Eat it, part deux

My dog Ozzy. My dog Ozzy is a lovable, emotionally damaged sad sack of dog. My dog Ozzy is usually well behaved, inasmuch as he doesn't normally go about jumping onto counter tops to steal food. He does lots of other undesirable things, and he'd do just about anything for food. Lately, there have been lots of mini bagels around, which weird in it's own right. It all started back at Samson's bris in November where the guests noshed on mini bagels and Max's mom's chopped chicken liver. But it was Ozzy who noshed on the mini bagels when nobody was looking. Every so often since then, there have been mini bagels around our house and my parents' house. For brunches. For no reason at all. Not something either of normally keep on hand, but there you go.

And it turns out they go really well with peanut butter.

So today when I bought the bag of mini bagels at Target, I could almost taste the peanut butter on the one I would have at my mid-morning snack tomorrow. It was going to be delicious, I tell you! But Ozzy put an end to all of that silly almost-tasting, when he ate the entire bag not more than an hour after I got home.

I feel sad and bageless now.

Hello, I Love You

The fancy first picture with my fancy new camera:



I. Love. This. Camera.



Obviously the Sharks pajamas worked, as my stinky team actually won last night.

Ozzy Report

Ozzy got his nasty tubes removed today, hooray hooray. The vet said that all cancer had been successfully removed, and there was no sign that anything had metastasized. Yay! And now he gets to rock the uber hip shaved patch until his fur grows back in. It's like temporary tattoos for doggies.

In other doctor news, Samson's 4 month checkup was today. 15 1/2 pounds and 26 inches! That's a big meataball!

Son of Frankendog

So I'm sitting here on the kitchen floor next to Ozzy who looks like he's been hit by a train. Two massive rows of stitches--both with these horrible plastic drain tubes sticking out--one of those awful clown collars, and most pitiful whimper you've EVER heard in your in your life. This is one unhappy dog--unhappy, but alive. I had a real bad feeling about this surgery, so I'm very glad that he made it through. Now I get to spend the next 12 hours sitting next to him on the floor and petting his paw which seems to be the only thing that lessens the whimpering. THANK GOD the baby is down for a nap. And Max is on his way home so that we can take turns caring for the baby and comforting the dog.

Really, this is god awful. Anyone who's met Ozzy knows that he has a very special set of vocal cords, and the whimpering is just heart breaking. I know it was a really small tumor, easily removed and he should make a full recovery, he'll even be a lot better by tomorrow morning, but right now it just seems so wrong to put him through this.

They're delicious with fava beans and a nice chianti

Cooking dinner last night, Max wearing Samson in the Bjorn, getting the baked potato out of the oven.

Me: Careful, you don't want roasted baby feet.
Max: Mmmmm, roasted baby feet.
Me: A delicacy in some countries, they're generally frowned upon here.

But how about some fresh baby noggin marinated in olive oil? A new friend from boot camp says that olive oil applied one hour before bed time will get rid of the mysterious flakes that mysteriously appeared on Samson's mysterious head this morning. Baby dandruff, gross.

Just spoke with the vet, Ozzy did great during surgery, and all the lumps and tumors and such were removed and he's starting to wake up. I'm so thrilled! Ask me how thrilled I am in a few hours after I've picked him up and they've shown me how to empty and clean his drainage tubes. Doggie juices, gross.

The steak comes with extra love

Just gave Ozzy his last meal before surgery. I don't think he noticed the extra pieces of left-over steak on top; he eats every meals as if it's about grow legs and sprint away. He'll be eating at home again tomorrow night, but something inside makes me want to treat him extra special tonight. Which means I'll just be feeling a little less sorry for Max tonight when I wake up and see that Ozzy has expanded his corner of the bed to include 45-60% of Max's side. Never trust a 75 pound dog who can make himself the size of a cat.

I even had a salad for lunch

Back to Baby Boot Camp today. Paul's visit last week provided me with a good excuse to skip class, and to eat lots of tasty things that probably definitely had more points than I should be eating. But today's sunshine and Samson's good mood made it a really nice way to spend the morning--enough so that I'm even looking forward to going back on Wednesday. It will be a good way to keep my mind off the poor Oz's lumpectomy. Maybe one day, some day, I'll actually achieve my dream of not loathing exercise more than anything else in the world ever. Certainly more than superlatives.

ps. It's not entirely surprising that I hate exercise so much. See what I had to deal with as a child? Do you see any bespectacled chubby girls in those commercials?

pps. Found this while writing the last post (re. the dead pheasant). Have been messing with dog ever since.

Crap

Can I just have one dog without cancer? Just one? Please? Stupid Ozzy's stupid lump is a stupid malignant tumor. So now he gets to eat whatever he wants, sleep wherever he wants and fart as often as he wants until he makes a full recovery.

Stupid tumor. I'm so sick of this crap. CRAP.

You Vet Your Life

Have I mentioned lately how much I like difficult things? I'm a huge fan of impossible tasks, or at least doing stuff that involves military-style planning and a small army to get them done. And I like to do these things alone. And when they don't go smoothly, I get pissy and blame other people. Yeah, I'm a real doll.

So my day today appeared to be calm, not too much running around or getting dressed, just a leisurely lunch with my mom and my brother Paul who's visiting from Brooklyn.

Well screw that.

I decided that today would be a great day to bring the cats to the vet for their annual check ups and their vaccines in preparation for their teeth cleaning appointments next week. Not so horrible on the surface, except for catching, caging and transporting two furious 14-ish pound cats. And let's not forget about the baby.

Since I was already going to the vet, I might as well bring the dogs just to get their intranasal bordatella vaccines so that they can go to doggie day care tomorrow while we're all having lunch at Greene's in the city. They were just in last month for their respective lumps, so we know that nothing's wrong with them.

Ha!

The vet noticed Ozzy's new red eye spot--it's been there about 2 days and I've applied my new "watch and see for one month before freaking out and going to the vet" philospophy to it. After looking at his eye, the vet announced that Ozzy probably has a tumor on his third eyelid, a common condition in dogs with unpigmented eyelids. Since we were there, the vet might as well check out the new lump on his rear end--another "wait and see" test for me--and that one had to be sent out to the lab for further diagnostics.

Sigh.

Let me just add that my mom rocks for not letting me take on such tasks solo. Even if she did lock herself in the backseat of the car with Samson, ha ha.

This is not a Mommy Blog

Oh, wait. Crap.



Those poor, poor dogs. The cats are used to it, but the dogs were always center stage. Eventually the baby will stop doing cute things allllllllll the time and I'll remember how Nanna has been my best friend for over 11 years and how Ozzy has consistently provided me with hours of entertainment, if not headaches and an ulcer.



I'm so ashamed. I didn't even post about the lumps. That's right--two for Nanna and one for Ozzy. (They were all either fatty tumors or benign sarcomas, so we came out ahead in that match.) Nor did I post about the bangs (I got BANGS last week. The jury is still out, waaay out.) Honestly, what kind of person have I become? I person with lumpy dogs and a questionable hair do, apparently.

It's a lethal combination of spending 24/7 with Samson and...spending 24/7 with Samson. Makes for some difficult blogging. Either type one-handed--and I have a hard enough time typing with both hands--or use my precious sleeping baby time to blog, laundry and hygiene be damned. And even if I did blog more, there's not much to blog about other than my fleshy pink master. I could blog about the social hierarchy of my Friday afternoon playgroup. Did you know that infant playgroups have cliques? It's absolutely ridiculous. Or I could blog about the wonders of Baby Einstein videos and damn how I wish they had these when I was in high school. But it all comes back to Samson.

And poor Nanna, she knows it. She's lying on the floor, looking up at me with those big brown eyes. Do you even know where my belly is?

But I've got to make more of an effort, for the sake of my own identity. Wait, I do have an identity, right? Or did I loose it in that pile of onsies waiting to be laundered?

Motherhood, thy name is Bessie

Day 12 of parenting...never has time held such little meaning for me. Twelve days? Twelve days? I've only been doing this for TWELVE DAYS?! Even though I've been relegated to the position of an on call dairy cow, I'm definitely feeling the love. 2007 has been an amazing year, and this culmination of awesomeness has really given our little family a capital F. It's still so early, and things will change big time when Max goes back to work, but we've really established some routine-like behaviors, as much as one can have a routine with a newborn in the house. Which is not at all.

Max is a terrific father (DUH). He's making sure to spend an adequate amount of time teaching Samson the ins and outs of Halo 3 while Samson sleeps curled up Daddy's chest, clenching precious, tiny fistfulls of chest hair. As a long time Xbox hater, I've surprisingly found myself calmed and soothed by the sounds of Halo. The familiarity, the background noise and lights, just knowing that these sounds mean that Max is contentedly sitting on the sofa, playing, make me feel so comforted. It means I have one less person to worry about, one less person/dog/cat who needs me right now at this moment. Someone who I love and care about tremendously is happy and content and it doesn't require anything from me. Not that Max is needy, it's more that I'm one of those over-giver-type of personalities, so just by the virtue of being in the same room as me, Max is entitled to the lion's share of my physical and emotional energy. And now that there's someone around who actually needs that portion of energy, it's nice to be able to give it to him and not worry about Max. Who is a grown up and can take care of himself. And the dogs. And the cats. And oftentimes me. Why do I need to keep reminding myself of that?



So day 12. So far, day 12 has consisted of eating, pooping, sleeping, and peeing on one of our precious few newborn-sized snuggies--the kind of garment that buttons up the front instead being pulled over the head. We learned back on day 5 or so that Samson hates hates HATES having clothes pulled over his head. Looking back, it's kind of like, duh, of course he hates it, but we were not prepared for this hatred and hence had zero newborn-sized clothes that did not induce screams of frustration from our son. Since then, we've remedied the situation but still have to do laundry daily in order to satisfy our snuggy demand. I would buy more, but I have the feeling that he won't be wearing the newborn-sized stuff for too much longer, so I'm holding out.

The dogs and cats have really adapted well to the fleshy pink intruder. Nobody really seems to care about him, even if he's crying. Which is perfect, because the last thing I need is for my already nervous dog to get anxious when the baby cries, or for my prone-to-grossness dog to devote his time to trying to get into the diaper genie. Or for one of my two generally unremarkable cats to decide that warm baby bodies are where it's at and we'd like to sleep in the crib now please. No, it's pretty much business as usual for the animal set, and I hope they appreciate the extra spoonful of wet food they've been getting at night or the very deliberate love and attention we've been trying to dole out regularly. Or the copious amounts of treats.



Later today we've got our 2nd appointment with the pediatrician. I can't wait to find out how much weight Samson has gained! I'm sure he must weigh like 10 pounds already. He eats SO MUCH and looks SO MUCH bigger than he did when we brought him home 8 days ago. We're raising a real prize piggie over here.

How could I not mention the brit? On Thursday, AKA day 8, the mohel did unspeakable things to Samson who was a real trooper about the whole affair. The secret ingredient: wine. They got the baby drunk first, and after watching him sleep ALL afternoon like a perfect little angel, it's really tempting to just dip a few fingers in bourbon before bedtime and let him suckle away.

One last thing. Hands. HANDS. Samson's favorite thing to eat is his own little hands. What's for breakfast? Hands. Lunch? Hands. Dinners. Hands, dammit. Hands.

Earthquake

We had a 5.6 earthquake about 90 minutes ago. Max and I both felt it, and the dogs totally started to bark and run around the house. It was exciting! See, Samson? if you come out now, think of all the fun and exciting things that await you! Earthquakes! Dogs barking! Pizza!

The grandparents-to-be got us an amazing video camera so that we can forever save treasured moments in Samson's life and share on places like blogs. It's also got a pretty kick ass still picture feature--I think this will quell my craving for a digital SLR for a while longer. It takes pretty nice shots of Ozzy.



That's a handsome dog.

Two against one

Ozzy got tag teamed by two pit bulls at the dog park this morning. He's fine, they're fine, everyone's fine. Now, I'm always the first to admit fault on his behalf when Ozzy instigates some form of K9 skirmish, so please feel the gravity of my statement when I say he was blindsided and attacked by these two other dogs for no apparent reason (there's always a reason in dog land, true, but Ozzy wasn't posturing, protecting Nanna, protecting me, or asserting dominance in any way--he was just minding his own doggie business, sniffing the ground and whatnot.). He never had a chance--they had him on his back before I could say boo and were biting him on the neck, torso, head--it was awful. Luckily, it wasn't the kind of biting that pit bulls are famous for, nor was it even the kind of biting that draws blood. It was more the snarling and snapping kind of biting, the kind that made me run up to the mess and stop just short of sticking my arms in and trying to pull him out. Instead, I poked at all three dogs with my flinger, shouted lots of things like "Hey!" and "Don't do that!" and "Not good!"

The owner of the other two dogs came and pulled them off, and Ozzy stood up looking utterly dazed and confused, but unhurt. Nanna ran up to him and sniffed him all over, and I ran up to him and did the human equivalent of sniffing him all over: petting him and crying, running my hands through his dusty, dirty, slobbery fur, looking for gashes and puncture wounds. Like I said, he's fine.

At least, he was fine, until he learned that those pit bulls were female pit bulls, and he had just gotten his ass kicked by a couple of girls.

Updates on all fronts

Animals:

Nanna got her stitches removed, and the incision promptly filled up will fluid, making a jiggly tennis-ball sized lump of goo. The vet assured me today that this is OK, drained it, and told me to massage the incision site twice daily to avoid fluid deposits. At which point, I swear to god, Nanna looked up at me and smiled.

Miru gets to stay unmedicated for another 6 months, at which point he is gets another cardiogram ("cardiogram" always makes me think of "candygram" which always makes me think of the land shark routine from SNL. And now it also makes me think of this.) to check his rate of deterioration. Fine by me.

Milhouse gets louder and friendlier every day. Has taken to sleeping in laundry baskets full of freshly washed baby clothes.

Ozzy continues to fart frequently. Sigh. Has mastered the art of hogging a California King sized bed. Sigh.

Married life:

Just over one month old. It's great! Both the Social Security office and the DMV were very helpful when I changed my name, and customer service representatives keep congratulating me when I call them to order new cards, checks, what have you.

Samson:

Terrific! We've definitely moved into that super uncomfortable phase of pregnancy where sleep is hard to come by and food must be consumed in small quantities because there's no room in my body for anything but a baby, let alone a full order of garlic mashed potatoes form Black Angus. We won't go into how little room there is for my bladder or it's contents. I did have to make a little trip to the emergency room Friday night when I sliced the bejesus out of my thumb while chopping onions. The thumb's fine, but the tetanus shot they gave me still kills. The ER doctor promised me that the tetanus shot wouldn't cause Samson to be born with horns or wings (although how cool would that be?), and I came to a concrete decision regarding the epidural. I don't like pain at all. I've been whiny and cranky and mopey for the last three days, and I swear my arm is going to fall off or explode at any second. Not to mention my ginsued thumb. Ow.

So all in all, things are good if not a little whiny. Coming soon: something hopefully a little more interesting than this kind of stuff.

First Crush

I just love this video.



Nanna is healing nicely; stitches come out next Tuesday. Still waiting on Miru's test results. Milhouse tried to eat my granola this morning. Ozzy still smells questionable. Samson is preparing for the world soccer championship, or maybe some kind of martial arts contest. Either way, he's sure to being home the gold.

In other words, not much is happening around here lately, which is good. I'm getting a little more tired every day, and I'm training for the napolympics. I'm hoping to get sponsored by Sealy or Mattress Discounters.

Lumpdate

Nanna is out of surgery and slowly recovering. Miru's heart may or may not be safe for another year. Ozzy most likely has nothing more than a lump on his tummy. Oh, and gingivitis.

We won't know 100% for sure whether or not the cancer in Nanna's lump has spread beyond the bits reoved in her surgery until next week, but the doctor felt pretty confident that she got everything. Even then, there's nothing that says the same cancerous cells won't show up in some other tumors a few months down the road. But for now, she's lying on the living room floor, more zonked out than I've ever seen her before, with another one of those frankendog looking row of stitches running up from her belly to her side. The doc says that this recover will take longer than her previous ones because they had to take a good chunk of muscle out off of her rib (again), plus she's a bit older this time around (11 years old at the end of this month!). Poor, poor dear.

Miru's heart murmur is a clue that he will eventually develop this cat condition that has a crappy symptom: sudden death. But because it was caught before his heart exploded, we can monitor it as time goes by and get him on medication before there's any manifestation of physical symptoms (like suddenly dropping dead). The question is just when he goes on the medication, and the today's cardiogram should give us the answer to that question by next week. Of course, I wouldn't be surprised if the side effects of said medication are hair loss, incontinence and kitty dementia. He's fine tonight, except for the fact that he's being tortured by his cruel captors who keep him locked in a townhouse when by all rights he should be roaming the streets of Foster City till the wee hours.

Ozzy basically got jealous of all of the attention Nanna was getting regarding her lump, so he said "Look, look! I gots a lump too! Can I have some turkey now?" If any dog could will himself to have a small, non-cancerous, turkey-getting lump, it's the Oz. But We're glad he's OK (comparatively).

Human health: Samson and I had our 32 week check-up today (what, only the pets get to go to the doctor today?), and we are practically perfect in every way. Seriously. I love this doctor because he says things like that. Our fundus is the right hight (31 centimeters), our blood pressure is just right (some bigger number over some other smaller number), and our weight is just right (yeah, as if I'm going to post that here). Hearts beat as they should, movement is present and regular, everything is normal and A-OK. I love it! Now if only they doctor could do something about this heat wave so I could get some sleep...

Another Lump for Nanna

And this one's another cancerous tumor. But thanks to constant belly rubs and our daily post-breakfast love fest, I found it really early and the vet thinks it will be no problem to remove the whole thing and get good margins on Thursday. The same day Miru goes in for his echo-cardio-thingy to check the status of his heart murmur. We'll probably have to go in even earlier in the week because we found another lump last night, this one on Ozzy's belly. His first lump. My first 3-animal medical crisis week. Plus, when Miru got out last week, he brought home some fleas. Yay.

But not all news is sick animal news. Some of it is expecting friend news! LDB up in Portland is growing a little friend in her belly for Samson to play with! How cool is that! Four hundred cool.

The portrait shots from the wedding are up on Picasa Web. There are still some digital photos and a few quick cams to handle, but I think we're mostly set on picture posting.

Medium sized update

So I went up to the Sea Ranch for 3 days last week to get my bearings in regards to the wedding. The wedding that's in exactly one month. Ahem.

The verdict: boy did we pick the right place to start the rest of our lives together. Thanks to mom and dad's scouting skills and their intrepid ability to test fancy restaurants for us in our absence, the food will match the beauty and the intensity that is the Northern California coast and redwoods. And that's really what a wedding is all about, right?

Once again, I'm torn by how happy we are to have a nice, simple, intimate (aka "small") ceremony, one that's more or less devoid of stress and time-intensive decisions about tablecloths and seating arrangements, and my desire to share this wonderful place and this wonderful event with all of my nearest and dearest. Thankfully, our friends and family understand, and they support our decision. And that makes me feel less torn.

On to the story of Ozzylocks and the Three Deer. Well, there's no story really. There were these three deer grazing outside our house, and Ozzy watched them and made deeply primal growly noises. As if, Oz. They have horns, buddy. Horns.



Nanna, of course, had more important things to worry about. Like all of these sticks! Who left all of these sticks lying around here?? How am I supposed to fetch ALL OF THESE STICKS???



Other business: Max will be home in 2 short weeks! The movers will come to pack up the rest our belongings in Dublin in a week or so, then I get my best friend back, my bringer of milkshakes and not-so-secret Degrassi TNG watching pal. Life is good.

Other other business: the AIDS Walk went really, really well last Sunday. Extra super fantastic THANK YOUs to everyone who supported me by donating. I met my fundraising goal, and was able to take part in something really special and helpful to my community. I walked the whole 10K with team captain Laura and her dad, not to mention my four-legged cohorts. Oz and Nanna did splendidly, and were incredible tuckered out by the end of the weekend--three days chasing sticks in the ocean, multiple trips to the dog park, and one heck of a long walk through a fog-filled Golden Gate Park. I think they've finally forgiven me for leaving them for a year.

Mini Update

I am still here--busy with work, and a fabulous pre-wedding fact-gathering mission to the Sea Ranch. More about this later, and pictures of Ozzy's not-so-close encounter with a trio of deer.

One other thing: big hugs and warm thoughts for my good friend Tiny Trousers (and her ever loving mom). Who knew an Australian shepherd mix (or whatever the lying sack of crap at the pet store said you were), who is almost certainly part mountain goat, could get herself stranded on the dusty crags of my heart and mind for so long? Well, I guess I knew.

If I had a Nanna, I'd hug her in morning

Oh! Wait! I do have a Nanna!





Yup, this weekend's going to be chock full dog belly. CHOCK FULL.

Don't fret, I will involve Ozzy's belly as well. But girl belly is just so much nicer.

And all of this supposed cuddling and dog belly will take place assuming that there's room for me on the bed. which is questionable.



Other parts of the coming week will be spent with this lovely creature:



Mammas, don't let your best friends from high school grow up to be cowgirls!