same old shit, different day....

...was one of ex-BFs sayings. True enough.

Disorganised as always. Running late as always. Didn't do most of what I should have. New mynah from yesterday died on me. Blah blah blah....

The increase in Remeron and Neurontin have had one noticeable effect - sleep. Only woke up once that I know of last night, but to counteract that bonus, I slept through the alarm, slept in the bath, had a quick nap late afternoon and am only starting to feel half-awake now. Not doable if I am on call for paying job - I have to be able to respond intelligently if I am phoned at night. See how it goes; hopefully the full-on dopiness will wear off.

Only constructive activity for the day was taking 4 ducks, 9 Egyptian geese, 40 tortoises, 1 dikkop, 1 terrapin, 1 hedgehog and 2 spotted eagle owls out to our release conservancy. I get more than my share of releases because I have flexible working hours, a pickup with canopy and sufficient income to pay for my fuel - they are the bit that makes all the dying and injuries bearable. When you see a bird or animal come out of it's travel crate, look round, sense freedom and head off without a backward glance....what we do most days seems worthwhile.

And another message from DuckBuddy...Saturday afternoon, so guess hubby was playing sport again. She misses me, wishes she could go back to before last fight, etc. I miss her too. When she isn't psychotic, she will always be one of the smartest, funniest, sweetest people around. When I think of her, I see her all bright-eyed and laughing. But that image is overwritten by the way she knows exactly how to really wound, and the memories of her doing it. And I just don't want to lay myself open for that again. Even if it means I lose out on all the good days too....

PT did walkies and assessment yesterday. Down a couple of kilograms, lost centimetres in most places. Except, (bloody hell !!) my butt and my thighs, those being two of the many areas that I really don't need being any bigger. He reckons he is happy, and that the butt growth is temporary, as the muscle tightens up. Hope so. This week is going to be a bad one, with Christmas face-stuffing, no exercise, and - almost guaranteed - drinking on Christmas day as well. I know it is stupid, but at the moment I cannot conceive of a day of faking sociability and family-feeling without alcohol to smooth the prickles off of me.

Not a good week all round. Working shifts on both Christmas and the 26th, and have a full house with mynahs, pigeons and two baby parrots to hand-feed from my dentist. So going anywhere needs planning and much transporting. Probably only see PT on Mon and Fri. No tdoc. No (my) pdoc, although seeing borrowed one on Thu. Haven't finished present-buying. Haven't started present-wrapping. Domestic worker is home on long leave, so need to do dishes and laundry and dogs - her sister is filling in a bit, but is somewhat lacking compared to DW herself.

And the idea of sucking exhaust fumes is almost overwhelmingly sweet. Backup meds now number almost 500 good ones, plus whatever the current script is. If the timing was right, that's anything up to another 350 assorted. It would just be so easy to give up fighting, just so tempting....

days in the life of an idiot...

...pass at two different speeds. They endure forever, so that things I know I did yesterday seem an eternity away. And they whiz past so that every one has its own list of the things I just never got around to doing. Inherent failure just waiting to be fact.

Yesterday PT and I did the walk from his office, before going shopping for new running shoes and socks. True to his promise, I had absolutely no say in what we bought. He did ask if I had any colour preference, to which I said 'no, they're all equally ugly' and any cost limits. He gave me a strange look when I said no to that because when the cost is amortised over 3 or 4 years, a couple of hundred rand is fairly irrelevant. I think the last pair of shoes (other than flip flops) that I bought was in 2004, and I've only worn them once. So I now own a pair of weird looking NB trainers and 6 pairs of thick socks to go with them. Did today's walk in them, and they were surprising comfortable, albeit heavy. That was after he'd laced them up for me, because he has a special way of lacing them to give more ankle restraint. I felt like a schoolkid standing there while my shoes got tied for me.

And then I saw borrowed pdoc again. And cried again for most of it. Think I actually like her, even if she needles me with tough questions. Like whether the rehab work is actually a good career choice for me, with all the birds and animals that die. I wonder about that too, often. And that's before I even count the number that I kill - either directly by having to euthanase them, or indirectly by my inability to care for them adequately. I just don't see a way to not do it, though. Not only is there nothing else that I could see myself doing, but hordes of people have my direct number to call for the species that the centre doesn't treat. And if I wasn't taking them, then I would be directly responsible for all of those dying. No easy way out.

All the other questions too. Why don't I socialise more, why don't I have a relationship again. Easy answer to that one (although I didn't say it) - no-one would want one with me. Haven't really dated anyone since I was seeing ex-BF in 2004 and that was fairly casual. Tried some online dating, but it didn't really work. Having regular sex would probably be really good for me, but it just ain't gonna happen. I can't inflict myself on anyone knowing what a useless asshole I am. And anyway, the ones that I might want wouldn't ever have even looked twice at me. Not even when I was at my peak, and I'm nowhere near that at the moment.

And the whole suicidality bit as well - what level (8/10), what stops me (guilt about my family). Didn't tell her though that at the moment I am pretty much doing most things with the background thought that it doesn't matter what chances I take, because with one more reason, it would be a 10/10. Or that my meds stash is probably adequate on it's own by now. Method, means and motive; almost all the cherries in a row. I'm just too tired of this to face the prospect of another year like the last three....

Told her that I'd been going up on the Eldepryl sooner than scheduled, which she wasn't wild about but figures I'm the one who will have to explain that to pdoc. She suggested upping the Remeron (120mg) and the Neurontin (1000mg) instead - both to make me sleep more at night and for the a/d effect to maybe kick in, so will do that instead this week. What doesn't kill might cure, I guess.

only six shopping days left to christmas

and think I am likely to shatter my previous record for last-minute present-buying. Just can't face shopping centres or crowds or noise. I know that I don't achieve much most days, but somehow it takes the whole day and by the time I flee for home I am just so tired. All I want to do is get home, feed the birds and animals and collapse at my PC.

Walkies with PT this morning, an extra block both ways, and a couple of minutes less. Even though I keep stopping for a few seconds to let my legs stop quivering. I am so totally unfit. Hard to believe what I used to do - gym five times a week, at least three 5km runs, at least three games of squash.

Then again, I find it hard to believe sometimes that I ever had a life. I know what I used to do, but it seems as if it was a different person. One with some energy and ambition. One who spent time with people. One that didn't think of suicide every day. It all just feels so far away from what I am now.

I miss myself...

happy reconciliation day part 2

so in the interests of being all happy and celebratory.....I spent most of the day crying again. Over nothing. Anything. Everything.

At least I see tdoc tomorrow. Nothing she can do apart from metaphorical hand-holding, but it kind of makes me feel that I still have one honest real-life relationship. Even if it is paid for....

ho hum

ok, so what did I actually do with the entire day....

Fed birds, went to fetch a bird that had died already and instead bought a cake to take to tea at visiting-friend, read half the newspaper, tidied half of desk. Reread school magazines which were lying on desk (no, I have no idea why they were there) and cried about all my entries. Read 'Me and Marley' by John Grogan and cried about dogs and dying. Made content lists for car CD's and cried listening to most of the songs. Shelved last 3 months worth of books, a major achievement. Cried some more. Had a phone-call from pdoc's admin lady, just to say hello and ask how it's going. Cried about that too.

What I didn't do : exercise, cook, wash dishes, shave legs (PT again in the morning) or almost all the jobs I was supposed to do today. And worst of all, didn't see visiting-friend. In spite of the cake that is still sitting on my car seat. I reread mail, worked out that I could legitimately go for tea onwards instead of lunch and mailed her to confirm. Halfway there I listened to the voicemail that I'd missed as I was getting ready to leave home, and discovered that she had had to change plans and was no longer hosting tea. Bummer. So now I feel like a real bitch for not going at lunchtime.

I feel like a real bitch about most things. I wonder why I still have friends, when all I ever do is avoid seeing them, or talking to them. I don't deserve them, or my family. Don't deserve either of my jobs, because I just screw those up too most of the time. Actually, I screw up just about every part of my entire life. Even the things that I try to do right.

Loser. Total, complete, utter loser.

same again...

...sore. Sober. Stiff. And miserable as all fuck. Long day, including another shift at the rehab centre. Where I excelled at being useless and did almost nothing but managed to be exhausted by it anyway. Now sitting here too tense to go to bed, and have just rediscovered that I am supposed to go to an all-day lunch/tea/dinner thing tomorrow. Ex-volunteer at the centre, who I actually like, is back home on holiday from an extended earning-some-real-money sojourn in the UK. I want to see her. Just not...yet. I'm not ready for any of the social things that seem to be coming way too fast, and way way not prepared for the whole Christmas bit.

I love my friends and family. Just don't want to have to see any of them. I am becoming more and more asocial, and don't know how to explain to people that it's not their fault - I feel as if my entire supply of social interaction is used up by people with birds/shop assistants/street vendors/other arbitrary conversations. Nothing left over for any more people, even the ones I care about.

I am just so tired of all this. Feeling crap. Feeling guilty. Dreaming about dying accidentally so that I don't hurt people any more. Enough already...

sore, sober, and s....

...guess it takes longer than two days to be filled with the joys of exercise and not drinking.

Actually, most of why I drink is because it makes me like myself more. But having realised that it had become an every day habit, I now have to prove that I can leave it for a while. And the start of the great whale fitness program seemed like a good time to cut out the vodka calories as well. I distract myself by thinking about pdoc's face when he gets the answers the other way round for a change: alcohol no, exercise yes.

So PT came for the second walkies today. I have a huge blister on my one heel from wearing shoes, so ended up walking in flip flops. We still set a reasonable pace even though I insisted on stopping every few hundred metres to try and stretch the aches out of legs and lower back. I limited the stops to quick pauses though. PT demonstrated another aspect - he wants me to meet him to go buy shoes and socks. So, Personal Shopper as well.

Afternoon was a shift at the rehab centre, although I mainly just limped around being useless. And got my arm pretzeled into doing a shift again tomorrow. They are really desperate for volunteers, even useless ones....

might not have been the most intelligent thing...

... to unilaterally decide to increase the Eldepryl the same morning as Personal Trainer came to try and kill me. Apart from hitting a max heart rate over 200 at one stage, it didn't do any harm. Besides, would have gone up on Sat anyway - and I don't have months to wait while pdoc builds it up slowly. Extra-slowly while he is away.

PT took me for a very brisk walk, with huge amounts of it being anything between gentle upward slope and almost vertical. He chatted the whole way, and didn't even glow. I was drenched, contributed only very short sentences and developed a blister from wearing shoes and socks for the first time in ages. Apparently I now need to buy new, expensive trainers and (probably) equally expensive socks. He told me to cool down in the bath, so my muscles could disintegrate slowly and not form lactic acid crystals - never being one to turn down a bath order, I slept there for an hour, and finally started feeling almost human around 19h00.

And - why oh why did I agree - he is back tomorrow at 09h00 for another session. I know I'm not exactly a shining example of mental well-being; now I know I am completely batshit as well.

The theory is that exercise is supposed to make me less miserable. Not so sure about that....

mortification yet again...

....saw pdoc's rooms-partner for the first of the appointments that he insisted on while he's away this morning. She intimidates me anyway, because she is ethereally gorgeous and obviously intelligent too. Only contact we've had before has been when she's covered weekends during hospitalisations, and hasn't been great. And her really psychotic patient who bombarded me with sms's until I eventually asked doc to get her to lay off or I'd lay charges, which would end patients already stagnant law career in it's tracks. And hearing from staff that she hated birds.

So basically, I was only going because I had to. And then she was just so nice and so kind that I started crying in about two minutes flat and just couldn't stop for the whole appt. I am such a total loser. Strangely enough, she brought up ECT really soon, wanted to know if I'd consider it. There seems to be a whole convergence of totally separate threads...all heading towards ECT. And I'm beginning to think it's the least intrusive/most available of the non-meds alternatives.

The whole TRD-definition starts with two different AD's. Augmentation. Tricyclic. MAOI. More augmentation sometimes. All for 6 weeks without effect. Ha f-ing ha. Just with current pdoc in last 30 months, where he's pushed dosages up to sometimes 15 of the PI-max, and all for at least 6 weeks, we've tried (and I'm almost definitely forgetting some) about 11 SSRI/SNRIs, 7 TCAs, 2 MAOIs, 1 RIMA, augmented with at least 6 mood stabilisers, 4 anti-psychotics, 3 stimulants, about another 6 off-labels, whole bunch of sedatives. Pretty much nothing. Even the damn vet tranquiliser. I don't ask what the S/E profile is anymore, I don't care. Even if it might kill me, the odds are lower than me doing it myself.

At least, I will have something to say next week. Personal trainer dude and I set up a meeting. He's filled with enthusiasm and vision, wants to know if I'm really motivated and committed to becoming a whole new healthy, skinny person. Gave him the 'do I look like I am?' stare and said 'no. I have no motivation and no desire to do this at all. That's why I am willing to pay you the equivalent of many peoples full-time salary to make me do this 4 times a week whether I want to or not.' Then he asks what liquids I take in. 'Vodka and Coke Lite. Or shooters. And coffee.'. Silence plus note-taking. And measurements on fancy kit. I am delirious to know that 3 kg of my enormous mass is bone. Whoopee. I officially qualify as 'big-boned', for what that is worth. First sessions are tomorrow and Friday, with a full schedule to be drawn up from there. Payment in advance.

Silly dude asked if I'd sign a contract, and eyes widened when I said sure, I'd go for 6 months initial, 3 months renewable after that. He doesn't realise that claiming 3 to 6 months from my estate will be easier for him than having to drag me around while I'm still alive.

Happy Christmas pdoc. Doing this one for you...

most days

I lie in the bath and cry. Because I just don't see the point in getting through the day when tomorrow is more and more statistically likely to be just the same. And then I fall asleep and really screw it up by being disorganised for most of it.

Didn't used to be like this. There used to be good times. Used to be longish periods where I did things, looked forward to waking up, bounced out of bed ready for whatever might happen. Don't know why it changed, or even when it became more likely for the day to be something to survive. Just...somehow over the past ten years, it happened.

I know the things that I should be doing. Exercise. Regular sleep and meals. No alcohol. Take meds. Be sociable. Fall in love.... Doesn't make any difference though. Can be doing all of those one day, and the next it's face first into the wall again. And I am stunned by it every time - why, when nothing has happened since yesterday. Why, when I'm doing everything right. Why.

Coming up for three years with this one, with two short breaks. No timeout this year. I am getting so good at the camouflage. Not good enough to fool myself though. It's as if I flip a switch, for the minutes that I have to spend with people. Turn a personality on, talk crap, watch from deep inside while the walking, talking j-doll performs. Go outside for a smoke, go to the toilet, drive off with whatever bird I have just fetched... and cry. I have made such a work of art - and it seems to get further away from being me every time I display it.

I cry in the bath because by 7 in the morning, I just don't know how I am going to get to the end of a day that has barely started. I cry because I am 43, and in spite of the ways I find to abuse my body, and the risks I take, I am robustly healthy.

I cry because if I don't end it soon, it seems that I'm likely to have another 30 or 40 years of this crap. And when a day of being me is more than I can envisage, a lifetime is just not possible. If someone else were to kill me, their punishment would probably not be as long.

Most days I wish I wasn't....

long and crappy day....

...nuff said.

stuffed every which way

woke up this morning feeling like the walking dead. Not really sure why, seeing as there wasn't anything too strange about yesterday other than the shift at the rehab centre. So did the morning minimum, slept in the bath, slept on the couch. Did the afternoon minimum, slept on the couch.

and somewhere in between the naps decided that I will try behave nicely for December, so that I have some good news for pdoc when he gets back next year. Which basically meant having a vodka and sushi blowout tonight, before I stop drinking for the month, and start going to gym. Seeing as I have already proved that the latter doesn't happen without having my ass kicked, I will sign up tomorrow with a personal trainer from the gym so that I cannot avoid going at least four times a week. Hey, had to shave my legs on Friday for the massage, and bought the track pants weeks ago. Only a pair of lightweight shoes still to get....

I really, really hope that adding the Eldepryl to the mix will propel me into feeling good. It worked for 6 weeks in 2005, so I'm as optimistic as I have been about anything since the f-ing wonder drug Parnate, almost two years ago. But without an iron-clad guarantee at least I should still have something positive to tell pdoc. If, of course, I don't collapse and die the first time the PT gets me on any kind of cardiac equipment, which is always a possibility. Will have to explain very carefully that when I say that I have to rest 3/4 of the way up the stairs to the gym, I am not joking at all. Shit. This is so not going to be fun.

this was a weekend non-work day?

OK, so I get to take weekdays off a lot of the time, but still, there's something about working on weekends that leaves me feeling slightly deprived.

Nightmare morning visit to the city centre. About a million pedestrians all busy ignoring road-rules and seemingly intent on becoming accident statistics. About the same number of minibus taxis doing the same. Me and the woman I was meeting to assess feral pigeon injuries and catching possibilities were very likely the only palefaces in the whole city. Followed by afternoon shift at the centre, where I never quite got into the rhythm, so it was all a stuff-up. And finishing off with an even more nightmare visit to the inner-city tenement area to fetch a feral pigeon with a broken leg. Figure that if there is ever a reason why I would stop being the local mad-pigeon-lady, it will be the insalubrious and dangerous areas that they thrive in. Even though my secret theory is that being suicidal actually makes me bomb-proof. If death is attractive, then the possibility of it happening at random isn't that frightening. And it takes away the guilt and planning aspects too.

Didn't stop me though from being very nervous about the little mongoose in the clinic this afternoon, who was passionately in love with my sandal-clad feet. He was scent-marking and nosing between my toes, and inside my denims, and far too interested in my bare skin for comfort. Not fearing death is a lot easier than dealing with the likelihood of small teeth and painful bites...

number of hours: 24

number of screw-ups: many, many more.....

- have killed every bird that came in, except the one I only picked up at 19h00 tonight. Hey, give that one time, and I'm sure it could just lay down and die on me too.

- good bit for the day: taking my niece for her belated birthday present. We went to one of the fancy day spas, where she had a teen manicure, pedicure and back/shoulder massage. I had a hot stone massage, pedicure and a salt exfoliation. We were only 20 mins late for the appointment - entirely my fault. For a change. To compensate, I got suckered into buying products, almost twice as much as the two packages cost. Even though I know the masseuse was lying when she said the only bad bit of my body was my stomach and that she had a miracle cream that would shrink my fat belly even as I applied it. And that the exfoliating cream would make my revolting feet absolutely sexy. Right. A carving knife for the fat roll, and something to shrink my feet by a third while reshaping all my crooked toes - a) I am uncoordinated and kick things, and b)I played goalkeeper in school hockey, so my broken toe count is somewhere between 26 and 29 - and simultaneously removing the hard and cracked bits caused by walking barefoot all year round? Don't think a couple of hideously expensive creams can do any of that, no matter what seaweed stuff they contain. Niece loved it though, so it was worthwhile.

other good bit, from last night. Local band 'Dog Detachment', from '80s, singing 'Waiting (for a Miracle). Available from One World . Superb.... Buy the album. Now. It's really cheap when you convert the ZAR price to $$. Listen to the sample at SA Rock Digest. Buy an extra copy for someone you like, which will encourage more re-releases of good and old stuff.

not even going to detail the stuff-ups. Just too many....

poster-child for idiocy....

...or I would be if that wasn't a not-very-PC image.

Ended up having to go to yesterday's meeting - boss told me he expected me there. Then he made me sit next to him, which I think was so that he could kick me under the table if I got too irate. Only concrete actions were that I will monitor program usage, and re-send out all the reports that I worked my butt off to produce from June to August, and that no-one has done a damn thing with since. And probably won't do anything with now either. Absolute waste of everything. Then again, I bill them punitively, so apart from actually doing lots of work over the next weeks, I will bill them even harder. Pays to support a lot of little animals, if nothing else.

And today was last appt for the year with p-doc. He thought coffin pin-up calendar was funny, but says he doesn't think he should put it up in his office - not that that was the intention, anyway. After which I screwed up most of the appt by just sitting and crying uselessly. So much so that I can't even remember any of the interesting new articles that he mentioned. I really am an asshole most of the time. He's kind of insisting that I see rooms-partner weekly while he is away, especially given that he is changing meds to something a bit experimental. And that I didn't hand over med-collection either. No point. It's not as if keeping it makes me more -or less - suicidal; just that when I eventually stop dragging this out, at least the method will be more certain. Given that one of the things I'm still all girly about is not being messy. And that I have such a low pain-tolerance anyway that I need to know that it won't hurt too much either. Rules out guns and car-crashes and trains and ropes, and a few more besides. Not like I'd be able to walk in with the hosepipes either, and that would be the prime means anyway.

End of baby bird season. Have to see this one through. Too many little pigeons until then....

so dumb of me, again

...just got home, about 4 hours later than expected, and no, was not out partying. The saga started yesterday, when some woman got hold of the rehab emergency cell no, and after she wailed all over the senior volunteer who had the phone for an hour, s.v. eventually said she would see if she could find help, although it was not wildlife, nor rehab, nor, actually, any bloody thing that the centre does. And calls me. Sucker-of-the-month is going to be my new title.

Turns out the woman has 24 cats and is being evicted from the house she rents, for not paying the rent. "Well" she tells me indignantly, "it's not like it cost the landlord anything, he's selling the house anyway!". Umm, possibly because he couldn't pay the mortgage because you won't pay your rent? Or is that silly real-life economics, and thus irrelevant? So she's found some other sucker to house her, but now the sheriff of the court has come to serve notice on her, and she needs to move asap, and - hysterical sobbing here - how is she going to move all her cats? "Because all the dumb bastards with pick-ups are just so selfish and hard that they won't help poor animals in distress". Right, and maybe the fact that you use some really vile epithets to describe people. And that none of them actually know you anyway, seeing as they are all people you just attack at random and demand service from.

Supposed to happen yesterday but she postponed. I get to the house after fighting rush hour for 45 mins - she isn't there, nothing is ready. I call, she'll be there "in 15 mins max". An hour later I'm almost ready to just leave when she arrives. She demands to hug me, I refuse, she gets all attitudinal with me. More vile terms to describe ex-landlord, new landlord, sundry other people. I tell her not to use those terms when talking with me because I don't like them. More righteous indignation, as in "well it's OK to call him a slimy Jewboy because he is Jewish!" and similar logic for other terms. I tell her I don't like the way she speaks, and to please not do it. She flounces off. I ask her to please pack cats (who are very nervous, she tells me, "because some stupid k** broke in and scared them") in the carriers I'd brought. Four in each of these two, and 12 in the big one. 20 mins later. It starts raining. She yells to me to come inside, I say "no, please just bring the cats in the crates so we can go". She can't work out what she should do. Pack the f-ing cats, I say. 4, 4 and 12, and bring the smaller carriers out to me. Another 30 mins. I am standing out in the rain. She wants to know whether she should put Cat X in with Cat Y. I haven't a freaking clue. Eventually, after she lets one or possibly two out of the crate and then has hysterics, an unknown number of cats are packed in the back of my pick-up. I suggest we leave immediately, I have now been there for more than two hours, and we still have a long way to go. Conniptions about how she will have to come back for all the junk that I wasn't taking (which she had promised to do in the afternoon), about leaving the runaway cat, about where we were going, when I got brutal and told her I was leaving and if she couldn't give me the address, then she could take her own damn cats. Needless to say...wrong address. Wrong number. Wrong street. Wrong bloody evening to do this to me.

The only thing I could actually agree with her on was when she cried a whole lot more, and told me that it wasn't fair that she had to look after all her cats on only a mean little disability grant. Yep, not fair. On the cats.....

was monday named from a phrase meaning disorganised chaos....

..or is it only me that stumbles into the week cursing because I'm never ready for it? Then again, it's about the same for every other day too.

Good bit for the day was that Nicky ate a bit this morning, and I transferred him to my regular vet this afternoon. Hope this cat realises I have a mortgage on his fur for the next ten years, given the huge bill that I had to pay to liberate him from the ER practice. And there will still be more to come, before he gets to go home to the squatter camp.

Apart from that, I fetched two pigeons, a dead mousebird (no, not really...the vet kept the little body. But I did go all the way there before they discovered that it had died fairly soon before), a live but icy cold mousebird and a sparrow.

Didn't do any of the other things I should have.

Did get round to sending a reminder to a bunch of work people to ask if they had read my request to combine the two meetings scheduled with roughly the same subjects, same people, same repetition of what I've already said in at least 5 meetings. So the one dude sends back a very indignant reply and then tells me I wasn't even invited anyway. I say 'yes I was, you invited me yourself.' 'no I didn't'. 'yes you did, and I have your mail to prove it. Sent last week on Thurs morning' 'oh, well I don't want you there anyway'. Gee thanks. I don't actually want to be there much, either. But if he can't remember what invitations he issued 4 days ago, perhaps it shouldn't surprise me that he doesn't do any of the things that he should have been doing for the last 8 months. Dickhead. Other dude hasn't bothered to reply, so I just won't bother to go to his meeting in the morning. Covered my ass though by sending a mail to my boss saying that under the circumstances I wouldn't attend either meeting.

And was saved from the tortoise dilemma by a reminder from an online store to say that the books I ordered ages ago should be delivered in the next 24 hours. Had forgotten about them, and that included in the order are Samuel Shem's 'House of God' and 'Mount Misery', which I ordered to give to pdoc, seeing as he rates them the funniest books he's ever read, but doesn't have copies anymore. So the tortoise can go back to sitting on a shelf for another few months.

Guess bed would be a good idea. Before tomorrow ends up being as wasteful as today...

sunday reruns

of Saturday. Except I went and bought the Sunday paper, so I know for sure that I haven't stumbled into some time warp. Otherwise, early feeds....bath nap....bath nightmare...call about Nicky...feeds....drink too much vodka....stuff around with tortoise paperweight...drink more vodka...listen to 'last CDs' compilation volume #6 repeatedly....blah blah blah....

Think though, that I'll try for pdoc's sober December, from tomorrow. Excluding team lunch if it happens - which I doubt. Besides, here is nerdy Homer my boss sending out an invite for lunch from 13h00 - 19h00; it is virtually compulsory for me to attend and drink him under the table for no reason other than just because I can. Um. I hope I still can - I am way out of practice, and I honestly have no idea of whether he drinks at all, or what his capacity is.

Nicky is still listed as critical, and on a drip. Vet reckons though that he is more reactive than he was yesterday, so there's still hope. Don't even want to know what this bill is going to run to. Tomorrow morning, if he is stable enough, I will transfer him to my regular vet.

And the tortoise looks like something your average 6-year-old would produce in craft lessons. Bummer. If I can get some liquid perspex tomorrow I might resuscitate the project in a new form, otherwise it's history. Should have known that I am way too unartistic to even try something like that.

Bed now, I guess. 90mg Remeron, 800mg Neurontin, 10mg Ambien and 30mg Inderal aren't quite enough to make me sleep, or to keep me asleep until morning. But the vodka should help.

And somehow I will make myself go to gym this week.....

exceedingly dumb....

....way to spend a Saturday. Call it over-reaction.

Last night, as I was about to stuff my face with supper and go to bed, Andy the squatter-camp kitty's gran phoned in a panic - Nicky, Andy's brother had eaten poison, she thought. Lots of poison used in the camp to kill insects and rats, and being environmentally friendly isn't even on the priority list. He hadn't come home on Thurs and had just crawled in and collapsed, please could I help. I know that he is a beautiful, healthy, well cared-for boy of 18 months, so crammed chicken down my throat and went to see. I thought he was dead. Cold, wet from the rain, only felt a thready heartbeat when I pressed my fingers along his sternum. So, off to the emergency vet, stopping only to pick up semisane cat-buddy (one block off the direct route) so that she could hold Nicky, and I could drive faster. Called ahead, and we got him straight onto the table. Fluids up, atropine and cortisone, treating the shock primarily because we didn't know what he'd eaten. Going to be another huge vet bill for all of this. Nicky is still there, still on a drip, still critical. They reckon he is slightly more responsive - 'slightly' is not a good sign after 24 hours. And cat-buddy suggested that I ask for liver and kidney function tests, to see whether it's worth keeping on. Would be a bit crap to give him all the ICU-type treatment only for him to die in a couple of weeks from systemic damage.

So...after early-morning feeds and the obligatory bath-nap with a nightmare surpassed only by yesterday's version, I have spent the afternoon and evening drinking way too much vodka while I try put together a miniature tortoise shell that I want to turn into a paperweight for pdoc. As in, must be done by thurs - after I've farted around not doing it for three months. Shell is about 2 inches long, from a baby Leopard tortie that died shortly after it was brought to me. I left the body in my mealworm culture so that the worms could clean out the shell, which sort of worked, but the membrane holding the shell together got a bit smelly, so I had to remove it, and the shell has been lying in about twenty bits in the bathroom ever since. This afternoon, I put the base together, used plaster of paris to keep it in place and to hold two lead fishing sinkers for weight, and then super-glued the plates to the plaster. At the same time, I superglued three fingers together, and attached another one to the desk. Since then, I have covered most of myself and the room with plaster and glue. It's like doing a 3-D jigsaw without a picture, no idea of the actual sizes, and only a guarantee that every single angle is different. Suspect he might not get it for this Christmas. Have a new method involving plasticine planned for tomorrow, after I have bought the plasticine and lots more superglue.....

The first of my exciting things bought on the net in the last month arrived yesterday...the pin-up girls with coffins calendar from
Cofani Funebri. This is a classic, and they are produced as a fun thing. Which is good, seeing as I don't see pin-up calendars going too well in most undertakers offices. Or maybe I just have a warped sense of humour....scratch the maybe.

For now though, think it's time to drag my drunken carcass off to bed. Hope my innate ability to not get hang-overs is still in evidence in the morning....

delivery day

...even though I was about 3 hours later than planned, semisane cat-buddy and I delivered 4 baby jackals to their release site an hour south of town, where they'll be hacked out for the next month. We also took a whole family of dassies (rock hyraxes) that were found in the engine of someone's car. Stupid cow thought she'd get them to leave by driving at top speed down the highway. Luckily the dassies hung on tight, so she then sent the car for a full valet clean - the garage were the ones who called us for assistance in removing 6 little biting creatures from the engine compartment. They got a great release site, and headed off into the bush at great speed.

Before that we dropped off the 4 surviving goslings, 3 swallows, an adult goose and two teeny Thick-knees at the centre. Last night's death toll was 2 goslings, a hadeda ibis killed by my dogs, a pigeon and Weeny one the mousebird. Bummer. Just call me rehabber-Kevorkian.....

just so tired

of feeling like shit. Enough already. Feels like whatever I do, there is always just more and more that I should have done already.

Birds increased by 3 baby swallows, 6 newborn goslings and two mynahs. Didn't kill any today.

Agreed to spend half of tomorrow driving four baby jackals to their new home. And IT boss wants me to check a whole lot of stuff as well.

Pdoc hinted - if saying straight out 'why don't you...' counts as a hint - that he'd like it if I did the hospital bit again. No way. Not at all by choice, and definitely not while duckbuddy is there. Dropping the Manerix, and trying Eldepryl again after a weeks washout. Hey, it worked for 6 weeks in 2005, so might as well. He wants the stash for his Christmas present, says I can keep 25, so I asked which 25, specifically, he would allow me. He thought about it and offered the multi-vitamins. Oh wow. And he wants me to see his rooms-sharing pdoc while he is away, which I'm not particularly keen on - she dislikes me because of birds, and I feel intimidated by her.

Ha bloody ha....I feel intimidated by almost everything, except for the things that just make me feel straight-out useless. I agree to doing things because I can't think fast enough of a reason not to, and then I end up lying and faking so that I can just hide away at home. If I was anyone else in my life, I'd figure I wasn't worth the effort - it surprises me that that doesn't happen more often than it does.

mixed bag

the bad bits started with losing two mynahs, the teeny-tiny pinky and a sparrow with probable spinal injury this morning. Followed by fetching a fat feral squab with a huge infected canker, so had to euthanase him. And more text messages from DB. I can't be outrightly nasty to her, because I do care. Yesterday she sent me a message asking me to come have coffee. I eventually replied a few hours later to say that I didn't think it was a good idea for either of us. She asked if I was sure. Today she says that she's sorry about messages but can't stop thinking about us when we met in the hospital, and am I sure about coffee. Yeah, I guess I am. Sure that I just can't go through a friendship that is more intense than most affairs, that I now know in advance will just end up hurting. I am just as much at fault. Maybe it's that I'm too old to volunteer for another round of pain. Besides...even if she's forgotten what she said, I haven't. And probably won't for a long, long time. Why would she want to be friends with an asshole loser, anyway.

Good bits were taking all three remaining mynahs to their new homes - one as Suzy reincarnated. It's done, so I will have to keep that secret for ever, but I think it was probably the right choice. Even if it was dishonest of me. The other two went to a friend of the home where one of them was rescued from the roof. I'd taken both to meet him, and when he saw them he immediately begged to take the two together. Which - blush - was actually my intention. Mad mynah daddy has demonstrated to me that mynahs seem to be more settled when there are a couple of them, and it doesn't seem to stop them from having strong human relationships too. And Shrekkie the mousebird is still healthy and happy, as are his buddies Pool Noodle and Weeny One. Not of course that they will ever know that they have names, but it makes it easier for me to keep track and feed etc. And canoodle too....

Other good bits to share are two new blog-links, both scrounged shamelessly from Lara B at Red,red whine. Nabbalicious writes beautifully and takes awesome pictures. And JR is so funny that my dogs have been woken up to come and see why mommy is howling. Heck, her folks are almost as funny in their comments on her posts. So - two very different but excellent blogs for your enjoyment. Shit, you deserve a reward for reading this one...

four or five months still

of baby season and everything that goes with that. Two years still of paying job in its current format, but boss has already said that his main reason for making me support other clients is so that I am committed to the team for longer, and have all the options available. Forty years or so still of living with myself somehow.

If I can't see how I get to next winter without sucking hosepipe, the prospect of eternity with myself is very uninviting. The things that could make a difference? None of them are things that I have any control over. And the more I try to change that, the less likely they are to happen. Actually, even thinking of them is probably enough to put a hex on them for eternity.

Born loser. I don't even want to detail the number of things I have screwed up today, which was - in terms of what/how many stuff-ups I made - pretty much an average day. Let's just say that every day contains more of them than even the most masochistic would want to put up with. And I have always had a really low pain threshold.

Think it's time to take meds and go to bed. In spite of the extra Remeron, I sleep really badly. Wake up and get out of bed every 90 mins. Wake up without getting up about every 60 mins. Scare myself stupid with what I wake up from on most of those. Scare the kitties almost as often. But hey, as revenge, bath-naps are unwakeable up from, no matter how I try. Asswipe loser forever, I guess....

monday bloody monday

late for everything the entire day, only because I am so completely disorganised. I mean shit, by now I KNOW that it takes me at least 30 mins to feed the birds before I go out. So I stuff around on the net and allow 15 mins, and then race around getting all hot and sweaty and being late. Asswipe.

Took the mealworm-vultures AKA the fiscal flycatchers back to their home today. Just in time....my mealworm culture might recover eventually. And three sparrows including cuddle-bunny, the thrush and the sick mynah through to the centre. But traded them for a mousebird friend for Shrekky - and then stole another two as well. Pic is of Shrek biting his sparrow-friend's bum. Really. A micro-second later the sparrow squawked and leaped forward, but they went to sleep cuddled up together anyway. Home via two vets, dropping off a broken legged barbet for surgery, and a bullfrog with a shattered jaw at the reptile specialist. Here long enough to feed everyone, and then up to the local vet to fetch a teeny pinky. Back home to feed everyone again, and get another mousie in. And there are three birds waiting for collection tomorrow.

And I decided to go with the replacement-Suzy. I know it's lying, but mynah mommy is distraught about the bird, and I just can't tell her it died. The ringer is the same age - might actually be Suzy's sibling - and would need a good home anyway. I don't view the birds as interchangeable objects, but in this case...

After duck buddy's message yesterday, I ended up texting tdoc in panic. She gave sensible answer saying that I need to set limits so that I don't get hurt again. Haha. Just getting the message made it all hurt. Reading it was worse. Having to decide what to do - even if it was nothing - was a tailspin. My fake personality is funny and outgoing enough that people are mostly friendly to me, but there are very few that I really trust enough to not pretend with. And DB was right up at the top of that list. Eventually I took tdoc's advice, sent an arb message saying sorry that she wasn't well and hope she gets better soon. And then got very, very drunk and cried a lot.

Wow. I am such a mature grown-up person. Not.

text messages from hell

- first lot from mynah mommy, who has plunged into despair over Suzy. When I woke up this morning, I had decided that telling her that Suzy had died was the right thing. Now I'm not so sure. Suzy had only been with her for 5 days, so a substitution would probably be unnoticable. And it would stop MM from being convinced deep down that if she was a better parent it wouldn't have happened - no matter how many times I tell her that nothing she did could have influenced it, and that Patsy, the other bird is fine and healthy still.

- second was from duckbuddy. Almost exactly three months since I last heard from her. Says she is doing badly and is back in hospital, and that she still feels bad about the things she said. I haven't replied yet - which in itself could be seen as nasty - because I don't know what to say. Hearing from her just ripped the scab straight off of what I'd thought was something in the past. Don't want to go there again. She knows exactly how to hurt me, and uses that knowledge. And I'm just too close to the edge already. At the same time, I wanted to rush to the hospital and see her, and tell her that I care about her and want her to be OK. Guess that just shows how totally dumb I can be sometimes....

lies and dead babies

....took Suzy's body to the vet for a post-mortem this morning. From the initial exam, it seems that she might have died of iron-storage disease, which is known to affect mynahs and softbills. What isn't known is an effective way to prevent it or treat it if it develops. Research shows that the same percentage of birds within a species develop it on both a low-iron and a normal diet. It does seem though to be common in certain family groups, so it's possible that a genetic predisposition to the disease can be triggered by diet. Seems that about the only treatment is bleeding the bird every two weeks. This makes it anaemic, and when new blood cells are produced, iron is pulled from the liver to make the new cells. Sounds archaic, but logical. Just don't know if I'd want to subject a bird to twice-monthly blood drawings.

Not of course, that it matters to Suzy. She's dead.

Chatted to the vet as well about not telling mynah-mommy about the bird dying, and returning 'Suzy' in a few days. I have another of about the same age, and any character difference could be explained by the vet trips and treatment. Not really ethical, I know, but I'm certain that it was nothing to do with her care of the bird. And she is absolutely devastated by Suzy's illness. She's the sort of person who blames herself for anything that goes wrong, she's already beating herself up about the mousebird from last weekend who wasn't able to be released, and I just don't have the heart to tell her that one of her darling babies has died. Vet reckons it's a mynah and they are all arrogant, domineering little beasties anyway...

The two little pinkies that had survived from Tuesday both died today. Shit shit shit. After 4 days, I care too much for them already. Still have one pinky, picked up on Weds. Looking ok, but let's not count him before he gets feathers and flies away - hatching is not quite certain enough. Pic is of him, species unknown so far.

damn it all to hell and back....

....mad mynah buddy phoned last night in a panic; Suzy the smaller of the two mynahs that I homed with her last week was limping and unhappy. I said I'd come see the bird this morning. Before I was even out the bath, she phoned in full-on terror. Suzy was unable to stand, and looked paralysed. I picked her up on the way to tdoc, dropped her at bird-vet and went back to fetch her an hour later. Bird-vet reckoned spinal, but no obvious cause, either injury or infection. Gave antibiotics and cortisone, plus more for tonight, and asked to see her in the morning.

Suzy died just after 4pm this afternoon.

Haven't told mynah buddy yet, just can't work out how to. I am more worried that it is something I did wrong with raising her than anything new mom might have done. But I know it will break her heart. So much so that I have even considered sending another bird back to her in a few days and pretending that it is Suzy. Am taking her body for a post-mortem tomorrow, so guess I will hold off on saying anything until I can hopefully know why.

Bugger. Bugger. Bugger. Losing babies within a few days is almost expected even if we still grieve. Losing one after weeks, when it is feeding and charming and flying... it's a lot of why I stopped doing daily shifts and have never started again. Too many little bodies that I'd started loving already. Still happens at home anyway....

So yesterday pdoc tells me to listen to Jeff Buckley singing 'Hallelujah', which I did last night, and have played many more times since. Looked up Buckley, who I'd never heard of before. Okaaaay. Apart from singing beautifully, he's dead. Told his girlfriend that he thought he was Bipolar. Then drowned 'accidentally' the next night, while swimming in a river fully-clothed and singing along to Led Zep on the radio - the estate says there was nothing mysterious about his death. Umm...going for a night swim with your steel-toed boots on??

Not sure if pdoc knew the BP and dead bits before mentioning Buckley to me. We did have a bet on something last year based on me guessing a particular singer who had killed himself, who pdoc really rated. I came up with a shortlist of about 30 possibles including the answer: Ian Curtis of Joy Division. I figure he might have known, but the song is so awesome anyway.

Add one more to the list of bipolar, talented....and dead.

mortification

I really, really hate it when I go see pdoc and just sit there crying. Which covers most of today's appointment. The rest was wishing that I could talk properly when I feel like this - it's easy to fake it and talk crap about anything, and I try not to ever do that with him or tdoc ...the whole false layer on top that I have developed for most people - instead of mumbling semi-coherent bits about 'enough already'. And having to acknowledge that once again I have done none of the things I should, and many of the ones I shouldn't. Haven't gone to gym, brought him my med stash, woken up happy, eaten regularly, gone to bed on time. Have hit the vodka a bit too much.

So, try again this week. If I can stop crying long enough. And shave my legs.

Meds for the week stay the same, apart from going up from 60mg Remeron to 90mg, and then maybe cutting back on the sedative ones, both the Ambien and the Neurontin. Just looked back in notes though, and found that last time he tried to up Remeron, at 75mg I slept half the day while still sleeping badly at night. The Pexola is higher now though, so that might make a difference. Then he asked whether I'd ever tried any of the opiates - answer is not yet. But I would, now, if they were on offer. He reckons 'no' because of abuse and addiction potential being too high, says 'you would have a couple of good months and then a huge crash and all the possible complications...' And all I could say was "I'd take it. A couple of good months. Better than anything else in just about three years". I would too....

ouch....

for an 8-hour sleep/night person, I seem to be awake for way too many 02h00s lately. Which goes together with three almost guaranteed corollaries :

1. I must still get up by 07h00 at the absolutely way-latest for morning feeds;
2. if I am still awake by 22h00, it means alcohol is involved;
3. so who gives a fuck anyway.

Today could probably count as good by recent standards - facilitating delivery/release of a whole bunch of birds. Only having to euth one pigeon, for a 99% likely spinal injury. Not killing any babies.

I still spent at least half of it wishing I wasn't. There's a very, very short list of things that could make me want to live - like one - and I know that the chances of it ever happening is way below zero. Really. More chance of snow. (It does snow here, too. Minutely this year. 1981. 1967. So snow in JHB is possible....) Failing that, the meds might work. Ha bloody ha. Really, really wish they would, not only for me - although that is enough of a dream - but also because it would please pdoc. And that in turn would make me even happier.

Compared to the shortlist that would probably be livable for regardless of meds, there's a whole bunch that would count as enough of a reason not to. Those are all far more likely to happen anyway, even without me pushing my chances. Like getting fired from paying work or volunteer job. Reckless catches of poisonous and biting beasties. All sorts of risky bits that I can do without fear, because I would almost welcome it if they happened. Which in turn means that they never will.

I don't swallow the weaseled-away collection of meds even though I want to...because of my animals, my family, my docs. Can't remember when last I thought it was a good thing that the one previous attempt didn't work, but I often wish that it had - many times, every day. I take chances with sensibility and safety just about as often, without even considering them, because all I need is one good reason. Just one....

repeat....it's only tuesday

thought I was semi-organised today. Then some silly woman screwed up the schedule by making me wait for twenty mins, before hunting for a bird (large) in her garden that "couldn't fly at all". Guess what lady...after you, me, your daughter, and finally - at my request - your two dogs cannot find a single feather of said bird anywhere in your entire, well-secured and very overgrown garden...it probably can. It probably just didn't feel like doing it earlier.

So after that little bit of futility, I was later than I wanted to be to collect the heron and take him through to bird-vet for a second opinion. As I thought, he was euth'd - dislocated elbow and wrist, nerve damage, necrosing carpals, skin and feathers trashed. But while I was there I managed to add 3 less-than-a-day-old weavers. They'd bombed out of the nest (which probably means parasites or ants in there) and straight into a swimming pool. House-owner saw them and leaped in fully-dressed to rescue them. Good lad. Thumbsuck? One out of the three will survive.

And because I hadn't gotten to bird-vet before consulting started, I had to wait for almost an hour. Which made me 15 minutes late for t-doc (SMS'd her while racing through to say I was late). So we overran by 30 mins, talking about my current complete lack of any faith in anything ever working to fix this crap. And, of course, the past few days office-design for shrinks, as per the posts and comments on Shrink Rap - Gerbil, tdocs here also have a course on the deep psychological meaning of where you put your chairs. The SA twist, of course, is that rule # 1 is that even a tdoc with a relatively placid middle-class practice should always sit closest to the door. Just in case.

So I still haven't gotten to the gym. Or shaved my legs....

fuuuuuccckkk!! it's only monday

and this week has already been too long. Nothing exciting. Heron will probably be euth'd tomorrow. Gained another 3 pigeons and a sparrow. Sent 3 doves to the centre with semisane catbuddy. Yawned the whole day, and wide awake now. Worked out that it is exactly 2.5 years since I last had sex. Cheated on my diet in terms of both food and vodka on the first day.

I really, really despise and loathe myself. With many good reasons....

weirdo things for the day

1. Blogger finally started accepting the tick in the little box that says 'remember me'. After about six months of ticking it every day. Yeehaw!! This is so awesome to me that I realise I am now officially a total and complete loser. I mean shit, when something like this excites you to delirium, what else can you possibly be, apart from a total loser?

2. Quote for the day. Only in South Africa. Story about a bunch of robbers who attacked a farm, killed one of the farm workers by hitting him on the head with a piece of iron and shot the farmer twice. So, the police spokesman says:
"...four of the five armed men were arrested by police and the community after the incident. One of the men seems to have committed suicide and fell into a nearby river."
And while I think that assholes like that should most definitely fall into rivers, I couldn't help but start laughing at the 'seems to have' quote. Preferably they should fall into the river with about 100kg of iron tied close to the neck.

3. I can't even remember how many nights I have been on call for, or when it got bad. Think the bad bit started last weekend, and kind of think that both the customers who are having issues are not actually issues caused by the DBA team or software. But I am too stupid to be able to prove it, so until my team leader is back at work on Monday, I will have to live with callouts at 20h00, 23h00, 02h00 and 05h00. And with not being able to prevent them because I am an idiot.

4. Bird homing for the day: 3 mousebirds to mad mynah lady for release in her garden, and two mynahs to live with her. Bird gain for the day: 4 doves from assorted places. Oh, and two flycatchers from yesterday, who have now eaten my entire mealworm culture plus half of cat-ladies scroungings. Tomorrow I go shopping. For mealworms. God, my life is so exciting. Bird in transit: a heron with a broken wing. Got the call. Thought about my current level of bird-chasing skills, and phoned goose-chasing buddy to help out. The understanding was that I hold her baby while she leaps on birds. I'm crap at holding babies, but my skills at that are stupendous compared to my running after fast birds. Dropped him off at vet friend for assessment. Probably a euthanase, but I didn't want to make that call.

5. What I've spent about the last 3 hours doing: reading the blogs from a blogswap, one of whom was Red red whine. Found three amazing new blogs who have made me read for hours, but will need to ask permission before I link to them. Tomorrow, once I've finished reading their archives back to when blogger was invented.

Wow. Saturday nights used to mean dates and having fun. When did I get so goddamn old...

dumber and dumber

as I get further away from working fulltime. Only 3 1/2 years since I was doing this fulltime and could remember everything I needed to know about 6 different clients - different signons, naming conventions, places to hide things...all at my fingertips. Now I can't even remember the basic commands for the software I support.

Make that about #50 on the list of 1000 reasons to hate myself even more.....

now i know for sure....

...that I am truly not the weirdest person around. I can't remember where I saw the link first, but just got a response to a query, and have now placed an order. The site is CofaniFunebri, an Italian firm of undertakers, who produce - wait for this - a calendar of pinup girls with coffins. Now that is honestly something I would never ever have thought of.

Have ordered one for myself, and one for p-doc too. It will be worth the subsequent explanations to see the look on his face.

Besides, if they won't take my corpse to feed to lions, I'd elect to be cremated anyway...

silly season

subtitled 'artichoke and cherry' season. Those being two of my all time favourites, and both have incredibly short find-them-fresh seasons in JHB. So as a result, after a week or so of dithering about the high prices, I realise that they won't get any less expensive and dive in while they are still around. Have now eaten artichokes for the last 5 meals. Hot. Cold. With hollandaise and creme fraiche and mayonnaise. And am wondering whether I can actually face another day of green stuff without puking. They're vegetables, ergo they must be good for me. Just wish I could put them into suspended animation for a few months, until my appreciation for them has been renewed...

appraisal and all

so apart from collecting two sparrows at separate vets, and a white pigeon somewhere else.....saw t-doc this morning. She figured it was a multi-purpose appointment; firstly to persuade me not to tell manager to f-off, then to make sure that I got there on time and lastly as a normal session. I really adore her - she is just such a warm, caring person. When I grow up, I'd like to be.... Yeah. Right. I wish.

And after that, the PA was a walkover. I got a really good rating, although that doesn't mean much as a contractor. Wasn't nasty to boss, although that actually didn't worry me too much. He is terribly sweet, and if he wasn't my boss, I'd be quite fond of him. It's just that as a manager he is totally ineffectual, and I think team leader and I scare him too. She and I are both very experienced, good at the work, drink, swear and smoke (all of them more than we should) and - at work - are both somewhat tough. It was the era we were formed in, mostly, when a woman in our positions then needed to be better than any of the guys, at everything. From going to the pub with the team, to doing call outs at midnight, and, above all, making ourselves known and rated as not being girly. Programmers could cry, DBAs couldn't. Not implying that any of it was such a good idea - it was just how it was.

But still, think boss is a bit nervy of both of us. Starting with the bit about knowing that neither of us would want his job, ever - it would mean too much admin and kissing ass, and way too many meetings. So, as long as we keep being good at what we do, not being promoted isn't any kind of incentive to conform. TL got a low rating on meeting attitude, and told him 'great, now stop making me attend so many of them'...I didn't even have that as a KPA! I mentioned the meeting on Thurs that I refused to attend...he told me that he agrees with me about not going and will do his best to put my points across. And that I can always feel free to rant to him if I can just please try not to tell anyone out of the data centre how stupid they are. He also told me that in a way he appreciates me getting angry about things, because he sees that as being an indicator of client-centricity, and that that is key to being a good data-centre DBA. So...as long as I document my major client's database environment some time before March next year, all is well. Guess what he hasn't yet realised is the fact that I care about my one client, I care that they aren't getting the service that they deserve, I care about my reputation with a handful of people in the industry - almost all of whom don't work for my employer - and I'm rather fond of getting large amounts of money for being skilled and available almost all the time. None of the above is enough to stop me from saying what I think. I don't need the job, but it sort of suits me to have it for a while. And while being fired would not be good for my ego, it wouldn't hurt my reputation, doesn't make me behave any better, and doesn't make me dress better either!

Last week, I mentioned the appraisal to p-doc, and said that the data centre and H/O management were pissing me off enough that I didn't see it going too well. So he asked what I was going to do about it, and was astounded when I said that I would bill them double for the annoyance factor. I've told my boss that as well...anything I regard as a waste of time, he gets billed for twice as many hours. P-doc thought that was rather desirable, albeit strange. Dress code.... well, suffice it to say that I am the only person who is expected at work in denims, flip flops and a tshirt. If it's a formal meeting I mostly wear baggy, open-necked shirts. And if it's a very formal meeting, then I try (between Sept and Apr) to not bring more than one basket of birds.

Actually, having this job is probably good for me. If I think about the amount of crap they take without firing me, I have to figure that maybe I am worth something. Somehow......

And I still haven't taken birdy pictures.

feather-floods

through to the centre again to fetch another two mynahs..... Another two. For a total of seven now, although one is a bit weaker than I'd like. And as I was collecting them, eleven feral pigeons arrived. A building that is being renovated, and the builders were seen throwing the babies off the tenth floor. Some people are really not worth keeping. The rest of the errands were fetching 3 hedgehogs of about two days old and delivering them to their new mum, and collecting a baby robin. Half the babies went with me, and in between trips out, I rushed home to feed the rest. Didn't get round to taking pics of anyone, because in between feeds I was collapsing on the couch until the next summons. And tomorrow is t-doc, performance appraisal at the paying job and the dentist. Haha, being out for 4 hours in the morning means that 21 birds will have to go to work with me. Should give my boss an idea of priorities.....

too sweet

back through to the centre again today to fetch another two Indian mynah babies, these two only about ten days old. I have the five of them in a basket together, and when I checked just now they were lying in an overlapping huddle. Wings and beaks everywhere, so that one can't actually count how many birds there are in there. Must remember to take pics tomorrow, after a feed. And before as well, when the bird layer disappears behind huge, yellow mouths.

And Weevil the white-eye has decided that she is now a Big Bird, all 1.5 inches of her. She screams loudly for food but then refuses to be fed from the syringe, and dances around the cage instead. This afternoon I found an acceptable compromise. If I drip food mix onto the floor, she is prepared to pick up a few drops herself, but because she takes so little at a time she demands to be fed every twenty minutes. Oy veh... teenagers...

slowing down

rehab boss phoned to see if I could bring something through to the centre today, and mentioned that the assistant manager had had no volunteers at all show up, after she'd been off sick all week already. So, after I'd washed the babies and then waited ages for them to dry off, I took 16 pigeons and 4 mynahs through to their new home, and then went in to see if I could be useful. I was, a bit. But I am soooo slow, compared to how I used to be when I was doing it more regularly. Last feeds require a rythmn, a level of organisation and movement that I just don't seem to have any more. By the time I got home, I had barely enough energy to get out of the car and feed the very indignant cats and dogs.

If this is what I'm like now, god only knows how useless I'd be if I ever get to 50...

metaphorical marathon

even when I was at peak fitness I was never much of a runner, and seriously doubt if I could actually run around the block now. But I feel as if I've been running myself silly all week. And just never catching up. Out of 14 appointments/arrangements since Mon, I have been late for all but one. I've driven just over 1000 kilometres. Fetched and dropped off a whole bunch of birds, killed a few, accumulated more. Will take twenty-two to their new homes tomorrow, which still leaves me with 7 needing hourly feeds, two on bi-hourly, 6 that would sell their siblings for the chance to have a feeding tube down their throats again but who all can actually eat by themselves, and another three who are long term care but feed themselves. Have chased two bunnies around a parking lot three times (and completely failed at catching them), chased and caught a goose, taken 18 tortoises, 4 jackals, a terrapin and a hedgehog out to a conservancy area for release. Missed an appt with tdoc because I got totally lost in a really scuzzy area (and even her calling me back with map in her hand couldn't get me out of wherever I was fast enough to still get there in time) and been reminded that pdoc is only ever running on time when I'm not. Have been five minutes or less late three times in two and a half years, and those are about the only three times that he's been running on time. Cried for 40 minutes through my nieces operetta at school, where she had one of the main singing parts. Told my paying boss that I wouldn't come to a meeting because it was pointless and a waste of time, and then remembered that I have my biannual performance appraisal next week. Guess that means I will not score well on anything to do with attitude towards management. The clients love me, which might balance that a bit. Am just about to run out of coffee and cigarettes because every time I remember that I have to go shopping, I have baby birds in the car and would rather get them home. And the bloody Hindu's are celebrating Diwali with a never-ending barrage of fireworks, which has two of the dogs in hysterics, and half the birds so upset that they won't sleep, so can't even go to the all night shop now.

Just want to go to sleep. Enough already. Somehow I don't think the Manerix,Remeron,Neurontin, Inderal and Ambien combo is doing much positive yet. Just don't know anymore if any of the meds are ever going to. I know what I should be doing, like going to gym (sorry Aqua, not yet, just haven't had time or energy this week), not drinking (doing ok on that except for family dinner on Monday and yeah, that was one of the things I was late for). And pdoc came up with a new one this week: joining Toastmasters. Fat chance, or should that be no chance. He still doesn't believe me when I tell him most people think I talk too much, told me yesterday that if he did a wordcount per halfhour session, I wouldn't even be on the same page as most of his female patients. Used to be that I didn't talk in meetings or give speeches or lectures, but that was one of the good things I got from demonic ex-BF. He kind of manipulated me into a high-profile job, and because it was important to me to impress him, I ended up doing the public speaking enough to get comfortable about it. Until the relationship ended badly, and then along with eventually dropping out of the industry entirely, drinking way too much for way too long and failing at killing myself, I started stuttering. Fun and games....not.

stolen trivia

from Lara over at Red Red Whine, last week. A whole bunch more things that you didn't really want to know about me.....

What makes you happy?
Not much at the moment…umm. Laughing gas at the dentist, sleeping with the cats, getting baby birds big enough to release

What are your favorite stores?
Bookshops

What’s the best cheesy song?
I Would Do Anything by Meatloaf

What’s the best apology song?
Sorry Love Daddy by Brian McFadden

What’s a truly beautiful love song that you’d never roll your eyes at if it was played at a wedding?
Everything I Do by Bryan Adams

What song are you embarrassed to like?
Bed of Roses by Bon Jovi. Only because everyone else seems to think it’s so naff

What are your favorite songs?
Mostly folk and soft rock. But pretty eclectic – my collection contains some of just about everything except jazz and gospel. And rap/hiphop, although I’m not too convinced that those actually count as music

What’s your favorite song to hear when you’re out on the town?
Been a long time, but HAS to be It’s Raining Men. Ok, maybe that one should also embarrass me

What song makes you cry?
One? Nah, more like at least three hundred

What’s your latest happy musical discovery?
Also thanks to LaraB, Josh Ritter. Have bought and downloaded a whole bunch of his songs, best one to date is Wings

What’s your worst habit?
I say rude things to other drivers. Mostly while I’m not looking at them, just in case they get pissed off and shoot me. And a whole lot of others that I am just not going to admit to

What’s annoying you right now?
Depression that has lasted way too long. Being fat. My boss at the paying job – actually, make that most of the management structure there.

Why did your past relationships not work?
My fault mostly, although I’ve ended all of them except one. I’m hard to live with, as well.

If you could have a romance with any fictional character, who would it be?
Alex Delaware in Jonathan Kellerman’s books

Which month of the year do you think best suits you?
Any of the ones that aren’t too hot because I hate being all sweaty. And any of the ones that aren’t too cold because I hate having to wear shoes. (My mother would want me to put my footwear or lack of it down under bad habits as well). So here, that normally leaves me March, April, May, September and sometimes October

Are you attracted to people whose personalities are very similar to your personality or very different?
Different mostly, it’s bad enough having to live with myself never mind anyone similar to me

You’ve won $100,000 but you have to give it all away. To which charity or institution would you donate it?
Easy – to the wildlife rehab centre I work for and the animal rescue group I’m also involved with

If you could switch lives with anyone for a day, who would it be?
My rehab boss, to see if she feels as amazing from the inside as she appears

If you had to pick one book to recommend, what would it be?
Can’t choose. Can’t even narrow it down to my favourite 100.

Who are you attracted to but you’re a little embarrassed to admit it?
Very embarrassed, not just a little. My dentist but I’m blaming it all on the nitrous oxide

If you could be on a reality show (from Survivor to Dancing With the Stars to Top Chef), which one would you be on and why?
Meerkat Manor so that I could show them more realistically, and stop people from wanting them as pets

What TV shows do you watch every week?
None

What are your five favorite meals?
Sushi/sashimi. Grilled chicken thighs in honey and mustard marinade. Deep-fried calamari. Artichokes with crème fraiche or hollandaise sauce. Smoked salmon trout with lemon and cream cheese.

What are your five favorite non-blog websites?
Cybershrink, Medscape, Google, Drugs.com, Wikipedia. Yes, I know I’m weird

What song will you always get up and dance to?
None, unless I’m seriously drunk. I’m a really bad dancer. At home alone… I’m Not In Love by Enrique Iglesias

yawn

long day, starting with baby feeds, including a few overnight visitors. One baby crow, who scared the pants off the mynahs when he cawed loudly - probably the only bird that does scare a mynah. Kind of like a bigger, stronger, louder version of themselves. And a baby hadeda ibis, who had to be wrestled down and force-fed. At 06h30, I'm not great on wrestling matches.

And then off to the dentist - 40 mins of gas while he did disgusting sounding things to a back tooth, and I just lay there making happy noises every now and again. Home for a nap, and then off to the vet with crow-baby, then to see tdoc. She figures that the gas is good for me, that I sounded more ok than I have for ages. I agree. Getting completely stoned legally definitely improves my mood. And - yay! - he has to wait before finishing the tooth, so I get more on Monday. Tdoc reckons I should ask pdoc to prescribe it for me, seeing as it does more than any of the other meds - if I had my hand on the controls though, I'd probably never actually get out of bed. Just lie there breathing deeply every now and again.....

Finished off by dropping crow, ibis and a dove off at the centre, taking another mousebird nestling for my baby-basket and then driving out to release a whole bunch of coots, tortoises, a hedehog and the dassie (rock hyrax) that I trapped last week. Ten days of good food hadn't improved his mood at all, and he made it very clear that he would still like to bite any portion of my anatomy that he could reach.

Seeing as I have to be up at the crack to go do another snake-catching course, guess bed is a good idea. I signed up for it mostly for a bit more catching practice, and hopefully some ID tips - maybe get comfortable enough with catching that I don't swear subvocally for the entire duration, and very vocally when I mess up!

not quite good...never quite good enough

no prizes for guessing the mood. Howled all over tdoc yesterday for no reason, and came straight home to the couch.

no gym today, but I did walk around a bit at the local dam catching an injured goose, so not quite bad either. And will repeat again tomorrow afternoon probably.

and after three nights of who let the dogs out on the alcohol, back to behaving for a few days. I really don't see that it makes anything worse, other than the one night out of probably 50 that I get morbid and tearful. So, with not drinking at all, I have at least two or three of those every week. Just speaking statistically it is probably better to drink. But hey, if it makes pdoc happy, I'll keep trying it.
And then he wants to know why I'm not being sociable.

ended up yesterday with 4 babies on hourly feeds - speckled mousebird from Fri (left the sparrow at the centre), and then accumulated 2 weavers and a white-eye. Added a teeniest redfaced mousebird today. Don't really want to keep them over next few days, but don't really want to hand them over either. Most of all don't want them to die, either with me, or at the centre (double helping of guilt then for not caring for them).

spring is not a good time of year for me anymore...

big babies

...of the 9 pigeons outside in the aviary, there are 4 that really don't think that they should a)be outside, b)be forced to eat on their own or c)do without a daily cuddle. And they are all hulking great birds already. When I put food down today, I ended up with one stuck between my toes, and three sitting on my head and shoulders while they shoved their beaks into every orifice they could find. Tried explaining to them that they couldn't be released until they stopped behaving like babies, but the explanation was cut short when one tried to put his entire head into my mouth. Gross.

And then it was off to the dentist for a checkup, where I was the big baby, and made ouch noises until he rolled his eyeballs and gave me gas. Which of course, was exactly why I was whining to begin with. I just love the stuff. I figure that he only gives me the absolute minimum, and not very often, and it's about the only nice drug that I ever get...heck, I just like feeling stoned! Only down side is that it makes me feel distinctly cuddly, especially seeing as he reminds me so much anyway of last b/f. When one starts perving at one's 63-year old grandfather of 5 dentist, it's obviously a sign that celibacy doesn't suit one. I knew that already actually..

great achievement

for the month, never mind week or day....was getting myself to a shopping mall to buy gym sweatpants. Wow. Thanks to Aqua for the long-distance push. More of a mission than I thought, though. What I want is plain-coloured, Tshirty-material, elastic at ankles, baggy even though I am ginormous kind of pants. Only things available are skintight from the halfway down your ass waists to the knees, parachute material, not an elastic ankle in town, and most of all....not a hope in hell of me being comfortable in them, never mind them being baggy by design. Eventually lucked out and found one pair that is at least baggy - the rest of the criteria will have to wait. That's malls and me done until the week before Christmas.

So now I have one less excuse about gym. Over to you on the shopping, A!

gray skies everywhere

which are more in keeping with the mood anyway, than the normal sunny summer. Been a week of driving back and forth again, fetching little birds all over. I said to my rehab boss that it was quite safe for me to get up in the morning with absolutely no plans for the day because by the time I got out of the bath our receptionist would have filled the day for me. All I want to do is just curl up on the couch anyway.

Still haven't made it to the gym, which is kind of embarrassing. First problem is that before I can go to the gym, I have to go shopping for some tracksuit pants, and I can't summon up the motivation to go anywhere near a mall. And I'm too fat to get them anywhere else.

Pdoc today looked at me and said 'I think we should swap'. When I looked blank, he clarified, 'moods. You can have my happy mood for a week and I'll take your miserable one and just stay at home with it.' Then he thought about it and said 'except that you'd probably run off with it and not give it back, so I'll just have to keep my good mood. And fix yours instead.'. Ha bloody ha....been trying that for nearly 3 years now. Then we had a nice discussion about bird flu - he and I both have a sneaking hope that when bird flu really gets going it will annihilate vast numbers of people too. Big difference between us though, is that he figures he would be excluded, while I wish that - thanks to cuddling birds of all kinds - I'd be one of the dead. Would save a whole lot of mental agonising, if I could just go kiss a duck and die...

mazel tov

to the mynah babies who ate by themselves for the first time today. About time too, 3 of them are already making short flights. At least, I presume that they ate something from the bowl of food that was liberally distributed around the cage.....

Mynahs always remind me of teenage hoodlums. Not only do they have extra-long legs that give them a bit of a bandy strut, but they also slouch most of the time. Added to which, they are incapable of quiet chat - it's always easy to find where the mynahs in the neighbourhood are sleeping, because from about 15 mins before sunset until full dark, they congregate in the chosen tree, and yell raucously at each other, and push and shove their neighbours. And of course, they often hang out on the side of roads, where, in spite of their propensity for jaywalking, they manage to avoid being hit by traffic most of the time. But when none of their friends are looking, they are still quite willing to cuddle up to mom!

still no idea

of whether the sore neck is the Manerix or the tick bite. Pdoc responded to mail on weds by telling me to cut back to 300mg on the Manerix until we talked on thu. On thu he didn't commit to either theory, but just said to stay down on the Manerix until the tick bite fever was either confirmed or past the window. Then announced happily that he'd never seen a bite that was basically on the spine before, and that he thought that might be interesting symptomatically. I kind of prefer interesting things that don't involve my neck.

Todays fun was collecting a snake of unknown parentage. Ended up meeting the finder in the parking area of a busy fast-food place on a main road, and then discovered that the snake was in a large box on the back of his bakkie. Given that he was really keen to ID it, he insisted that we open the box and move the snake to my container, which I did with tongs, and gave a tentative ID. Then he wanted a picture, so after he got his camera, I lifted the lid an inch. Snake, who is about 1.25m long and angry, bailed out of container at high speed and started exploring the loadbed looking for a way off. My tongs were already in their bag, so I grabbed the snake by the tail and tried to persuade him back into the box, which it didn't like at all. I think I was yelling something like ohshitshitshit at the time, until he got the tongs out for me and I could rebox it. And then I suggested that we not take photos anymore. He was so awed by the image of me as Medusa, clutching a writhing snake by one end that he agreed immediately. Turned out that my initial ID was right, and it was a mole snake. They are renowned for having one of the worst bites around in wound terms, as although they are non-venomous constrictors, they are very aggressive on initial contact, and use their powerful, thick bodies to tear tissue as they bite with their rows of sharp little teeth - wounds often need stitching. Boss lady rolled around laughing when I returned to the centre with him.
I don't know why I do snake catches, really - I am terrified by it, and I am so crap at IDing them, other than the common form of the top 3 most poisonous species. Number 2 on the list, of course, is the one that makes up about 80% of all my calls...

waste of an entire f**ing year

just had a mail from my exceedingly feeble boss, telling me that the project I have put in huge hours and stress on for most of this year has now been shelved indefinitely. I am so pissed off, and so depressed about it too. Between the data centre management and the account management I am not sure which is the most useless bunch. I'm a tech support drone, and it's not up to me to convince clients - that's why I have multiple layers of management.

I know I should go and dig in the garden or something to vent, but my neck hurts too much already. Not sure if it is a Manerix s/e or impending tick bite fever (picked up a tick from the baby jackals last week, yecchh!) but my neck has been really sore since Monday, after going up on the Manerix in the morning. Will check with pdoc tomorrow, but meantime I really don't feel like ending up with sore shoulders as well.

sad kitty stuff

Got a call last night about a kitten at the local squatter camp, from our insider lady. Someone had given a woman three tiny kittens, and last night she noticed that one of them couldn't walk. I collected him this morning, and took him to one of the local vets. As soon as I saw him, I had a bad feeling about the prognosis, which the vet confirmed. Total paralysis of the hindquarters, with absolutely no pain response, no anal tone, no movement. Whatever the cause, it was something that would almost definitely not be treatable in a kitten of about 4 weeks old. And so I held him - in one hand because he was so small - while the vet euthanased him....

falling asleep on my feet

after another few hours at a natural sciences exhibition where the rehab centre had a stand (I was there yesterday as well). We get invited to a lot of shows, most of which entail standing around answering questions about the centre, telling them what we do, and in my case at least, feeding baby birds that can't stay home on their own. This one also involved a lot of schools who had to fill in a workbook, so it was also answering the same 14 questions over and over. And over again. Although I did think it kind of defeated the purpose of having questions at all and made me feel very old, because I kept thinking that back in the dark ages when I was at school we would have been expected to go home or to the library and learn something by actually looking up the answers.
In books, never mind having internet access to all the info you could ever want about anything. Make that old and crotchety....

For light relief though, I picked up a fledgling spotted eagle owl (pic is of a nestling) at dusk yesterday in a local park - had been seen on the ground by dogwalkers who were absolutely sure it had a broken wing. I couldn't feel a break, but wanted to make certain, so I brought it home to get a second opinion from another volunteer. When we were both happy that there were no breaks, and the reason it wasn't flying was just because it doesn't know how to yet, the centre manager asked that it be returned either to the park if possible, or to one of the adjacent houses. So this afternoon, I took it back, found a safe and well-camouflaged spot for it close to one of the adults and released him. Before I left, I had the satisfaction of seeing a parent flying down to him. A feel-good rescue all round.

And now, at a ridiculous hour for a Saturday night, I'm off to bed. There are nine little beaks who will be waiting eagerly from sunrise on to be filled - as well as a whole lot more who really don't believe that they are big enough to eat by themselves yet and will add their plaintive cries to the mix. No wonder birds have short maturation periods; if they took as long as most mammals do, the parents would die of exhaustion before they ever raised any young to the self-feeding age....

thursday already

and I have done just about nothing this week. Apart from seeing tdoc on Tue and today, and pdoc this morning, all I've really done is fetch animals and birds from all over. Including 3 baby black backed jackals of about 3 weeks from somewhere 2.5 hours out of town on Tue, a whole bunch of birds yesterday, a bunch more today including my first baby mynahs of the season. Four little guys that look to be between 10 and 15 days old - been waiting weeks for them to start being found out of the nests, and now four at once. Needless to say, I have a waiting list for them already. While I wouldn't normally encourage people to keep wild birds as pets, mynahs thrive on human interaction and many of the ones I know are never caged or clipped - they stay by their choice, and, probably, because they enjoy having a tame human to serve them. Also, I figure that the more people see of them as pets, the more they will be regarded with some degree of fondness and in the long term it might become less acceptable to kill them in the wild.

Good to have tdoc back again. I know that most of what she does is just 'supportive' therapy, but she does also prod me into looking at things differently sometimes. I spend most of my life trying to pretend everything is ok, and at least I can talk to her about anything. I kind of feel she is the only person who knows everything about me and doesn't reject me for the worst bits. Yeah, I know it's a paid-for relationship...but sometimes it's still the only totally honest one I have. Even pdoc doesn't know a lot of what she does, partly because he doesn't really want to get into the really emotional stuff and partly because I adore him too much to tell him what a totally useless bitch I am a lot of the time. We do talk, and he can be really astute sometimes, but there will always be stuff I'd rather not discuss.

He was in great form today, and we ended up talking about all sorts of weird stuff. Including another one of his slightly off-colour stories - started off with the strange things little old ladies do sometimes, so he reckons one of the strangest he'd had was at a very busy hospital where most of the ambulance calls were taken to. A member of staff was brought in to ER with a bunch of flowers stuck in her genitals, so the junior resident on duty comes running to call him and tells him this in a very wide-eyed shocked tone. 'oh' says pdoc calmly, 'she probably just couldn't find a vase anywhere'! And shrinks wonder why they have a reputation for being a bit strange themselves....

So it's up again on the Aurorix again, to 750mg. And wait. He says no way to even thinking about methadone, which is probably my choice as well. I'm way too much of an addictive personality anyway, and the opiates are still something I find a bit scary. At the same time though, I'm running out of patience - and out of meds that we haven't tried. I've lost count of how many it's been just in the past three years, almost all of them without any effect at all. Getting to the point again where I just think it's been too long already, and it doesn't seem to be anything left to hope for.

No gym yet. But no vodka either.

three good things

tdoc is back from honeymoon and I get to see her tomorrow

I stuck to the no vodka decision, even if I didn't get to gym (I didn't actually have time, between bird calls)

I collected a really sweet bird this morning. He's a fledgling Pied Crow, who was found sitting alone in the middle of the road, and when I fetched him, he made it very clear that he hadn't been given breakfast. Took him to the centre, where he made such a noise in the clinic that the receptionist came running to see what was wrong, so took him to the kitchen where he ate 90% of a cut up dead chick before burping (no...not really) and settling down on my arm. Went back to the clinic to process him, and showed him to the boss. She looked at him, thought about it, and said she was going to hack him out away from the centre 'before he turns into a great big cuddly chicken'. Then she looks at him again, and at me, and says 'if its not too late for that already' - I looked down, and he was leaning against my chest with his eyes closed, fast asleep in a very uncrow-like way. Yep...cuddly chicken.

and again...

Entire day was spent semi-comatose, first in bed, then the bath, and then on the couch for most of the day. It was dark and drizzly for most of it, and all the babes are on 3 hourly feeds, so I basically fed and then curled under the '70s sleeping bag with a book in hand. And started at 5 o'clock on what I've determined will be my last alcoholic evening for a while. It's not going to make me feel any better; most of the time, drinking stops the real demons from roosting - and when they do, stops me from doing anything fatal. Will please pdoc immensely though. Might as well make one of us happy...

blaaahhh

Been raining just about solidly for the last six days. I have a room full of little birds who ended up wet and on the ground. I've cried myself ugly over the last three books I've read - every time anything bad happens, every time anything good happens.
Supposed to stay on 450mg Aurorix for another three days still, but seeing as I have no side effects anyway, and pdoc reckons that he wants to get up to 750mg before he expects anything, I went up this morning to 600mg. No result by Thur, I'll go up again, and he can yell at me when I see him. He wants to do the hospital bit anyway, which I declined on the grounds of having too many birdlings. Wouldn't go anyway, even if the house was empty. But it's just too close - never mind being near the edge... I'm sitting there with my legs dangling over, ready to lean forward and just take the dive..

damn!

Saw pdoc today. Didn't tell him how totally crap this week has been, although he can kind of guess by how much time I spend fiddling with the coaster on his desk and not talking, and by how much eye contact I can handle.

So, for the first time in two and a half years, he didn't ask about gym. And this is when I have something to tell him on said subject for the only time in just as long. Eventually I said to him that he'd missed a question. Which one, he asks. Gym, I say. His eyebrows go up and he asks 'and?', so I say that I signed up for one. He expresses great joy, shakes my hand, writes it in his notes, underlines it in red, gets even more overjoyed and circles it in red with exclamation marks. And tells me not to overdo it for the first week - 'don't go more than 6 times' he says. Ha bloody ha...little does he know the family history I can claim in my defence. My sister once became a member and stayed one for 3 years at a particular gym, without ever setting foot through the doors after signing up. Besides, six times in a month would probably be pushing it. I didn't want to admit that I had to stop and breathe heavily halfway up the stairs so that I didn't collapse at the entrance.....

the rehab bit

Aqua asked about doing more of the nice side of things. I do, I get way more than my share of them. I'm lucky in that the boss trusts me with doing a lot of the catching, and a lot of releasing as well. Actually, in all honesty, it's not so much skill - it's more that because I contract from home most of the time for the paying job, I'm available and I don't mind going places. And I'm not too scared of being bitten, which is a huge advantage.

I stopped doing shifts at the centre every day because I'd come home just about every day and cry about losing birds or animals. A lot of the catching does involve injured or trapped animals, and very often I need to make the call on whether they go straight to the nearest vet for euthanasing. And of course, the babies I treat at home are entirely my responsibility. Some of them will go through to the centre as soon as I can get them there, but most are feral pigeons and mynahs, and the centre doesn't treat them because they aren't indigenous. And crap as I might be sometimes, at least I'm giving them some chance.

Boss lady says that we don't know either how many of the littlest ones would make it with their parents, that in the wild a percentage would die anyway. Also, the ones that we get have often been traumatised in some way already - by falling out of the nest, being caught by cats or dogs, being cold and hungry etc.

But it's still heartbreaking to lose them, especially when it's a babe that you've been feeding two drops to every half hour for a few days. Don't think I'll ever get used to that...just that some days it hurts a bit, and some days it feels like a bit of me dying too....