Continuing On...

I got back to Bakersfield from Oregon around 10 pm. I dropped Wil and Evan off at Dean's. Carli and Evan had been roommates for about two months or so and during our move they decided to move also. Mostly because Wil would now need a place to stay, so they were all going to move into a little two bedroom house downtown. Carli had moved to Dean's until they would be moving into the new place in one week. Evan would be staying at his mom's and Wil would be crashing at his girlfriend's parent's house. As I was backing out of the driveway after dropping the boys off Wil looked back and gave a little wave. I cried all the way to the hotel.

I never thought I'd be like that, in fact I always thought it was so hilarious when my mother-in-law visited us or vice versa and started tearing up as she or we left. Now I was doing the same thing.

I got to the hotel Bill was staying at and was immediately struck by the unique odor that the suite had. I'm not sure quite how to describe it but he said it was like "somebody died there". It wasn't too bad, I guess. Well, okay it was. There was fake wood peeling off of the cabinets and when I saw the two burner stove I asked Bill, "This is from nineteen-sixty-when?"

I was okay with it all but he couldn't take it and we moved out the next day. We went to my favorite hotel chain, the Residence Inns by Marriott. We got the government rate thanks to my husband and the room was a humongous improvement over the previous place.

That was one of the most stressful weeks for me. Bill had to go to court every day and I waited at the room. Monday was jury selection. Tuesday morning they selected the two alternates and the trial began in the afternoon. We had meetings with the attorney after hours to discuss strategies. I was a nervous wreck.

Since all my "good" clothes were packed away and in storage I had to go shopping for court appropriate wear. I had a $35 gift card from last year and used that to buy some nice pants. I ended up paying $8 for them. Then I went to TJ Maxx and got a cashmere sweater for $39 and some boot/shoes for $29. I was glad I didn't really spend too much money yet managed to get a nice ensemble.

I did get called in and sat outside the court room on Tuesday afternoon but never got called inside. In fact I was sitting there at 4:30 when all the jurors came filing out and I knew I would not be called that day!

As it worked out I went in Thursday morning and was the second on the stand. I felt like I didn't do all that great because when I'm nervous my brain has a tendency to shut down. But my husband said I did just fine and our attorney thought I did well too. I was just glad to get it over with.

I had called the kennel before leaving for court to have the dogs bathed. I picked them up after court and brought them to the hotel. I had to pay $112 for them to spend the one night with us but at least I wouldn't be travelling for 10 - 12 hours with stinky dogs.

The next morning I loaded everybody up, kissed my husband goodbye, picked up the cats at the kennel on the way out and was on I-5 by 8:30 am. I stopped every 2 to three hours to walk the dogs and/or get gas. The weather was clear and traffic was light. I got into Roseburg at just before 7 pm.

I let the dogs out into the back yard then fixed a litter box for the cats. Kneadermeier hadn't been able to wait quite that long and had peed in her carrier. Too late for her. Then I had to feed everybody. When the animals were all taken care of I had to fix my bedroom. The furniture was in there but nothing was made up.

I had to put the bed frame together, which wasn't hard. The bottom box mattress was easy. But then I had to wrestle the queen size Tempurpedic onto the top. Not easy to do by yourself. I almost gave up but finally managed to get it done, found some sheets, and made up the bed.

Finally it was time to see what was in the kitchen for myself. Crackers, cheese, and a bottle of wine. It didn't get much better than that.

I almost felt like I was... home.

Gus's Surgery And More

During the week right before the birthday party we had noticed a rather large and hard lump on Gus's throat. We brought Gus in to the vet right away and she took a needle biopsy. That turned out to be inconclusive so we scheduled surgery for him on the Thursday after we got back from our quickie Oregon trip.

Before we brought him in we found another lump behind his elbow. I told the vet about that and she said it was more likely a "fatty tumor" but she would check it out. Gus was also going to have his teeth cleaned while he was out.

Here he is back from the vet, resting.

When I picked Gus up the vet told me the armpit lump was indeed a lipoma and no cause for concern. The problem was the neck lump. She said it worried her because she'd never really seen anything quite like it. We would find out for sure when the results came back from the lab on Monday.

Monday we got the news: Gus's lump was not cancerous. Basically it was a deep hemotoma that had become encapsulated. Here is a description from Wikipedia:

Hematomas can occur within a muscle. Some hematomas form into hard masses under the surface of the skin. This is caused by the limitation of the blood to a subcutaneous or intramuscular tissue space isolated by fascial planes. This is a key anatomical feature that prevents such injuries from causing massive blood loss. In most cases the sac of blood or hematoma eventually dissolves; however, in some cases they may continue to grow or show no change. If the sac of blood does not disappear, then it may need to be surgically removed.

So that was a big WHEW!

Also on Monday was my husband's mediation for his bus accident from about two years ago. That did not go so well. That meant a trial would start the next Monday. That also meant I would probably have to testify (as to the changes in his joie de vivre, etc).

On Tuesday morning promptly at 8am the movers came to get all the big stuff and stuff we wouldn't be needing immediately.

Flora, the pony, got her last trimming from her farrier. (She was later moved to the stables where she will be trimmed by Star's farrier if they're still there when that time comes.)

Wednesday we picked up the U-Haul truck so we could start packing our immediate needs stuff. The plan was that Wil and I would drive to Oregon on Saturday (hubby couldn't go because of meetings with the attorney), take possession of the rental, unload, spend the night at a hotel and return home on Sunday. While I was waiting for paperwork I got to talking with the U-haul guy and mentioned how I was a little stressed out because the guy that was going to buy the cow and this year's calf backed out and now I didn't have a place for the three cows. He mentioned his sister had some room and he called her. She said I could bring them over and my only requirement was that I pay for hay (no extra board fees). Hooray!

Thursday was Thanksgiving. We were packing and cleaning. I can't even remember but I think we had frozen microwave dinners.

I spent most of Friday bringing the animals to where they had to go. The bull went to my sisters'. The cows to Laura's (2 trips in the two horse trailer). The pony to the stables. The dogs and Kneadermeier to the kennels. Ollie had disappeared and we couldn't find her anywhere. I had to buy hay and bring some to my sister and some to Laura. Then the final cleaning of the now empty house. My vacuum cleaner broke at the most inopportune time so I went next door to borrow theirs.

Next door neighbor Dean and his family were at Disneyland so my husband and I spent the night at their house. We woke at four o'clock and by four thirty Wil, his friend Evan, and I were on the road to Oregon.

We hit some snow in the Lake Shasta area and again over the Siskiyou Summit but fortunately it wasn't bad enough to have to put chains on. However as we were coming down from the Siskiyou Summit the cars on the other side were all lined up putting their chains on. I guess we timed that one perfectly.

When we reached Grants Pass I thought I'd better call the rental office to see how long they stayed open. The girl said they closed at 4pm. I was a good hour away and it was already 3:20 by then. There was no way we were going to make it and I needed the key! She was so nice. She gave me her cell number and told me to call when we got to town and she'd come back to the office to give me the key.

Long story short: We got the key and got everything unloaded. We spent the night at a hotel. We turned in the U-haul the next morning and headed back to Bakersfield. The roads over the summits were clear though there was more snow on the sides. It was smooth sailing until we got past Stockton, then it was stop and go for miles and miles and miles.

I had forgotten about the holiday traffic. I remember when Clyde came home my husband hit the exact same scenario near Las Vegas. In fact it was Thanksgiving weekend four years ago. After we finally got home I figured I drove 24 hours in the last 48 hours!

Time to hit the hay. By this time my husband had moved to a hotel and that's where I drove to when I got back to town.

Oh yeah, my husband managed to snatch Ollie up the next day and took her to the kennels.

...more tomorrow!

Finding The Rental

The day after our granddaughters' birthday my husband and I set out for Oregon. Our main objective on this quick trip was to find a place to rent. I had previously filled out an application so I knew we were pre-approved for just about anything they had that accepted pets.

And wanting to be totally organized about everything I went online and checked out the entire listings from the company recommended to us by our new Oregon realtor. So upon our arrival in Oregon I had a list of about 20 places. That evening I took out a map and mapped out where the rentals were so we wouldn't be driving back and forth, covering the same ground unnecessarily.

The next day we started driving by the rental properties from the north to the south. The list of 20 was cut to a list of 8. Coming from a place where all properties and yards are fenced it was surprising how many we looked at that did not have fenced yards.

Then we took a second look at the 8 places. That cut the list to about 4. We called the realty/rental office and I spoke with one of the girls about our short list. She agreed to meet us the next morning at the place that was at the top of our list.

It was a nice home on the Umpqua River. We both really liked this place but once we got inside we realized there may be some problems. The realtor said this was the first time they were renting this property so they had no history with the landlord. Once we got inside we noticed that even though it was supposedly available "now" there were still clothes in the closet and the garage was jam packed full of stuff. Also there were hard wood floors everywhere. Maybe not such a good idea with three large dogs. Plus the yard was only fenced on two sides so we would have had to rig something up to keep them enclosed.

We thought maybe we'd go look at our second choice place, more in town and on a regular sized lot (small to us) but with a totally fenced yard. The realtor got the key and met us there. It turned out to be an older but nicely kept three bedroom, two and half bath. It had an indoor laundry room and an attached garage. The backyard fence looked to be secure so we decided to go with this one. Another plus was that it was $300 less/month than the other place.

We went back to the office to sign to hold the property and give our deposit. We didn't get the key right then because we wouldn't be taking possession for another week.

The next morning we got a post office box and then swung by the Palm Harbor manufactured homes model center and walked through their on-site models. After that we decided to head on home since neither one of us was really feeling up to par then.

We got home around 10pm and we were ready to get off the road. But at least we had accomplished our main goals; to get a rental lined up and get a P.O. Box.

I'll do pictures of the rental later.

Back To Blogging

Things have begun to settle down a bit so I thought I might try and catch up on my blogging.

My granddaughter's birthday was November 15th and we had a little party at our house.

Here she is with the next door neighbor's daughter and my son's girlfriend. She seems to be eying the gifts and I can just imagine her thinking, "Enough of the pictures already! Let's get on with it!"

So we got on to the opening of the presents. She got the jewelry she is wearing along with this lovely makeup kit.

And the requisite clothing from Grandma.

When it came time for the cake she suddenly became embarrassed when we started singing "Happy Birthday". Her mom, on the right, was trying hard not to laugh out loud.

But with Grampa's and Mom's help the candles were blown out and everyone enjoyed a piece of cake.

Being three is so tough!