Some Good News
Greetings everyone!
The latest on Tinkerbelle is really good. As of last Thursday her hematocrit was 31.5%, up from 22% the week before. That’s a big increase, and she is clearly feeling better. Normal range for hematocrit in dogs is 37% — 60%, and we hope she has managed to get into the normal range next week when we test her again.
At that point, we can start to ponder tapering off the prednisone. It’s a pretty nasty drug to be on for prolonged periods, and we are seeing some muscle loss at this point. In addition it is making her very hungry, but despite her voracious appetite she has lost a bit of weight. So we want to try to take her off it ASAP. That may not be possible, however, as we don’t know the root cause of her anemia. If she has to keep taking it, we want to get her down to the lowest dose needed to keep her anemia at bay. We’ll be working with the vet to manage those issues.
Still, the improved hematocrit is a big win, and it shows.
In other good news, our architect submitted the plans for our kitchen reno to the District. He was informed that the processing time for a new build is currently running at 12–16 weeks. Our job is much smaller than any new build and we’re hopeful that our approval time will be shorter, but only time will tell. He will keep us posted on things, and assuming they don’t need any more documents, they’ll ask for 50% of the building permit fee in a few days.
Looking forward to seeing real progress later this year.
And in still more good news, I managed to fix a problem with my mother’s phone from 2000 miles away. Remote tech support is always a challenge, as you might suspect. I have taken steps to make working on her computer easier despite the distance, but helping with her phone is not simple as I cannot see the device itself while we’re trying to fix things. Fortunately, we managed it this time.
For the curious, the gmail app on her Android phone was stopping regularly when it attempted to fetch mail from her non-google email account. None of the obvious things made any difference (and neither did a number of non-obvious fix attempts) so we logged into the webmail UI for her email account and deleted a bunch of spam and trash there. At that point the phone fetched the email properly and everything started working.
Best guess: a badly formatted spam was causing the gmail app to cough up its skull. That really shouldn’t happen, and thankfully it seems rare, but with Google being who they are, I have no idea how to submit a bug report. And of course the email(s) that caused the problem are long gone now, so I can’t even reproduce it.
Fingers crossed that it doesn’t happen again, but if it does I am sure mom will let me know.
Sadly, not everything was good news this week. There were some items on (or towards) the opposite end of the spectrum.
The first is the passing of James Earl Jones. The voice of Darth Vader — he defined that character despite never being on screen himself — will definitely be missed. We watched The Hunt for Red October the night we learned he had died, just to see the man in person. He was a great actor, and (I suspect) a warm and interesting person as well. He will be missed.
On a more personal — and less serious — note, I want to complain about a self induced sleep injury. About a week ago I woke up with a sore spot on my chest: right side, towards the bottom of my ribs. It had been fine when I went to sleep, but it hurt when I stretched the next morning.
It was clearly a problem with a muscle or tendon in the ribs. Sitting still it didn’t hurt, but certain twists and direct pressure on it were painful.
And again, it happened overnight. How on earth did I hurt myself in an obscure location while sleeping?!?
Regardless, it’s on the mend. It’s not yet fully healed, but it’s much less of an issue than it was. If only I could get the plantar fasciitis in my left foot to heal as well.
I hate getting old!
OK, enough of that.
There’s not much else happening right now. Overall, life is good. We’re heading into the second half of the month, which means the monthly email takes over my life for a while. I’ll be busy as a result, but I enjoy it.
Take care!