that when we are out of his preferred milk he will gladly accept a squirt of whipped cream as a substitute. And that's the news on the Unfarm, for now.
And although I am glad to finally be done with all the shopping and wrapping for another year, I am sad to see Christmas go. Not so much because I miss the gifts or the food (we have a special breakfast menu that we only use once or twice a year) but because I miss the season. Up until December 25 there's this huge thing to look forward to: decorations are set out, lights are up on the houses, people are - for the most part - pleasant and giving, families spend time together and everything seems somehow brighter.
After Christmas you have until New Years, give or take a few days, and then all the decorations get put away, the lights pulled down and stored, and there is nothing to look forward to. Just three months of cold, grey, bleak weather. I can't even look forward to snow, at least not on a regular basis. Any snow that shows up here is, for the most part, a pleasant surprise and short lived. We had an unexpected snowfall yesterday but by this morning all that remained was slush on the sidewalks that makes it dangerous to walk three exuberant dogs.
So here we go, entering the hardest part of the year. And it will be especially dreary this year as I am headed back to school (for the zillionth time) and am signed up for the oh-so-exciting classes of Statistics and Intro to Accounting. I can hardly wait. School-wise, spring doesn't look much better: I have to take on campus classes of chemistry and microbiology, with labs. There are few things I hate more than lab classes. Sigh.
Speaking of things I've been dreading brings me to January 1st. The day that all my resolutions go into effect, including the one to weigh in at the beginning of every month. It will, in all likelihood, not be pleasant as I have been munching on the four basic food groups all this month: chocolate, ice cream, cake and chips. And I have been using my current cold as an excuse to avoid my workouts.
I just realized that I've been rambling on about just about everything except my animal family here on the Unfarm. So what can I tell you? Minna continues to wiggle out of her diaper most nights, leaving me a mess to clean up in the morning - but both ducks have at least been staying in their corner as opposed to fly-jumping onto the rabbit cages in the morning. (Knock on wood.) The chickens have seen snow before and weren't particularly pleased to see it again. The ducks had not seen it before but didn't seem to mind it much - it is, after all, just another form of water - especially today when it melted and left puddles everywhere. Kita was excited to see the snow but unfortunately wasn't up to playing in it much as he was still recuperating from his surgery. Buddy the Wimpet will take snow over rain, if forced to choose one, but would much rather deal with the heat, and Maia doesn't care what the weather does as long as she gets to sleep on the bed during the 23 hours and 45 minutes that she isn't outside every day. I attempted another bonding between TJ and Jojo yesterday. It failed - I'll allow you a minute or two to get over your shock. [Humming a little tune...] Mynx was sad to see her mom go home yesterday but she has decided that her routine here isn't so bad and Aspen has discovered that when we are out of his preferred milk he will gladly accept a squirt of whipped cream as a substitute. And that's the news on the Unfarm, for now.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
A thought on art....
Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.
- Scott Adams
Yesterday, my brother and I took the day off and went to the fair. I went with my sister last year but she wasn't able to make it this year, thus necessitating I convince my brother to go with me. If we'd had the time I'm sure he would have insisted that we bike there as he is generally pretty opposed to using cars to get places. But the trip is about 200 miles and three hours by car and not exactly feasible to make it up and back in one day on bike. But to give him credit, my brother agreed and we had a pretty good time, even though he wouldn't let me get an elephant ear (my splurge treat) of my own and made me share one with him. (My sister has a different approach to fair food: as soon as we got to the fair last year she said, "Ok, we need to get elephant ears, caramel apples, and cotton candy.")
Most people tend to go to the fair to ride the rides and spend hundreds of dollars to win stuffed animals that just got unloaded off the ship from China that morning and probably cost about 50 cents to make. Our family, on the other hand, spends most of our time looking at the animals and the various 4-H and art exhibits. And it was the art exhibits, both professional and high school (some of the high school art was good), that have sparked my guilt. These kids are at least ten years younger than me and they're doing some really nice work. I really need to spend more time working on art. I usually just draw or work with acrylic paint but I also want to work on watercolor, lithograph, block printing and collography (just as soon as I figure out what exactly collography is.)
So, a mid September resolution of sorts: to work on practicing art more often. The two things that usually stop me are laziness and fear of the result not being as good as I had pictured it in my head. But maybe this time it'll be different and I'll actually follow through with this resolution. Hey, just last week I finished the quilt that I'd been working on for several years and had resolved to finish this year, so there's always a chance.
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