today, all the cigarettes are floating, waterlogged, in the ashtrays outside the building. we stand huddled under the eaves by the door, smoking, keeping dry. and then we sprint out to the drowned ashtray and throw our butts hissing into the ashy rainwater.
then it's back up the stairs, ass in my chair for another six hours.
the greyness of the morning made for a groggy, half-hearted wakeup call. i did not want to go work out with maria. i did not want to take our (once more) ailing little gunther to the vet, just to hear bad news about his recurring kitten diarrhea and then be charged for it.
panic panic panic. buyers remorse and fear.
oh, but there are no refunds with a personal trainer. so helen dropped me off at maria's, and she took gunther (with shiloh for size comparison) to get checked out. i immediately confessed to maria that i did not want to be there, that i was on the verge of a panic attack, and i really wished i was still in bed.
her solution? cardio, of course. lots and lots of cardio. i even got to punch and kick the shit out of the punching bag for awhile. "this can be anyone you want it to be. just hit it," maria instructed me. and so i punched and kicked at the looming dread of a panic attack not quite realized.
the attack never came.
the verdict on gunnie is a bufuddled veterinarian. for a 12 week old kitten, he is clearly way too small, but no one knows why. no worms, no bacteria. the vet put gunnie on an antibiotic to help with the diarrhea, and wants to do blood tests. his fear is that gunnie has a shunt in his digestive tract which is misrouting food to his liver or elsewhere. such a defect would mean expensive surgery that we cannot afford.
for now, antibiotics and the hope for solid gunnie poo in the litter box. mister vet assured us that gunnie has a great quality of life. he eats. he plays. he's precocious. he's just a little bird instead of a big and growing kitten like his siblings.
i worry, though. he's such a little bird.
i can't worry. tomorrow is my birthday. and we all know what that means: bananie made it another year!
Posted by bananie at October 25, 2006 1:57 PM | TrackBackHappy happy birthday! You're always so much younger than I think you're going to be...not because you look old or anything (you don't), but how can you be so damn talented and profound and only be...what is it now?....twenty-three?
Happy birthday Bananie!!! Den and I were talking the other day about maybe coming down to Austin for a long weekend one of these days (a friend told us Austin has a burgeoning film industry, which is what Den really wants to be doing)... don't know if/when this would happen, but I'll keep you posted!
Posted by: Heather at October 26, 2006 11:14 AM