the little things

Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

First real snowstorm last night, not counting the appetizer of light snow and freezing rain on Wednesday.

We had hunkered down in the attic watching movies on TV when our doorbell rang. We couldn't figure out who would be at the door at 10PM during a winter storm; turned out to be two kids offering to shovel our walkway for 10 bucks. First time that's happened. Anyway, happy to pay it, but you'd hardly know there'd been any such youthful entrepreneurs working the neighborhood as it hasn't stopped snowing since. I ended up spending about 2 hours myself this afternoon going over the walks again as well as hitting the driveway, cleaning off the cars, and digging out the side path.

Shoveling isn't so bad though. Good to get outside. Had some tunes. And was treated to near perfect snowflakes landing on my jacket and gloves when I took breaks to catch my breath and let my fingers thaw out a little.

Still, December has been a rough month. I've actually been meaning to write up a November update, but I've been busy with various projects (work and personal) and twitter and Facebook have provided sufficient outlet for me to dump what's been on my mind that I haven't found the need to carve out some time to write here.

Anyway, December. First weekend of the month: a new client... that I don't think I'll be seeing again. Not a good fit, and frankly, a little creepy.

Went to a frisbee tournament in Vegas and badly sprained my ankle only a few points into the first game. (reconstructing events, apparently another player stepped on my foot as I was going up for a D) Sidelined me for the whole weekend. (and then some -- got X-rays yesterday to confirm no broken bones, but it's actually more sore now that I'm wrapping it as advised by the nurse practitioner, and still a bit swollen and purpley.) Vegas is not a good place for a leg injury; everything is convoluted, as well as huge and far apart. I also lost more money than I care to admit to the internet, and I lost my voice. (which seems to be the manifestation of some kind of cold, although I don't have any other symptoms besides the voice and some throat/sinus congestion.)

Back home, the cat seemed to manifest more old and low energy. Plus, cat pee all over the basement. The SOOTTAD thought that he just missed me while I was away, and I'm sure forgetting to remind her about scooping the litterbox didn't help. All peeing aside, his condition has seemed to take a noticeable turn for the worse in recent weeks. And much worse after my weekend away. We had conveniently already scheduled a vet appointment Thursday for his annual checkup, but it only confirmed the worst: renal failure as well as anemia. the vet doesn't expect him to last past next week. Not sure what else to say about that. IV treatments are an option, but not expected to help much. Plus we don't want to add any more trauma to the kitty seeing as how badly he was doing after the vet visit.

We're spoiling him rotten at the moment. Carrying him to the litterbox. Treats when he's up. Lots of snuggles if we can do it without disturbing him too much. [I swear that's the only reason why we got out of bed at noon today.]

It actually seems like a good thing that we dropped the ball on getting tickets out to CA since it means we can spend more time with him and doesn't make us have to rush any ... decisions ... that we don't want to go rushing into. He actually seems to be doing a bit better than he was doing the day after the vet visit, but he's still clearly not doing well.

So anyway, it's been a rough December so far. Ups and downs, but mostly downs. It's the volatility that is the indicator of problems, or at least that's how I understand it. And there are things that will probably make it that much worse, but hopeful the little things will help us get through it. At least the SOOTTAD and I are together this time around. As much as it'll suck, we'll get through it together.

And for the record, it's still snowing. We'll just try to think about the snowflakes.