If you remember my previous post, Spencer was due to visit a new grooming salon after a less than positive experience. Well, he did it! :) Spencer had his first grooming experience that was POSITIVE - with J's help, of course. He was frightened, poor pup, but he managed to be bathed, combed & clipped; even had his paws and toenails tidied.

I'm pretty sure that my pets are trying to prepare me for motherhood.

I've always said that my fur-babies are technically my 'first' babies. I've raised all of them from when they were wee ones, and I've loved them from the moment I laid eyes on them. Yes, that love might see trivial to people who have kids already {& yes, I'm sure my own heart will explode when our little human-bub arrives} but my animals will always be my loves. I have room in my warm and fuzzy places for ALL of my babies.

Today was our annual vet visit for the kitties. Oscar and Evie are only indoor cats, so people think I'm weird for getting their vaccinations each year.. but it makes me feel better knowing they're at least getting a good once-over from our vet at that time, too. This morning, Oscar yowled the entire way to the vet, and even Evie {who's usually completely silent - mute kitty} was squawking away with him.

Of course the second we arrived at the vet, both stopped their wailing & put on their best smug kitty faces, with the nurses making a big fuss about them both. Oscar still weighs a hefty 5kg, but Evie surprised us all - she's so tiny and fragile, but she's up to 4.2kg! Little sneak! :)

After the check-up and the vaccinations were complete, I noticed that Evie's carry case was a little, er, on the wafty side. I assumed she just wasn't happy after having her butt violated from that nasty thermometer, so set them both down on the waiting room chairs to pay up. As I lifted them, Evie had left a lovely little pee puddle on the seat - whoops! Thank goodness she's cute. The nurses fixed it up, and I had a spare towel in the car, so all was ok... until we were on the way home and the cat-crescendo started up again.

Not soon enough, I drove back home - only to find that not only had she peed all over her blanket, she'd also left me another surprise present.. which she then rolled over into during transit. What does that mean? SPONGE BATHS FOR EVERYONE... including this kitty-mama right here. Joy!

See? They're totally getting me ready for public outings with a newborn. Screaming, tears, charming the pants off everyone in sight, then potty disasters, outfit changes & oh so many baths. I think I can do this.

And on another side-note? I rang today to chase up my Glucose Tolerance Test results - and I passed!!!! Apparently for the 3-hour test here, they do a rating of up to 8. Anything >8 is considered high risk for Gestational Diabetes, and I was down in the 5-6 range. So ridiculously pleased. I'm fairly sure I'll have to do another test later on in the pregnancy to double check, but we'll fight that battle when we come to it.

I feel like I don't have much to give in the way of blogging right now. These past few weeks have dragged on like crazy, and I am no closer to my next IVF cycle in any way, shape or form. As is usual for me, I've got no signs of ovulation whatsoever and I'm just so over this whole rubbish.

The pregnancy announcements are coming out of the woodwork right now, and I'm completely wrecked with each one. Every excited blog post, or text message, or facebook announcement, or forum post is just another dagger; it's just another reminder of everyone else so easily achieving what I can't. And when people who have been TTC for as long, or longer than me, announce their own pregnancies? I am happy... but I'm also devastated.

I am so tired of being on this side of the fence. I'm so tired of being positive and cheerful for everyone else, when I'm dying on the inside with every one. I'm sick of pretending to be okay when I see accidental pregnancies happen, when I hear people complain about their kids, when lucky ladies who only started trying in 2012 have already seen those two pink lines appear.

I feel numb.

Today is CD16 and I've got nothing to report. 9 days of Highs on the CBFM & not a positive OPK in sight. If I get no signs of ovulation by CD22 (the latest I ever O'ed on Clomid previously was CD21) I'm taking Provera and ending this whole, time-wasting cycle. Don't even get me started on the agony of doing another long down-regulation IVF, because it means that nothing is going to happen around these parts for a really long time. My womb is staying barren for a long while yet.

The only saving grace I have right now is Jase - and the fur babies. The kitties let me smother them in cuddles, and Spencer pup is a crazy happy ball of energy. They make my bad days that little bit better.

Anyone who knows me at all, will know how long I've wanted a dog. I grew up with dogs, and have always wanted one of my own.The puppy plan went out the window when we moved to the UK. In the meantime, we adopted our two sweet kitties. I adore them and wouldn't change our decision to be a kitty mama for anything.

You... were the cutest, runtiest puppy with hilarious bulging eyeballs.
You... almost ended up with the name Hercules, but lucky for you, I was shut down.
You... lived with us through four temporary homes, until we moved into our home.
You... suddenly sprouted all your beautiful fur, and had the most gorgeous beard & tail.
You... put up with Rusty better than all of us do, and were always so patient with him.
You... liked nothing better than curling up on the washing, but only the clean stuff.
You... gave awesome kisses, despite your breath.
You... used to love your Liony, and would spend hours kneading him with your paws.
You... were possibly the most spoiled dog in all of Australia.
You... waited for me to come home and spend some time with you before you left us - and for that I'm grateful. Miss you already, kiddo.

Max: 1997 - 2009

One of the things I never realised would have such a huge impact on my life, was the friends I would make through blogging. If you had told me way back when that I would classify a large number of bloggers as good mates, I would have laughed at you.

Alright, maybe I wouldn't exactly have laughed. But I wouldn't have believed you.

One of my favourite bloggers, Juliezilla (aka my bloggy twin) recently had a spiffy revamp done on her blog - wtf have i done?? And to celebrate her new design, she's holding a contest. There are even a couple of prizes involved - bonus!

So what are you waiting for: stop by, ogle her pretty blog, say hello and enter!

Keep in mind though, if you beat me at the contest, I'll cry. I want that third prize.

A few days ago, I brought up a common argument that has been ongoing in my household for years, entitled "The Photograph that Sparked a War".

While I wait patiently for you to check out the link to refresh your memories, I'll just summarise it briefly for those of us who are lazy short on time:

Cute chihuahua. Doggy sized t-shirt. Completely adorable photograph. Full frontal doggy bits. Photography debate. Sibling rivalry. I win. He loses. Life goes on.


Judging from the comments in the last post, the general consensus was that because the picture is of the utmost awesomeness, it must have been me with the mad photography skillz, yo. (Actually, I just made that up because it sounded good. We still have no idea who took the picture, and probably never will.)

This afternoon, I opened my an email from my Mum, and found this waiting for me:



You know what? She's totally right .... but I still took the damn picture, already.

Once upon a time, there stood a two-story house in a quiet and relaxed suburb. Inside that house, there were two adults, and a brother and sister. For the most part the siblings lived amicably in ajoining rooms, arguing only once an hour every so often. They had their differences, but they also had their moments of peace.

One afternoon, they spent some time playing with their chihuahua, Max, who had recently taken a fancy to a t-shirt wearing toy lion. Snickering, the two siblings talked about how the lion was about the same size as Max, and that we should see how it looked on him. They then set about clothing the chihuahua (much to his disgust) and snapped a picture. The result was a ridiculously cute photograph.

Yes, I'm talking about my brother & I a few years ago. So why did this uneventful afternoon spark a war, you might be wondering? It all comes down to who takes credit for the photo. I will swear until I am black and blue that it was me who snapped the shot. I even remember how I managed to get the positioning perfect - Max was sitting at the top of the stairs, and I was lying down the stairs so that the level was the same. But Ajay also swears that he was the photographer... and so, years later, the debate has still not yet come to an end. Oh dear.

If we never solve the mystery (i.e. If Ajay never comes clean and admits the real story!) at least we have one heck of a picture as a memento.

At 11:55am on the 1st October, 2007, my darling Lucy-bun died in my arms.

The tiny wee floppy eared bun was the first one that came up to me in the pet store, I knew she was mine. I had no idea what to call her; the shoebox she was stored in was for a pair of Nike shoes, called "Lucy". That was it. Since we had driven to the store in two separate cars, so mum took Bella home in her shoebox, and I drove Lucy. I talked to her the entire way home, and haven't stopped since.

I worried about her all the time; Bella was so much bigger, and I was sure that my little Lucy was going to squeeze through the bars of her hutch! Lucy was tiny! I couldn't get over how small she was, or how delicate. But my two bunny girls adored each other, and would constantly snuggle and groom and flop.

She was always the snugglier of the two buns, and would love to just lie on your lap. She is the only bunny I've ever known that gave out bunny kisses. She was always so gentle, still adored snuggling and exploring, and was prone to headbutt you if you got in her way. (Which sort of hurt, actually.)

After discovering that she had been picked on and while looking after her horrible sores, we had kept her inside for the past two weeks. Lucy was adorable! She'd run to the bars to greet you, follow you around her cage and grunt at you when you picked her up.

Her sores had mostly healed, and she was doing fantastic; but I suppose it's really hard to know what goes on inside those tiny little bodies. Bunnies are resilient little creatures, so I had no idea that anything was wrong with her this morning.

She gave me her usual little squeak (a happy one!) as I put her out on the grass enclosure so she could run around, which she did as always. But a short time later, she had flopped to her side, and wasn't responding to anything. She couldn't stand, she couldn't hold her head up, and she looked terrible.

I gave her a little water, wrapped her in a towel and stayed with her - and she stopped breathing a while later. I have to say, this is the hardest thing I've ever had to do, sitting with her, bawling and talking to her, not knowing what to say or do. But now my beautiful girl is gone, leaving me with another ache.

Rest in peace, my darling Lucy-bun. I'll remember you, always. And I'm so, so sorry.

Yes, the Lucy-bun saga just keeps on going . . .

The vet who was scheduled to perform Lucy's operation today was the rabbit specialist - he looked after Bella when she was sick, and helped give me options when I was at a loss of what to do next. I felt comfortable that I was leaving Lucy in good hands, so I signed her in for surgery and took off to go to the doctors myself. The parting words I received from the vet clinic were that I could call at 4pm to check-up on how the surgery went, or they had my number. I was preferring this not to happen, seeing as they generally only ring you if there is bad news.

But I digress. I ended up back at home and about two hours later, my telephone rang. [You can imagine the panic I went into when I recognised the caller ID.] The vet had rang to chat with me about Lucy; he had been doing another examination on her wounds before putting her under anaesthetic, and wanted to run an idea past me. He recited the risks of rabbit surgery I'd heard a dozen times before, and then came out and stated that the chance of the anaesthetic being fatal far outweighed the option of letting her wounds heal without surgery.

Of course, I was completely confused; what do I do? I'm not an expert by any means, so I asked bluntly what he thought I should do. His response was to try and stay as unintrusive as possible. In plain language, avoid the surgery. He told me that he had observed Lucy in the consultation hours and noted that she was a happy, jumpy bunny who didn't seem to experience any discomfort from the bite marks. I agreed with his decision, so once again my grumpy wee bunny is home with me.

She's doing okay, she's surgery-free and she's her usual head butting self. Over the next week, I'm to keep a close eye on her wounds, make sure no abscesses appear, keep her foods up and take her back for a visit next week. All well and good, I just have to squirt her antibiotic medicine into her mouth twice a day as well as putting ointment on the wounds. Let me just pause here for effect. Yes, I have the wonderful job of giving her medicine by mouth. Does this procedure sound familiar?

Anyone who has read my ramblings for a while now, will remember that I have done this before. Here's what I had to say back when I was treating Bella;

"She is hilarious when she has her meds; she makes it hard for me (but has never bitten, but eventually gives in. When the liquid goes in, out comes her tongue, and she sits up on her hind legs and swipes at her tongue with her paws.

If I spoke bunny, I’m sure she’d be saying "What the FUCK was that? Get it off!"

Ever tried giving a rabbit medicine before? Ever actually gone near a rabbit's mouth before? Ever seen the size of their chompers before? You'd think after administering medicine to one rabbit that I'd be an expert at the job.

Yeah, er, no. I'm apparently not.

When I played nurse for Bella, I wedged her in close to my body with one arm and got her mouth open for the medicine fairly uneventfully. Heck, I made it look like a fine art after a few weeks of practice. I figured I'd use the same maneuvere on Lucy, except that I was forgetting one small factor; she has pretty horrible open wounds. On her back. On her side. And she hates people going near her head, even to pat her. Yours truly is no exception to the rule.

It took me about fifteen minutes to eventually wrangle the medicine into her mouth this afternoon. Fifteen minutes! It's going to be a fun couple of weeks!

But honestly, I'm just happy that the vet is positive, that I'm doing what I can to make her well, and that she won't have the risk of anaesthetic hovering over her head. Hopefully with her medicines, some TLC and a little tmie, Lucy'll be good as new soon, give or take a few bald spots. And I can rest a little easier too; the price for today ended up being $80, plus another $80 for the new hutch I've purchased for her. There will be no more Ricky & Lucy snuggling from now on, unless they are in their outdoor enclosure with their momma supervising.

Oh, and as for my very own diagnosis? I;m the proud owner of a charming gastro intestinal bug. Except the vet didn't diagnose me. I went to a real doctor. Honest.

It's not over yet folks, but thanks for the well wishes so far. I have one more favour though; can you keep them going for today too?

Mum dropped Lucy off at the vet this morning as I had to head into the city for some professional learning, and called me at lunchtime - apparently the vet bill was looking at around $400 because of the severity of the injuries, and they wanted to check that I could afford to pay it before they operated. Of course being in meetings all day meant that I didn't get to respond in time, so Mum picked her up again this evening and brought her home tonight.

She'll be back in tomorrow, regardless of the cost. Oh my God, you should see the state of her bites/scratches - it's completely heartbreaking, and made me feel like the worst rabbit momma in the world all over again. The sores are much bigger than I'd imagined; the vet shaved and cleaned the wounds today, and without her fur hiding the wounds they are absolutely horrid. How she's even still walking, let alone acting like her normal self is beyond me.

The bottom line? She will be a pretty sore bunny tomorrow when all is said and done, and my two darlings will most likely have to be separated from here on in. As for me? Well, I'm still feeling terribly bad for poor Lucy, I'm feeling guilty about how bad the bites actually were, and I'm feeling a wee bit sorry for myself when I think of my financial situation. (I'm also feeling queasy, although that is probably from all the food I ate today.)

Bottom line is; Lucy is my baby. She is completely healthy and happy aside from her injuries, and I will do everything in my power to heal her and get her well again. My bank balance is just going to have to suffer for another few months. Keep the hoppy (ha! see what I did with that?) rabbit thoughts going for us, if you can!

Now it's late and I'm heading to bed, to see if I can kick the squick factor.

I got home from work yesterday and did the usual; threw down my bag and wandered outside to check on the bunnies, top up their water and give them some more veggies.

As I was leaning down to the hutch, I noticed Lucy had some fur missing on a patch on her back. I picked her up to look at it closer, and realised it was actually a sore - it looked like a bite or scratch that was a few days old. I checked her over, and discovered another big red patch near her leg - and promptly started to panic.

We took her to the vet, who checked her over and declared them 'open sores'. Apparently bunnies can get infections quite easily, so the scratch/bites have to be opened, cleaned out and sutured. Under anaesthetic, which is always questionable for such tiny animals.

The vet thinks that although Ricky and Lucy have been getting along well in their hutch together, Ricky is acting out as the 'dominant' female. It seems about right, as Lucy has always been a mellow wee rabbit. I just feel so sorry for her, the sores look horrible and painful - and if I hadn't picked her up today, I wouldn't have even spotted them. I feel like a bad rabbit momma, again.

Lucy's still perky, chipper and as grumpy looking as always, and is all booked in for surgery today. I know it's ridiculous, but I'm already insanely worried about how it will go; I suppose it's understandable, since the last rabbit surgery visit ended up with Bella being put to sleep. Please keep my beautiful Lucy-bun in your thoughts today, if you can.

After last week's bunny-related injuries, you may or may not remember that I vowed to have the last laugh, by booking Ricky in to have his 'bits' removed. You might also recall my disappointment in not being able to find any said 'bits' myself, because surely it was my rabbit momma duty to be capable of peering into bunny nether regions and spying any suspicious bulges. I discovered rabbit mounting, humping and a few random weird smells, but nary a ball in sight.

To cut a long story short, today was the day. I had Ricky all set in his travelling cage before I left for work and Mum dropped him down to the vet's office for me. I presumed all was going well, until I got a phone call from my mother in the afternoon, who said four dreadful words: "We've got a problem." Of course, I then had flashbacks to when I got the bad news about Bella-Rabbit, and immediately started panicking.

Turns out the news was just a little less stressful than that, though.

Ricky's first check up fee & shots: $38
Quote for Ricky's De-Sexing Operation: $95
Possible Price of an Infected Hand Amputation: $10,000+ (Who knows?)
Finding out that your BOY RABBIT is actually a GIRL RABBIT? Priceless.

No operation was necessary. And I'm not completely useless when it comes to bunnies, since there were never actually any balls to find. Poor Ricky, being subjected to almost daily physical examinations for nothing. He must have felt so violated. I'm not changing his name either, we'll just call him/her Ricki. Like Ricki Lake. Go Ricki! Go Ricki!

And guess what? The little bugger gave me two fresh scratches today. Some things never change, even if you are a slightly confused cross-gendered bunny.

A couple of days ago, I was putting Ricky back in the hutch when he decided to help me out a little, by launching himself into a flying leap off my hands and into the enclosure. Which was all well and good, except that one of his claws gave me a tiny scratch on my palm on the way down.

No big deal. I washed my hands and didn't think anything of it.

Until now, that is. Since the spot has since turned sore and puffy and looks suspiciously oozy, for lack of a better word.

It's not pretty. Think I'm dying. May lose hand. Need sympathy. Now. Please.

Ah, well. I guess I'll get my own back on poor, unsuspecting Ricky this afternoon - it's time for the "Search for Ricky's Genitalia" quest to continue. And if we find any man-parts? It's hello expensive surgery and bye-bye bunny balls.

I'll keep you informed. (Because I know you're simply itching to know how it goes.)

Edit: He's been booked in for Tuesday morning, so he gets to enjoy his manliness for another couple of days. Do you think that I should hire him some strippers and/or bunny adult entertainment for his last party weekend?

So before I begin, I should inform you that I have tried to take photos of the birthday ring to share with you guys. Honestly. My camera though, isn't having a bar of it. Guess that's what you get for buying an el-cheapo digital camera with no zoom and an automatic flash. And for having a pale hand. Every time I try to take a picture of it, the flash turns everything white (well, whiter than it already is) and you can barely even tell I'm wearing a ring. I'll keep working on it.

But can I at least distract you with random animal/us pictures? Yes? Excellent!

You'll have to excuse the dodgy formatting, because I've figured that this theme? It does not like anything too fancy used with it. Center? Doesn't work. Trying to insert some basic html to get paragraphs? Er, no. And since my host has changed it's file servers, I'm stuck.

First is tanning bunnies. Watching them flop down on the ground is priceless. I did have other bunny pictures to show you, but this blog is being evil enough as it is already.  And next, these are my last photos that will be taken with Jase before he flies to London -- TOMORROW.  [Loud wailing.]  You'll have to excuse the red face and puffy eyes, and no, it's not from bawling at the thought of him leaving. It's the head cold and ahem, upper respiratory viral infection being plain old nasty. [Bleh.] Anyway, safe travels, dude. I love you. And I'll miss you. And just think of the perks over there, other than enjoying yourself in a foreign country and all. Let's face it, without my germs, you're most likely going to be sickness free for a while.And you'll get to go sightseeing!And be a tourist!And have fun! And maybe, just maybe, I'll learn how to mend holes in socks while you're away. Not that I'll be mending your socks like a house mistress or anything, but you know. It's a handy skill to have. Innit?

Since a lot of my blogging friends are of international origins, you may not be aware that Australia is actually in the midst of a pretty horrible drought. Our dam levels are diminishing and to put it simply, we need it to just start fucking raining already. (And keep it up for a few weeks. Or months. Not bloody likely.)

Where I live, we're on minimal water restrictions; no sprinklers, no washing cars with hoses, little things to salvage whatever water we can. Even so, our water levels continue to shrink pathetically. In other states the restrictions are even stricter, with showers being limited to under four minutes, and higher fines being put into place. It's not looking good.

Here at home, we're busy doing our little bit for the environment too. (And no, I'm not just trying to justify the reason why the grass on our front on lawn is well and truly dying. We're just terrible gardeners.)

Our kitchen has a 'double' sink, one smaller half and one larger half. My mum went out and purchased a round and slightly flattish (totally a word) bucket to place in the larger sink; its job is to collect any stray water that usually would go down the drain while we're using the sink while cooking, cleaning or doing whatever else one does in a kitchen sink. (The possibilities are endless.) The idea is that as the bucket fills up with water, we take it outside and use it on our wilting back garden.

Since I've been lazing around at home for the past few days while my eyes get back to normal (they're getting there, but the dryness is horrible), yesterday morning I was given orders to clean the kitchen. Which is fair enough. I'm at home anyway. And other than squinting at the computer monitor updating blogrolls and selling off old textbooks on Ebay, I'm not really doing anything useful. After pottering around doing nothing for a few hours, off I trudged to the kitchen. Half an hour later, said kitchen was all clean and sparkly. There was just one thing left to do: empty the water bucket.

Now I'm not too clever at the best of times, let alone when I'm . . well, actually, I don't even have any excuses to insert here. My common sense is just plain pitiful, really. I could have been logical and lugged the full bucket onto the counter near the door, opened the door while I was bucket-free, then grabbed the bucket and stealthily evaded the dogs before getting rid of the water. I could have even simply yelled for some help, since dad was working from home and was right around the corner. Oh no. Much too easy! And I am an independent woman who doesn't need any help, thankyouverymuch.

Instead, balancing the water bucket precariously against my bosom, I trudged over to the still closed back door. Shouting at the dogs to stay put or else, I held the bucket steady with my chin, flicked the latch and opened the door with my toes. The dogs surprisingly behaved, so I stepped carefully outside, closed the door with my toes once again and hobbled over to the garden to dispose of the water.

Rusty, my somewhat excitable wee chihuahua was happily trotting along beside me, following my progress and probably wondering what the heck I was actually doing. Feeling insanely proud of myself for accomplishing SUCH an important task all by myself, I felt a case of the warm fuzzies come on. Seeing Rusty sitting beside me, especially after having him not do the bolt inside whilst I was juggling both the door and the water bucket, I offered him a big smile and knelt down to give him a pat.

All but drowning him in dirty kitchen sink water in the process.

Oops.

I couldn't believe what I'd done. He was literally dripping wet.
And remember, he IS an extremely small little dog.
And the bucket? Was kind of big.
And extremely full of dirty water.
I felt absolutely terrible.

That is, until I saw him sniffing himself excitedly with a wonderous expression on his face. Most likely wondering where that smell of kitcheny goodness was coming from. That's when I saw him wag his tail at me, turn around to his behind and proceed to lick it all off.

And that's about the time that I peed my pants with laughter.

We're pro-environmental, Rusty and I. Fighting the Australian water shortage one blonde moment at a time. And damn proud of it, too.

I had Bella Rabbit put in for surgery this morning.

Even though I had declared that I would persevere with medicine and see how she went, my heart just broke when I went out this morning and her eye was swollen shut due to the facial swelling. We got the phone call at lunch time; things weren't good. Bella had a severe jaw infection that was basically inoperable, they took x-rays and still couldn't figure out the actual cause of it. Her jaw was practically destroyed by the swelling. There was nothing he could do.

The vet gave me the option of taking her home, or having her put to sleep. I think you can guess what I chose. My heart is broken.

Rest in peace, my Bella Rabbit. I miss you so, so much already.

I haven't mentioned the bunny dramas of the past week, as I've been persevering with getting them to love each other. Alright, really I would have been happy with them just not hating each other, but I wasn't going to start getting fussy about it.

New Bun is beautiful on her own and loves cuddles, but just doesn't like the other rabbits. Bella and Lucy have started getting really grouchy (with her and me) and things aren't going smoothly at all. I've had them cage by cage all week to get used to one another, and have been introducing them together in small intervals.

I realised things just weren't happening when there was a three-way rabbit hatefest around the dining room floor; teeth gnashing, bunny grunting, floor sliding hate. After a while, I couldn't see which rabbit was the culprit; it was all of them. It was whilst sweeping up the tufts of fur from the floor that I decided things just weren't working.

It's with great sadness that today I'm going for a drive to give New Bun to her new momma. She's going to a place where she'll be the head bun, meaning she'll be loving all the attention. I will miss snorgling her cute furryness, but I know it's for the best.

Farewell, New Bun. I'll be sending celery and carrot wishes your way.