Nov 27 – Dec 2
Absolutely zero progress on since the last update.
I worked on various minor maintenance tasks and little unimportant personal projects after work much of the week while waiting for the concrete from the first spigot project to cure so I can assess results before doing the remaining two. It was windy many afternoons so I didn’t really want to be shoveling dirt to fill the trench and getting it blown in my face.
Bear started showing signs of not feeling well, vomiting once, then diarrhea for a couple of days. I realized late Thursday to early Friday that he had gone from having diarrhea to being constipated and that if we didn’t get his bowels working again, he would be in distress so I gave him a couple of enemas much to his displeasure. He did clear a number of sizable objects that appeared to be undigested beans. Not entirely sure where he got those from. Maybe they were edamame beans that escaped me one evening a few nights before when I was eating them but I don’t remember dropping that many… I walked him around quite a bit outside as well to try to help things move along.
Hoping that would do the trick for Bear, I moved onto relocating my hobby/project work space in the 5th wheel to the travel trailer. The space in the 5th wheel had become a convenient dumping ground for things to take care of later (which never comes of course) and I far more inclined to sit and watch the mind numbing box with Cheryl and Rachel then sit at the table with my earbuds in and work on various computer and electronics projects as I had planned. After I got things setup in the travel trailer, I worked through around 4 tutorials in the Sparkfun arduino inventor’s kit that I bought well before ever leaving Michigan.
Saturday morning it was clear that Bear’s condition was continuing to deteriorate. He was no longer eating, drinking, peeing, or pooping. 3-4 more enemas with minimal clearing of fecal matter. Clearly dehydration was now in progress. There was a traveling vet scheduled to be in town for a vet clinic so I took Bear in for review. The vet sat down and talked with me taking a quick cursory look (no exam) and advise I take him to someone to get him on an IV to re-hydrate him thinking that while I may have cleared the intestinal blockages, it was too late and he needed re-hydration to come around.
As I had to work Saturday evening I knew I would not be able to take him so I rousted Cheryl and Rachel and told them to get ready for a road trip while I called around to see where we could take him. Given the it was going on 2 PM on a Saturday afternoon, our options were really limited. We ended up settling to take him to an Animal hospital in Tuscon, three hours away. Knowing it was going to be an overnight trip, Cheryl and Rachel through together an overnight back and took off with Bear.
At that point, it was only a couple hours before I had to work so I just puttered around looking for some electronics project components I had failed to locate in the clutter and cleaned a bit.
Work went fine. Finished around 7 PM local. To late to work outside, so I started a little research project that I had been wanting to do. I ended up working on that until 2 AM local (4 AM eastern).
In the mean time, Cheryl and Rachel had arrived at the animal hospital in Tuscon and Bear was being assessed. I’ve always said: I would not spend that much on a pet when I hear about people paying huge vet bills. Put it down and get another. Guess I’m a liar. After spending $$ on a test for parvo and then imaging of his belly, it was determined that he was mildly dehydrated and that he still had obstructions that needed to be cleared. Recommendation: Overnight stay with IV’s and enema’s and other measures necessary to clear the obstruction. While the price for the treatment was high, it wasn’t going to break the bank. Yes, we could put him down and get 2-3 more dogs of the same breed for what we paid for him compared to what we were going to now pay to keep him alive. He’s part of our family now with many years of life still to live. It sucks parting with that money. It would suck more parting with Bear. Decision made. Treat him as suggested.
Sunday having stayed up so late, Bear’s well being on my mind, the research project I started the night before still on my mind, all combined with the cool temperatures and wind outside sapped any motivation I had to work on projects outside. While I could have worked on electronics projects inside, I opted to pound on the keyboard all day writing for the blog and working on my personal laptop.
Speaking of my personal laptop, I think it may have been compromised. I’m scanning it now for malware as I type this.
As far as updates from the hospital on Bear, the update as of this morning was that he is starting to eat, drink and poop. They wanted to monitor his recovery a while longer. I’m translating that to mean that he has passed or is in the process of passing what ever had him backed up and is on the road to recovery. At this moment, it is visiting hours are Cheryl and Rachel will be going to check in on him soon as they have not been able to get another update since this morning.
That pretty much brings you up to date.
As far as all the writing I’ve said I’ve been doing all evening and day clearly that hasn’t been reflected here, I’ve decided to start two new sections/threads in this blog site. One for food and health (I see those eyes rolling out there 🙂 ) and one for technology projects. I’ll prefix the technology projects blog entries with “Tech:”. I’ll prefix the food and health blog entries with “Food and Health:”. The blog entries for the construction projects and general babbling will continue on as they have been with the general project phases being the prefix in the title. This way, if you are subscribed and getting emails, you will know which subject matter the blog entry is pertaining to and you can decide to read it or not accordingly. I’ll also add the new sections to the table of contents so you can browse to them if you wish to for those readers who aren’t subscribed and instead periodically check the site for updates.
Warmest regards all.
Cary
Seeking Simplicity 