cody bear’s friends

so we haven’t talked about cody bear’s gastroparesis in a while, have we?…

NO! because i think this is the longest he has ever gone without barfing! i’m so proud of my little guy. (if you’re lost, check out the gastroparesis posts by clicking on that word in the tag cloud to the left)

with such healthy food, switching the meds (reglan) from 15 to 30 minutes before eating, and the stress relief work the dog is working on, this is the longest he has gone without being sick! almost 5 months i think!!!

some notes:

it still sucks when people cuddle him and always feel the need to mention how skinny he is, as if i’m starving him or something. but i think i’m learning that they’re not accusing me of not feeding him, they’re just surprised because he is so fluffy and that when they pet him they can feel his ribs and back bone.

because the stomach struggles to digest, cody bear has been getting 3 or four small meals a day. he eats them very slowly….

feeding him with the molecuball insures that he will eat slowly and actually chew the bites of kibble. plus…he’s so cute when he does it!

also, he is pretty much allowed to eat as many treats as he wants. they just have to be made of really healthy ingredients and nothing full of preservatives like snausages and such. no chews or bones either.

and, the higher the fat, the better, as far as i’m concerned. fewer ingredients sit better in his stomach, too.

also, i try really hard to walk him before meals, not after. i don’t want the food in his belly making him cranky if we encounter a barking or scary dog.

i know the gastroparesis is still there, but it is nice to be controlling it.

well, the weekend went well, so it was hard going back to work today. but….it didn’t turn out badly!  my boss was funny and even though i screwed up for a bit, he was cool about it…and….my coworker was hardly annoying at all!

it helps knowing that my boss is seeing his bad habits, too.

i will admit, much of my mental energy was spent wondering why i haven’t heard from the border collie rescue group.  i totally smothered cody bear with attention after work because he has acted so depressed lately.  it made all the difference; he was SO CHEERY. so…i know a play mate is a good idea.

besides…there are way too many dog toys in this house for one dog!

i don’t have any thing juicy to talk about tonight.  ‘cept maybe the super tasty meal i made myself.  some sort of green bean tomato onion dealie in a mixture of seasonings and white wine served on this mixture of rices.  i have to say….it was scrumptious! exciting….? no, but scrumptious.

hopefully i’ll have something silly to post about tomorrow.

here’s one of the funnier things we saw at work this week.  one of our clients (a hospital) returned this pc to us for service….

now, not everyone is great with computers, BUT, if you are medical staff at a hospital that may one day be treating me or someone i know….i really hope you know how to turn on a pc.  also….do you need this as a reminder? if someone shows you the button one time, will you need a note taped on to remind you?  ever again?

ok…well, we were cracking up about it! then…it was time to get ready for one of our coworkers 50th birthday party!  l and i made this…

gosh, i sure hope you can tell it is an e!  the picture turned out cool because we had the party on the cyc(cyclorama) in the photography studio.  i love the cyc! i wish all the walls in my house had curved bottoms!

then the party, followed by leftovers.  we had soo many leftovers, (the caterer was just so so) but, not many containers.  here is my friend m with the mug-o-asparagus i had to take home.

the party was great and the birthday guy loved it.  there was some jerkiness, but i’ll talk about that tomorrow….once i’ve cooled off a bit! also, the guy in charge of the beverages only brought one case of beer for fifty people. DUH!

i did end up carting the cup of veg home i the honda’s cup holder.  i was snacking on the asparagus en route. it was good.  traveled well.

i’m super excited with my new client: a local organic farm!  they’re friends of mine and i am so glad they finally decided to do a website!  their veg are amazingly delicious and diverse!

i love their farm and i wish they would adopt me and cody bear.  it would be great to quit my job, pack up our stuff and move to their beautiful land, about an hour outside of town.

truthfully, cody bear is a city dog. i don’t know if he would last very long in the wildlands.  for him….off leash, without a bag of yummies sans tweezers and filtered water is wildlands. but i digress….

look forward to pictures of herbs, chunky root veggies, crisp leafy greens and succulent fruits!

because of shyness, personal space issues, etc. i can’t show you the folks i work with…

but i can show you what they eat!  here are the contents of the break room in our office building:

ok, so far so good…

coffee, juice. that’s cool…

many, many lemons….

peanut butter and wine, naturally.

so, there you have it.  an insight into our gang.  12 people.  6 of whom have dogs.  4 have cats.  8 with human children.  5 have been divorced. 5 married, 7 single.  2 confirmed dems, 5 confirmed republicans.   4 women, 8 men.  youngest is 25 years, oldest is 61.

 took the canon to my friend’s organic farm to get some shots of veg!  i am going to do their website and they’re going to pay me with vegetables!

they have tasty organic veg.  my favs: their chards. YUM.  the okra.  the cucumbers. the tomatoes. the garlic.  the turnips.  it is all so yummy!

and pretty.  eat your veggies….they’re pretty!

guess which newby vegan has developed a soy allergy….

yes…me.  bummer, huh?

in late november i met with a quirky and upbeat nutritionist who was excited about my leap into veganism and urged me to stay away from soy.  for the first few weeks, i cooked fresh veg and whole grains and i felt GREAT!  more energy during the day….woke up without having that congested feeling.  for convenience sake i needed to fall back on tofu, soy sauce, soy products.

i started getting sicker and sicker and (DUH) didn’t even think about the soy.  well, there it was…. a nasty and inconvenient allergy that just kept getting worse for over a month.  (i wasn’t putting two and two together).  i have been without ANY soy now for exactly 7 days and am remarkably better.  truly, the symptoms were gross and i am so much happier.

back to the drawing board on the vegan diet though…can’t fall back on the mock meats and the soy sauces flavorings.  damn…me lovums my soy sauce…

hi…

today was how a saturday should be. i had the BEST day. wanna know what went down?

as i mentioned earlier, i met my friend m, a most wonderful and talented photographer, and we went on a road trip to a friend’s farm and to some fields of wild flowers.

we arrive at our friend’s and just seeing her and her super nice husband was great. then she sat us down, made us tea and handed us some locally made honey, gave us bowls of fresh fruit salad (crisp and sweet) and chocolate chip cookies.

it was delicious. and we just sat in her light and comfy country home talking about ….stuff.

it was a beautiful day and we were surrounded by poppies!

surrounded…

chickens….

eggs…

more pictures later, but back to the great saturday…

we spent hours in the car, but she is great company. i was exhausted when we got back to town so, what’s better on a saturday? nap time. curled up in bed with cat and dog and had the coziest snooze. took dog to play date with a very silly poodle named coco. then a bike ride to a friend’s house for some chatter, followed by a great dog walk with my wonderful cody bear!

then off to the bar for some chips and salsa and irish beer. so, here i am. saturday is over, but i’m still appreciating it.

i LOVE weekends!

no editing photos tonight people: the food is ugly and the pets are cute.

once again, i rushed home to be with cody bear as he ran hell-on-paws through the back yard…

the dog was cute and spunky for about an hour.  naturally i won’t post all the pics, just know, ….cody bear can run and cody bear can smile!

next, off to a friend’s to visit, then to a local puppy class to take fuzzy pictures!  off to grocery store for a bell pepper and some mushrooms!

that was a close up of bell peppers, spinach, baked tofu and mushrooms with a super yummy rice mix and a spicy sesame-soy marinate.

after stuffing myself with the vegan spicy food, i took cody bear for his third walk of the day.  he’s such a good bear!  we get back and the cat was feeling sooo neglected, so…here is here best shot with the new camera:

i think she looks mad.  big and mad.