Sonicrusk Blog

I awoke with a phone call Thursday evening. It turned out that my dog had hurt her paw.

Do you know the thumbnails on dogs? I don’t know if all breeds have them, but my dog has this nail on the side of her paw that just grows and grows, curing around like an elephant tusk. Most dogs wear their nails down enough by just walking and running around. The thumbnail doesn’t get worn down because it never had any contact with anything.

Somehow, my dog must have gotten it snagged in something. She didn’t totally rip it out, but must have pulled it out enough to cause an injury. She was licking it incessantly. Since it was past regular business hours, I thought about waiting until the morning and scheduling an appointment with my regular vet, but I thought about my dog’s discomfort and probable pain, so I decided to visit the emergency vet.

I went with my mom and her friend. First, though, I offered to buy them a Starbucks coffee downtown. This was morning to me, even though it was 9PM, and I wanted to get a cup of coffee.

We drove into the drive thru and made our order. At the window, my mom’s friend, who was driving, noticed a rickety Lucite cube about a quarter filled with dollar bills right outside of the cashier window. She remarked to us how easy it would be for someone to just walk up and steal it. When the cashier kid opened the window to hand us our coffee, she advised him that maybe it would be a good idea to bring the clear cube of cash into the store for safekeeping.

One of the coffee orders was wrong, so we had to wait a few minutes for a new coffee to be made. In front of us, walking in front of the drive thru exit and then to the front of the store entrance, a black guy walked across. He didn’t look like a bum. In fact, he was the spitting image of one of the boxing commentators on HBO. He made intense eye contact with the tip cube.

My mom’s friend reiterated to the cashier the idea of bringing in the tips after we left. He handed us the remade coffee and we drove off. As we exited the drive thru and passed the front of the store, we saw the tip jar gazer. He was wearing a white T-shirt and looked pretty sweaty, beat down. We pulled onto the side street that would take us back to 24th Street, the main artery downtown and looked back at the drive thru window. Sure enough, the boxing commentator look-alike made a beeline over to where the tip jar had sat. The cashier had pulled the cube into the store with him after handing us our last coffee. Foiled!

At the emergency vet, they took my dog back to do some repairs on her nail. She didn’t have to have it removed; the vet just pulled it back some and cleaned it. She put a gigantic dressing and wrap over the affected paw, gave some Novox pills, and left me with a $170 bill. Yikes!

Before deciding to go to the vet that night instead of the morning, I had given my dog a Valium left over from the fourth of July. That along with the Morphine shot administered for the procedure made her pretty loopy. Have you ever seen a stoned dog? They stare at nothing and stand in place. They also sleep in weird positions.

The vet advised me to make sure that she didn’t lick the wound in order to avoid infection. So I left the dressing on until yesterday evening before changing it. Changing a dressing on a dog paw is another ordeal. My dog nipped at me and squirmed. Most dogs don’t like having their feet touched even under normal circumstances. With an injury and dressing change, you can imagine. Luckily, I had my sister to help me.

I gave my dog a Novox pill at around 11AM and it knocked her out. After changing her dressing, she started to bite at it, presumably trying to get the dressing off so she could lick the wound. I had to put an Elizabethan collar on her. It was incredibly pathetic. She kept bumping it into things. She couldn’t lie down to sleep and kept staring at me, pleading. I finally felt so bad that I took it off and just reinforced the dressing. I might have reinforced it too much, adding too much weight and bulk. She is hesitant to walk on it, but she was that way with the previous dressing too. She has been sleeping comfortably for a couple of hours so I am going to leave her in peace. I’ll take her to her regular vet on Monday. Unless he says otherwise, I will remove the dressing/bandage then.

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In the last post, I mentioned how I was going to take a trip to Georgia to see my buddy Hoat. It was meant to be a four-day trip. I asked for six consecutive days off, and received eight.

Last week, I talked to Hoat on the phone. During the conversation, he told me that the army was sending him on a two-week TDY (temporary duty) and they wanted him to fly out on the morning of my third day there. That would have left me in Georgia alone for one day before flying back to Bakersfield.

Yesterday morning, Hoat called me. He said that his army unit wanted him to fly out for the TDY the day before I arrive. He would know for sure this Monday. That would mean that if I flew to Georgia, I would spend the entire trip alone.

Well, this was not the best of situations. I thought about it. Any of you that have flown in the past ten years knows that airline tickets are virtually non-refundable. If I don’t fly out, I eat the ticket. The best that I can hope for is a “credit” by the airline.

I’ve eaten plane tickets before. Right out of the army in January 2001, I was set to visit my buddy Al in New Hampshire. This was before he was married with twins. Anyway, I woke up the morning the flight was to leave out of Los Angeles to discover that the Grapevine was snowed out and closed. I called Al and gave my regrets, canceling the trip.

I could always go ahead and fly out there, but I had better prepare some quality sightseeing. Lord knows I don’t want to sit around Hoat’s empty apartment all by myself 3,000 miles away from home.

I asked a few people in real life what they thought. One recurring piece of advice was to stay in California, enjoy my time off, and possibly find something fun to do in California where I am closer to home and more in control of my own movement. It’s good advice. I also looked at my work schedule to see about trading some shifts, spreading some of my off time out some so I don’t work myself into a haggard mess.

What would you do?

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I hope my readers were not too worried about me. Not counting the last post on the strange sign posted at Long’s Drugs, I haven’t posted in two weeks, not to mention the fact that that post was on me feeling down. Write a post on the blues, and then don’t post anything substantial for two weeks.

Actually, I just didn’t have anything inspiring to write about. No trips, no revelations, no funny stories. I’ve been working my ass off a lot and that doesn’t leave time for work. I asked my job for six days off in the near future in order to visit good ol’ Hoat in Georgia. They gave me eight days off instead, none of it vacation. So, I have been working these large blocks of time that are very tiring. I’ve also been hustling on some dating issues that are a real pain in the ass. Married people always envy the single, possibly forgetting how crappy dating is.

I haven’t had a chance to enjoy the recent beautiful weather but I made my way over to Long’s this morning to buy a few things. They changed the sign from “CLOSED FOR SECURITY REASONS,” TO “LOCKED FOR SECURITY REASONS.” Ah, I said to myself, how one word changes everything. You see, Long’s has an entrance in the front as well as on the side. They locked the side door so they can keep better track of who is entering.

Anyway, I was standing in the parking lot of Long’s getting ready to go in when I got a hint of déjà vu. The weather reminded me of Hawaii. I felt like I was back to the place I lived for two years.

Hawaii had its bad points, but the weather was not one of them. The air always had a clean, peaceful quality about it. Standing outside this morning at 0700 reminded me of it. Maybe later, I will write about my time in Hawaii. I am trying to not talk about so many negative things as much on this blog.

I came home today and removed the aluminum foil off of the windows in my office after several months. It feels good to have some sunshine around as I type.

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I drove by one of my favorite stores this morning to buy some merchandise. There was a sign on the glass doors stating “CLOSED FOR SECURITY REASONS.” Was Long’s Drugs on Mt. Vernon Avenue robbed? Anyone know what’s up?

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