A girl and her uncle

When I was a little baby, my paternal grandparents came from the midwest to meet me. They stayed in a fancy hotel in downtown Manhattan. My grandfather felt that I needed something, so he and my grandmother set out for FAO Schwartz and purchased a wheeled elephant. I assume that it rode back to the fancy hotel in a cab. My grandmother told me that it was then wheeled through the lobby while all sorts of elegant people showed their extreme disdain. At some point, he was named Uncle Dunkle. He had a handsome saddle and bridle and a ring in the middle of his back that, when pulled, caused him to make an elephant noise. I played with him, and my sister and brother also enjoyed him. Eventually his bridle and then his saddle fell off, but he never lost the ability to make his elephant noise.

Here is a picture of BZ (when I started speaking, I could not for the life of me say Elizabeth) and her uncle.

the juliet reality show

Well, our poor kitty continues to have seizures and near-seizures. Yesterday morning, it happened again when I was slightly closer to waking and a little quicker to react. I rubbed the acupressure points I'd been shown, and the second seizure was over much more quickly than the first.

I realized that there was a reason I thought she had died after the first one: holding her was like holding a fish on dry land -- they flop and flop and flop, and they stop only because they've died.

She lived, of course, and we got her off to the vet fairly quickly, where she had blood drawn and got a nice kitty massage. (I wonder how many human clients ask for a little healing touch for themselves.) Internet research reveals that there's usually an under-lying cause (although sometimes there isn't, and that condition is called epilepsy). Blood tests can pinpoint or eliminate most of the causes. And, confirming what the vet said, and counter to all the kitty lore I've heard and observed, it's comforting to the cat to stay with her when she's experiencing these events.

As I was reading snippets from the internet to Robert, Juliet started to go into another seizure, but never quite got to the full-blown state. And she's had three more pre-seizures since then. It wipes her out. Sometimes she's hungry afterwards, sometimes she doesn't care about food at all. But she does want to sleep a lot.

Here's hoping for some answers from the blood tests.

may we live in not-so-interesting times, at least for the rest of the weekend

Early this morning, about twelve hours ago, I awoke from a deep sleep to find -- well, I'm not sure at what point exactly I woke up because I was a little foggy in the beginning. And let me say also that everything's fine for now.

At some point, I noticed that Juliet (the cat) was writhing around on the floor, well, not exactly writhing, but kind of half-curled up, furiously kicking her back legs, and huffing -- ff-ff-ff-ff-snort-ff-ff. I later realized the bed was wet, and so was she, so she must have fallen off the bed at some point, or half fell, half jumped. I tried to pet her and calm her, and she'd just straighten out for a while and go back to the curled-up paddling.

So I picked her up and held her, and eventually, she calmed down. In fact, she got so calm that I thought she might have died in my arms. I put her down (bad Liz, on the cold tile floor, but gently), and went to get Robert, who turned on the light. We realized she was moving her head ever so slightly. I got a towel and we laid her on that. And after a while, she managed to turn around 180 degrees to face us. We petted her and sat with her. Eventually, she raised herself up, and kind of stumbled around, and eventually her back legs started working.

And then, she wanted three things in this order: petting -- she was very demanding and purred very loudly every time we touched her; food -- she was starving and ate a large amount and kept it down; and sleep -- she and I curled up on the bed and she fell into a deep sleep.

But between food and sleep, I called the emergency room (yes, they have e-rooms for pets) and they said that as long as she was "better," I should just take her to the vet. Oh, and a quick perusal of advice off the internet yielded this gem -- your cat won't swallow its tongue, so don't stick your fingers in its mouth while its in some kind of neurological state (I can just imagine all the well-meaning but clueless pet owners who end up in the human e-room after getting a severe cat bite under these circumstances.)

And the vet was wonderful, as was the vet tech. The vet turns out to be an animal accupuncturist and chiropracter as well as a trained medical vet. He said that she'd had a grand-mal seizure, which could be, but isn't necessarily, related to epilepsy. He also showed me some pressure points that might help if this happens again. And he gave me some good advice for next time -- stay with her, comfort her, call the vet when they're open to report it, and take her to the e-room if she doesn't stop after five minutes. He was very calming for both of us.

He also said that the options range from "watchful waiting" to pheneobarbitol (presumably in small doses) to an MRI. I think that we're going to err on the do-nothing side for at least a while and develop some strategies if it happens again.

May the rest of the weekend be filled with no more surprises of any kind. And may we all recover from this latest adventure.

long time no blog

It's been a busy couple of weeks. Work has been extra busy. I'm facing down a deadline on Thursday. So far, I think I'm winning, but the victory has involved long hours and a certain level of exhaustion. My part-time status at work has allowed me to recover in between my long days. It's also allowed me to mostly keep the household running during the week, minimizing the number of errands we need to complete over the weekends. Which is good, because weekends have been busy too.

Two weekends ago, we went to one of those infamous same-gender weddings. I know many same-gender couples who've married over the last year, and we've attended three of these weddings. It still amazes me to think that the union is legal, at least in our protected little state. It's a thrill, and I think it'll continue to be a thrill for a long time.

This wedding was between our friends Chris and Corey and was in the Arlington Street UU Church. The day itself was cold and rainy -- so much so that we saw two Japanese tourists nearly blown away on the streets of Boston while we were headed to the church. But inside, the church was warm and welcoming. The two grooms wore tuxedos, and the flowers were tasteful. Each groom walked down the aisle with their mom. Another friend performed the ceremony, and even though he'd gotten a one-day permit, he came across as if he'd been doing it for years. The Boston Gay Men's Chorus sent 25 members (the two grooms are also members) and they performed a couple of songs admirably, including one of my favorites, Everything Possible. The church wasn't packed, but there were lots of people there.

Afterwards, we went downstairs for a potluck appetizer buffet (yum -- this was the crowd to try that experiment in!) and an amazingly good cake (of course -- it was from Konditor Meister). And of course, lots of hugs and laughs.

We went home for a bit, then turned around and headed back to the city ("the city," of course, being Boston) for an evening contra dance in honor of the wedding. One of my two favorite callers led the dance, and the band was great.

The next day, we caught up with two friends for a mother's day brunch, hastily arranged the day before. We each made something tasty, had a great get-together, then dashed into Boston again for the last Boston Symphony Orchestra-sponsored chamber concert in our series. I'm so glad we've discovered these concerts; we've already signed up for next year's series.

And this weekend, we went to what was billed as an early music concert, featuring a tiny German orchestra playing Bach, Handel, and Geminiani. It was totally delicious. As usual, we ran into friends, so had a nice chat during intermission. (We're never sure which friends we'll see, so it's always a nice surprise).

Saturday was wonderful. We started the day "in town" at a Vegetarian Cambodian cooking class at the home of the founder of a local set of restaurants -- the Elephant Walk. It was a treat to be in the kitchen of a professional chef, and equally to hear her story. There were ten students, so we split up into three groups and with supervision cooked three amazing dishes. Then we all sat down and ate them. I'm hoping we can attend more of these classes; this one was just stellar.

After a brief trip home and a much-needed nap, we headed back to "the city" again, this time with friends to see the Boston Pops. The first part of the program was "light" classical -- the fun stuff that has been featured on cartoons and in popular culture ("kill the wabbit" and "hello mudda hello fadda"). There was a surprisingly non-schmaltzy Paul Simon medley and a very nice rendition of Birdland, and then Rockapella came on and did some numbers with their enormous backup band (kind of an oxymoron, don't you think?) and some "solo" numbers with just the five of them.

And Sunday, after a two-hour phone call with my mother (actually, we transacted a lot of family business, but I was glad to have a headset), we mowed the lawn. It's too bad that new grass isn't considered valuable -- this was the "first mowing," and the grass had become quite uncontrolled. Actually, I like all the flowers that pop up in the spring -- the violets and ajuga, and even the dandelions. But a neighbor came over and said "oh! we were concerned that something was wrong!" which is New England for "thank god -- you were starting to bring down the property values, but we like you too much to say that out loud."

Funny story -- I guess I'm not the only one who likes the dandelions. While I was on the phone with my mother, I saw two boys (around 12) ride up on their bikes, spy the dandelions, and leave the bikes on the lawn while they ran around and, with great joy, picked handfuls of the ones that had gone by. Then, standing in the middle of the front lawn, they each took a deep breath, blew, watched the seeds float down, laughed (still with joy, not with meanness), and hopped on their bikes and rode away. Made me smile.

These days, I'm not sure if I'm resting at work or on the weekends, or perhaps on my days off. Life is good.