As I documented yesterday Elsa’s eating had improved and with it her overall demeanor. When I got home from work at the end of the day she seemed happy and energetic, even jumping up to greet me a bit. I also took her for a short walk, something I have not been able to do all week. However during that walk her poop was pure diarrhea, a sign of things to come.
She did eat more food my girlfriend made last night although significantly less than the night before. We wrote it off to her eating a bunch of food the last 24 hours. She was still acting ok although each time I let her out to pee she also had some diarrhea action which concerned me. The last thing she needs right now is something to dehydrate her as diarrhea can do.
Last night was not good. I took her out twice in the early hours of the morning where the trend continued of doing a number 1 and runny number 2. I decided overnight I was going to use PTO today to stay home with her as I did not like the way things were going. Once I got up in the morning I discovered she also had some accidents in the master closet and in the bedroom. In addition she threw up twice, something she had not done since last Sunday.
I already was going to the vet for her to get more fluid injected under her skin and for them to take more blood work. When I described the events of last night they gave her meds for diarrhea, nausea and yet another special food that I am confident she won’t touch. I have a feeling it is going to be very difficult for me to get her to eat anything right now.
The blood test results from today are going to be very significant. If the numbers swung significantly back towards the bad side since Wednesday it is going to indicate that she is having significant kidney dysfunction which would translate into her ultimate demise. As I have been reading about kidney failure in dogs and the symptoms of it I realized that she may have been having issues for a prolonged period of time. Things that I wrote off to her just slowing down some as she gets older and Elsa being Elsa, like an unwillingness to eat at times, sleeping a bunch, drinking a lot of water and the odd behavior with eating non-food objects obsessively was likely misguided.
She had a full physical including blood work in August and although the kidney related numbers were somewhat elevated they were nowhere close to dangerous levels which is why I have been collecting urine samples for them to analyze several times since then as a precaution.
I can only hope that the numbers today are promising although my gut is telling me that things are not looking good. Compared to my other dogs I have owned Elsa has always been the most care free with very few health issues her entire life (11 years). For this potentially fatal condition to become front and center suddenly is a very tough thing to deal with. Just thinking about the possibility of losing her has made me tear up repeatedly over the last few days.
So yesterday Elsa spent the entire day at the vet again receiving IV fluids at a reduced rate while they tried to get her to eat various canned dog food with very minimal success although she ate mini Milk Bones like candy. They gave her some sort of shot to stimulate appetite but still had little success getting her to eat. I already told them how fussy she can be about eating but they seemed to think it was something else causing her not to eat. In addition to the appetite stimulant they sent me home with four bottles of pills to address various things related to appetite and one for pain/sleep. I was confident that her not eating was totally because of what they were trying to get her to eat, not because she was not hungry. Last night she proved me right.
My girlfriend cooked up chicken breast in a pan and mixed it with rice. Elsa ate a plate and a half of it. I did not give her any of the pills. She has kept the food down and her energy level seems good right now. Everything is not roses however, she had diarrhea when we brought her home but she was ok afterwards. She had a more solid BM at 3AM when I took her outside. Last night she had several times when her body was shaking. Each time it happened it stopped relatively quickly and I did not notice it this morning. That was another reason I wanted to not pump pills into her unnecessarily, who knows how they interact and what symptoms they could cause.
Her blood work numbers relating to kidney function have improved but are still in the danger zone. The big question is if there is significant permanent kidney damage. We won’t know that answer until more time passes and more blood measurements are done. When I talk to the vet yesterday she made an indirect reference to the possibility of Elsa ultimately not pulling through this which hit me hard. We certainly are not going to concede that outcome.
This morning I was back at the vet. They removed the IV port but wanted to inject fluid under her skin to assist in keeping her hydrated. She emerged with a big bubble on her back which looked odd. I took her back home. I am a bit nervous leaving her alone but I will be skipping the gym to go check on her over my lunch hour. I also set up an indoor Ring cam so I can monitor the main living space to see how she is doing.
It already has come in handy when I used it to see that she had drug out a few things from under a table that I forgot to put out of her reach. I immediately ran home, fearing she chewed/ate something again. Luckily it appeared she did not.
My girlfriend and I will keep doing whatever we can to weather this health storm for Elsa. It’s been challenging so far and I expect more challenges to come.
When I picked up Elsa from her overnight stay at the emergency vet the clerk said it showed I was owed a $558 refund. That was the estimated charge for the night so it made no sense why it would be refunded but hey, I was not going to ask questions, maybe this was just a small stroke of good fortune in the midst of this mess. Of course when they reopened at 5PM I received a message that the refund was an error and I received a new request for payment which I fulfilled. So much for found money, of course it was too good to be true.
So Elsa spent the day once again at the vet, receiving IV fluids which were bringing down her high kidney related numbers. However early afternoon I received a call from the vet. She said she had to reduce the flow of fluids because Elsa’s blood pressure was getting high. She said that when you are doing intensive IV fluid rehydration a potential issue can be it stresses the dogs cardiac system, great. So they dialed back the fluids and I picked her up after work. They gave me two different types of prescription food that they wanted me to get her to eat. They said they got her to eat some of it during the day. They thought that she would be more willing to eat more of it at home. I told them right away that if she doesn’t like the way the food smells she will just not eat it, no matter how hungry she is.
So once I got Elsa home my girlfriend came over. We tried repeatedly to get Elsa to eat the special food. She absolutely refused. She was laying in the bed and just looked exhausted, probably partially because she has taken in so few calories over the last few days. She had some periods of shallow, rapid breathing which were worrisome as well.
I told my girlfriend we should just make her some chicken, she needed to eat something. We cooked some boneless chicken breast in a pan and then gave it to her on a plate. It needs to be on a plate because if it’s in her dog bowl it somehow means it’s not special. Yes Elsa can be that neurotic. Thankfully she ate the chicken, clearing the plate. After eating she seemed a little more normal as well. She also would eat some of the expensive freeze dried raw food I bought for her recently as well as her treats so she definitely got some calories in her. She also had her first small BM in a few days last night which is a positive. She had a good night of sleep outside of getting me up at 3AM to let her go pee.
So this morning I tried to give Elsa more chicken however it was not nicely grilled like last night. My girlfriend boiled the remainder so I cut it up and heated it briefly in the microwave. Elsa wouldn’t eat it. I was very frustrated. I even took the chicken and threw it in a pan to heat it up, thinking that extra step would convince her the food was “special”. Nope, she still walked away from it. The only thing she would eat this morning were her Blue Buffalo steak treats. So I know she is hungry, she just is so picky at this point it’s a crapshoot if she will actually eat or not.
I dropped her back off at the vet this morning. I told them how eating the special food was an absolute no go but that she did eat some chicken. I told them about the periods of erratic breathing which they said they need to keep an eye on. Today they will be monitoring her blood work numbers as well as administering more IV fluids if they feel they are necessary.
To be quite honest my state of mind is not good. I don’t see a clear path to resolution yet based on what I am being told by the vet. All I want is for Elsa to return to normal but instead I feel like we are currently in a rabbit hole of uncertainty, not only about how her numbers got so elevated but also how we fix it.
Yesterday at the end of the day I headed to the vet to pick up Elsa, expecting to get further care instructions once I took her home. They told me they had her on IV fluids all day and as a result one of the two bad numbers had started to drop but they recommended that I admit her to the emergency vet to continue IV fluids all night as well.
The recommendation took me by surprise and my knee jerk reaction mentally was a hard no. Elsa is very nervous and gets freaked out easily so the idea of leaving her at the emergency vet overnight sounded very unappealing. My vet is very understanding and nice. She said that the IV fluid has started getting her numbers down and allowing them to continue overnight would keep that progress going. So I eventually agreed to follow their advice as it was the best thing for her health even though it is not ideal as far as her comfort and anxiety goes.
After stopping at the house I loaded her back up in the truck. My girlfriend and I got to the emergency vet which is only open 5PM to 8AM around 6PM. We were surprised to see a very full parking lot. We sat around for close to an hour before getting put in a room. While waiting we saw some animals in sad shape, the saddest being a small older dog that evidently had a heart attack and was eventually put down.
My regular vet had already sent over instructions for Elsa’s care but even so we had to go through the song and dance of the new vet doing yet another exam of her before they admitted her. I guess procedurally they have to. Elsa was surprisingly chill during most of the process, a byproduct of some meds she was given earlier. It wasn’t fun allowing the lady to lead Elsa back to the kennel area. She has never stayed anywhere overnight away from me or others I have trusted to babysit her during her lifetime. So the plan was to come back first thing in the morning to pick her back up and then take her back to my regular vet for another full day of getting IV fluids.
I woke up before the alarm I set which was already an hour earlier than normal. I was eager to pick up Elsa. They said she did well outside of not being interested in eating the special bland food my vet wants her to eat for now. Elsa was glad to see me but also still a bit disoriented. I covered her with one of her favorite fuzzy blankets for the ride to my vet since the temps were in the 40s this morning.
When I dropped her off my vet said that the plan is hopefully to allow Elsa to come home with me tonight as long as there is more progress in getting the bad numbers down. The effort however will continue as there is going to have to be careful monitoring going forward to make sure she does not fall into kidney failure. We also have to ensure there are no opportunities for her to eat foreign objects going forward. I just want her to be healthy and happy so life can get back to normal.
I played pickleball Friday at lunch and again Saturday morning. For whatever reason it was some of the best play I have had in quite a long while. On Saturday I won all four games I played and some of it was against some good players. I was just seeing and reacting to the ball well at the kitchen line. I have this habit of going for third shot drives instead of drops more often than I should. It goes back to my pitcher mentality, you want to overpower your opponent with pace.
The thing is even if you hit the ball hard from the baseline, because of the physics of a pickleball which make it travel slower, most decent players will be able to block that drive without much issue and you are stuck back at the rear of the court which is a disadvantage. However if you do a successful drop into the kitchen you make it difficult for your opponent to attack the ball as well as give yourself time to get up to the kitchen line yourself which is always the goal. Anyway the cliff notes version is I played smarter on Saturday, dropping and dinking and trying to be aggressive only when there are good opportunities for it.
I watched a good portion of both conference championship games. I loved that the game in Denver turned into a snow game which always makes things significantly more entertaining with New England pulling out a very close low scoring win. The Seahawks and Rams were the opposite, scoring regularly with Seattle coming out on top at the end. I don’t think the 2025 Eagles could have beaten any of those four teams. I also don’t think anyone at the beginning of the season would have picked those four teams to be in the championship games. Watching Matthew Stafford play QB makes me wish Hurts had the ability to make quick, decisive and accurate throws like he does.
Over the weekend I installed an auxiliary light in this cool barrel you see in the picture. This barrel was custom made by my uncle over 50 years ago for my parents. It made the move to Florida with my mom and wound up in my possession after my mom passed. The built in light that is wired never worked since I have had the barrel so I randomly decided to fix that Saturday afternoon, installing a LED bulb connected to a smart outlet so it turns on and off automatically every day. The stained glass becomes much more noticeable and cool when the light is on. I really enjoy seeing the barrel lit up now.
Installing the light meant I had to get inside the barrel. I pretty much forgot what was in there since it hasn’t been touched since I moved. I realized I had pet ashes in there from both of the cats we owned as well as two of the birds. Alison was into keeping ashes. Inside was also the paper I made up for my mom’s memorial service as well as her glasses and her purse. It was a mix of emotions to see all these things front and center again.
We had another horrific incident of ICE killing a man for no valid cause. The spin thrown on this by Trump loyalists would be comical if it did not involve an innocent man’s murder. Their spin is the guy should not have been carrying a gun so it was his fault that he got shot. Yes he was a legal gun owner something most Trump acolytes firmly support. Hell many will say the solution for gun violence in America is for more people to legally own guns. So despite this hypocrisy, the footage clearly shows the man was holding a cell phone, not a gun, yet was extinguished by yet another ICE officer on a power trip. The question is, what are the consequences for this repeated abuse of power and how long is this going to be allowed to continue? Unfortunately it is clear that walking around with protest signs doesn’t move the needle even a little bit.
So Elsa is currently at the vet. In the past year or two she has become increasingly obsessed with eating non-food items. She has swallowed parts of her stuffed toys, various paper products, plastic pee pads, a piece of rope from a beach bag and many other things. As a result I have been locking down the house further and further to limit her ability to do this. It’s crazy.
Well Friday evening she ripped apart and ate about half of a small sock she got a hold of. Typically when she eats non-food items the symptoms can be diarrhea and/or throwing up as well as low appetite until she passes whatever the object was. Well Saturday afternoon she threw up a huge amount. It almost looked like a snake of organic matter. It was hard to tell if there pieces of chewed up sock in there or not.
She resumed eating but has repeated the binge and purge cycle two more times, throwing up early Sunday morning and then again last night after she had eaten more food during the day. By nature I am a wait and see person when it comes to medical issues and since she typically would just pass whatever item it was and normalize I didn’t want to panic. However when she threw up for the third time last night I was genuinely concerned she may have some sort of GI blockage causing the issue. I called the vet this morning and left a message. They called me back and advised me to bring her in early, which I did.
They took an x-ray and said it did not seem to indicate there was a blockage which is good. The also did some blood work and it revealed some very concerning numbers related to her kidneys. They have been monitoring Elsa’s kidneys via urine tests for about a year or so. The numbers were elevated but not in the dangerous threshold. Well the numbers in her blood work were very high, well past danger thresholds. The vet asked if she could have eaten anything else that might be toxic as that could cause a spike in those numbers. I told her it’s possible but I saw no evidence of her eating anything else bad recently.
So the plan is to let them treat and monitor her during the day to see how she is. She ate some food this morning so they want to see if it goes through her GI system like it should. Hopefully the bad numbers slide back to normal, otherwise we could be dealing with a serious kidney issue. Elsa is like my child so not having the ability to know exactly what is wrong/hurting because she can’t tell me is frustrating. It’s equally frustrating that she continues to cause herself issues by eating this shit. I am crossing my fingers that she comes out of this ok. Just the image I have in my head of her being at the vet scared and wondering where I am makes me sad.
I wrote recently about how outrage is a word used so frequently when reacting to US politics and the actions of both Trump and his appointed minions. People that are not certified Trump cultists generally have a very hard time understanding how people could so blindly follow the words and guidance of a man that is clearly corrupt, an egomaniac, and that sounds like a child with his manner of dealing with people and conflict, resorting to name calling and insults instead of intelligent discourse and debate. Yet, there are a hardcore dedicated segment of the population that literally puts Trump on a God-like pedestal. They will follow and obey his every word.
I remember when I dug into scientology and how outrageous it was, they way it endlessly taps into its followers wallets while asking for iron clad loyalty in return. If someone in a family does not buy into the bullshit of scientology they are cast out, scorned and if they dare open their mouth are subject to retribution by “church” officials. Sound familiar? Trumpism is really just the latest iteration of scientology where a false idol is propped up and worshiped with great promises of rewards for doing so when in reality those actually being rewarded the most are already at the top of the food chain. It’s depressing to me to realize that human beings can still be manipulated/brain washed in this manner but it has always been this way throughout history and will continue to be that way until we devour ourselves in the end.
This weekend I will do my best to insulate myself from the madness that flows non-stop like a river via social media and news.
After a several month hiatus last night I reentered the world of Azeroth, also known as the World of Warcraft, a game I have been playing since early 2005. There is a new expansion coming out very soon. I have basically skipped the current expansion entirely and as a result all of my characters have been sitting around collecting dust. The new Midnight expansion has a number of cool things, some of which work out great for someone like me that does not have countless hours to invest in a MMORPG anymore. They make it much easier to just get in play without having to relearn everything from the ground up.
Another big feature add in this expansion is housing, something that has been asked for for as long as I can recall. You can now own/furnish your own home in game which is persistent and viewable by other players in the world. You can tweak your house an infinite amount of ways with very minimal restrictions. It’s very cool from what I have seen although I have not built my own house yet.
Last night I got on my hunter and leveled him from 75 to 80 which is the current level cap until the expansion goes live. Doing so was fun and enjoyable. My hope is to hop on all of my other characters and speed level them to 80, using the various catch up mechanics they have in the game to do so. It felt nice to disconnect from the real world which is filled to the brim with so much idiocy. I hope to get in there more this year, it’s a great way to reset my brain.
Speaking of idiocy, if you saw Trump’s address at the world economic summit you got a full helping of it with leftovers. I physically cringe at times when I hear him speak publicly on the world stage. I imagine what other country world leaders must be thinking but are unwilling to say about this man that continually embarrasses both himself and our country on a global stage. Canada’s prime minister was a rare exception where he clearly took aim at the actions of Trump and those that surround him during his speech. I can only hope there is a day in our future where cult mentality is no longer a reality in our political ideology instead of the words of a single person becoming their truth, no matter what reality actually is.
Cold weather was again around for a good portion of my extended weekend with morning temps in the low 40s and some days where the high was in the low 60s. Yes I know, most of the country would love to have those type of numbers in January but for us locals it feels legit cold. Partly because of the cold I only played pickleball one time over the three days and in that session only played two games because I had a breakfast with a friend to get to. My schedule was free yesterday morning but when I saw a temperature that started with a 4 when I woke up I quickly wrote pickleball off for the day. The fact that my right leg is still not feeling great made the decision even easier.
Elsa has been driving me nuts with her compulsion to eat non-food objects when left alone. When she was young she was destructive like this but the behavior settled down. In the the last year or two she has resumed, eating toilet paper, paper towels from the trash, cardboard, rope from a beach bag and whatever else she can get her mouth on. It’s very frustrating. It’s to the point that if she is going to be left alone I will have to close off all of the bedrooms so she is only left with a sterilized space to be in. Maybe it’s her way of letting us know she doesn’t want to be left alone but it has to stop. Eating random things like that could lead to GI problems or even a blockage.
I mentioned my surprise when my old house went back up on the market back in September/October time frame. The people that bought the house made it seem like it was going to be their long term residence but obviously something changed. At first based on what I heard I thought maybe the couple that bought it got divorced because for a period of time just the wife was there according to my old neighbors. However I now think perhaps the husband got transferred elsewhere for his job because now nobody is in the house, it’s just sitting there unoccupied.
It’s now been on the market for over 4 months. They dropped the price once back in November 25K but there has been no activity. It makes me a bit sad to imagine the house that I saw built from the ground up which was my home for two decades plus sitting there empty. So many memories were created along with the monetary and sweat equity invested into that place it just feels weird to imagine it sitting there dormant. Of course somebody must be doing some sort of upkeep to keep it sell-able. I haven’t driven by there in a while, I should go take a look.
I bet you thought from the title that I was going to talk about the insane obsession Trump has with Greenland and how he is willing to torch our NATO alliances to get what he wants, like a spoiled man-child. Nope I am talking about the movie named Greenland, actually the sequel Greenland 2 that I saw Saturday night. Greenland refers to the bunker that exists there for doomsday scenarios. In the movie that scenario is fragments of a comet that bombard Earth extinguishing the majority of the population. For whatever reason I enjoy movies that depict the end of days. In the sequel which takes place 5 years in the future of the comet strike the Earth is still a mess but Gerard Butlers family is forced to try to survive in it. I found the movie entertaining but certainly far from great. I would give it a solid B.
We saw the movie at the Cinebistro, the most upscale movie watching experience in Naples. It opened a few years ago. I think the place is struggling. The theater seats were looking a bit worn, almost every headrest had cracking fake leather. The temperature regulation was awful. Despite wearing jeans and a long shirt I felt like I was sitting in a meat locker. The food is good but terribly over-priced. I paid over $80 for what was essentially two appetizers, a soft drink and one alcoholic beverage. When we walked in there was absolutely no people sitting at the big fancy bar in the lobby and our theater had maybe 10 people in it. I would not be surprised if the place goes out of business. I think the thought was people would be willing to overpay for a movie experience if it was high end/good enough. The Cinebistro just isn’t worth it, IMO.
So the cold blast that has been predicted all week arrived yesterday and overnight with temps around my place dipping into the low 40s. With the 7 month long summers down here the very brief blasts of truly cold weather are no big deal and keeps you on your toes. I still have my 25+ year streak alive of not wearing a coat/jacket to work. It makes zero sense, I know.
I have an extended three day weekend thanks to being off for MLK day. Hopefully the world doesn’t end by then.
Last night I did my first live stream of 2026 which in reality was 5 different streams. For the first time ever I streamed to my EUC Army YouTube channel in addition to my main channel. I did not realize I could do this easily with my streaming platform. Any opportunity to get more eyeballs on something the better. In addition both channels actually had two formats of the stream broadcast, wide format and vertical. The stream also was broadcast on my Twitch channel bringing to total amount of streams to five..
Streaming on a Wednesday evening with only a few hours notice is not a recipe for a large turnout so the viewership was not huge but it still was a good broadcast that went close to two and a half hours. As is often the case the topics veered off PEVs from time to time. I’m a bit tired this morning.
A big time cold front rolls through today. The temperatures will be dropping as the day goes on. I will wake up tomorrow with outside temps in the low 40s. I enjoy these bursts of cold as they are such a contrast to the heat and humidity we deal with so much of the year.
