I need to sharpen my Axe

It's amazing the amount of space that can be recovered with just a few trips to the dump!!! There's so much room in our basement now, we can park our bikes down there... WOOHOO!!! I spent the better part of two days with a few trips up and down the ladder and I finally managed to finish my new counter. I used all scrap lumber and some other pieces/parts and didn't buy a single new thing. I even used some screws from my Dads collection. Now I have the perfect place to set up my sewing machine and boy do I need to set it up. The downstairs is going to be so nice this winter. We've got two work stations, we're moving the tv down there and the fireplace will be a new feature this year!!! It's just gonna be darn cozy!! On one of our bike trips we rode to the end of Potomac Street. Now for those of you who don't know the area.... Potomac street is only paved just pass the train station, then it's all gravel dirt or mud depending on the recent weather. We cruised it all the way to Bakerton road and back, stopping at the old inlet to the canal along the way. Add to it our trip out to the 340 bridge and we did a whole 4+ miles. Hey that ain't so bad concidering we just started riding again. Oh and If I hear one more person say how they rode the stationary bike at the gym more than 4 miles..... LOL... try it with rocks and bumps and mud and briar's, then get back to me!! We stopped several times during our ride and at one particularly awesome place... (I have to keep it a secret for fear that it be claimed as someone elses secret place), we saw like a 100 or so earthworms mating or doing something in a pooled area of a stream. It was pretty gross at first because I thought they were all dead, but then I got a closer look and they were squirming around one another. Sex in the woods..... what a "novel" idea... LOL!! This really was a beautiful spot and we plan on going there again... with bug spray! We must have passed through some sort of portal to get there because it even made Steve appear innocent and trust me when I say that would take a time portal!!!

Thursday, Steve gets home from work and tells me, "Venus has a big knot on her back" Long story short, she'd been bitten either by a non venomous snake or another cat. Seeing how we've "re homed" every other stray that happened into our live trap, we went with snake. The bite had gotten infected and abscessed. When I got to it, it just oozed this big glob of puss and blood almost causing me to vomit. We cleaned her up (shaved her) disinfected the wound and put some antibiotics on it.... Watched her for a few hours, determined she would be fine until morning and went to bed.

Friday morning Venus and Dash (our most handsome puppy :) ) both had vet appts. We're having all our little critters chipped. When we almost lost Bette to animal control we quickly realized we didn't want to live always wondering what might have happened to a kitty that never returned home. We know that chipping isn't 100% positive that we'll always know if something happened to one of them, but it's better than nothing. There's always the chance they might get picked up by dragons or consumed by flesh eating slugs.

Dash got his chip and his booster shots and was clearly upset that all that wasn't followed by a puppy treat. Then it was Venus's turn..... poor kitty got chipped, vaccinated for leukemia, boosters and a shot of penicillin. Her wound, which is difficult to determine how or what she got it from, looked pretty good, but would still take a few days to heal. I returned them both home and went back out to grocery shop. I got back here just an hour or so later to find Venus suffering a major allergic reaction to one of her shots. She was having difficulty breathing, her ears were bleeding from scratching, there was vomit everywhere and she continued to vomit. I rushed her back to the vet where they gave her another needle... this time benadryl and re hydrated her with some kind of injected saline solution. Poor poor girly..... She slept all the way home and for several hours afterwards. Today she's healing well, over the allergy issue and annoying us to let her back outside!!

All of this animal drama took place on the 9 month anniversary of Blazes departure from this world. I guess the odds are pretty great that there'll always be SOMETHING happening on the 5th of each month, but damn. .... I need a break from animal stress for awhile. Believing we were going to lose Venus just a few weeks after burying two of our other kitties, I was quickly approaching mess status. I'm glad she survived... I'm more than glad.....and after what it cost... she better live a long and happy life. Hopefully she learned a lesson somewhere in all this. Now to find the cat that bit her and move him or her to another planet. Blaze must have enough company wherever he is because he watched over Venus and got her to us in time to heal her injury. Thanks Boy!! It's really turning into a great "end of summer" for us. So many projects completed and so many more on the table.

We've got a few relatively local outings coming up..... a trip to Philly.... a trip to Germany.... gotta go see my Mom...... working on the windows still.... and the usual gettin ready for winter type stuff. That reminds me... I need to sharpen my axe.