To One and All

For my friends and readers alike, I wish you a very

























Best wishes for a happy and prosperous 2008

Cloudy Weather

I'm not a happy camper today. Saturday night when I got home from work my cat, Entrée, came out of the back of the house almost dragging his hind end. He didn't seem to be in any pain, but it was as if his back legs had been to a wild party that the front end of the cat missed out on! I couldn't find any swelling, injuries, bites or anything else to account for his plight, but I did notice his hind feet were icy cold while his front feet were toasty. Not good. Still, his pads were rosy pink and the cat as a whole seemed fine, just wonko legs. After about an hour he was up walking again; not normally, but much better. He was eating, drinking and eliminating ok, so I opted to wait for morning.

In the morning (sunday) he had another bout of rubber legs, so I took him to the pet ER (no small thing since it costs both arms and both legs just to walk in the door there). He was walking better by the time we arrived, rather like a German Shepherd with hip displasia, but the vet could find nothing obvious wrong. She thought that a pinched nerve would be very painful and unlikely to clear up so fast, and it wouldn't cause circulation problems. Wrong symptom presentation for botulism or a toxin from a bite. She also thought that blood clots would be very painful. We opted to do nothing, since he was in no pain and it didn't seem life threatening. I didn't want to pay the ER cost for diagnostics if they weren't emergency measures.

So this morning we went to our regular vet. Entree is fine, as far as he knows, but we go in for an echo cardiogram (sonogram) next Thursday. The Dr. says the only thing that really fits is that he threw a clot. Arterial Thromboembolism. The cold feet are pretty much diagnostic of that. It's quite common, even in young cats. Usually painful though, so that part is odd. But a pinched nerve or any other spinal problem wouldn't clear up so fast, and none of the other things we talked about will cause the circulation problem he had. His heart rate was 180 beats/min, which is quite fast, but then he was at the vet... could be nervousness. The Doc, whom I have known for 12 years now, wouldn't meet my eyes and sat looking down at the floor in silence for quite awhile afterward. We chatted some about our families, but the mood was very somber. That in itself is the most frightening thing. Entree is quite the celebrity at the vet and very well loved there.

So for now he's on 80mg or aspirin every 72 hours and if he does have a heart problem he'll be on some sort of medication, Probably beta blockers. Which type of myocardial disease this turns out to be, if any (still holding out hope) will tell us more about his prognosis. They're all progressive though and, outside of a heart transplant, which they don't do for cats, not very treatable. He says many cats do well in the early stages. No idea how long that means... the website I linked to above doesn't give more than a year for any of the possibilities.

Entrée has a history of mystery illnesses. He's had multiple bouts with interstitial cystitis (irritable bladder syndrome) and survived them all, even when he became completely blocked for so long he lost all bladder control. Then last September his whole hind end swelled up and the vet couldn't find anything wrong. Once the swelling went down (heavy antibiotics and an anti inflammatory) we discovered a cat bite and abscess. He's been a "free range" cat for almost 8 years here in our wild canyon, and that in itself is nearly miraculous. The pragmatic names AR gave our two cats (Entrée and Aperitif) seem to have given a protective status. Perhaps he'll pull his usual stuff and everything will be clear with his heart next week, marking another life down. I've lost count how many he's gone through now...

Keep all your stuff crossed for him please.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Or happy Hanuka or Winter Solstice a little late. Best wishes whatever you celebrate.

I am SOOOOO stuffed. We had prime rib with all the fixins, pie for dessert and then at home there's just no end to the goodies. Next stop Alka Seltzer. Ugh...

So here's a fun one... what is the tastiest thing each of you has eaten recently?

Mine would have to be A Lindt ball. Sounds yummy, no? LOL! Seriously, Lindt makes these little chocolate balls filled with the most meltaway creamy centers... but then I haven't hit the box of See's candy yet.

Caramel Bailey's isn't half bad either...

Herding Cattle

So is there any reason I shouldn't play this game from work tomorrow? Cow Maze

I made it to level 16 and I am SOOOO torqued. I got all three bales in place, but I need a right arrow and I have only a left arrow remaining, so I can't get to the prize. It was so spiff that I managed to get the bales done I cannot face re-engineering the whole shebang some other way in order to get the right arrow left at the end. Grr...

Oh, I also didn't end up scheduled for as many days as I expected, now that the final (I think) schedule is in. So I only have to work three days before the end of the year and then a couple of practicum days. Not so bad after all.

DID learn there is prereading for my projective testing class. Hopefully there will be oodles of time for that once the book comes, but the whole holiday shipping jam makes me nervous. Book is set to ship the 25th. Surely it will go the 26th, right? Of course it has to come all the way across the stinking country.... um... but it's still going to come in time for me to have a few days to read the first two chapters; I'm sure of it!

It's Pouring!

I mean that both literally and figuratively. It's actually not pouring down rain anymore, though the sky is clouding up and the second wave is on it's way. Yesterday we got more than 1/3 of our annual rainfall in 18 hours. By 2pm when I left for work my little frog rain gauge was overflowing. Froggie can hold 5 inches and I have no clue how long he'd been full. Then when I got home around 8 pm he had two more inches, so we got at least 7... possibly quite a bit more. We had minor flooding, but so far nothing dramatic. The next storm might change that though.

I love going to the airport weather report though... we have such dramatically different micro climates in our area that sometimes when I look at the "official" weather from the airport weather station it looks as if they must be in another state! I see that they recorded a total of 2.9 inches of rain yesterday. Um... maybe their frogs are smaller than mine? My neighbor's 5 inch tube also overflowed, so I'm not delusional. Apparently we need bigger frogs.

Then came the other flood; the work one. One of the other MFTs got hurt and is off her feet for at least 2 months, thus my 2 days a month just shot up! Looks like I'll probably work 6 days between now and the first, and that's not including my practicum days. So while I'm piling on hours and making some much needed dinero, I am not getting a break.

Just wrapped up my third integrated report that went to court almost untouched by my supervisor. W00T! I'm feeling really good about my improvement in that department, but I still have such a long way to go in terms of feeling confident about my test interpretations. And how come all these people are so darned muddy? The textbook cases are always so straightforward and tidy. LOL!

Shipping all my Christmas gifts today and then I'll have that little chore done. Cards still not printed, much less customized and sent and the house is exactly as decorated as it got the day after my break began. Oh well. Merry merry and lots of nog to you all!

I is a Professional!

So I'm not just a little psych whore, giving away my therapeutic skills to anyone for free, I am now a PAID MFT Intern on the weekends. W00T!

Did my first weekend shift at Juvenile Hall and survived. Did have a couple of crises to negotiate, but I survived and so did the clients. Whew!

So as of last Friday afternoon I no longer have a therapy portion to my doctoral practicum, but as soon as school is out next summer I'll pick up a counseling practicum and work with strictly couples and families. I'm looking forward to that, particularly because the supervisor is one of my very favorite teachers, who taught both at the university where I took some undergrad psych classes and now teaches at my current university. His Family Therapy class is what convinced me that I wanted to embark on this whole process! I did a masters practicum at this site and loved it (some might recall that my supervisor there died just as I was leaving... so I do have qualms about how it will be to go back without her there). But the kicker is that he is an old school systems therapist and will be doing live feed video supervision. That is just SO hard to find in this day and age! I'm scared shitless of the work (couples and families overwhelm me, and I haven't had good experiences with the latter) but seeing as I am an MFt and not just any old t, I really need to get past that. LOL! I have worked with all of two couples and both cases seemed to go really well, so I don't know why I'm so nervous. Maybe because of all the horror stories I've heard from other people. Anyway, I'll be learning from a master and he'll be there to hold my hand, just as I've always thought supervision should be, so maybe I'll live through it. =)

In the mean time my MFT supervisor was quick to remind me that I can VOLUNTEER as many hours as I want doing therapy at the Hall, I just can't use them for my doctorate and I can't get paid for any but the hours I contracted for on the weekends. Oh joy... think I should sign up for full time? Sheesh! I swear to you, these places will suck you DRY if you don't stay firm with them. At least all the hours I do for pay will count as experience on my CV and toward being paid more as I go along. Oh yeah... they count toward my MFT license if I opt to do that in the end.

So my house isn't getting decorated very fast and my holiday cards are still unprinted, but at least I have already covered our rent hike for January!

Off to bed so I can go back to whoring bright and early tomorrow...

Breaking Away

Well damn! I am being offered hours upon hours of work at my practicum over the break. This is wonderful with respect to packing in the numbers, but people, I want a BREAK on my break, for heaven sakes! This coming week I will have to set very stern boundaries to keep from working every single day except Christmas. I want to just step back up to 3 days a week, not five. But all in all it's good and will make up for the hours I'm going to lose when I drop the counseling part of my practicum.

Today though... today is for decorating, cleaning the fish tank and baking cookies! Going to hang with a couple of friends from school this afternoon too, since one of them has a relative up here she's visiting.

So far have shopped for my sweet love, both my sisters, my niece, one brother in law and my mother. It's bothersome that when I finally have time to shop I discover it's nearly Christmas and the shipping everywhere is going to be tight. Damn! I will NOT do my holiday shopping when I'm trying to go to school too. Got to improve on foraging gifts all year so there isn't such a crush.

I did write my annual year end poem over the weekend though, and now I just have to print it and send it out. Nice as e-cards are, I am a firm believer in putting hand written treats in people's snail mail boxes.

Place to Spend Break

I plan to spend time reading here over break. How totally cool...

Sorry, try that link again and see if it works now!

Happy Birthday to ME!!!

Well I am now not just 40, I am officially Forty Something. Sigh. I'm on the fat side for me, too, but I wanted CAKE today, so screw it, I'll just get a little fatter between now and the end of the year. Being food conscious over the holidays is just no fun, you know? (she rationalizes madly)

Had a nice day though, and managed to finish a report that has been plaguing me for three weeks now, so I am doubly happy! My mother in law gave me a gift card to my favorite coffee place, so I'm in 7th heaven anticipating being able to indulge my caffeine monkey in style without feeling guilty. Scored some other very nice stuff too, which makes the fat and the age a little easier to bear. LOL!

Come January I will be a good girl and get back on track with my eating and exercising habits. It's been hard to eat right and exercise as a grad student. Some people really rely on that to keep them sane, but that's just not who I am... the comfort food and caffeine are what keeps me sane and exercise for the sake of exercise has always made me grumpy. Whatever, it'll all work out in the end!

How Did it Get So Late So Soon?

``How did it get so late so soon?

  It's night before it's afternoon.

  December is here before it's June.

  My goodness how the time has flewn.

  How did it get so late so soon?''

                        -Dr. Seuss

It’s OVER!!! I’m free until the 7^th of January. W00T! Can’t wait until the rest of you are done too and we are all un-students for a few weeks. Well, as best one can be with dissertations, practica, internships, research projects and so forth.

The party went well and I had a blast. Who knew we had so many people with amazing voices in our class? I love to sing, and especially love harmonizing, and we did lots of that to all kinds of different music. Even sang two mantras in Sanskrit, which was a trip! We had so much fun we’re considering starting a singing group during our dinner break. Keep your eyes out for the Singing Psychos at the Boston APA seminar. Heh heh…

Not so confident this term about how I did in my classes. I feel ok, but I’m unsure because we had two clinical classes and they’re harder to gauge. Next term I have both projective and neuropsych testing, so it’s going to be a whopper of a term. Must get on the book order ASAP. I’m looking forward to it though, and when I’m done I’ll be able to do any kind of testing that comes up in my practicum Yea!!!

Speaking of the old workplace, the program manager called to say he managed to get the powers that be (well most of them, it’s not a done deal yet) to let me do paid weekend shifts after all. I was going to just call him back and decline, since I knew it violated APAs stupid assed “conflict of interest” directives, but on a whim I ran it by my adviser and the program chair. I am SOOOO glad I did! They gave me some options to try and I passed those along to my program manager. The agency is not set up to offer stipends, so I doubt that will happen. It would be ideal because then I could use all the hours for my practicum. As it is I will probably just drop the counseling portion of my practicum, which was down to 4-5 hours per week anyway, and do all my counseling work as just an MFT Intern. Thankfully the BBS has no worries about either trainees or Interns being paid, so I can accrue hours, experience AND money all at once. Joy! Our rent goes up as of the first of the year, and this should offset that perfectly. Great timing!!

Post Script: Am I the only one having problems with Blogger Dashboard? I’m wondering if it’s the last couple of updates to Firefox causing the problem, but when I try to use the post function it’s all fucked up. Lost this whole post, which is always a joy. It autosaved two versions, but they were very early on. Gah!!

Badder and Badder by the Minute!

So my school is having an "ethically themed" holiday party this Friday (the one I volunteered to help with) and I was struggling to come up with a dish to bring. I'm half Irish and half English and have no connection much to speak of with my heritage. Mom did make a nice Shepherd's pie, but 1) I can't do it as well as she does, and 2) I have to cook it today and serve it Friday, so that's not the best choice. My cohort is supposed to bring meat or veggie main courses, but the best I could do were some salami wrapped cream cheese sticks that don't look very Irish to me, but they were on an Irish cooking site. Easy, quick, contains meat and it's a lunch party anyway, so who wants to eat heavy dishes at noon?

But then.... we always have rum balls at Christmas in my family. Why not just use Irish whiskey, I thought? So I did, I made kick ass Irish whiskey balls rolled in more whiskey and dipped in a mixture of coconut and powdered sugar. Oh YUM! They absolutely rock! Unfortunately I didn't have the coconut when I made them Sunday, so I got that last night and coated them this morning. Had to try one to see how they were going to be, of course. There is nothing like a nice, potent whiskey ball at 10 am on a day when you have shitloads of mental work to do under tight deadlines. Hee!!!

Now I'm in a great mood, but I'm having some trouble concentrating on Maria, who is struggling painfully through my Cultural vignette. I'm supposed to assess her and provide a treatment plan as my final for that class. Shoot. Think she'd be all better if I just offered her a whiskey ball?

Last Week Countdown!

One week of school left and all the final papers, presentations and so on we all know that entails. So what am I doing? Redecorating my blog, of course! Blame that Tam, she's such a bad influence, but I saw her new winter theme and gave in to my decorating urge. It's STRONG this year and I want to start NOW!!!

I volunteered (another intelligent use of my precious time) to help with setup and take-down on our PsyD holiday party and I'll be decorating on Friday when I should be studying my little heart out for my last psychopharm class. Gah... I am SO done with school!

When is everyone else off for the winter break?