Conversations with my car

The vet was right the first time. Asshole, the horse, does have laminitis. Unlike Barbaro who has a catastrophic case, Asshole doesn't and if all goes well in time he can recover.

What caused it? Who the hell knows.

Part of the treatment involves totally eliminating any and all feed from his diet. All natural, no manufactured carbohydrates of any sort. He can have grass — There's none left in the yard or anywhere else now. He and "Dingbat," the other Quarter horse, have eaten it all. — hay and ($16.50 a bale) alfalfa hay. And because alfalfa is so expensive, Dingbat ain't getting none of that.

This has led to utter chaos at feeding time.

Since Asshole can't have any feed he has alfalfa in his hay rack. With as expensive as it is you'd think he'd be thrilled, but no. He doesn't want it. He can hear Dingbat eating his feed and he wants that. It's feeding time and that's when he's supposed to have feed! In his pan!

Meanwhile, instead of eating Dingbat plays with his feed for a half an hour or so, nibbling, because what he really wants is Asshole's alfalfa!

They're driving each other nuts over the stall wall. Me? I didn't have far to go before but now? Now, I.Am.There.

How "there" am I?

I pulled in the other day after a(nother) trip to the hardware store, this one to pick up more clips to lower Dingbat's feed pan even more to make even more certain that Asshole can't reach it over the wall. I clicked the key fob to lock the doors, and yelled "SHUT UP!" at my car when it beeped. To make matters even worse, I then began apologizing to it for speaking so roughly. To make matters worse still, I didn't know until I turned around that I had an audience watching me patting its hood as I stood there talking to it.

According to the vet the wound on Asshole's neck from the spider bite is healing well. "That looks good?" Going into week three, there's still puss pockets around it with . . . goo coming out, but that's good because that means it's still draining! Naturally!!! Herself (remember, she's a nurse) looked at it yesterday and had the audacity to agree with the vet.

There's a reason for the saying that a pill is big enough to choke a horse, and Asshole has been on 12 of those horse-chokers twice a day. (One prescription finished yesterday morning, so now it's down to two, twice daily.) That wasn't a problem before because I'd dissolve them in water, mix in some of his beloved apple-flavored electrolytes to mask their bitter taste, and then dump the mess over his feed. But now Asshole can't have any.

So, I cut up a couple of apples, bore a little hole in each piece and bury a pill inside.

Asshole takes the individual chunks readily. His face is filled with a look of utter contentment as he chews and chews and chews. And then spits the pill out.

You know how restaurants ask customers to complete survey cards to rate their dining experience? This morning Asshole commented on his new cuisine by dropping a "dump" in his feed pan.

On other fun subjects since I last blogged:

Da Kid discovered somebody has been going into our garage and helping themselves to stuff. Hubby then discovered more stuff gone. Later Da Kid found the paint sprayer in a another corner of the garage where Hubby (he denies all knowledge) apparently put it while looking for Da Kid's missing industrial weed eater which he'd forgotten he'd loaned to a neighbor a month ago. The neighbor who reminded Da Kid he still has his leaf blower, too, and has for two years. Da Kid's chainsaw remains missing, though, although I dimly recalled the possibility that Da Kid had loaned it to another neighbor who also doesn't return anything.

Saturday morning brought a visit from Animal Control after an anonymous complaint about the horses. I figured someone might have called because Asshole looks like shit (He does.) but no. Someone had called in a complaint saying the horses don't have any shelter. Interestingly enough, I spotted the inspector pulling up just as I was pushing the manure-filled wheelbarrow out of the stalls.

And, my computer is acting up so if I disappear for a while it's either that, I'm in jail . . . or busy talking to my car again.