Poor little Oliver.
My smallest cavy (a.k.a. guinea pig), Oliver, has been a bit ill. Baxter, his much larger brother and roommate, has successfully avoided this ailment.
"Oscar" — that's his nickname — first exhibited symptoms last Friday. I notified the piggies it was time for a treat; usually Oliver starts whooping, running about, standing up and generally expressing excitement. [Baxter is a tad more sedate.]
However, this time the little guy remained in the igloo, and even declined the cherry tomatoes, which he loves, even when I put it right under his nose. He turned away. Well, that's an obvious sign of sickness.
I removed him from the house and discovered he was shivering. He body also had that limp feeling a sick piggie gets. Scary.
I wrapped him in a towel and tried to warm him up. His doctor couldn't see him until Monday... I should rephrase. He and Baxter hadn't met their doctor yet; since they arrived here in September of 2005, they never needed to.
Dr. D. couldn't meet and examine them until Monday, and good exotic pet vets are hard to come by, so I phoned my sister, who was upstairs in bed due to an unrelated malady.
She came as fast as she could, frantic, and immediately set about finding the name of the antibiotic we'd need to get at a pet store. Knowing the proper ingredient is essential as there seems to be a lack of medicine and supplies of the treatment type marketed specifically for guinea pigs. I've always found that annoying as hell. Luckily, we're in the future, so this sort of thing can be investigated online. I'm digressing.
While researching, she began questioning me, and almost launched into a lecture, but then cut herself off with, "Oh, you've never had two GPs [at the same time in the same house] before!"
Now, I know you have to separate a sick GP from the others, however, I didn't have a particular location or 'sick bay' to put little Oliver in.
She emptied out a case of beer, lined it with a towel, and arranged one of our space heaters to face him. I suggested putting him on the hospital bed — the mattress covering conducts heat.
- unfinished entry due to fatigue, followed by the upgrade to PHP5, which caused some brief downtime [05/16/2008 1:38PM] -
Thursday May 15 2008: it echoes to this day...
resonate?
I've been poisoned by Starbucks!
Mom picked up some Coffee Frappuccino at the store yesterday. [Note: I prefer Mocha, and it's possible I've never tasted this flavour before.]
I drank one — maybe around noon? — didn't notice anything unusual, then drank another right before it was time to pick my sister up from work. As the drive went on, I began to feel like tossing my cookies, so to speak. Mags, who came along for the ride, might have noticed I was a bit quieter than usual, but probably chalked it up to any one of my various other ailments.
After picking up H.R.H. The Queen, we stopped at Mags's apartment so she could grab something. While waiting in the car, I noted my queasy feeling, and QB said I was a funny colour.
As soon as I got back to the house, I took some Alka Seltzer, which made me feel much better. I listed the things I ingested, looking for a culprit. The Frappuccino was briefly a suspect; I eliminated it due to a lack of evidence. This would change.
Cut to today. I grabbed the third bottle of coffee drink from the fridge, fully intending to relish every swig. The flavour seemed kind of off, but silly decaffeinated me blamed that on the minty toothpaste & mouthwash taste still lingering in my mouth. Idiot.
After polishing off about ¼ of the 9.[whatever] oz. beverage, my stomach started to turn. It was then that I noticed a ring around the inside of the bottle's neck, located at the highest point of where the liquid had been. The ring, the taste, both evocative of sour milk. Good god, is this stuff spoiled? YUCKO! HAVE I BEEN DRINKING CURDLED MILK?!
I looked at the expiration, oh, excuse me, the "best taste by" date: MAY 05 08.
Damn it. And we've been unable to locate the receipt. Figures.
Thursday May 15 2008: it echoes to this day...
resonate?
I have photography to do.
This place needs cleaning up. It has needed clean-up for quite some time. My problem is largely based on not wanting to use an old photograph for a new layout. Since I haven't gone on one of my amateur photo shoots lately, I have nothing to base the visuals on.
That means you, my poor visitor who has somehow stumbled upon this e-log, you have to view this crazy ass "design" from... ??? Damn, web.archive.org isn't working at the moment, so I'm not sure when I threw this baby up. (Ha, "threw this baby up", that ought to pull in some interesting search results!)
So, my mission, and I've chosen to accept it, is to take some photographs and look at existing pictures — just in case an 'oldie' is worth anybody's time.
Thursday May 08 2008: it echoes to this day...
resonate?
dot org - the ring
The dot org webring (for personal .org domains) recently got a makeover to go with it's new backend. (I finally moved dot org off of RingSurf's servers.) It isn't super-fabulous, but it is new, and that's something...
For the record, the .nu waves webring (for personal .nu domain owners & hostees) will undergo a similar transition.
Friday May 02 2008: it echoes to this day...
resonate?