Posts
Take some consolation in my absence readers, my Nanowrimo count is still a lovely zero. In addition to all the craziness I had been dealing with, my baby, Banjo has been having some severe medical issues. The poor guy had been losing weight (he's been skinny ever since we found him as a stray last March, but it's ridiculous now) and lately has been pacing, drooling, staggering about walking into walls, and being completely unresponsive to us.
Our previous vet has never given us a diagnosis despite the several thousand we had been putting into their coffers for a variety of tests and exams. So, Wednesday, when I received an extremely anxious phone call from Phil saying Banjo needed a vet NOW, I hurriedly called Edgebrook Animal Hospital in East Brunswick, NJ. So far, they have been wonderful! Our previous vet never did any standard blood work on Banjo, so we started there and all signs are currently pointing to a liver issue.
Despite his uncanny resemblance to Old Yeller at the end of the movie, Banjo is not in any real danger. Whew! (that's from me, Boyfriend, and our immediate families and friends) There seems to be a high probability that Banjo has a liver shunt, which is about as pleasant as it sounds. Best case scenario, the situation can be handled with supplements, etc. (Whew! from our wallets!) Worst case scenario, there is going to be an expensive operation in Banjo's future, (Yikes! from our wallets!) but it will end the problems we have been having since the day Banjo came into our lives.
On the plus side, Banjo is a purebred lab and, honestly, I could not of tailor made a better dog for a small, new family. I can say now, I would trust Banjo with baby. He is just a pile of sweetness and I could not ask for a better dog. Although we are potentially facing a massive vet bill in the near future, we didn't pay a penny for him to become a part of our family.
In other news, I'm still waiting to hopefully hear from the dream job interview I had last week. This has actually been one of the very few benefit of Banjo being sicky: my mind has been off the job. Additionally, I want to finish updating Mary's Historical Programs and sending out some advertisements, but without knowing the schedule of this potential job, it's a little hard to figure out when I can book shows in the future.
Moving on from that, Boyfriend and I are supposed to be heading to Remembrance Day in Gettysburg in a week. I say supposed because it depends directly on Banjo's health. Remembrance Day is a really a weekend dedicated to Abraham Lincoln's visit to Gettysburg after the battle in 1863. It was then that Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address. The town commemorates the occasion with an amazing parade, a ceremony in the National Cemetery, and a "celebrity" guest who reads the Gettysburg Address. This year the speaker is Stephen Lang. The name might not ring a bell to you, but if you saw Avatar, he played the bad guy. If you are into the Civil War, Lang played George Pickett in Gettysburg, Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson in Gods and Generals, and is slated to play Abraham Lincoln in the upcoming "To Appomattox."
I should have some interesting things to write about in the near future. I went to the Great Falls and the Patterson Museum yesterday with my family and next week I have a show focusing on Thanksgiving in 1863, then, hopefully, on the Remembrance Day.
Our previous vet has never given us a diagnosis despite the several thousand we had been putting into their coffers for a variety of tests and exams. So, Wednesday, when I received an extremely anxious phone call from Phil saying Banjo needed a vet NOW, I hurriedly called Edgebrook Animal Hospital in East Brunswick, NJ. So far, they have been wonderful! Our previous vet never did any standard blood work on Banjo, so we started there and all signs are currently pointing to a liver issue.
Despite his uncanny resemblance to Old Yeller at the end of the movie, Banjo is not in any real danger. Whew! (that's from me, Boyfriend, and our immediate families and friends) There seems to be a high probability that Banjo has a liver shunt, which is about as pleasant as it sounds. Best case scenario, the situation can be handled with supplements, etc. (Whew! from our wallets!) Worst case scenario, there is going to be an expensive operation in Banjo's future, (Yikes! from our wallets!) but it will end the problems we have been having since the day Banjo came into our lives.
On the plus side, Banjo is a purebred lab and, honestly, I could not of tailor made a better dog for a small, new family. I can say now, I would trust Banjo with baby. He is just a pile of sweetness and I could not ask for a better dog. Although we are potentially facing a massive vet bill in the near future, we didn't pay a penny for him to become a part of our family.
In other news, I'm still waiting to hopefully hear from the dream job interview I had last week. This has actually been one of the very few benefit of Banjo being sicky: my mind has been off the job. Additionally, I want to finish updating Mary's Historical Programs and sending out some advertisements, but without knowing the schedule of this potential job, it's a little hard to figure out when I can book shows in the future.
Moving on from that, Boyfriend and I are supposed to be heading to Remembrance Day in Gettysburg in a week. I say supposed because it depends directly on Banjo's health. Remembrance Day is a really a weekend dedicated to Abraham Lincoln's visit to Gettysburg after the battle in 1863. It was then that Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address. The town commemorates the occasion with an amazing parade, a ceremony in the National Cemetery, and a "celebrity" guest who reads the Gettysburg Address. This year the speaker is Stephen Lang. The name might not ring a bell to you, but if you saw Avatar, he played the bad guy. If you are into the Civil War, Lang played George Pickett in Gettysburg, Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson in Gods and Generals, and is slated to play Abraham Lincoln in the upcoming "To Appomattox."
I should have some interesting things to write about in the near future. I went to the Great Falls and the Patterson Museum yesterday with my family and next week I have a show focusing on Thanksgiving in 1863, then, hopefully, on the Remembrance Day.
Poor Banjo! :-( But I'm glad to hear he'll be ok!!!
ReplyDelete