The Shredding and Other Things

We picked Slate up from the vet's office last Wednesday afternoon. They had done blood work, x-rays, an EKG, dental cleaning, and pulled four teeth. Quite a work over for the little guy. They had gotten a later start, so the little thing was quite woozy. Everything looked really good. The heart murmur is still there, but it still may go away when the mouth infection subsides. All of the blood work came back normal. WHEW! Everything is functioning well, and his lungs look good. The only thing they found was his heart is slightly enlarged. Dr. K. sent his EKG, blood work results, and x-rays to a cardiologist for consultation. He was sent home with another round of anitbiotics for his teeth, lasix for four days to keep any after surgery fluid from building up in his lungs, and a medication to make it easier on his heart. The vet was quite pleased and said that even though his heart is enlarged and has a murmur, it is very manageable. That was something I was quite glad to hear. I should hear some more details from the cardiologist sometime today. After the reports, we got Slate loaded up in the car and back home. He slept on and off for the rest of the night. His teeth weren't bothering him too bad, because I fed him some plain baked potato, and he woofed it right down *snicker*. After I gave him his meds, got him settled, and had dinner, I crashed for the night. The stress had exhausted me (or maybe it was just having seen the vet bill...good grief...more Ramen noodles).

I woke up yesterday morning with a blinding headache. I couldn't even make sense, so I called into work, took something, and went back to bed. It was a migraine that I think the stress caused. I didn't mind too much, because I knew I'd be home to check on Slate throughout the day. Casey was having some intestinal distress, so he stayed home too. When we both got up yesterday afternoon, we were feeling well enough to get some of the old paperwork out and go through it. We've just filed all of our old mail with sensitive information on it away for the past several years, and it was taking a life on of its own. We got the shredder out and shredded everything but one bag and the current stuff. Shredding all of that old stuff was quite liberating. Also, it was more junk to get out of the house. We'll now be able to use the writing desk (which was full to the brim) to store our current stuff. Just a little bit to go on the paperwork, and we'll have that completely out of the way.

I'm back at work and feeling pretty good today. I'm looking forward to the weekend. One of my student assistants is throwing a going away party that I'm attending tomorrow. He's leaving the states to go into the Peace Corps in the Ukraine. Tomorrow night, we're getting together with some friends to have dinner and watch a movie. I'm sure that Sunday we'll get more done with the house and more done on the "great shredding". I just hope that everything stays calm