Teddy marked the one-year anniversary of his transplant recently. Unfortunately, this week's news isn't as good.

He's lost weight. And his creatinine level, while still within normal range, is up. I took him in for an ultrasound yesterday, and his stomach wall is much thicker than normal. Which could explain the loss of appetite and weight -- the connection between stomach and intestine is smaller than normal.

The vets are worried about possible lymphona. We're scheduling a biopsy now.

Like I said, I never got spanked, nor do I have or plan to have kids so I will gladly defer to actual parents.

Spider Boy is adoreable.

I'm feeling a little guilty today. It's my last day, and this morning the shit hit the fan with this huge project for my coworkers.

That Hello Kitty laptop is almost perfection. It just needs to be a Mac...

I was not spanked and hope not to spank, though I can certainly imagine situations in which a spank might be warranted.

I was spanked and went into parenthood without a philosophical objection to it. But the idea of hitting my children was (a) repugnant to me and (b) I had plenty of other, effective ways to discipline them.

On the other hand, Emmett really likes to roughhouse, and I frequently have to do something like scrape/drill my knuckles into his ribs or back to get him off me. Or if I just need to frog march him somewhere, I grab a chunk of his backfat and twist it.

I cannot stress enough, though, that these encounters are all driven by Emmett attacking me (in a friendly but rough way). It's sort of like living with the Pink Panther's house servent Kato.

It's snowing. The heel of my shoe is loose. Systems have been down for nearly 24 hours, unplanned.

I'm glad I don't have to come into work on monday!

Or if I just need to frog march him somewhere, I grab a chunk of his backfat and twist it.

Now this my dad did, but with armfat instead. He also (even when I wasn't in trouble, just out of habit) would take my arm just above the elbow to walk me places. Not quite frog marching, but felt like it a bit.

I was spanked only twice as a child, and I remember both very clearly, so they did what they were supposed to do--make an impression.

I did spank a child I was babysitting once, after repeated warnings to him, and I told the parents (both of whom I knew very well and I was very familiar with their parenting styles, otherwise I would never have done it no matter how much the kid provoked me) as soon as they came home that night. They both backed me up in my decision to do so.

In all the years I babysat since then, it never even crossed my mind to spank a child.

I only got spanked once (that I recall) as well. I secretly crossed the street alone to go to the park. Scared my mom out of her mind. Justifiable spanking.

I got spanked at least three or four times (maybe more times that I've forgotten). The one time that sticks in my mind was when I turned the thermostat up to 95 degrees. My dad told us that could burn the house down.

Dunno - maybe that was true. That was a 110 year old house when we finally tore it down....

That was a 110 year old house when we finally tore it down....

Seems like an awful waste of manpower when all you had to do was crank the heat.