Who knows? I don't even know, yet.
I got insomnia and tummy problems...
The toilet seat and flushing mechanism both broke...
BOTH turtle tank filters broke, one in a way that I was unable to fix it...
Our cat Maurice is supposed to spend the time we are away in medical boarding at the hospital where I work. Do you think he has magic voodoo powers keeping us home?
How was yours?
2. Skype kicks Yahoo Messenger's ass, yo. I mean, I've been trying to get this VOIP thing going for months so I could record my AC consultations for my clients, and I could not stop my calls from getting dropped. First the headset was for crap, then I was afraid it was my cable connection. Now I know I just should have been paying the extra money for Skype. It's worth it to actually be able to hear both ends of a conversation and not have malfunctions every few minutes. Now, if I can just get my recorder to register both speakers at a reasonable volume...
3. I still don't have a job. But! I had two AC clients today, a follow-up on a web job, and a referral from a classmate to an opening at the vet hospital where she works. Progress?
4. I am disturbed to inform you that now I cannot look at my cats without imagining their skeletons. Unfortunately, my first cat dissection will finally happen on Tuesday. I think I'll get through it okay; I just hate the thought of imagining slabs of dessicated meat every time I hug my critters.
5. Tomorrow night we see Kathy Griffin! Woo!
Further bulletins as events warrant, y'all.
I can't take other courses in their place because, as someone who already has a BA and some grad work, I've already fulfilled most of the credit requirements for the program! Which all means there may be only one or two courses open to me this semester, i.e. I'd be less than a half-time student, not eligible for any loans, still responsible for paying interest and payments on my pre-existing loans and have to return to work full time. Da Nator is Not. Pleased.
My only hope at this point is that I will be able to reach the director of the program (who is probably God Knows Where during August) and convince her to allow my a spot in the courses. Wish me lots of luck. Groveling Hat... on!
2. On a much less important note, "the most beautiful thing ever"?
I think not. While I think Mia Michaels is a great choreographer, if she hadn't shared the backstory that this piece on So You Think You Can Dance last night was about her and her recently deceased father reuniting in heaven, would everyone be crying and raving at the end? The piece was good, but nowhere near as wonderful as her Emmy-nominated "bench" piece from last year. To cap it off, Neil's extra-Caucasian one-note dancing drained much of the spirit out of it, and Lacey, who normally is a bit better at conveying emotion (at least outwardly), must have been brought down to his level, because she spent the whole dance with a precious, frozen grin plastered on her face. Let's face it, what everybody loved about the piece was the dead father, and possibly the fake flowers all over the stage.
Lacey has been mostly consistent and vote-worthy, but Neil should have been gone a long time ago. He has been getting by on his WASPY, non-threatening-to-tweens looks, rather than his dancing or emotive ability. Boo, I say, BOO!
Thus endeth the gripe session for the day. Now I'm off to try reaching the program director again, setting up some work ours with my pet-sitter friend, and moping in the most obnoxious way possible. Maybe I'll work on vacation photos tomorrow. Today, I'm missing Hawai'i too much...
technorati tags: so you think you can dance,sytycd,vet tech,school
Snorkeling, snorkeling and more snorkeling.
Semi-successful sea kayaking (sure, we tipped over, but at least we didn't try to drown each other in a panic like one of the other couples).
Scenic hiking to a secluded spot ringed by lava rocks, coconut palms and basking green turtles.
Reeeeally good potato-mac salad.
SCUBA diving for the first time (with sharks!)
Sunset tropical cocktails at Don the Beachcomber's.
Frolics on scenic and secluded beaches.
Traversing several climate zones to partake in scenic views (mostly of cows).
Minor nervous breakdown while realizing one's own universal insignificance while hiking across a huge volcanic caldera full of baby Earth.
First helicopter flight - over flowing lava!
Approximately one squillion photos and videos of trip to go through.
Airplane breakdown and weather resulting in over 48 hours of travel home, including a forced layover in scenic Pittsburgh, PA.
Return to very happy cats and very stinky apartment.
Mrs. Nator's newly hired staff member emailing that he won't be able to take the job after all, as his partner has been transferred.
Landlords claiming that we will have to pay for damages to the drop ceiling of the apartment below due to a minor amount of water getting through the floor that they've known for years is hole-ridden subflooring that funnels any spills right through.
Trying to figure out if I'll get student loans, how to register on Wednesday and how the hell I can start making at least $400 per week immediately.
... any questions?
For those who asked, the MIL visit was fine, bordering on great. Mrs. Nator had some lady issues and had to work some, so MIL Nator and I hung out a lot, going to see the frogs at the American Museum of Natural History together and such. We actually have a lot in common, such as a love of natural science and taking photographs, so we get along great, besides her being a (non-proselytistic) born-again Christian and me being a Godless lesbian who has sexual relations with her daughter. We especially had fun going to Roosevelt Island to watch the fireworks in a rainstorm on the 4th of July, and despite her seeming a bit worn out and stressed at times (which makes sense due to other things in her life) and me needing a bit of alone time now and then, I think we all had a good time.
Alas, the Meeting of The Moms did not occur, because my mom's car broke down on her way here. I was disappointed they didn't meet, but more bugged by the fact that my mom is officially a senior citizen now and still never has a car that is reliable. The fact is that she just can't afford a new car and on her relatively low income, which makes me worry for her safety and the future. Mrs. Nator and I even talked a bit about getting all the kids together and contributing to a decent car for her in the not-so-distant future, although I'm not sure how we'd afford that, much less with us planning to throw her mom a big surprise party for her 65th birthday. It sucks not to be rich. Not enough for me to go work in the corporate world or anything, but, yeah.
Still, everyone is reasonably well, our new bed seems to be great for both Mrs. Nator's and my chronic back problems, I'm almost all set to go to school in September, it looks like I may have a new gig working for my friend's cat-sitting business when we get back (how perfect for me is THAT? I am tres excited), and, oh yeah, where will we be getting back from? HAWAI'I, that's where! Have I mentioned that enough?
I should have a buttload of photos up soon from my roaming photography sprees with MIL Nator shortly, as I want to try to get them up before I have 12,000 photos of lava and green sea turtles to process. Oh, yes - I'm trying SCUBA diving while there AND taking a doors-open helicopter tour over the volcano vent, y'all. Do not expect a coherent post beyond something like "OMGSOAWESOMES!!!1!!1" for awhile, mmmkay? If ever. Assuming I survive, that is.
Enjoy the rest of July, Natorettes. I'll be thinking of you, and wishing you could snorkel with me...
In other news, I still have to clean the entire house tomorrow. That's over 1100 square feet of cat fur, kitty litter dust and highway grit. And that doesn't even count the de-pornifying. I love my mother-in-law and we get along famously, but damn.
Have I mentioned the new bed is HUGE? The cats still haven't figured out a way to get up on it.
Later, taters...
Well, we done dood it. We finally got a new bed. King size, in fact. Simmons firm plush top, so it's steady with all those little coils, but the top gives.
It is HYOOOOGE. Like, I have to hop up to get my butt on it, and my legs dangle way off the ground. It's not a California King, because apparently 1-800-MATTRES leaves those on the West Coast, along with leaving off the last S for Savings. I think it will accommodate Mrs. Nator in all her lengthy glory, however. She can make up the couple inches of length by lying more diagonally.
Spending the money was scary, but with both of our backs giving out at times, it had to be done. Now we just have to try to keep the cats away from it, other than when we're in it. They're traumatized enough already by the movers schlepping it in. Anyone know how to rig up a boat horn to a pressure-sensitive mattres(s) pad?
Happy PrideI guess. I dunno. I am so old and nest-y, I can't be bothered. Do I really want to sweat for hours watching a parade and then wander around trying to find a place to get a drink? No.
Wish Me Luck
on two things coming up. The first is today, when I have my exam to see if it's okay for me to take a beginning SCUBA class. I really want to take one in Hawaii. However, since I fat, lazy, on prescription drugs and have had spinal surgery, I have to get the okay from my doctor. I'll also be getting a blood test to make sure I got my measles-mumps-rubella vaccinations, because I have to verify that before I register for classes. I'm not worried about that, though. I just want my doctor to look at the SCUBA form while I'm there and tell me I'm healthy enough to do it. WoooOOOOnnns, please!The second is cleaning for my mother-in-law's visit. She's coming on Wednesday, and thus far, I have been having a hard time getting my ass in gear. It's just pure procrastination stemming from feeling overwhelmed at how grubby this place is. There's no cure for my laziness long-term, I suspect, but a little boost of WoooOOOnns for one task couldn't hurt.
And that's it for now. I feel as though I've become rather boring, lately. Sorry if I have - there's just been a lot to do in preparation for school, mom-in-law's visit and Hawaii. My brain is rarely in the now, because I'm so excited about the close future. I guess if you're really bored, 1. fuck you, schmendrick & 2. you can go look at slideshows of my trip to the NY Botanical Garden or my visit with my sister, bro-in-law and the niece and nephew. I'm out!
In actuality I am Doing Things, even if they aren't always obvious. I am reviewing my student loan and admissions paperwork. I am pricing web hosting sites and going over PHP/MySQL tutorials while mulling over the relative merits of full vs. partial-Flash site design. I am even (sort of) "working out" sometimes. Then I am getting overwhelmed by everything and switching gears to peruse the TripAdvisor Hawaii forums or play cell-phone Boggle on the stoop. Hey, somebody's got to keep the stoop warm. This is Brooklyn, you know.
P.S.: Did I mention we are going to HAWAI'I?
I'm edgy all morning knowing I'm going to see my Reiki master for a session. As I've been going through months of disbelief in all things spiritual and scientifically unproven, I am nervous about what might happen. In the past it has always helped me and made me feel more expansive and attuned to the universe and myself, but in my present state I think that this was all delusional: wishful thinking in the face of a reality that is not so magical. Stressed into exhaustion, I decide to take a nap.
When I am awakened by the clock radio, it is playing an episode of Radio Lab called "Placebo." The program traces several kinds of healing methods that have been outside modern medicine:
If, for example, my animal communication sessions were merely psychological/emotional interactions between me and the human clients, how does one explain the cases where the information would have been impossible to impart through conversation and inference? How did the lost dog return before dying, the words of an epitaph or the entire layout of a house I'd never seen appear to me in detail? How did creatures with no capacity for complex verbal language as we know it change behaviours, even heal, after sessions? Just how far do coincidence and subliminal suggestion go?
I am excited yet fearful of how the Reiki session will affect me regarding this dichotomy - that I will be changed or unchanged, restored to faith or confirmed in "realism". After all that, the session is revelatory. My Reiki master knows me and the fears that limit me. After talking with her extensively and undergoing the treatment, I feel more powerful an open than I have in months. I realize that, although our modern intellectual society instructs us to "put away childish things" and views beliefs in omnipotence or greater powers as childlike, narcissistic and deluded, (except in, say, the case of a particular God - but that's another story), it is the very belief in such a power within ourselves to affect change that makes us capable of doing great things. In other words, belief can affect the physical world, and not just our perceptions of it.
When I return home, my cat follows and clings to me day and night. It's like she has sensed a change, feels a difference. Is it my imagination, my mood? Cleared chakras? Has something in me "opened"?
In the following three nights, I dream:
I have some important decisions coming up, and now is the time for some changes in my life. I must believe in something, and I can start by believing in myself.
Maurice does not like it when there is a thunderstorm.
Maurice does not like it when you run the wet vac machine.
Maurice ESPECIALLY does not like it when he hides from the thunderstorm, and you scare him out of his hidey-hole to retrieve the wet vac machine, and then RUN IT FOR HALF AN HOUR.
Maurice thinks he will find a novel and surprising new place to void his bladder.
Just you wait and see.
1) Where did you and Mrs. Da Nator meet?
We met at work. We both worked at the same organization, in different departments. I worked on the website, and she did customer care. One day she emailed me telling me she was new there, and she had some questions about the website. Little did I know this was all a ruse, as she’d seen me around and thought I was cute! I had no idea she had asked about me and made up questions so she could meet me in my office.
She showed up with a big smile, a freedom ring necklace that she kept obviously toying with, and a story about how a male customer who had been asking her out was “barking up the wrong tree.” Not being completely stupid, I gathered that she was trying to tell me she was gay. We became friends, but for months afterwards my friends and I referred to her as “tree girl.” Did I mention she hates it when I tell this story?
Anyway, I was going through some bullshit about not believing in love and trying to have a purely sexual relationship with an ex of mine, but over months our friendship grew better and stronger, and eventually I saw the light. By that time I was having regular panic attacks, so Buddha bless Mrs. Nator for putting up with me. Finally, I understood that we were truly in love and stopped waiting for something to come down from the sky and smite me for that. (It could have just been because she’s so good in the sack.)
Anyway, we’ve been inseparable ever since. We’re going on seven official years, come November, and so far nary an itch.
Note to The Powers That Be: This is NOT your cue to smite us.
2) When did you discover that you were an animal communicator?
Let’s see if I can make a long story short (which goes against every fibre of my being). I went through a very traumatic period where my much beloved cat was sick. I exhausted every “normal” option, but couldn’t decided if/when to euthanize her. A friend of mine suggested I try a session with an animal communicator, and while I was extremely skeptical, I figured I hadn’t much to lose, beyond forty or fifty bucks.
The session actually helped me a lot. I still wasn’t sure I believed in it, but it help me to decide it was time to put my cat friend to sleep. After the pain of that, I did some research on AC, casually but curiously.
Coincidentally, or perhaps by some stroke of fate, a couple weeks later a documentary on AC with Dawn Hayman, a well-known communicator came on our local PBS station. I watched it, and was fascinated. Mrs. Nator took note of this and decided I must go to a class with Dawn, even if we could barely afford it. Not that long thereafter, I found myself at Spring Farm Cares, communicating with rescued animals.
It still took me a long time to believe it, but some of the stuff that I got just blew me away. It was especially interesting when members of the group would exchange photos of our pets at home and then tell our partners in the exercise what we were getting. My accuracy rate was very high. It was wonderful and extremely disorienting at the same time, as if reality had shifted.
It took me months of practicing, results, reading and other classes to feel it was real and I was really doing it. Actually, as you may have been reading, my faith in AC has not been strong of late, so it’s good to remember that. I really appreciate you asking this question, because it’s important for me to face what I feel now about AC and why it’s changed. I can’t deny all the evidence of it over the years, and yet I’m afraid of it. To be continued…
3) When did you first know that you were a lesbian?
Lord, that’s a tough one. I can tell you I was a practicing lesbian from a very young age – maybe six or seven. However, when I was caught with my best friend as a child (somehow we always knew to keep what we did secret), I was convinced that what we’d been doing was a “normal phase,” but just that: a phase in heterosexual development, and a shameful one at that.
I pretty much suppressed my sexuality for years after that. I generally thought sex, and my body, pretty gross. I knew something was different about me, and that I preferred girls to boys, but then I figured most young and teenage girls were involved in drama with each other. Of course, since lesbians weren’t something you saw or heard of in daily life, I’m not even sure I knew they existed, in any tangible sense. I remember only a brief, sudden rush of excitement and embarrassment when I was fourteen or so and my brother brought home a VHS tape of The Hunger. As for many children of the eighties, seeing Catherine Deneuve and Susan Sarandon make out was a seminal (heh) moment. But I couldn’t even fully grok it, what with my father sitting right behind me as I watched it!
So, it wasn’t until college that I finally got it. By the time I was seventeen, I’d been going clubbing in NYC and made lots of fabulous gay boyfriends, but I still didn’t even really get what lesbians were, or even hear much about them. It wasn’t until one of my freshman year roommates informed us that she was gay that something clicked. I began to pick her brain about everything, and eventually started meeting new people, identifying as bisexual, then, over time and with experience, understanding I was a lesbian.
Interestingly enough, as I came out, she decided she was actually straight and literally moved into the closet (our dorm room had a huge walk-in, were she moved her bed and dresser). She was an odd one, but thank you, Daphne, wherever you are, or who knows how long it would have taken me to figure it out. On the other hand, I might have been spared all the hideous drama of being an officer of an extremely dysfunctional LGBT student group, but that’s another story.
It’s amazing to look at kids today and think how different it is. Sometimes I wish I could have known and been out much younger. Of course, nowadays it seems like all the young women are actually coming out as transgender, so maybe I’d have a mangina or pumpable penis by now. It’s all a matter of perspective.
4) Would you live anywhere else but the NYC area?
I’ve asked myself that question many a time. It’s hard to say, because I’ve been here so long and it’s such a part of my identity, but I do tire of it, at times. Let’s say, if the time and feeling were right, yes. I mean, heck, I’ve already got fantasies about at least having a vacation condo in Hawai’i.
5) (Lame one) What is your favorite meal?
Well, I’m going to be lame on the answer, too, and say that I don’t really have “favourites” of anything. Life has too many variables and I am too mood-driven to settle on one thing forever. However, I will tell you the meal I have most often: breakfast, specifically cereal. I could eat cereal 24 hours a day. That is perhaps the one and only thing that I and Jerry Seinfeld have in common.
Thanks for the questions, TY! Now, I won’t tag anyone, but if any of you want questions, let me know, and I’ll make up some for you…
There was something of a surprise for me when I arrived at the vet clinic yesterday morning. Not only was the power on, but there were lots of new faces. Newly hired faces. One new vet and three, count 'em, three new techs.
Whereas everybody was very nice, I found this very discouraging. Here they'd been telling me how desperate they were for assistance, and acting like they were chomping at the bit to hire me, and suddenly here are all these new people getting paying jobs before I can even apply. That was cause one of my disgruntlement.
Cause two was there were just too many damn people there. It turned out to be a semi-slow day, and with the youngest assistant - a kid who looked to be a teenager, the size of a basketball player in baggy jeans, with a soft voice and sweet smile - jumping on all the much of the feeding and cleaning, I began running out of things to do. Not that I missed the mopping, and I still did a lot of cleaning, feeding, administering meds, etc., but I began to feel superfluous. I felt stupid following the techs around reminding them that if there was anything I could do for them or I could observe, I'd appreciate it. I did get to learn how to run the autoclave and observe a skin parasite in the microscope out of that, but pickings were slim.
The nice tech who often guides me took pity on me and got me to collating radiographs (never call them x-rays or you'll sound like a yokel!), and teased me when I got all in a tizzy because the "W" section was alphabetized in the exact opposite order of everything else. (Yes, I am a mess in my home life. This is just a necessary adaptation after years of an overactive perfectionism gland nearly gave me multiple aneurysms. You should have seen how meticulously I used to sort my record albums).
Later, she showed me how to take a heart rate, which, although quite straightforward, I nearly failed spectacularly. The sweet dog we were practicing on was panting heavily, and for the life of me I could not hear anything beyond that, nor feel her pulse beyond her chest expansion (I was also busy worrying neurotically that I was getting my ear wax on somebody else's stethoscope, which was a bit of a distraction). Finally, after feeling that poor dog up for ten minutes I found a spot by her armpit that worked. I still wasn't sure that I got it right, because the rate seemed very elevated. It turned out this was the same dog whose x-rays, I mean, radiographs I'd seen earlier and thought "I'm no vet, but something looks very wrong in the chest region there." Shortly thereafter, I heard she was suffering from some kind of pulmonary disease. It's kind of hard to be proud of my powers of observation when it meant that this sweet pooch was close to death.
After that, I got to observe my second anal gland expression (that never gets old), and had a conversation with the head vet about my turtles. I wanted to see if anyone there did exams on turtles, since I've been worried that our monster girl, Edamame, may be eating her plastic plants and is not laying eggs yet. I figured we might need to get her an x-...radiograph, but this vet said, "oh, you can't do that with turtles, it's blocked by the shell." I narrowly avoided giving her the hairy eyeball, because I'd seen radiographs taken of a turtle with impacted eggs just that week on Emergency Vets, but I figured that a.) maybe that took a special machine, b.) most vets are not well-versed in reptiles and c.) bad idea to mouth off to the head vet when I'm not even hired, yet. To her credit, she recommended an exotic pet hospital to me, saying she or no-one else there knew enough about turtles for me to waste my time or money there. She also came up to me later with some books on turtles from her office, with appropriate pages she'd marked with post-its, and said I should feel free to look at them and photocopy what I wanted. It was really very sweet, and I had to go and ruin it by snorting to myself alone in her office later when I realized I already knew everything on the marked pages, including the part that clearly said one way to diagnose impacted eggs in turtles is with radiographs. Smarty-pants me.
And that, plus the stethoscope incident, illustrates a lot about what I was feeling that day. I'm finding myself in a strange suspension between being smart and dumb, the new kid and an old hand. Many of the people there are younger than me, and have less formal education than I do, but they have years of experience in that field. I go there willing and eager to clean litter trays and do laundry because I want to learn how to do what they do and see if I want to do it. At the same time, having that teenager there doing essentially what I was doing got my invisible hackles of ego up. I'm a well-educated, smart woman who's been working in a professional environment for years, taught myself web production and design, and worked as a paid and respected animal communicator. I also happen to be loping towards forty. So, every time someone kindly asks something like "do you know what the normal average temperature range should be for dogs?" or "have you ever drawn blood?" I want to slam my head against a wall, because no. I do not know those things, and I feel stupid about it, and I'm getting paranoid and reading condescension (probably falsely) in your voice because it I'm a fast learner, really I am, and how can I not know those things but know that you can take x-rays, fuck, I mean radiographs of turtles, and feline chin acne is often related to plastic allergies, and canned pumpkin filling treats canine diarrhea, and something was sure the hell wrong with that dog's insides?
So, anyway, stupid and smart at the same time. I suppose it's the price of trying a new career track later in life. I'm just going to have to try to leap at chances to learn and show them that I pick up things fast, without coming across as frustrated and arrogant as the little voice inside me sometimes is. That is, if they even turn out to have an opening to hire me.
I had a pretty good talk with the director of the place again, and she said she'd email the head tech who handles hiring and training, whom I haven't met, yet, so I can talk to her about possibilities when she's in on Tuesday. I felt like a got a few brownie points when I asked if there was anywhere I could stash my bike if I cycled there, and she pointed to her bike behind me in the corner of her office and said that that was how the clinic started - she and her partner, the head vet, had met at a bike show. On the other hand, although she'd sounded desperate to hire me full-time before, this time she mentioned something about "summer openings" when people take time off, which does not bode well. I have enough to worry about considering taking a full-time position that would involve a big pay cut. To have that position be overly tenuous would not be good. She was still very nice to me, but I came away worried. Even if I do get the month of severance my old job's HR said they might give me (which surprised the hell out of me, and I'm not counting on until I see it in my bank account), I will need income fairly soon. If it's not looking probable that they'll hire me by the end of the next week, I may start looking at other clinics. And, in the meantime, it's back to trolling the Interwebs for animal-related office jobs more in keeping with my current resume, just in case.
So, that was the gist of it. I was getting tired at the end of the day, even though it was earlier than I'd left the last time, and rung up Mrs. Nator on the phone. She answered in the tiny, pained voice that says she has a major migraine before she can even form the words. When I got home after the long bus ride, I found her curled on the bare mattress in the dark, my grubby fleece robe wrapped around her upper body and over her face. I promptly flopped down beside her, shoved my face under the lapel with her and passed out. I didn't awake for several hours, and I missed going to a good friend's birthday party. Then, I got my period. Wheee!
On a positive note, I did get to learn more and care for the animals, including OMG-THE-CUTEST-L'IL-FURRY-BUNNIES, Y'ALL! Yep, three silky-soft bun-buns, two up for adoption, and one boarding. They are messy as all get-out, but so inquisitive, and you should see when they get their fresh lettuce and carrot greens, numnumnum...
Moreover, if I'm this alarmed and upset that they may not hire me full time, it means I care about it. I'm not saying a big part of that care isn't that I'd be mad if I couldn't make an easy transition right into a new job without having to hunt any further. But, I think I really do want to try working there, yo. Why else would I be so excited to get there, so anxious to be given a chance, and so shaken when I think I might not?
I may have found something I like, there. How much money is that worth?
Let's step back a moment from the case at hand and the investigation of how it happened, and take a look at the bigger picture. If you are a concerned pet caregiver, it's time you learned what's really in most commercial pet food. Studies have shown that a great proportion of brand-name pet food is made of "food" unfit for human consumption. This includes not only any portion of the chicken, fish or cow you'd refuse to eat, but past-expiration meats, rancid grains, additives, and even the bodies of euthanized pets. That's right, in 1990 the American Veterinary Medical Association and the FDA confirmed that not only diseased livestock was rendered into pet food, but cats, dogs and other pets. Meaning that you could be feeding your cat another cat, or your dog could be eating not only a relative, but the chemicals that were used to put that relative to sleep, too. I know, disgusting.
Besides the dubious meats, the large amount of grains in pet food, particularly cat food, is not conducive to good health. Whereas dogs are technically omnivores with carnivorous leanings, cats are built to eat meat, period, with just the occasional bit of vegetable matter sometimes thrown in. Eating food full of corn meal and wheat is like you or me eating candy as our main foodstuff. Believe me, one of my cats would much prefer to eat Saltines and Meow Mix at every sitting, but I can't let her do that, just as I wouldn't feed my child Big Macs and Pixy Stix for every meal. Sure, there are some people who feed their kids that, but we all know that's not healthy by now, right?
Therefore, here's a tip: if you look at the back of your can or bag of cat or dog food and the first few ingredients say "by-products," "meal" - as in chicken meal - or grains, like corn? It is bad pet food. It doesn't matter how much you pay for it, or if the label says "Kozy Kitten," "Fancy Feast" or "Science Diet" - it probably comes from the same factory, and it is not good for your pet. Take a look at the recall list for the recent scare. You'll see everything listed from "generic" grocery store brands to the Iam's and Science Diet pushed at many veterniary offices. They are all pretty much the same, and if you read the labels, you can tell. The one uniting factor in this case is that the type of food was the "cuts in gravy" variety, and if you look at the ingredients, you will realize that most "cuts" are actually formed masses of extruded meat and grain proteins - like the targeted wheat gluten - that have no resemblance to actual carved meat and gravy.
So, why do vets sell foods like Science Diet and Iam's if they're the same as bargain food, and what should you feed your pet? The answer to the first question is pressure and money. There are a few types of SD food that are formulated for special needs animals like diabetic cats or dogs with allergies. Vets often stock these because they are the easiest way to get clients to feed their animals something vaguely within their pets' dietary restrictions. The important thing is to address the specific disease and offer a type of food that the caregiver will actually buy, because it is relatively inexpensive, readily available and requires no preparation, even if it isn't as good for the animal as feeding it higher quality food. Let's face it, most people don't want to go through a lot of effort to feed their pets, or spend a lot of money. So, this food fits a minimum basic need.
However, companies like Science Diet routinely pressure veterinarians to not only stock their foods, but to sell a variety of them. I've heard tales of vets who would not be left alone by major pet food companies. On top of that pressure, selling food can be a vital financial source for veterinary offices. Basic veterinary care is not a high-profit business, so if they have the space in the reception area, most practices will elect to sell food and other products. The clients buy the food because they feel it must be good, since it's in the vet's office, and the practices are not only able to furnish the clients with restricted diet food, but boost their bottom line with sales of regular food. The pressure to sell, therefore, comes not only top-down from the pet food industry, but up from the clients, who want the reassurance of having "vet approved" food available, and from the very monetary needs of the vets, themselves.
Finally, the answer to the second question, what should you feed your pet? As I mentioned, dogs are borderline omnivores who lean towards the carnivorous, and cats are carnivores. This means that both species should eat mainly meat. However, just like you wouldn't eat any meat you happened to find (I hope), neither should they. The food they eat should be reasonably fresh and healthy, just like what you would feed yourself.
Does this mean you should cook specifically for your pets, or feed them a raw or BARF diet? Lots of people think so, and blend raw meats with veggies and probiotics, or cook meat and veggie stews for their animals. But, if that seems too expensive or like too much work for you, you don't have to go whole hog. Other options include:
- Buying commercially-available raw diet mixes. These are blends of dehydrated or frozen veggies and vitamins that you mix in with your own raw meat. These can be found online or at premium pet food stores.
- Buying commercially-available frozen or dehydrated raw-food diets, like "Stella and Chewy's" or similar brands. These are basically like little frozen hamburger patties, only with appropriate ingredients. Just defrost in the fridge, and plop 'em in the food bowl - easy! They are available now online, at many pet stores and in better vet offices, like the one I'm interning in.
- Buying commercially-available canned or dry food that has good ingredients. How do you know they're good? Read the label. If you see meat, like chicken or turkey, first, then limited amounts of grains like brown rice, vegetables and fruits, with a few vitamins or supplements like taurine added, those are good ingredients. As I mentioned, the word "meal" is bad, as are by-products, artifical flavourings, colourings, preservatives or sodium. If the can says "organic" or "human grade," all the better.
Remember, even if you have limited money, there is enough of a range of foods now that you should be able to but something decent. So maybe you can't swing the 100% organic, yet. Try to at least eliminate by-products and corn, or meat "meals". Maybe you won't find them at your local mega-mart grocery store. Look online or at a local pet food store, and you should be able to find something.
As an example, here are some food brands I regularly feed my cats:
- Merrick
- Wellness
- Eagle Pack
- Newman's Own
- Innova
- Wysong
- PetGuard
- Felidae
- Evolve
- Natural Balance (yes, the one by Dick Van Patten of Eight is Enough fame)
There are few more, but you get the picture. I am enough of an animal freak that I'm becoming at vet tech, and I worry about what my "kids" eat. Still, my busy life and budget mean that raw-food meals for them are rare, and mainly I serve them canned and dry, bagged foods. But there are enough brands of this that are decent now that I can pick them up at the local pet food store - or our vet clinic - and know that my critters will be eating healthy grub.
The bottom line on all this is that, with a little bit of extra effort, you can not only help your pet have a healthier, longer life, but you can probably save yourself not only some extra medical care bills for them, but the panic of this sort of poison scare. If the food they eat doesn't come from one of the country's largest, anonymous plants and isn't crappy to begin with, chances are you won't find diseased chickens or contaminated wheat in it, much less chemical toxins or the former residents of the local pound.
Thus endeth the lesson. Thanks for bearing with me, and I wish all of you and your animal pals good health.
tags: recall, pet food, cats, dogs, listen up people
The man who let me in was a vet tech who wasn’t expecting me, but he was friendly all the same and started to show me around the place. My first task was to clean the enclosures and change the litter, food and water for the cats, both boarding and residents. There was the group up for adoption in the reception area, the crotchety crew in the cat room, residents in a couple offices and the group in the ill-named dog ward, which at this time contained no dogs.
Things kind of sped up from there. More staff kept arriving, and every one was nonplussed by the power outage. I was to receive several apologies over the day with the explanation that it wasn’t a “normal” day to start on, what with no x-rays, analysis machines, computers, phones or even lights working in the exam rooms. It probably turned out to my advantage, however. No phones meant fewer clients on a usually chaotic Saturday, and my acclimation was probably easier for this.
The majority of my time was spent cleaning: litter trays, dishes, surfaces and floors. I did more sweeping and mopping alone than I’ve probably done in the last year at home. If nothing else, it got me over the phobia I’d incurred when I slipped a disc while mopping. The physical labour was actually refreshing, and felt like I was doing something useful for a change, rather than sitting staring at a computer all day.
Patients came in and out. One woman brought in her elderly dog who had been seizing, and clearly on the brink of death. She came in shortly after I did at 9:00 AM and sat with him in an exam room all morning. She was still there with him when I left at 6:30 at night, and he was still motionless. She wasn’t ready to put him down, yet, and the staff wasn’t pushing her.
There were an unusual number of euthanasias for some reason. I counted at least four, despite the old dog lingering, and there may have been more. The clinic director apologized to me for it at the end of the day, saying it was certainly not normal, but seemed to happen sometimes during drastic weather changes. I was surprisingly all right with it. I’d had a fear of being overly emotional, but I was mainly just focused and busy. Interestingly enough, I found the same thing that I had when I’d volunteered at a cat shelter in the past: it was the largest male vet tech who was the most outwardly emotional. Several times during the day, young women half his size were bustling about taking care of business, as he paused to mourn over a cat he didn’t want to die. It didn’t stop him from doing what he needed to do, but it was arresting seeing a beefy man frozen on the verge of tears, while ballerina-esque ladies in lavender scrubs brushed by with just a glance.
I only got a few hands-on moments with patients, besides petting some of the boarding and resident cats when I had a minute. At one point I gently held a tiny cat, skin and bones, barely breathing, with one lost eye and the other closed. I was asked to touch her and make sure she didn’t fall off the table while they prepared an injection. She didn’t move, and I began to wonder if she would die right there while waiting. I gently stroked her and tried to send her loving Reiki. The large male vet tech entered and was upset – she was another one of his favourites, who had apparently been brought in after being hit by a car in the past. This time she was in to be euthanized. I thought they might do it right then, but apparently they were giving her something else. He took over holding her, and as another vet tech tenderly tried to insert the needle into her small, fragile vein, the kitty’s back legs came to life. Eyes still tightly closed, her body resisted, kicking and squirming, making the insertion difficult. I wished she could just die in peace. The insertion done, they whisked her up and into another room.
For a moment, I wasn’t sure what to feel. But then I realized, I felt that she was ready to go, and it was a good thing that she’d be beyond pain soon. From then on, seeing the euthanized animals gave me less pause. Besides, I had tasks to do.
Due to the lack of lights, many procedures were done in odd areas. An elderly dog, blind and mostly deaf, was examined in an upstairs, unfinished room with a skylight. Slowly, her person lead her down the stairs, explaining that the dog was still fine on the stairs at home, and they didn’t want her to get used to being carried. “You’re amazing, Martha!” the head vet encouraged, as, wheezing and shaking, the dog reached the bottom. It took several minutes for them to coax her down the hallway. She kept expecting another stair step.
A tiny Yorkie puppy was examined at the communal lunch table, where it was bright. The vet would look from the puppy’s tiny face up at me and whisper “she’s so cute," while I munched my cookie. An old German Shepard was laid down in the middle of the floor in the back room, while his person, three vet techs and no less than two vets at a time observed him. He had recently had a tumour removed, and they were checking the wound. While they were there, his person mentioned he had a constant erection. Everyone gathered around to see what the cause was, and whether his glans could be retracted. He maintained the sweetest look of puzzled surrender throughout, a big, former athlete with gray fur on his muzzle. When the problem was fixed, there was the natural joking as a younger vet complimented the head vet, saying she couldn’t have done it. “If we chose by sexual preference, you’d be much more experienced with the area than I am,” was the rejoinder.
Another animal went through some genital changes, the first surgery I’ve ever seen in person. A simple neutering procedure, this one went awry as the aptly named “Snip-Snip” went ballistic on the table. Unable to use the mask, the techs placed him, hissing and twisting, into a plastic box, then inserted a tube to administer the anaesthesia. There was a sudden moment of concern when he began a repetitive, spastic moaning while going under, accompanied by a leg twitch. They hauled him out, and tried the mask again. This time he was fine within a moment, fully out, tongue protruding pinkly.
The neutering was fast and surprisingly a bit violent. (Gentlemen, cover your ears.) At first, it went quickly. The vet made a small incision in the scrotal sac with a scalpel head, and with a quick squeeze, the testicle plopped out with an almost audible pop. As a second vet observed, however, it seemed that the cat’s unusually large balls and penis, along with some tough ventricles, were posing a problem, and I found myself blanching a little as the vet pulled and pulled to get things disconnected. By this time, my view was partly obscured, and I was also looking at the cats in the cages through the window, wondering what they could see of all this. The yanking apparently finished, the operating vet began to tie the tubes in a knot, prompting a conversation with the other vet about how this technique worked better for her than sutures, and neither of them could get the method taught in school to work right. Snip Snip’s parts were shoved back in, his claws clipped, and within a few minutes he was partially awake and stumbling around angrily in his cage. By the time his person came to get him a couple hours later, he was back in fighting form, and rightly pissed off. The largest vet tech had to close the area door and herd him into his carrier with a towel. You go, Snip Snip. Stay bad.
Near the end of the day the power came back on, and I could stop hand-washing dishes and start doing laundry. The towel and blanket pile could have rivaled a small hotel. By then, it was also time for the evening feeding. So, now that I’d been shown how to read their feeding charts, I was able to take care of most of them, including special diets and medicines that went into food, although the pills and shots would be left to the techs. It actually took close to two hours to take care of everybody, in-between other tasks. After that, there was one more mopping, one more load of laundry, and I was ready to head home. As I bought some cans of cat food at the counter, the young receptionist gave me a discount, and then said “oh, you’ll get a bigger discount when you work here. The director said you’ll be starting, soon, right?” I hope this meant I made a good impression.
During the slow rush-hour bus ride home, I took stock. My feet were very sore, I was tired, and extremely hungry (I hadn’t known there was no lunch break, and that we all were to graze when we had a few minutes). However, although I knew I’d be tired and a bit sore the next day, it was nothing as bad as I’d feared, used to sitting my fat ass in an office chair for hours on end. And yes, I felt a little like a peon, having done mostly cleaning all day, and only handling animals intermittently. But I felt good, as well. I had helped animals and the people who treat and love them, if even in a small capacity, and I had started to learn. It was enervating, exhausting, and felt like a day well spent.
Day two will come in two weeks, after I’m back from my vacation, and right around the time I start training my replacement at my current job. I’m looking forward to experiencing a “normal” Saturday with rounds, x-rays and full treatments. I’m interested to talk to the resident massage therapist about the hydrotherapy treatments, the vet who’s studying acupuncture to whom I outed myself as a former animal communicator, the vet who had to see a patient in the middle of our conversation about her vet training on a Caribbean island. I want to learn more from the big, sensitive tech, the efficient one who’s planning on becoming a vet, and the kind one who, after ten years, is not sure what she wants to do next. Most of all, I’m looking forward to learning more about myself, and to helping the animals. This may be the beginning of a beautiful friendship.
Yes, I am excited about trying out working at the vet clinic. I've been thinking of switching to working hands-on with animals for a while, and this looks like a really nice place to start. The clinic is an easy bus ride from my home, has a warm feel, and everyone there seems very friendly and progressive. The ladies who started the place are a gay couple - one is the head vet, and the other is a clinical social worker, who runs the office and also special programs like counselling and groups for people with chronically ill animals, etc.
As soon as you walk into the place, you can see it's different, too. There are big windows and blonde wood in the reception area. Parts of the walls are restored, weathered brick, and instead of the usual IAMS or Science Diet on the shelves they stock human-grade, organic and holistic foods, cat litter, etc., all at reasonable prices. Also in the reception area are several stacks of cat housing where cats up for adoption through their shelter program are sleeping, playing, or haughtily staring at the passing dogs.
The vet we saw was super-nice, and into holistic treatments, as well. She prescribed Feliway and a nutritional supplement that is calming for cats, rather than anti-depressant drugs, and gave us free samples of enzymatic treats that help clean kitties' teeth for us to try. She mentioned that she was studying acupuncture for animals, and we got into a fun conversation about what modalities you could use for turtles - acupressure? Far-infrared, ultrasound or lasers? All of these are good signs that this would be a place I might fit in.
As for getting full-time employment as a vet tech, from what the manager (the social worker) said, there's a big shortage of vet techs in NYC. I would imagine this is partially because it is a relatively low-paying job, especially for those living in an expensive city. It's also a job that can be dirty, exhausting and emotionally difficult, as well as meaningful and fun. The upside to all this is doing something you care about and having 4 day work weeks, at this place.
I have to say the manager's and vet's desperation was a little scary, if reassuring in terms of the chances of me getting hired for pay down the line. In another market, vets might be more choosy about wanting to hire people who've already been through vet tech schools (usually a two-year accreditation) or had on-the-job experience. In this case, however, my showing up and showing immediate interest, along with having some experience as a shelter volunteer, was enough to have them practially begging me to start. (I didn't mention the animal communication work I did. I'm not sure how that may come up or apply, later, but it's not what I'm looking to do, right now.)
Anyway, I'm excited enough that I'm going to see if I can get started this weekend. Everybody put on your propeller beanies (or share FN's) and send me wwOOooo-wOOOoonns for good luck!
Now in answer to FN's questions:
i am also proud to be a Natorette. do we have a song? what about a pledge? i think we should have a beer volcano too.
I think these are capital ideas. Considering my affection for both volcanos and the Flying Spaghetti Monster, a beer volcano is a must. Also, you will all wear propeller beanies, whereas I get my official Napoleonic Pyrate Newspaper Hat. Which is fitting, because I just figured out how to burn pirated movie torrents to DVD. The Cap'n would be proud.
As for a pledge and/or song, I haven't had time to work on those, but suggestions are welcome. References to lesbianism, cats, Mrs. Nator, Brooklyn, football, geekery and chocolate are all highly suggested. I do, however, think that the perfect anthem might already have been created right here.
Bye, kids! See ya real soon!
They were supposed to be there at 8:00 am and leave at 5:00 pm with a functioning bathroom (i.e. one in which we could use the toilet and shower) in their wake. They didn’t show until around 10:00, which was fine, as I was working through a fevered sleep and a half-bottle of bismuth at the time, but it was less convenient when I was still begging them to finish up at 6:30, before my colon exploded. There was a tense period where I thought I’d have to decide between getting an assfull of dirt and plaster dust, or trying to clean off the toilet seat and possibly re-plastering the walls with my own special brew, but I made it just in time.
The toilet and shower do work – although I immediately had to clean them, and the plastic sheeting draping them makes attempting to shower feel like being slowly laminated. The walls are… well, let’s just say they’re olde-timey. As in, the slats and horsehair plaster have been exposed, then most of the plaster disintegrated, leaving a frontier bathhouse sort of feel. On inspecting the condition of the plaster (look! It’s got hunks of actual horse hair in it!) and wood, I suspect they haven’t been touched since the building was built, sometime around 1900. Layer after layer of plaster and paint had just been slapped on top of them for the last hundred-odd years. No big surprise considering the shape we’ve found the rest of the place in.
While I don’t think horsehair plaster is as evil compared to sheetrock as this guy does, he’s got a point in that it’s incredibly messy. I doubt the contractors had much trouble removing ours, considering its deterioration, but the dust is pernicious. Even with plastic sheeting everywhere, we were hacking and sneezing all morning, and the cats, once roused from the protective flanks of their Mommy Who Would Defend Them From The Strange, Noisy Men, quickly became coated. That’s the most troubling part to me, so if you hear I’ve become rich after inventing a claw-proof filter mask for pets, you will know the inspiration. As it is, they won’t even stay out of the piles of debris when we try to isolate them. (“What’s this? Some kind of chemical-soaked rag? I must roll in it!”)
At any rate, with a much improved stomach and most of the dust hacked out, getting to work was actually something of a relief this morning, considering I have the detritus of sheetrocking to look forward to tonight.
Until I discovered they are doing construction on the office next to mine.
Technorati tags: rant, stress, plaster, contruction, contractors, cats
Somebody has to go to the V-E-T.Yep, The Shmoo, who was due for a check-up, anyway, has suddenly started licking her lower belly bald. There's still a short covering of fur there, but where there once was a prodigious sea-urchin puff, there is naught but a peachy-fuzzed pink protrusion. Oh, the shame of it all!
Naturally, Her Shmoopiness threatened to gnaw my face off if I tried to get a photo of it, so you'll have to trust me on this one - at least until I catch her asleep, exposed and defenseless. The Buddha belly is fetching in its own way, but a little troubling. I suspect a plastic bag I found her sitting on last night is the culprit, and this is akin to an abdominal version of The Dreaded Chacne, as we call it (AKA feline chin acne caused by a reaction to plastic). If this is so, then removing any plastic bags she has managed to arrange on the floor for her lolling and licking pleasure should remedy the problem.
Of course, this sounds more simple than it is, as her plastic addiction leads her to expend much of her formidable wiliness and force of will on acquiring the forbidden material. It also may be noted that we are not the most vigilant nor neat of kitty caretakers. But, we will have to try, for her health and comfort - to say nothing of the fact that the Betty Ford clinic is way too expensive for our budget.
Today's Cat Blog is dedicated to the one, the only, Maya the Shmoo. She may be getting older and wider, but she is also getting plusher and more snuggly as time goes on. Maya is the kitty with serious attitude - the one who gets what she wants when she wants it, or you will fear her wrath. Her tones are far from dulcet, as she is both deaf and cantankerous, but she lets out the cutest little snorfling purrs when she licks our ears at night before we go to sleep. She is the cat who sleeps between us, and the one that we most pine for when we go away. In short, Mrs. Nator and I are both deeply in love with Ms. Maya, in all her bizarre, cranky, chacne-infested glory.
Thank God she's not a person, however. The world would tremble!
