Mr. Buck Gets His Teeth Cleaned

Ew-wee! I am so excited about Mr. Buck's visit to the Fluffy Puppy!! The groomer has a dog hygienist come in every other month to clean dog's teeth. He doesn't use sedation! He is absolutely AMAZING!! He is like the Dog Whisperer. Jason, the "dog whisperer hygienist" take the patient to the back room. The room is about 5' x 5' square with low walls and glass on one side where the appointment desk is so I could watch the whole thing. He has towels on the floor and he sits on the floor with the dog between his legs but one leg is crooked over the dog to hold him in position. Jason pulls the dogs head to his chest and talks to him and strokes him. He puts his left hand between the dogs teeth to hold his mouth open and uses his right hand to clean using the same type of instruments I use when I clean people's teeth. He has an ultrasonic scaler, too. Mr. Buck was nervous and pulled away sometimes but Jason stroked his his and pulled him back in to his chest and kept working. Mr. Buck never cried or anything. I was so amazed, I can't tell you! I got scolded for not brushing my dogs' teeth. Shame on me! I KNOW better! But, life gets in the way and Mr. Buck does get his ears cleaned out by me three times a week plus all the usual dog chores. I will start brushing his teeth. Anyway, Mr Buck now has clean teeth and fresh breath. It was "only" $120.00. Compared to over $500.00 at the vet, it was a bargain!

Keep flossing!

Feelin' Accomplished

Today was a busy, productive day. Feels good! Went to work to see one patient, got out of there at 9:35, went to the doctor's office to pick up my youngest daughter who was having a not-so-fun procedure. Her DSH was at home with the kids. Read for an hour and a half while waiting for her to wake up. Took her home and met Bailey, the dog they are dog-sitting. Played with granddaughters and dog. Went grocery shopping on the way home and spent way too much money, put everything away, ate lunch at 2:00. Ran three loads of laundry, vacuumed, mopped kitchen floor, did dishes (still no dishwasher), dusted, put clean sheets on the bed, played ball with my Bailey, cleaned both bathrooms and started dinner. While dinner was cooking I sewed! Oh, yeah, I watered the lawn while I ate lunch.

I can't remember if I told the dishwasher story. We have lived in this house for almost 7 years. It is a 53 year old house (same age as me). The house had a nice new Bosch dishwasher when be bought it. The dishwasher was grossly clogged with hard water deposits after three years. I took it all apart and cleaned out all the deposits. Actually, I couldn't get it all. It kept getting clogged up until I insisted on a new dishwasher. We went to Sears and got the cheapest one they had. On sale. The kitchen is 53 years old and disgusting so I didn't want another expensive dishwasher that would just get ruined. I want a whole new kitchen with a water softener! Well, the plan was to get the cheap dishwasher, let it get ruined by the hard water and gut the kitchen and replace everything. The economy tanked, the banks got stingy with 2nds (what do you mean our house went down in value and you won't lend us any money?!?!?!?).

New plan: get a water softener and new dishwasher then save like fiends to do the kitchen.

Can we say "Money Pit"?

I really am very thankful for my little house, even if it does need lots of work!

This weekend: more garage work!

Tree

Our huge, gorgeous camphor tree at the front of our house is dying. I loved that tree. It was one of the things that attracted me to this little house of ours (the main reason was the affordability-we live in the Bay Area). We had an arborist come out and evaluate it. I wanted to save it but it can't be saved. The change in the tree since we got the news has been amazing. It really looks sick now. So sad. We have to get a permit from the city to have it removed, the cement sidewalk and curb has to be broken up and removed, then the stump can be removed. Then we will have to have the sidewalk and curb redone and a new tree planted. This is going to be expensive. Sigh. At least we can do it in stages.

Mother in law

Update: Mother in law doesn't have a broken hip (first and second set of xrays showed no fracture), and she doesn't have pneumonia. Hmm. She doesn't want to get out of bed, she has been coughing for weeks and she says her leg is "dead". The skilled nursing facility is giving her physical therapy for her leg but there doesn't seem to be much of a plan for her cough. Cough meds and anti-biotics haven't helped. We will keep working with the doctor and nurses.

Garage-continued.....

Last weekend and this, we have been working hard on the garage. I've mentioned before how everything just gets dumped in there over the years while we work on house projects. The corner between the big garage door and the small side door has now been insulated, sheet rocked, peg boarded and cupboarded ;) I spent the day going through all the junk and treasures in the middle of the garage and putting things in the cupboards. There were lots of things I would have thrown away but DSH wouldn't let me, sigh. We need to add more shelves in the cupboards (thanks Home depot) and we were short on the supports for the shelves we did have (thanks again, Home depot). We will be doing the same type of work on the opposite side of the garage which is a bigger space, so, it will continue...

On a sad note, my mother in law fell a week ago. The skilled nursing facility had x-rays taken but they found nothing. She has not gotten out of bed the past two days and says her "leg is dead". She doesn't complain of any pain. They want to x-ray again and MRI. If they find a fracture they are considering surgery. She has two slightly collapsed lungs that they aren't doing anything about but the doctor mentioned she might have pneumonia since she won't stop coughing. I can't imagine that they would do hip surgery on a 91 year old woman with possible pneumonia and two slightly collapsed lungs. But, I don't know. She keeps saying she is ready to go home to the Lord. I think she may be closer.

Christmas projects have also been started!

East Coast Swing and Foxtrot

The first four week session is complete. It was not as successful as we had hoped. Because we have danced a lot of East Coast Swing (my favorite) we went ahead a signed up for the class after it had started which meant we missed the first lesson. The next week we had a substitute teacher and he was terrible. We were so confused (and we can dance East Coast Swing!!). We have had Foxtrot but it is not a favorite and we haven't dance it in years. We did not do well. The third week we had the regular teacher and what a difference! She was awesome and everyone caught on much more quickly. Tonight was fast review and a new step added in for each dance. Everyone was struggling by the end of the class. DSH and I decided we will take the beginning class over again to improve on the basics we learned and to imprint it in our muscle memory! I keep suggesting we practice at home but to no avail.

Tomorrow my dental office is going to San Francisco for the Dental Convention. I HATE driving to SF and looking for parking. Happily, we were able to talk our boss into driving us all up to the class. He goes to SF all the time so he knows what he is doing. We are all going up to get continuing education to keep our licenses current. Lunch out and then back to work. I am only seeing two patients tomorrow. Kind of silly to hurry home for two patients, if you ask me (but, the boss didn't).

Side note: didn't Obama's speech stink? I thought so. He is so full of hot air and full of himself.

Memory

My dad was the fourth and youngest child to my grandparents. They owned, and lived in, one house their whole married lives. It was a very modest home, only two bedrooms and one bath, a small living room and a tiny eat-in kitchen. The house is in southern California. I loved the colors in each room. They were ice cream colors with large, white moulding. There were only three channels on the TV and when we visited, my sister and I were the remote. My grandpa watched baseball, news or Lawrence Welk. We did not get to watch cartoons. There was one toy in particular that my sister and I loved to play with. I searched on ebay to find one and I did! It probably cost my Grandmother .99 cents. It cost me (dare I admit it!) $99.00! I bought it last year when the economy was better, I had birthday money and I was addicted to ebay! There, I confessed! I do love it and I know I will probably never find another one but I do feel twinges of guilt for wasting so much money. I showed it to my three year old granddaughter and she was enthralled. Of course, I wouldn't let her play with it because I didn't want it broken! So, I have to ask myself, self, what was the point????