Mr. V has kidnapped me to a place filled with trees, mountains, cold weather, REALLY cold weather, crazy drivers, and did I mention REALLY cold weather? Welcome to my spring vacation!
We are here in Alberta, Canada. So far the trip has been a fun adventure. Mr. V has a little over a week of leave, so we decided to go on a vacation. Since he is the one who is about to go on deployment, I let him pick the trip. So everything we are going to do here is all his idea...with a little input from myself (i.e. I refuse to go on a gondola ride that hangs thousands of feet over the ground, so he settled for one a little less scary. I also refuse to hike in the back country of avalanche territory, along with other scary dangerous things he would love to do.)
We left Oak Harbor Saturday morning and made it to Revelstoke, British Columbia by nightfall. The ride was an adventure. I'm sure I'm just a wimp, but my sheltered east coast upbringing kicked in big time as we drove through snowy mountain passes. I have learned that Canadians are completely psychotic when it comes to driving. They drive at least 30 miles over the speed limit on wet or icy roads and around sharp twists and turns without ever hitting their brakes. If you aren't driving as psychotically fast as they are, they are quick to pass you in no passing zones, while driving around a sharp turn. Needless to say, the drive was a bit scarier than I ever imagined it to be. I'm not exactly sure WHY they insist on driving this way. I would be inclined to say that they know what they are doing, but we passed one tractor trailer shell on the side of the road (it was obvious that it flipped over, and burned to a crisp on one of those sharp turns. Did I mention that the 18 wheelers also drive insanely fast? I was amazed that they just left the shell of a truck there on the side of the road. It looked like it had been there for a while.) A few hours down the road, we passed yet ANOTHER tractor trailer that had overturned on the highway, around a sharp turn. We have pictures of that one that I will upload when I get a chance to organize the pictures. You would think that burned trucks, flipped over trucks, and bridges with guard rails that have obviously been hit, would inspire people to drive a little more carefully, but apparently not.
The crazy drivers, along with the snow and ice that we encountered in several areas made for a scary drive. But thankfully, we made it to Revelstoke unharmed. We stayed at a really nice hotel for the night, and in the morning we headed off to Banff, Alberta.
The drive to Banff was interesting in several ways. First, it was absolutely beautiful. Ever since moving to Washington, Mr. V has driven me crazy with his constant speeches of "Brooklet look! There are big snowy mountains around us!" I do think the area of Washington that we live in is beautiful, but to me it was a beauty that wore off quickly. I still think its nice, but I just can't get excited about it every day like he can. So I wasn't really expecting to be amazed at the big snowy mountains up here, but I was. This is a beautiful area. The rocky, jagged mountains (I had an epiphany when I said "Hey the Rocky Mountains are really rocky!"), are pretty spectacular looking and I have to admit that I am impressed by the beauty up here. We drove through 3 or 4 national parks on our way to Banff (Banff is one of them) and on the way I had some more scary shocking moments. We are apparently in avalanche country out here. I can't even count the number of times we saw signs that said "Avalanche area...do not stop". That was just a little shocking to me because I've never been in an area where avalanches are common. We even saw the results of several of them. The roads up here have avalanche tunnels that are strategically placed at the bottom of frequent avalanche areas. I thought that was interesting when we drove through the first one. I thought that was REALLY interesting when we drove through several of them in a row that were completely covered by snow...the result of avalanches. Thats another thing I will upload pictures of eventually.
The next interesting stop for us was on the border of British Columbia and Alberta. There is a small, quaint, little town called Field. There's nothing extremely exciting about the town, but I just found it interesting because there couldn't have been more than 50 homes, and it is hours away from any larger town. It was just so secluded and quaint that it almost seemed unreal. To me it looked like a town that is placed around a train set at Christmas time. I don't know how people can live there 365 days a year without going crazy, but I could happily live like that for a few weeks before I'd lose my mind :-).
We are staying at the Banff Springs Hotel, which is a dream for a history nerd like me. It was built in 1886 and aside from renovations and upkeep, it still looks like an old historic hotel. Mr. V definitely made a good choice in choosing a place to stay.
Today was spent on the Banff Gondola and on Sulpher Mountain. This was the least insane of the gondola rides Mr. V wanted to go on. I still freaked out a bit when I saw how steep it was, and he has a video of me on the ride up that no one will ever see (I had no idea he was filming me as I had a small panic attack.) This particular one stays fairly close to the top of the trees, wheras the other crazy one he wants to ride, is WAAAYY above the trees. I chose...well...compromised...on this one based on the fact that it stayed lower. However, I didn't know that it is one of the steepest gondolas in the world, which is what caused my panic attack when we got on, and I looked up the mountain. I am happy to say that I survived the trip and saw an amazing view of the Canadian Rockies at the top. I'm also happy to say that I survived the cold at the top of the mountain and even managed to hike one of the trails that had a sign saying "Hiking not recommended."
Tonight we're just relaxing back at the hotel, but tomorrow brings more adventures as we check out the famous hot springs here! I'm not sure about the idea of swimming outside when its 10 degrees out, so we'll see how this goes!
Monday, March 30, 2009
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
How do I maintain my sanity?
I was going to sit down and write a pretty long blog about the visit from my in-laws last week. However, I think the majority of the visit can be summed up in one single conversation that I had with my father-in-law on the last day he was here (This is almost word for word exactly as he said it. The only way words are changed is if I forgot what he actually said. There is no sarcasm or exaggeration.):
FIL: *spoken in the most condescending tone I've ever heard* "Brooklet, I'd like to talk to you seriously for a minute. I don't want you to take this as a criticism because its not. I am just genuinely concerned about you. I don't know if you are going to be able to handle it when Mr. V is deployed. First of all, you have 9 cats to take care of. Do you understand that that is a lot of work? I don't think you are going to be able to handle it. You really need to think about downsizing and getting rid of at least 3 of the cats. I don't think you completely understand what is going to happen when he's gone. You are going to have to take care of the house. You are going to have to learn how to do certain things...like learning how much money you have in the bank account, balancing the checkbook, and learning how to pay the bills."
I interrupted him at that point because I could only take the condescending insults for so long. First of all, yes sir, I know I have 9 cats. And you know what? If I downsize to 6 cats, I will still have to feed them, scoop their litter boxes, take them to the vet when needed and give them attention. The only thing that happens when I have the 3 "extra" ones is that I tend to trip over them more often. Otherwise, I still have the same number of litter boxes to scoop and as gross as it is, 3 extra piles of poop is not something that is going to cause me to falter and prove that I can't live on my own.
Second, not all husbands control every single thing that their wife does. Some husbands let their wives have access to their bank accounts. Some husbands even let their wives handle paying the bills ALL THE TIME, which is what we do. I pay the bills now. I've been paying the bills for well over a year. Before I met Mr. V, I paid my own bills for the house I rented ON MY OWN (well with a roommate, but still...). I have been paying my own bills since I was 18. I turn 28 in a month. I think I know how paying bills works. Oh and the bank account? I am the one who balances our checkbook and keeps Mr. V in check when it comes to spending money (he's not a bad spender, but I just have more knowledge of what's in the bank account because, oh that's right, I PAY THE BILLS!!)
I did tell him all of that, in the politest way possible, but I think I let some anger slip into my voice anyway. I really tried to be nice and patient and tell him nicely that I already knew how to maintain a house on my own, but its hard to be that polite when you are seething with anger. I know I should just let it go, and brush it off my shoulders, but I was VERY insulted by that conversation with him.
Couple that conversation with the 2 hour conversation we had at dinner one night. Apparently, FIL thinks its absolutely important that Mr. V and I produce some children NOW! He stated reasons such as "You don't want to wait too long. Brooklet is getting older." Thanks. I know people have children when they are much younger than me, but I wasn't aware of the fact that I had reached an age where child bearing almost wasn't possible anymore. When Mr. V explained to his father that he has been under a LOT of stress and pressure lately and didn't even have the mindset to think about children right now (which I think is a pretty good excuse - he HAS been really stressed lately, so why in the world would you want to add more responsibilty to his already heavy load right now?) Mr. V also explained that if and when we do have kids, we want to try to plan it so he will be around more than he is now. I am adament about the fact that I want my future children to have a father. I don't want to be a single mother, and the way life is right now, even when Mr. V isn't deployed, I would essentially be a single mother because he doesn't have any extra time to throw around. We both understand that perfectly planning when to have a child doesn't always work, but at the same time, we don't think that means we have to be irresponsible on purpose. Father-in-law came back with reasons why all of our "excuses" were bad ones. He basically said that its ok if I'm a single mother because kids don't need a dad to raise them (umm maybe they don't, but I'd like it to happen if possible). He also said that when dad IS around, he just needs to spend all of his time with his children, therefore leaving his wife in the dust and not paying any attention to her (which I have a major problem with). He said that grandparents can help raise the children (which might work out if the grandparents lived anywhere near us...but they don't) He kept making comments like "Whatever. You'll get through it" and you know what? I know that we WOULD get through it. HOWEVER, now is not a good time for us to have children. Its not even a good time for us to THINK about children. If something unplanned happens, then yes, we will get through it. But I really think its insulting and somewhat crazy that my father-in-law cares about nothing except for the fact that you are supposed to have kids, so why don't we have any yet?
They were here for 9 days and I was more than happy to say goodbye to them when they left. My mother-in-law is a VERY sweet lady and I feel bad for her because she never has much to say when FIL is talking, but I can't complain about her too much. She went with me, and my sister-in-law to a Mary Kay event that we had a lot of fun at, and she bought me a nifty early birthday present from an antique store in nearby Freeland. She found these earrings that were made from the insignia of a World War II military uniform. They are WWII planes, that someone sodered earring backs onto. Since I'm a history nerd, and my husband is a pilot, I thought they were great! So that was a nice diversion from the annoyances of my father-in-law's "How to live life MY way" speeches.
So now the visit from my own mother is a month in the past. The visit from my in-laws is already starting to fade away. Now its just Mr. V and me until deployment. We are going on a pre-deployment vacation to Canada next week and I have never looked forward to getting away from here more :-).
FIL: *spoken in the most condescending tone I've ever heard* "Brooklet, I'd like to talk to you seriously for a minute. I don't want you to take this as a criticism because its not. I am just genuinely concerned about you. I don't know if you are going to be able to handle it when Mr. V is deployed. First of all, you have 9 cats to take care of. Do you understand that that is a lot of work? I don't think you are going to be able to handle it. You really need to think about downsizing and getting rid of at least 3 of the cats. I don't think you completely understand what is going to happen when he's gone. You are going to have to take care of the house. You are going to have to learn how to do certain things...like learning how much money you have in the bank account, balancing the checkbook, and learning how to pay the bills."
I interrupted him at that point because I could only take the condescending insults for so long. First of all, yes sir, I know I have 9 cats. And you know what? If I downsize to 6 cats, I will still have to feed them, scoop their litter boxes, take them to the vet when needed and give them attention. The only thing that happens when I have the 3 "extra" ones is that I tend to trip over them more often. Otherwise, I still have the same number of litter boxes to scoop and as gross as it is, 3 extra piles of poop is not something that is going to cause me to falter and prove that I can't live on my own.
Second, not all husbands control every single thing that their wife does. Some husbands let their wives have access to their bank accounts. Some husbands even let their wives handle paying the bills ALL THE TIME, which is what we do. I pay the bills now. I've been paying the bills for well over a year. Before I met Mr. V, I paid my own bills for the house I rented ON MY OWN (well with a roommate, but still...). I have been paying my own bills since I was 18. I turn 28 in a month. I think I know how paying bills works. Oh and the bank account? I am the one who balances our checkbook and keeps Mr. V in check when it comes to spending money (he's not a bad spender, but I just have more knowledge of what's in the bank account because, oh that's right, I PAY THE BILLS!!)
I did tell him all of that, in the politest way possible, but I think I let some anger slip into my voice anyway. I really tried to be nice and patient and tell him nicely that I already knew how to maintain a house on my own, but its hard to be that polite when you are seething with anger. I know I should just let it go, and brush it off my shoulders, but I was VERY insulted by that conversation with him.
Couple that conversation with the 2 hour conversation we had at dinner one night. Apparently, FIL thinks its absolutely important that Mr. V and I produce some children NOW! He stated reasons such as "You don't want to wait too long. Brooklet is getting older." Thanks. I know people have children when they are much younger than me, but I wasn't aware of the fact that I had reached an age where child bearing almost wasn't possible anymore. When Mr. V explained to his father that he has been under a LOT of stress and pressure lately and didn't even have the mindset to think about children right now (which I think is a pretty good excuse - he HAS been really stressed lately, so why in the world would you want to add more responsibilty to his already heavy load right now?) Mr. V also explained that if and when we do have kids, we want to try to plan it so he will be around more than he is now. I am adament about the fact that I want my future children to have a father. I don't want to be a single mother, and the way life is right now, even when Mr. V isn't deployed, I would essentially be a single mother because he doesn't have any extra time to throw around. We both understand that perfectly planning when to have a child doesn't always work, but at the same time, we don't think that means we have to be irresponsible on purpose. Father-in-law came back with reasons why all of our "excuses" were bad ones. He basically said that its ok if I'm a single mother because kids don't need a dad to raise them (umm maybe they don't, but I'd like it to happen if possible). He also said that when dad IS around, he just needs to spend all of his time with his children, therefore leaving his wife in the dust and not paying any attention to her (which I have a major problem with). He said that grandparents can help raise the children (which might work out if the grandparents lived anywhere near us...but they don't) He kept making comments like "Whatever. You'll get through it" and you know what? I know that we WOULD get through it. HOWEVER, now is not a good time for us to have children. Its not even a good time for us to THINK about children. If something unplanned happens, then yes, we will get through it. But I really think its insulting and somewhat crazy that my father-in-law cares about nothing except for the fact that you are supposed to have kids, so why don't we have any yet?
They were here for 9 days and I was more than happy to say goodbye to them when they left. My mother-in-law is a VERY sweet lady and I feel bad for her because she never has much to say when FIL is talking, but I can't complain about her too much. She went with me, and my sister-in-law to a Mary Kay event that we had a lot of fun at, and she bought me a nifty early birthday present from an antique store in nearby Freeland. She found these earrings that were made from the insignia of a World War II military uniform. They are WWII planes, that someone sodered earring backs onto. Since I'm a history nerd, and my husband is a pilot, I thought they were great! So that was a nice diversion from the annoyances of my father-in-law's "How to live life MY way" speeches.
So now the visit from my own mother is a month in the past. The visit from my in-laws is already starting to fade away. Now its just Mr. V and me until deployment. We are going on a pre-deployment vacation to Canada next week and I have never looked forward to getting away from here more :-).
Monday, March 9, 2009
Down on the Farm
People tend to make comments about my house full of cats pretty often. Sometimes I have mixed feelings about these comments, when I find myself wondering "Should I be happy that he just said that? Or does that mean that I'm really a crazy old cat lady?"
For example, this past October I made the rounds of Petsmart and Petco for their annual Halloween Costume Contests. I dressed up the cats, and my rabbit. At Petsmart, the cats as a group won 3rd place (don't laugh - you win money for this stuff!). At Petco, my rabbit, dressed as a scarecrow won 3rd place. However, while the rabbit was a winner at Petco, the cats got their own special prize. At the end of the contest, the manager of Petco stood up and started talking about wonderful people who do animal rescue. He was talking about cats, and since there was a kitten adoption event going on in the store, I didn't think much about his speech. I just thought he was talking about the adoption event. Then at the end of his speech he said something along the lines of "And today we have 2 people here who have started their own rescue in their house, and we are thankful every day for people like them." He was talking about us. During the contest we had to show everyone our animals and talk about them a little. So of course we were introducing cats by saying "This is Wendy. She was living in a dumpster when we found her." "This is Patches. She was living in a bush begging for food at a restaurant that we stopped at." And so on... So the "prize"? We were given 6 large coupon books full of items for cats. They are the same coupon books that you would be given if you were to adopt a cat at Petco. In the books were several coupons for free food, which we can ALWAYS use! He also gave us a bag full of food samples. We were VERY greatful for all of this but we were also slightly in shock. Both Mr. V and I were thinking "He just called us a rescue. Is that a good thing? Or are we crazy?"
Fast forward to this past Friday. One "fun" thing about having a lot of cats is dealing with them when there is a medical issue. Sometimes its hard to figure out which cat is sick. Sometimes when we do find a cat with something wrong with it, it means the the other 8 also have the same thing wrong with them. So about 2 weeks ago I took my cat Wendy to the vet for a dental cleaning. She had minor dental disease and I have been told for several years that she needs a professional dental cleaning. I kept avoiding it because cats need to be under anesthesia for dental work, which is expensive. February was Dental Month at Best Friends Veterinary Hospital, with 10% off so I finally caved and took Wendy in. $500 later, she had clean teeth and updated shots (some of that money went to some extra monitoring that I opted for while she was under anesthesia ). They also ran some lab tests on her, did a "fun" stool sample and found out that she has coccidia. Coccidia is a wonderful, fun parasite that is one of the harder parasites to get rid of. So of course, I asked the vet if my other 8 cats would also have coccidia. The answer? "Not neccessarily, but its very likely." Wonderful!
I went home and debated back and forth with Mr. V about what to do about our possible coccidia outbreak. In the midst of debating whether or not we should drop a few thousand dollars on ALL of the cats at once, another one of the cats, Moses, started scooting his butt across the floor. Wonderful. While that action is funny to watch, its also really disgusting. It usually means one of 3 things. 1 - he's cleaning his butt after using the litter box (absolutely gross, but this would have been the best answer), 2 - he has anal glands that need to be drained, and for anyone who knows about this procedure, its something that can be done at home, but it is worth any amount of money in the world to have a vet do it for you, or 3 - he has worms/parasites. Since Wendy was just diagnosed with coccidia, it meant that Moses was off to the vet too!
After a pretty thorough checkup, it was decided that Moses also has coccidia. I asked the vet again about the chance of the others (now 7) having coccidia. I got the same answer. "Not necessarily, but its very likely." Wonderful! This was a different vet from the same animal hospital.
I asked her what I needed to do about this. Do I really need to bring every single cat in for an exam? I think she saw the horror and panic in my face as I calculated what this was going to cost me, so thankfully she helped me out. She told me that by law, a vet can't prescribe medicine to an animal, unless that animal is a patient. The law states that there has to be a doctor/patient relationship. Awesome. HOWEVER, there is a loophole in this law :-). When a vet goes to a farm and one animal is being treated for parasites, then ALL of the animals will be treated, regardless of if they have been seen by that vet. So after talking to her boss, the vet who owns the hospital, she pretty much classified me as a farm, gave me enough medicine for all of the cats, and I got out of there with a $300 bill, instead of a $2000 bill.
So now we have been recognized as a rescue AND a farm. Which really makes me wonder? Am I really a crazy old cat lady? Is this a positive thing that people are classifying my house as these things? I guess I should be thankful that my animals area all healthy (minus a coccidia outbreak) and no one is classifying me as a hoarder. Since a hoarder typically has more animals than they can care for and those animals are showing very noticable signs of being unhealthy, I guess I should be thankful that people notice that we do take care of the cats here. There may be 9 of them, but they are all loved, although you wouldn't know that right now. Apparently coccidia medicine is quite horrifying to them, so after their last dose today, maybe they will come out of hiding and love me again :-).
For example, this past October I made the rounds of Petsmart and Petco for their annual Halloween Costume Contests. I dressed up the cats, and my rabbit. At Petsmart, the cats as a group won 3rd place (don't laugh - you win money for this stuff!). At Petco, my rabbit, dressed as a scarecrow won 3rd place. However, while the rabbit was a winner at Petco, the cats got their own special prize. At the end of the contest, the manager of Petco stood up and started talking about wonderful people who do animal rescue. He was talking about cats, and since there was a kitten adoption event going on in the store, I didn't think much about his speech. I just thought he was talking about the adoption event. Then at the end of his speech he said something along the lines of "And today we have 2 people here who have started their own rescue in their house, and we are thankful every day for people like them." He was talking about us. During the contest we had to show everyone our animals and talk about them a little. So of course we were introducing cats by saying "This is Wendy. She was living in a dumpster when we found her." "This is Patches. She was living in a bush begging for food at a restaurant that we stopped at." And so on... So the "prize"? We were given 6 large coupon books full of items for cats. They are the same coupon books that you would be given if you were to adopt a cat at Petco. In the books were several coupons for free food, which we can ALWAYS use! He also gave us a bag full of food samples. We were VERY greatful for all of this but we were also slightly in shock. Both Mr. V and I were thinking "He just called us a rescue. Is that a good thing? Or are we crazy?"
Fast forward to this past Friday. One "fun" thing about having a lot of cats is dealing with them when there is a medical issue. Sometimes its hard to figure out which cat is sick. Sometimes when we do find a cat with something wrong with it, it means the the other 8 also have the same thing wrong with them. So about 2 weeks ago I took my cat Wendy to the vet for a dental cleaning. She had minor dental disease and I have been told for several years that she needs a professional dental cleaning. I kept avoiding it because cats need to be under anesthesia for dental work, which is expensive. February was Dental Month at Best Friends Veterinary Hospital, with 10% off so I finally caved and took Wendy in. $500 later, she had clean teeth and updated shots (some of that money went to some extra monitoring that I opted for while she was under anesthesia ). They also ran some lab tests on her, did a "fun" stool sample and found out that she has coccidia. Coccidia is a wonderful, fun parasite that is one of the harder parasites to get rid of. So of course, I asked the vet if my other 8 cats would also have coccidia. The answer? "Not neccessarily, but its very likely." Wonderful!
I went home and debated back and forth with Mr. V about what to do about our possible coccidia outbreak. In the midst of debating whether or not we should drop a few thousand dollars on ALL of the cats at once, another one of the cats, Moses, started scooting his butt across the floor. Wonderful. While that action is funny to watch, its also really disgusting. It usually means one of 3 things. 1 - he's cleaning his butt after using the litter box (absolutely gross, but this would have been the best answer), 2 - he has anal glands that need to be drained, and for anyone who knows about this procedure, its something that can be done at home, but it is worth any amount of money in the world to have a vet do it for you, or 3 - he has worms/parasites. Since Wendy was just diagnosed with coccidia, it meant that Moses was off to the vet too!
After a pretty thorough checkup, it was decided that Moses also has coccidia. I asked the vet again about the chance of the others (now 7) having coccidia. I got the same answer. "Not necessarily, but its very likely." Wonderful! This was a different vet from the same animal hospital.
I asked her what I needed to do about this. Do I really need to bring every single cat in for an exam? I think she saw the horror and panic in my face as I calculated what this was going to cost me, so thankfully she helped me out. She told me that by law, a vet can't prescribe medicine to an animal, unless that animal is a patient. The law states that there has to be a doctor/patient relationship. Awesome. HOWEVER, there is a loophole in this law :-). When a vet goes to a farm and one animal is being treated for parasites, then ALL of the animals will be treated, regardless of if they have been seen by that vet. So after talking to her boss, the vet who owns the hospital, she pretty much classified me as a farm, gave me enough medicine for all of the cats, and I got out of there with a $300 bill, instead of a $2000 bill.
So now we have been recognized as a rescue AND a farm. Which really makes me wonder? Am I really a crazy old cat lady? Is this a positive thing that people are classifying my house as these things? I guess I should be thankful that my animals area all healthy (minus a coccidia outbreak) and no one is classifying me as a hoarder. Since a hoarder typically has more animals than they can care for and those animals are showing very noticable signs of being unhealthy, I guess I should be thankful that people notice that we do take care of the cats here. There may be 9 of them, but they are all loved, although you wouldn't know that right now. Apparently coccidia medicine is quite horrifying to them, so after their last dose today, maybe they will come out of hiding and love me again :-).
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