Oh quester, that's so hard. I'm glad to hear that she has recovered with such grace and strength, but that's never easy news to hear.

Bonny, that's incredibly sweet. Good boy, Cagney!

BT, what everyone else said. Belated birthday happies, and I'm so sorry about your brother and SIL. I'm so glad you have such a joyful immediate family to take comfort in.

In meme news, our house is infested with (white-fonted for the rodent-phobic) rats. With four cats and two dogs, they never come out of the walls, but I hear them in the walls, under the house (floating foundation), and in the attic (which we don't have easy access to). I am beyond squicked. Our amazing landlady is getting a special exterminator out this Friday to assess the degree of the problem and start to fix it, but I'm fighting a serious case of the heebie jeebies. The worst was the other day when a MASSIVE RAT ran out from under the house and nearly ran across my foot on the back patio. I hear them scrambling around and even squeaking sometimes, and I'm pretty sure they are eating the duct work and OMG I CANNOT DEAL.

Shudder.

Oh Pix, I feel for you on that one!

quester,

WOW. You now, good for her for being upfront with you. Sounds like she is working her way through coping, though the process clearly hasn't been easy.

Pix, uh uh, I don't wanna.

Also, GC, I just realized I didn't acknowledge your earlier post--LA would be poorer without you, but I wish you all the best!

I went to the doctor this morning. Got a prescription for some new meds, and one for physical therapy. No cortisone injection this time, because the swelling has gone down.

Oh, and whenever I'm in a lot of pain, my mom feels bad that she's not here with me, so she buys me stuff. Just got the full box sets of Buffy and Angel.

I hope the doctor's visit helps, Hil.

I hope the new plan works a whole hell of a lot better than the old one, Hil. Also, Go Mom!

WOW. You now, good for her for being upfront with you. Sounds like she is working her way through coping, though the process clearly hasn't been easy.

My niece is lucky to have a big close-knit family. My brother and sister-in-law are great parents.

I'm just blown away that something so aweful happened to her and I never knew or had a clue that anything like that had ever happened to her.

Please, could I ask for two different parcels of ~ma?

Niki, my beloved surrogate mom, is going in for open heart surgery tomorrow morning. She is 87 and has been struggling with congestive heart failure for a long time.

When we talked last week, she was hopeful, but also a bit resigned to the possibility that she might not make it.

I want whatever is best for her.

The other thing seems so trivial, but it's grinding on me.

The client whose dog attacked the cat two weeks ago has gone plum crazy. Plus, where we thought the vet bills were $500, which we've already paid, they are actually $7000.

The organization is protected by several layers of agreements but it's just so sad and aggravating.

More than anything, I want the company attorney to take over dealing with this and help the owner to understand his culpability in a way I have not been able to. Plus, I want the walker, who had been protected from having to deal with all of this, to step up.

On an up note, a Mastiff attacked one of our beloved doggy clients today...an English Bulldog...and THAT walker was a super hero. In the end, the owner of that dog couldn't stop praising us. Fortunately, because the walker actually threw his entire body onto the Mastiff, the Bulldog was not hurt.

I don't know if it is the full moon, or what, but I really need a break from all this strife.