George Updates, Line Dancing & Snoopy

Thanksgiving was indeed a wonderful day! We have a lot of great Art in our family and this year, we were especially blessed to have more Art than ever with us at the table. In fact, it could have been possible to have as many as five...We had some other special guests, like Richard, our good friend and brilliant creator and Commodore of the Yacht Dogs Yacht Club...

After dinner we played Texas Hold'em and made a beautiful puzzle...

It's been a busy week, trying to get ready for the holidays, making presents, many of which I cannot post as I'd like to surprise the recipients, so after Christmas I will have lots of knitting projects to tell about, and most importantly taking care of Amber and George, both of whom went to the vet this week...at least once... ahem...
Yes, the George update is that the last round of chemo didn't do much to reduce the internal organ problems. We changed protocols Thursday to something we had never tried before and he was feeling pretty punky that evening. By morning, the diarrhea was back, his temp was up and he would not eat, even when I tried to hand feed him little pieces of chicken. So, we went to the vet. I love our vet; I should say, I love our vets, we have several now. I called and they said to just come on in. We arrived and were seen within 5 minutes - and they were busy! They care so much. They put him on IV fluids and gave him Sucralfate to help his GI tract. My suspicion that he was becoming dehydrated was right; had we waited until he was truly dehydrated, it could have been a really bad situation. He's still feeling punky, but he ate a small breakfast and his temp has stayed in the normal range today. He wags his tail when we talk to him and we are giving him crushed ice "cookies" (cubes) as treats to keep water in him.

Oh, Amber is fine, she had the normal yearly checkup and is in great health, especially for being 13. However, as we have radically changed George's diet these past 6 months due to the cancer, I have failed her in her health on the weight issue. She has always been a 45 pound dog. Always, withing a pound one way or the other, never an issue. She has gained an enormous amount of weight these past months and I am to blame. Her mind set has gone from slow and never wanting to eat much (famine), only eating a full meal every few days, to constantly wanting to eat (feast) and always looking for more. Fortunately, she likes Ice Cookies too, as they contain no calories. So, other than my worrying about her teeth, she is getting lots of those and little else, other than her strict food diet now. Hopefully we can turn her metabolism around. I hope so, she's having arthritis worse than ever and I know this is a major factor in it all.

I sent a care package to a friend, Sheri in Arizona this week. I hope she has it before she sees this post. Sheri is an actress and was recently on CSI NY and West Wing, we've been friends for years through the Marine Lending industry. She's a Snoopy nut. Among a few other treasures, I sent her a piggy bank that I've had since I was a very little girl. I know that it will be highly cherished at her home among her other Snoopy memorabilia and that is where it truly belongs.
Last night I went dancing with my friend Kim. I haven't been country dancing in years. I used to be quite good and I knew all the line dances. I remembered most of the ones they did, but not well enough to go out there and do them. That was very frustrating. It was the first time I have ever come home from a night dancing without being completely exhausted. I did, however, have an absolute BLAST! As we left last night, it was snowing hard, again, but my dreams of a white weekend are not to be, it has all melted away. I'm looking forward to more dancing nights and wondering how long it will take for me to remember the steps. I think the last time I went was in 1993...