Crappy Holidays
Normally my posts are upbeat, but this one is going to be more of a vent. I apologize in advance.
This holiday season started off a few days before Christmas, when I got a call from Ken that Frankenstein had a golf ball sized tumor on his neck. After running some slides, they were able to determine that it was some type of lymphoma. It is VERY rare for a three year old healthy cat to get lymphoma, and Ken and I were torn apart. I canceled all of my holiday plans and drove up to Appleton for the holidays. Ken was able to help with the very dangerous surgery to remove Frankie's tumor, and the surgery was a huge success. The next few days were rough though because he was in a lot of pain and we had to watch him 24-7. Some might call us crazy, but Frankenstein is our little boy, and to see him go through all of that, and to know his prognosis may not be good, was a horrible thing to go though.
My dad decided to cancel his holiday plans so that he could spend some time with us. The snow also made the roads virtually impossible to travel on. Christmas Day Ken and I came down to Madison and we ate at a China Buffet for lunch, then went to my mom's nursing home and played Monopoly for hours. This day was by far the best of the past few weeks. PS. I dominated at Monopoly!
The next painful events I won't go into much detail about, but everybody has squabbles with extended family, right?
My next venting session is about the New Year's Eve from hell. Ken has never had luck with New Year's Eve, and swore to never celebrate it. I was able to whine and beg enough to get him to come down to Madison for a GREAT New Year's eve. And parts of it were great, I got to spend some time with my dear friends Kari and Lisa. Other than that it was crap. Rather than going to somebody's house and relaxing, we went to a bar (which I have always hated doing) and drank cheap champaign. After midnight the champaign got to my stomach and I wanted to get going. At this time, I was house sitting for a place with 4 dogs, 2 cats, and 2 mice. There were a lot of animals, but they are the most ADORABLE ever. Anyway, we get back to the house only to find the key (which I brilliantly attached with a thin metal loop) had fallen off somewhere. We then spent the next three hours in single digit temps trying to find the damn key. At 4am we decided to give up and sleep at my dad's house. We had to wake up a poor neighbor early in the morning to get the key!
Then a day later the worst blow... my wonderful grandpa passed away. He was 98 years old, and fell asleep holding my grandma's hand. You can't ask for a better end than that, but it still tore me apart. We hopped on a flight to Florida and spent the weekend with my grandma and family. It was nice to see everybody but very hard to see the sadness in my grandpa. They were married for 65 years!
On the flight home we got stuck in Detroit due to the fog in Madison. When we finally got back I had one of my most stressful days of work ever, only to get the flu last night. Today I am missing yet another one of the busiest days of work which is stressing the heck out of me.
Whew! That's about it for now. I am hoping things will go uphill from here! And yes, I do know things could be MUCH worse than this, and I am so lucky to have my family, Ken, my great friends, and a wonderful job.
Normally my posts are upbeat, but this one is going to be more of a vent. I apologize in advance.
This holiday season started off a few days before Christmas, when I got a call from Ken that Frankenstein had a golf ball sized tumor on his neck. After running some slides, they were able to determine that it was some type of lymphoma. It is VERY rare for a three year old healthy cat to get lymphoma, and Ken and I were torn apart. I canceled all of my holiday plans and drove up to Appleton for the holidays. Ken was able to help with the very dangerous surgery to remove Frankie's tumor, and the surgery was a huge success. The next few days were rough though because he was in a lot of pain and we had to watch him 24-7. Some might call us crazy, but Frankenstein is our little boy, and to see him go through all of that, and to know his prognosis may not be good, was a horrible thing to go though.
My dad decided to cancel his holiday plans so that he could spend some time with us. The snow also made the roads virtually impossible to travel on. Christmas Day Ken and I came down to Madison and we ate at a China Buffet for lunch, then went to my mom's nursing home and played Monopoly for hours. This day was by far the best of the past few weeks. PS. I dominated at Monopoly!
The next painful events I won't go into much detail about, but everybody has squabbles with extended family, right?
My next venting session is about the New Year's Eve from hell. Ken has never had luck with New Year's Eve, and swore to never celebrate it. I was able to whine and beg enough to get him to come down to Madison for a GREAT New Year's eve. And parts of it were great, I got to spend some time with my dear friends Kari and Lisa. Other than that it was crap. Rather than going to somebody's house and relaxing, we went to a bar (which I have always hated doing) and drank cheap champaign. After midnight the champaign got to my stomach and I wanted to get going. At this time, I was house sitting for a place with 4 dogs, 2 cats, and 2 mice. There were a lot of animals, but they are the most ADORABLE ever. Anyway, we get back to the house only to find the key (which I brilliantly attached with a thin metal loop) had fallen off somewhere. We then spent the next three hours in single digit temps trying to find the damn key. At 4am we decided to give up and sleep at my dad's house. We had to wake up a poor neighbor early in the morning to get the key!
Then a day later the worst blow... my wonderful grandpa passed away. He was 98 years old, and fell asleep holding my grandma's hand. You can't ask for a better end than that, but it still tore me apart. We hopped on a flight to Florida and spent the weekend with my grandma and family. It was nice to see everybody but very hard to see the sadness in my grandpa. They were married for 65 years!
On the flight home we got stuck in Detroit due to the fog in Madison. When we finally got back I had one of my most stressful days of work ever, only to get the flu last night. Today I am missing yet another one of the busiest days of work which is stressing the heck out of me.
Whew! That's about it for now. I am hoping things will go uphill from here! And yes, I do know things could be MUCH worse than this, and I am so lucky to have my family, Ken, my great friends, and a wonderful job.
