Avoiding the Void

I always wondered what people who don't work, don't have kids to raise and houses to maintain, do all day. For instance, my old college roommate who never went to class, never cleaned her side of the room and never did anything remotely productive for the entire time we shared a living space. Now I know. It's amazing how fast the day goes by when you do absolutely nothing.

In between my ever swelling knee, my involuntary naps brought on by my anti-nausea medication and the ironic hyperactivity that fights with the drowsiness and makes me clean obsessively (you thought I was obsessive BEFORE this! Ha!), the hours pass like quick silver. I now know how I ended up with the polar bear. Driven by some unknown facet of my pain meds, I am chained to the computer, checking on line for updates I don't even care about, checking work and personal email etc. and of course, somehow always ending up on petfinder by the end. I used to laughingly explain the acquisition of the PB to being high on Vicodin and lo and behold, I spoke the truth.

In an attempt to mitigate my drive to acquire a new animal like last time, I have settled on a cat this time. I loved Maudie and still do but her quality of life was horrible since she could never adjust to the presence of a dog, even a calm, low key dog like the polar bear. The obvious solution to providing the PB with a companion but without the degree of work involved with a dog, is to get a cat who is well adjusted to dogs. I love cats and thus the cat would not simply be a living, breathing plaything for him but an animal I will happily love and spoil. I have always wanted a Bengal and have located 3 gorgeous gray tabby/Bengal mixes in Wenatchee. They are kittens and should adapt to PB quickly. I have yet to confirm if they are still there but will call tomorrow and who knows, by my next blog posting, adorable kitten photos could be adorning this very site. Here is one of them:


It's only been a week but I my cabin fever is making me crawl the walls. Crawl literally since I still struggle with walking. The pain has abated but the swelling has taken over. On Friday I went back to the doctor so they could remove 60 cc's of blood from the joint. My entire leg was ridiculously fat and I swear I could hear the fluid sloshing around in there. The only upside to that kind of pressure is that it seemed to ameliorate a lot of the excruciating pain I felt the day before. Judging by how things look today, I will be back in his office tomorrow getting another large gauge needle jammed in there.

Yet another benefit of being imprisoned in my own home and on the computer all the time is that I can successfully stalk those people who have real lives. Thus I have been in contact with PB's behaviorist who has suggested 4 mg of melatonin for PB 30 minutes before a stressful event i.e. a walk. Sad but true that a walk is a stressful event. She recommended a couple other all natural supplements that might aid him and I will try them if the melatonin doesn't work. I am far more at ease in trying those options than in trying the Rx drugs. As soon as I can venture out as well as walk on my own, I will give this a try.

And finally, while Polar Bear is an apt name for my boy, it isn't anything I want engraved on his name tag so we have narrowed it down to the following which I fully expect you all to vote on. Remember, I have time to stalk right now.

They are: Kai, Ulysses and Quasar. Thoughts? Choices? Write ins? Obviously I need help people - it's been almost 10 months now! And now I must heed the call of cleaning. Ask not for whom it tolls. It tolls for thee!