Christmas time is here

Stream of consciousness post in 3...2...1...

• I am a fan of the Christmas season. Especially now that my shopping is more than 75% done!
• I think I'm done buying music games like Rock Band, Guitar Hero, etc. Unless they release Rock Band: Nine Inch Nails or Rock Band: Phish or something like that. Also, no buying any more plastic instruments.
• I beat Super Mario 64 for the first time ever today. I never really liked it when I tried to play it on my N64 - I think I missed the side-scrolling world that I knew and thought the camera/controls were stinky. But I bought it for the Wii Virtual Console over a year ago and I was inspired to give it a try after beating New Super Mario Bros Wii. And you know - it was pretty good. I guess I didn't give it a fair shake back in the day.
• Speaking of New Super Mario Bros Wii, I loved that game. I'd recommend it to any fan of the old-school Mario games or the DS version. Nintendo could pump out a new side-scrolling Mario game every year and I would buy and enjoy every single one. Playing with friends is definitely challenging, though. I've only been brave enough to try two people and that's chaotic enough. Having four people running around, bumping each other off platforms and stealing power-ups...would be hilarious and frustrating in equal measures, I think.
• Next on the gaming agenda: Super Mario Sunshine. Never played that either. Then I'll probably play through Super Mario Galaxy again unless I get something more exciting for Christmas :)
  
• Our house's Christmas lights look fabulous. And by fabulous, I mean slightly over the top (I'm looking at you, red LED sign proclaiming "Merry Christmas" in the window that Matt picked out). LED lights are so freakin' bright! The lights on our tree (real tree, of course) are old-school standard lights, though. So we have a little of both.
• Piper has puked up fake greenery from garlands a LOT. At least it isn't balling up in her intestines.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving!

The smells here at the mini-ranch are getting really good!

They say it's my birthday...

Happy birthday to me!

Quick life updates in celebration...

• Pene got a clean bill of health last week. Her kidney values were SO good that she doesn't have to continue with fluids, special food, or anything, and she doesn't need rechecking for 6 months. So although we'll never know what caused her problems in the first place, it was something like an acute illness or her eating something bad, and NOT chronic kidney problems. Yay!
• Cousin Lisa and Lyla came to visit last weekend. I even did a good 4 hour stretch of babysitting all by myself. I was way too proud of that accomplishment, but hey, it was my first real time taking care of such a little one (or just about any kid, actually). And Lisa is coming back next weekend with the whole family in tow for Carolyn's 83rd birthday celebration., so this all makes me very happy.
• Dragon Age: Origins is a good video game. Not as amazingly awesome as I'd hoped (my expectations were way too high) but very enjoyable and I look forward to playing through it multiple times. Also video game-related - I am quite excited about the New Super Mario Bros Wii game that comes out tomorrow. I might actually be able to get Matt to play with me!

Well, I should go. Pene is going crazy because we've taken out her ranch bag and put on her collar, which means she is ready to go to the mini-ranch RIGHT NOW. =D

Pene's friend

The last thing Pene deserved was to be sick again, but sometimes life isn't fair for dogs either. She went in for her annual check-up on September 26, and the routine blood work showed that her kidneys were having some serious issues. Her BUN and creatinine were really high. So last week she spent two days at Metro Paws getting IV fluids and was started on antibiotics and special food (low in protein). At no point did she ever seem sick. We didn't discover any particular reason (like toxin exposure or infection) for her kidneys to be not working correctly. It could be that they were damaged during her awful bout with distemper and might be permanently damaged :( What we're doing now, along with her special diet and antibiotics, is administering subcutaneous fluids twice a week at home. I stick her with a big needle under the skin of her back and Matt squeezes in a liter of saline. It makes her look like she has a camel hump, or like Murphy when he had his "sidecar"/"friend"/tumor.

She is SO good when we give her the fluids. We think she might honestly not even notice what we're doing, aside from that we're keeping her in one place. We do it at night when she's calm and sleepy, and that helps a lot.

What the plan is now is for her to get the fluid treatment twice a week for a month. Then we'll recheck the blood work. Then we'll do a month without fluids, followed by blood work again. At that point we should know more about the nature of her kidney problems.