Well, fuck. *Snort*
Aug. 4th, 2005 10:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mad_andyYou know... sometimes good days come completely out of the blue.
I'd chased Ticketmaster about the Iron Maiden tickets that we'd ordered through the fanclub. You see, lots of people had got e-mail confirmation; we, however, had not. Trying to get Slay to ring his credit card people and see if the money had been taken was like trying to get blood out of a stone so, when the tickets went on general sale and I bought two (just in case), I chased Ticketmaster.
Two e-mails later they confirmed that I had them. And that afternoon, while I was at work, they showed up at the house and, because nobody was there except the dog - and we've told him not to sign for anything unless we're there - took them back to the sorting office and left me a nice little card. Today I went and picked them up.
Now, because of my previous job in a postroom I got to know most of the local posties. Some of them have even recognised me in my new persona when they drop post off at work. And one of the chaps who was in the sorting office recognised me and, laughing while he got my letter, asked if I'd been at e-bay again.
"Nope," said his oppo, "tickets."
He handed me the letter and I must have looked a bit happy. The chap I recognised chipped in - although they were both grinning at me at this point.
"Anyone good?"
"Iron Maiden!"
"Ah."
"I'm going to be hanging over the barrier..."
He grinned at me. "Hanging what over the barrier?"
I gave him my best, I-am-a-dangerous-lunatic grin. "Everything, mate. And then some, given half a chance."
With both men creased up with laughter behind the counter, I wound my merry way to work.
Well, less said about that the better, but having my tickets put me in a pretty good mood. Couple of good things, though; we've got a pair of blind kittens in at the moment, and they're going to a spiffy new home on saturday. Hurray!
I'm going to take a moment to give you their sorry tale. These kittens were, it seems, born blind. Their mother was a feral cat who had wandered into this lady's garden, made herself at home and produced a litter. (Said lady cat was trapped by Cats Protection, neutered and returned to the lady's garden, to live out her life as a pet, albeit an outdoor one.)
The nice lady rang the other vet surgery in town to enquire about treating the two kittens with dodgy eyes, only to be told quite rudely that they should be put down. Immediately. Shouldn't have been allowed to make it to six weeks, because what good is a blind cat. She should have either brought them in at a few days old for destruction, or drowned them herself.
*Waits for sputtering noises from flist to subside*
Quite. So she came to us, very very upset, thinking we would do the same but, she hoped, rather more politely. Hurray for our vets! Heather (very sweet lady, very good vet, is also a pilot) said nonsense, we'll find them a home.
Now, it's true that had they been at this point still wild it might have been hard to justify this decision. But these little guys...they've been around people since day 1. They like people. They're a brace of tabby and whites - blotch tabbies - a boy and a girl and you know something?
They don't know that they're blind.
They play, they track where you are with their ears, pounce on your fingers, eat like horses, yell for attention...everything a normal kitten does. Their other senses seem to be sharper - or maybe they just use them more. Whatever, they're smart enough that once you've started playing with them they can catch your finger midair, and one of my cats still can't do that. They've been blind since birth - Heather reckons they got a virus in utero, probably calici - so have never known any different. We've all fallen madly in love with them - and they are called Stevie and Wonder. *Snort*
Come Saturday, they're off to a spiffy new life in Surrey; they're going to be living in a flat with a professional lady, have their own room specially set up for them, as indoor cats, loved and safe for the rest of their days. I love happy endings, don't you?
Made a very poorly inpatient much more comfortable, with a noticeable effect on her demeanour. By which I mean she went from flat on her side to sitting up and looking around her; damn, but I'm good at my job. *Chuckle* Modest, too.
On a less happy note, Thoth - my albino hob ferret - came to work with me today. Last year he had a very nasty abscess in his right lymph gland, the big one under the angle of the jaw. It was a bugger to drain, as the jugular vein ran right over the top of it...nervous work, that was. I've been watching his neck for the past week or so thinking nah, it's not swollen...his neck always looks lopsided in the summer...maybe it's a temporary thing...give it a few days, it'll resolve on its own... before finally admitting defeat and giving it a damn good prod last night. (I usually try and refrain from prodding unless I have reason!)
Bugger. Ferrets aren't supposed to keep golfballs in their necks. Especially not where their salivary lymph gland lives. Still, none of his others seem to be up so in the basket he went this morning.
I expected, when the vet stuck a needle through it (after the obligatory 'try not to stick the needle through his jugular, there's a good chap' warning) to get a fairly repulsive stream of pus into the syringe. Easy peasy, bit of sedation, in there with a scalpel blade, flush, repeat twice a day. With the flush, not the blade.
Nothing.
Except a smear of dark cells on the slide when the vet pushed the plunger to see what she'd got...
To explain why my heart hit my boots at the sight, I'll just say that the last ferret I knew with a lump in her neck that wasn't an abscess had lymphosarcoma. Which is cancer - and just about as bad as it gets. Aggressive, spreads, kills in about six months. Multiple organ failure, metastasizes to all the organs...evil stuff.
Mind you, it might just be an infection other than a dirty great pocket of pus; poor Thoth is on antibiotics for two weeks, and if it's just infection then the golf ball will start to get smaller pretty quick.
Mind you, he's got the biggest bloody bruise on his neck, poor bastard; I'd held him for the aspirate (he was as good as gold, bless him) and while I watched the vet squirt the nasty-looking stuff onto a slide I felt something hot on my hand. Poor little sod was relaxed in my arms and bleeding like a bastard.
"I did warn you about the jugular...?"
"Oh shit," said the guardian of my beastie's health.
(To be completely fair; she had tried to avoid it and then did everything she could to minimise the damage. Thoth then did me a favour by wandering all over my shoulders and pasting me with blood - if we're covered in blood we're not allowed on front desk and you all know how fond I am of reception duties!)
On the good side, Thoth got spoilt silly by all and sundry and got lots of cuddles from me. He's a typical albino boy; loving and gentle, sweet tempered and as laid back as they come. I know you're not supposed to have favourites - but he's a very special little chap.
Anyway.
I trotted off home, cheerfully knackered, and discovered that my Magnum tickets had also arrived!
Much celebration. I love Magnum to bits, and I love the Astoria to bits, and this combines two of my favourite things. Happy little bastard.
Then I got chatting to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
arrys_girlie online. She's coming to London for the Hammersmith gig, staying in a hotel near the venue. Now, Slay is clearly still unwell, because when I asked if we could get a room there too he said yes. So I booked it quick before he could change his mind - and whaddya know, we're going to be staying with Caz and Fiendy the night before the gig and the night of it! I love meeting people I've met online - and I'm sure the three of us are going to get into allllllll sorts of mischief...
AND.
I got my picture - the one from BruceAir with all the nutters against a backdrop of mountains - into a piloting magazine that has an article about the flight. The funny thing is that I told heather about it - and she's said they'll have a copy at the flying school she helps out at. I can't wait to see her face - she'll spot yours truly straight away!
So. I'd better be off to bed - got a hell of a long day tomorrow.
But...isn't it nice to have so many things to be happy about?
One last thing before I go:
OK. Two:
*Happy sigh*
I'd chased Ticketmaster about the Iron Maiden tickets that we'd ordered through the fanclub. You see, lots of people had got e-mail confirmation; we, however, had not. Trying to get Slay to ring his credit card people and see if the money had been taken was like trying to get blood out of a stone so, when the tickets went on general sale and I bought two (just in case), I chased Ticketmaster.
Two e-mails later they confirmed that I had them. And that afternoon, while I was at work, they showed up at the house and, because nobody was there except the dog - and we've told him not to sign for anything unless we're there - took them back to the sorting office and left me a nice little card. Today I went and picked them up.
Now, because of my previous job in a postroom I got to know most of the local posties. Some of them have even recognised me in my new persona when they drop post off at work. And one of the chaps who was in the sorting office recognised me and, laughing while he got my letter, asked if I'd been at e-bay again.
"Nope," said his oppo, "tickets."
He handed me the letter and I must have looked a bit happy. The chap I recognised chipped in - although they were both grinning at me at this point.
"Anyone good?"
"Iron Maiden!"
"Ah."
"I'm going to be hanging over the barrier..."
He grinned at me. "Hanging what over the barrier?"
I gave him my best, I-am-a-dangerous-lunatic grin. "Everything, mate. And then some, given half a chance."
With both men creased up with laughter behind the counter, I wound my merry way to work.
Well, less said about that the better, but having my tickets put me in a pretty good mood. Couple of good things, though; we've got a pair of blind kittens in at the moment, and they're going to a spiffy new home on saturday. Hurray!
I'm going to take a moment to give you their sorry tale. These kittens were, it seems, born blind. Their mother was a feral cat who had wandered into this lady's garden, made herself at home and produced a litter. (Said lady cat was trapped by Cats Protection, neutered and returned to the lady's garden, to live out her life as a pet, albeit an outdoor one.)
The nice lady rang the other vet surgery in town to enquire about treating the two kittens with dodgy eyes, only to be told quite rudely that they should be put down. Immediately. Shouldn't have been allowed to make it to six weeks, because what good is a blind cat. She should have either brought them in at a few days old for destruction, or drowned them herself.
*Waits for sputtering noises from flist to subside*
Quite. So she came to us, very very upset, thinking we would do the same but, she hoped, rather more politely. Hurray for our vets! Heather (very sweet lady, very good vet, is also a pilot) said nonsense, we'll find them a home.
Now, it's true that had they been at this point still wild it might have been hard to justify this decision. But these little guys...they've been around people since day 1. They like people. They're a brace of tabby and whites - blotch tabbies - a boy and a girl and you know something?
They don't know that they're blind.
They play, they track where you are with their ears, pounce on your fingers, eat like horses, yell for attention...everything a normal kitten does. Their other senses seem to be sharper - or maybe they just use them more. Whatever, they're smart enough that once you've started playing with them they can catch your finger midair, and one of my cats still can't do that. They've been blind since birth - Heather reckons they got a virus in utero, probably calici - so have never known any different. We've all fallen madly in love with them - and they are called Stevie and Wonder. *Snort*
Come Saturday, they're off to a spiffy new life in Surrey; they're going to be living in a flat with a professional lady, have their own room specially set up for them, as indoor cats, loved and safe for the rest of their days. I love happy endings, don't you?
Made a very poorly inpatient much more comfortable, with a noticeable effect on her demeanour. By which I mean she went from flat on her side to sitting up and looking around her; damn, but I'm good at my job. *Chuckle* Modest, too.
On a less happy note, Thoth - my albino hob ferret - came to work with me today. Last year he had a very nasty abscess in his right lymph gland, the big one under the angle of the jaw. It was a bugger to drain, as the jugular vein ran right over the top of it...nervous work, that was. I've been watching his neck for the past week or so thinking nah, it's not swollen...his neck always looks lopsided in the summer...maybe it's a temporary thing...give it a few days, it'll resolve on its own... before finally admitting defeat and giving it a damn good prod last night. (I usually try and refrain from prodding unless I have reason!)
Bugger. Ferrets aren't supposed to keep golfballs in their necks. Especially not where their salivary lymph gland lives. Still, none of his others seem to be up so in the basket he went this morning.
I expected, when the vet stuck a needle through it (after the obligatory 'try not to stick the needle through his jugular, there's a good chap' warning) to get a fairly repulsive stream of pus into the syringe. Easy peasy, bit of sedation, in there with a scalpel blade, flush, repeat twice a day. With the flush, not the blade.
Nothing.
Except a smear of dark cells on the slide when the vet pushed the plunger to see what she'd got...
To explain why my heart hit my boots at the sight, I'll just say that the last ferret I knew with a lump in her neck that wasn't an abscess had lymphosarcoma. Which is cancer - and just about as bad as it gets. Aggressive, spreads, kills in about six months. Multiple organ failure, metastasizes to all the organs...evil stuff.
Mind you, it might just be an infection other than a dirty great pocket of pus; poor Thoth is on antibiotics for two weeks, and if it's just infection then the golf ball will start to get smaller pretty quick.
Mind you, he's got the biggest bloody bruise on his neck, poor bastard; I'd held him for the aspirate (he was as good as gold, bless him) and while I watched the vet squirt the nasty-looking stuff onto a slide I felt something hot on my hand. Poor little sod was relaxed in my arms and bleeding like a bastard.
"I did warn you about the jugular...?"
"Oh shit," said the guardian of my beastie's health.
(To be completely fair; she had tried to avoid it and then did everything she could to minimise the damage. Thoth then did me a favour by wandering all over my shoulders and pasting me with blood - if we're covered in blood we're not allowed on front desk and you all know how fond I am of reception duties!)
On the good side, Thoth got spoilt silly by all and sundry and got lots of cuddles from me. He's a typical albino boy; loving and gentle, sweet tempered and as laid back as they come. I know you're not supposed to have favourites - but he's a very special little chap.
Anyway.
I trotted off home, cheerfully knackered, and discovered that my Magnum tickets had also arrived!
Much celebration. I love Magnum to bits, and I love the Astoria to bits, and this combines two of my favourite things. Happy little bastard.
Then I got chatting to
arrys_girlie online. She's coming to London for the Hammersmith gig, staying in a hotel near the venue. Now, Slay is clearly still unwell, because when I asked if we could get a room there too he said yes. So I booked it quick before he could change his mind - and whaddya know, we're going to be staying with Caz and Fiendy the night before the gig and the night of it! I love meeting people I've met online - and I'm sure the three of us are going to get into allllllll sorts of mischief...AND.
I got my picture - the one from BruceAir with all the nutters against a backdrop of mountains - into a piloting magazine that has an article about the flight. The funny thing is that I told heather about it - and she's said they'll have a copy at the flying school she helps out at. I can't wait to see her face - she'll spot yours truly straight away!
So. I'd better be off to bed - got a hell of a long day tomorrow.
But...isn't it nice to have so many things to be happy about?
One last thing before I go:
OK. Two:
*Happy sigh*
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-08-04 10:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-08-04 10:08 pm (UTC)Except the part about Thoth, of course... keeping fingers crossed for innocuous test results. And he *does* sound a love.
Tickets and no front desk and more tickets and hotel/party with friends. Yay!
Sending hugs and more good vibes (especially for Thoth.)
And the Bruce pictures are quite fab as well. Of course.
no subject
Date: 2005-08-04 10:22 pm (UTC)Sorry, just had to drop in for a drool.
*mops up wet spot on floor before running back off to Mega-land*
no subject
Date: 2005-08-04 11:08 pm (UTC)It's so awesome you'll meet Fiendy for the Maiden gig. :)
no subject
Date: 2005-08-04 11:16 pm (UTC)I'll keep my fingers crossed for Thoth--I hope the antibiotics work.
no subject
Date: 2005-08-04 11:33 pm (UTC)Good things...
Date: 2005-08-05 03:40 am (UTC)I do hope your little guy is going to be okay, he sounds like a real cutie! I love ferrets but the Hublet abhorrs them, so...no ferret love in tha house here.
And I like the Bruce-in-white pic. Yowsa!
no subject
Date: 2005-08-05 03:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-08-05 09:55 am (UTC)Blind kittens! They sound incredibly cute - as all kittens are. *spit* kill them. Yeah, sure. That's what someone said also when it turned out that Opal (one from the endless litters that went about in my cat-filled house) couldn't see properly. Fuck them. She was the most adorable kitten ever - and great comedy relief, since she used to bang her furry little face against doorframes from time to time...;)
And yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! About tickets and Hammersmith! Hug Fiendy and Caz for me. And give Fiendy a good snog! ;) You gals are going to have so much fun...:D
no subject
Date: 2005-08-06 01:30 am (UTC)So far behind.
Hank
~wondering just how one teaches a ferret to hunt~