Allyson, I've taken Effexor but since I've never had an AD work for me, I don't know if I should be the one giving advice since I was all side-effect and no help apart from knowing that the stuff in my head wasn't just what everyone had (which is helpful, hugely, because it was all in my head but chemically and not me just being weak or something.) Still, they work really well for so many people that I am always VERY in favor of trying them. Effexor can make suicidal ideation worse. It's not the most common side effect but it's there.

Yikes, Hil. I think that's why I just don't drive in snow. Which will be a problem if I ever live where it exists in a real way.

I'm sorry about Kuma. I become attached to Buffista pets.

It's raining here so I drove up into the Park and walked around a bit. It was really lovely and smelled wonderful. The rangers are probably all doing happy dances because it's been a slow gentle rain for hours and that bodes well for wildflowers.

which contained the language " I believe we are closer to removing the issues regarding your treatment". I don't even know what it means, or what the timeline is or anything, but I'll take it.

That seems positive. Fingers are crossed. It's ridiculous that you can't get the treatment that your specialists want.

Liese, I hate bird strikes. My Mom has a lot of doves outside. Those are some dumb birds. But I still feel bad when they smack the window. But I think she's only had one that caused apparent injury. Since they live there, I don't think they just limp home and die either. So dumb birds, but hardy.

I know. I do lots of stuff to avoid it, like sparkly things in the windows. But this one was just nuts. There was a whole gigantic flock. Like, hundreds. And something scared them, east of the house, and they all flew toward the house, scaring the crap out of me and the dog in my west-facing office. And then they sat contentedly on my kennel fence and surrounding trees for a few minutes. And then they all left.

Storm birds, flocking ahead of whatever front is presumably about to dump all that rain on you. Though that shouldn't make them bump into your house.

Oh, you're right. They were probably parked in the trees on the crest of the hill, maybe for the evening, and then had a predator fly over or something.

I am sorry about Kuma, Kat, and about the bad days Sparly and Consuela and other people I am undoubtedly missing.

So the saga of my former youth group leader and former family friend continues. Apparently the judge called a mistrial because . . . I'm not sure why. The mom of the victim on the stand was "combative" or something, or hadn't been coached, and said shit the jury couldn't unhear. And now it's up to the family if they want to continue to pursue the case. Hopefully they do. Fucker still has a court date about the child pornography possession, which will hopefully bear more weight in a second trial.

I told my mom that this was the first time in my life that I was glad that I am and have always been a bitch of a girl. She replied that she was thinking about it the other day, and agreed that he'd never have had a chance with the surly kid!me.

God, I want him to die in a fire and go away forever. And his wife and his church who covered this shit up.

I fondly remember Kuma's obsession with the red dot, wet hair and how the nutty beast refused to sit down the curvy road up to Big Bear in Hank (lori's land rover.) That dog bounced his pointy self all over me and Bear and the best I could manage was to hang onto him while he stood on my lap.

Devi Update: TL;DR version- she got a chest xray, no sedation and a steroid shot that may or may not help. No firm diag. I'm going minimal Devi-torture. It looks like if this doesn't clear it up, we'll just keep on going on until she's suffering.

I hope the steroid shot helps, sarameg.

ION, now that it is painfully cold out, my kitties decided that they need to be outside ALL THE TIME and I need to physically grab Ply to get her in at night. Yet, when I had to close my windows and it was still a balmy 40 or 50 degrees out, I couldn't get them out the door with a cattle prod.