the unpaid job, fun and not so fun

Last time that I dropped out of IT was mid 2004, although it had been about 6 months of planning. My really wonderful parents had suggested to me that maybe a less stressful job might help, and had offered to subsidise it until I could get some part-time income. My major loves in life are reading and animals, so after a bit of investigating of the book side, I approached the most well-known and respected wildlife rehab centre in the town where I live. Took a bit longer, but eventually I started to work for them as a full-time volunteer.

Since then, I was rehired by my old company as a contractor, to support one of their major clients - who had been "my" client for 5 years. Only took 4 months for my successor to stuff it up pretty badly....stop! gloating is ugly! smack self on wrist...**. since then I've been contracting part-time in IT, working most of the time in rehab.

The last year has been doing not enough of either.

Almost every day has been a struggle to get out of bed, although mostly I try make it up by 07h30. I have to, to feed whichever animals and birds are living with me.

There are 6 permanent residents - Whizzer, aka "big dog", cross GSD weighing in around 57 kg, almost 10 years old, suffering with arthritis and mast cell cancer. Zac is also almost 10 - where have the years gone to?? - and he's a highly pedigreed Border Collie, who was badly abused as a puppy. When he came to us, he'd been living on the same farm as Whiz and I, and we knew he would fit into the family, but we were his 4th home in 18 months. Years on, when he has never been hit once, he still flinches at sudden movements. Basically though, he's just a little love puppy.

And then the cat pack. My much loved Pushkin, who died a week after her 20th birthday, had been an only cat - and insisted on staying that way too! After losing her, I swore never to have an only cat ever again, and adopted Toby and Tessa, who are now 5. Brother and sister, and while Tess is a gorgeous grey tabby, Tobes got the looks in that family! He is a tabby-point siamese, with incredible blue velvet eyes, stripey tail, feet and mask, and creamy-grey coat. Not the sharpest knife in the drawer, though. Stuart and Samuel are brothers, about 2 now. They were part of a feral litter that I rescued from an office block, and with no intention of getting another cat at all, the next thing I knew was that my local vet had found them a good home. With me. Damn..took them to her cos I didn't want more cats! They are both pure white, but Sam has 'odd eyes', one blue, one yellow, while Stuey has both being yellowy-green. Normally referred to as the boy-monsters...while they shred, knock over, climb on any available objects. Oh yeah... there are a few fish too. So far they have survived being treated as kitty-tv by Stu. He watches them for hours, but has only fallen into the tank about 6 times.

Birdy inhabitants vary from week to week, so I'll post about them often, but not many are here for longer than a few weeks at a time.

While I mostly get out of bed on time, after first feeds, I end up sleeping in the bath, or just wasting most of the day in semi-sleep. Sometimes I get as far as doing a couple of tasks...sometimes just being is way too much. I have cut down drastically as far as the number of birds I take on personally goes, but sometimes I sit and cry because just feeding 2 or 3 of them uses all the effort I have.

Sometimes just breathing uses way more than I have.