It happened about two and a half weeks ago. Rascal was jumping up into my truck. Her leash caught on the door, pulling my dog to the ground. She looked surprised, but jumped again, up to her spot on the passenger's seat. I forgot where We went and what We did, but it was routine.
I remember that I was getting ready to take my eldest grandson back to New Britain, where I noticed that my dog was holding her back left leg up. I pointed it out to Chris. She must have a muscle pull. It will heal.
If it doesn't heal within a few days, I will take her to her vets for an exam.
Several days later, Rascal spent the entire day laying on her bed, not moving.
I called the vets and got an appointment for the next day. My next door neighbor offered to help get the dog to the doctor's office. We suspected she might have a spinal injury. I didn't want to move her spine if it wasn't necessary...hense the bed was used as a stretcher.
Rascal was carried on her bed to the back of the truck. At the vet's, the vet nurse came outside to help me carry the dog bed with patient, into the exam room. Rascal raised her head up, but made no move to get up on her legs.
She looked around and recognized the room. This is where they "do" things to her....like give her shots or take her temperature. She does not like going to the vets. Little dog got up on three legs and headed for the front door on her own....proving that she was not paralyzed and that she did have something wrong with her back left leg.
It is easy to catch a dog that is hobbling on three legs. She got x-rayed and examined. She got pain pills and an antibiotic. She got sent home for observation. The dog bed was stored in the back of the truck and Rascal was carried to her travel spot on the passenger side of the cab.
I think Rascal likes being a patient. If she lies still, her hock (heel) doesn't hurt. She gets medicine and special food. I put her food dish out of reach, forcing her to get up to get the food. She gets carried outside to go to the bathroom. The weather is nice, so she lies on the grass like a queen. She doesn't seem to be in pain. She isn't listless. She just refuses to move. She has a good appetite, watches what is going on. She follows activity with her eyes, so she is alert.
Later in the day, she gets a good meal. She is getting fat. She is coaxed to get up on her three legs and walked around a little, so she will move her bowels. She does so. Once, she indicated she wanted a walk around the block. We walked. I watched that back leg. There is still something wrong with it, but she can put it down on the ground and walk on all fours. On another time, We went to the nursery to buy a plant. I thought Rascal would want to ride in the wagon that is provided for heavy plants. No. Not her. She wanted to get down and walk around to sniff all those good earth smells.
Back home, she reverted to laying around all day. I am calling the vets back...again...

Rascal is my dog. She's soft like a rabbit. Her fur is white with a ginger saddle on her back and a ginger colored "hat" on her head. She is part Pomeranian and part chihuahua. Both parts bark a lot. There are other breeds in there, too, but who knows what they are. She carries her tail over her back. Rascal is healthy, sturdy, bright and alert. She weighs about 20 pounds. She is loving and tries hard to please...when it pleases her to do so. She catches on changes of routine quickly.
The other day, Rascal was jumping to get into my truck. Her leash caught on the door and pulled her back. She looked surprised, but jumped up again and sat on her seat. Rascal loves to ride in the truck. She watches out the window and barks at anyone who comes too close to the truck. She barks at dogs and cats on the street. She has a wonderful time riding around. If I've been out for breakfast, she gets part of my breakfast. There are times when I didn't want to go out for breakfast, but there is Rascal at the door, waiting for her share. Of course We went out.
The day she was pulled back by her lease, I noticed she was limping. She held her back left leg up. Oh well...just a bump. She'll be all right in a day or two. Muscle heals by itself. By day three, she wouldn't walk at all. She sat on her haunches, looking forlorn. She went all day without eating or drinking or relieving herself. Perhaps I had misjudged her injury. Could she have had a spinal injury? Rascal lay on her bed all day. I put a blanket over her and called the vet. The next morning, my neighbor helped me to move Rascal...bed and all. into the truck. If she had a spinal injury, I didn't want to make it worse. We were careful to not move her spine.
The vet nurse met us at the door and helped me bring Rascal into the examination room. Every one was so careful of her....because of her back.
Then Rascal looked around. She knew this place. It is the animal hospital. Rascal doesn't like it at the animal hospital because every time she comes here, they do something to her. She gets shots. Rascal got up from her bed/stretcher and hobbled to the front door on three legs. Oh Ho! My little dog can walk after all. She didn't walk before, because it hurt her to move the injured leg...not because of a spinal injury.
The good doctor x-rayed her and saw no fractures or compression. Manipulated the leg and found she had injured her back left hock (heel). The little faker got pain pills and antibiotics to take home. Her days of being babied are over...She is correctly named. She is a little rascal.

My daughter has arranged to work from home for three days a week. She goes into the office on the other two days. I think this is a great idea. When I was in loss control, I spent very little time in the office. Mostly I was on the road, visiting our accounts. Once I started a vacation, but had a report that wasn't finished. To get it in on time, I took my computer on vacation with me. The report was sent in on time via the computer hookup to the phone line...next to the pool. I loved that job. I could have worked there for another decade, but that's another story. Working from home is a "green" decision. It is also a financial decision...an energy decision. Companies that make arrangements for their employees to work from home save a lot of money. They can get by with fewer desks, less overhead running the office. The employee is always available through the computer or telephone. Working from home means recouping commuter time, money spent on car and gas. Working from home reduces air pollution. The employee is more mentally focused, less stressed. Working from home means flexibility. Instead of chatting with other employees, the employee can throw a load of clothes into the washer while waiting for something to download. The dangers are misuse of time if the employee isn't disciplined. I remember my boss said, about being an outside rep, "We give our reps a lot of rope to maneuver with. Some of the reps have hung themselves with it. They got fired." Fortunately, I and my daughters are self starters. We are disciplined about time management. Telecommuting works. The other two days in the office is time used for face to face reporting, for building relationships with colleagues, for catching up on things including office politics and gossip and for showing face to make sure that you are not forgotten

There are lots of stores around town, to shop for clothes, if the shopper is a teenager....age 30 is tops. There are very few stores around town for shopping, if the female body is mature, or over weight, or out of shape. Years of working out at the gym and jogging have kept my weight down. However, there is little I can do about aging. The alternative is dying. I think I will keep on living, thank you.
That leaves the problem of finding clothes that fit, are comfortable and don't make the lady look as if she is following teen trends...yuck!
One way I've solve the problem is to sew my own. I love to sew. The sewing scene has changed, though. The fabric stores now carry a lot of supplies for "crafts"...read...clutter. No thank you. I don't need more things around the house to dust...even if they are very clever.
Among the artsy-crafty items, good fabric can be found, but less of it when I did a lot of sewing. My time allocation has also changed. I do less sewing and do more alterations. It's faster than sewing from a pattern. My dressmaker's form got rusty . It got thrown out. I went looking for a new one and went into sticker shock. 500 dollars? Do you know how many dresses, blouses and slacks I would have to sew to recoup 500 dollars? A lot of clothes to justify that expenditure. Instead, I look elsewhere.
It now is necessary for me to shop in upscale stores to find clothes that fit and are flattering on me...read...expensive. Talbot Knits is one of my favorites. I treat myself to one new item every spring and fall. I promise to throw out or donate, at least two outfits for every one outfit that I buy. In that way, some order is restored to my tiny closet. There was an ad on TV for Talbot's today. I admired the clothes, the models (thinner than I am, but they are thinner than most women.) One outfit consisted on slacks cut off at the calf. It is an updated version of pedal pushers...what Lucy used to wear on black and white television. I don't have anything like that. Perhaps these cut offs will be my next purchase. They will replace two pairs of shorts. A woman with grey hair shouldn't be wearing shorts anyways.
I am a "hands on" person. I paint the walls, dig in the garden, wash the car. Those lovely clothes from Talbot's sit in the closet. I spend most of my time in stretch jeans and some old pullover. The shoes on my feet are scuffed up old sneakers. They are practical clothes for work. Yet I continue to follow fashion and buy a few pieces. Some event may come along that requires me to look good.

I was listening to my favorite radio program the other night instead of falling asleep as I should have. The topic was over population. The people calling in were irate! They defended their positions that they can have as many children as they can afford. They spouted religious dogma and attacked the host for suggesting that religion had any thing to do with the problem. The host was interviewing an author. I forgot his name. The author said while the program was on, He was being bombarded with hundreds of e-mails on his website. About 90 % of the e-mails agreed with him. Over population of our planet is a very serious problem.
This reminded me of an experiment I learned about in college. Researchers set up an ideal environment for mice. It was healthy. Food was plentiful. They let the mice breed indiscriminately. They kept the environment clean and disease free. There was a mice explosion in the contained environment.
Mice behavior changed because of the stress of over crowding. Homosexuality was identified. Withdrawn behavior was identified. Females had spontaneous abortions or absorbed their fetuses . Aggressive behavior was shown. Abnormal mice behavior was seen...call it mice mental problems. Eventually, the mice population stabilized and last I checked, was remaining at the same level.
I think this experiment is a good indicator of why We have social problems in the human population. We are way too over crowded. We are stressed. I know that I am.
Even if We stabilize out numbers, as the mice did, We have another problem...using up natural resources and degrading our environment. There is no science researcher dropping food into our world and cleaning up the pollution.
h I suppose We can sustain a growing population, but at the cost of a lower standard of living. Do you want to live without your car? Central heating? Grocery stores? Do you want to have to patrol your property to keep your neighbors from stealing the produce from your garden? Would you shoot someone who wants the peaches on your peach tree?
The author (not the one being interviewed on the radio)...the author Jard Diamond wrote a book, "Collapse". It made the New York Times bestseller list. The topic is how societies choose to fail or succeed. In this well researched report, Mr. Diamond discusses how societies failed as they used up their natural resources. He gives ancient and modern examples. After the society descended to a desperate situation, the citizens had to disperse, die of disease or starvation , or resort to cannibalism. Mr. Diamond gave example after example. In historic terms, excess population could choose to migrate to another island, or geographical location to start again. We now live on a world where all the islands are populated. If We degrade the earth, there is no place else to migrate to. Only the four horsemen are left as an alternative. I think this explains a lot of the social ills We now endure. Very few societies succeeded with this challenge. They did so by limiting their numbers so as to not stress their environment beyond its ability to recover.
The world now has so many people that I don't think such large numbers have the ability to cooperate with each other....to agree to solve global problems. I don't think our national leaders have the guts to put the welfare of the earth and its people above their own political agendas. For people to solve this problem, they need to be aware that there is a problem. They need to be educated. They need to have evolved beyond the "I got mine. To hell with you" mentality that I see on every level of society. We need education and birth control. It should be all right to live a life without children. Making a contribution to our world through art or science is a good legacy. The more people, the cheaper human life is. Don't you want each and every single person to be treasured and welcomed to our world? We can do that with smaller numbers.
I see animals, fish and birds living in the survival mode. When migrating birds come up north, the first thing the males do is stake out territory. They sing for territoy. They need that territory to assure a food supply. They need the food supply to attract a female to raise a new brood of birds. The males can be fierce to gain that territy. Weak males don't breed.
My guess is that We haven't evolved out of that survival mode. Countries invade other countries to gain territory and natural resources. We're the same as the birds, fish and animals.
I am not hopeful.
When I was little, each succeeding generation was healthier and better educated that the generation before. My parents lived longer than their parents . I am living healthy and longer than my parents.
My grandparent's education stopped at the 8th grade level. My parents finished high school and some education beyond that. I finished my bachelor's and master's degrees and went back for more. I had to, because the press of numbers became competition for a job. My children did not finish college. My grandchildren quit high school. Is my generation some sort of peak...Are we not on a downward slide?