Who Needs Legs Anyway?

Well, it has been a few days since we went to the vet, and there hasn't been much improvement, sadly...

It could be that the antibiotics are just working their way through his system and they haven't really taken effect yet. In the meantime, getting Nigel to take his medicine has been quite the fun experience. He has to take one drop of an anti-inflammatory twice a day, and then three drops of the antibiotics three times a day. To get the medicine in him, I have a couple of little plastic syringes that I get to stick in his little mouth and shoot the deliciousness right down his throat. Poor little guy, it smells awful.

Also, here is a picture I forgot to post last time. This is my little friend getting ready to go to the vet for the first time. Imagine sad music playing in the background as you view this picture through your tears.

You can kind of see his little leg all hurt, over there on the top right. Fortunately this picture obscures most of his actual leg, because in full view it's pretty gross and horrifying.

But I still love him.

We Learn Things

Greetings, Internet Friends! It sure has been a while. I figured now was a good time to give you an update on how things are going with Nigel! And the answer is...

...not so good.

A couple weeks back, I noticed that Nigel had been walking with a bit of a limp. I didn't really take much note of it, because in all honesty, Nigel is almost two years old. That's like 60 in hamster years. Maybe more. Anywho, yesterday morning I woke up to check on my furry friends, and I was shocked and horrified to discover that what had been a barely noticeable injury had caused his left leg to swell to about four times its normal size. So of course, being me, I freaked the crap out and called every vet in the tri-state area.

Hamster medical care is kind of tough, because not all vets deal with such small little animals. Hamsters are considered "exotic" pets by your average veterinary practice. Fortunately though, the nearest exotics clinic happens to be across the street from my house. I took off work early and hurried home as fast as I could, got Nigel all ready to go, and rushed to our appointment. 

I ended up getting myself so flustered running out the door, I forgot my keys twice, and then I forgot Nigel...

 The doctors at the the clinic where I went were so nice to me and to Nigel, and they told us that hopefully it's just an infection. We came home with some antibiotics and anti-inflammatory meds that will hopefully take care of the swelling. If the swelling doesn't go down after a while, though, it could possibly be bone or lymph node cancer. If that's the case, we will maybe need an x-ray to determine the extend of the sickness, and it's possible they might have to amputate his little leg.

If anyone's cool enough to pull off three limbs, it's Nigel. But for now, we're hoping the medicine works and he gets back to his old self. Personally, I'm just glad he's ok and home for the time being. 

Happy Hamsterween, Everyone!

Maybe I Just Need More Cats

It may surprise you, what with how precious I am, but I'm terrible at dating.

Well, I'm terrible at interacting with human beings in a socially acceptable way most of the time, but dating is an especially difficult endeavor, I think. Perhaps it is my choice in men, but I tend to think it is more an issue with my personality... Some of the more polite observers have described me as having a "strong personality." In truth, there is a significant percentage of others who have described my personality in ways that I shan't repeat, as this is a family blog. Mostly I think my problem stems from the fact that I sometimes have difficulty finding that fine line between funny and horrible. And I absolutely don't do well with flirting.

On somewhat rare occasions, there are men that stick around after this unfortunate first encounter, perhaps because they attribute it to nerves, or maybe they think it is a fluke. Or occasionally I'll run into the sort of guy who is amused by that sort of shock value. Whatever their reasons, sometimes there are men that actually develop an interest in me. And why wouldn't they, what with my stunning good looks. 

At this point, the wheat is separated even more from the chaff by my terrible habit of turning everything into a battle of wills. It could be something as simple as deciding where we go for dinner, but for some reason I will get an idea in my head, and there is no changing it ever, even if I am totally aware that I am completely wrong. It's a matter of pride, I suppose, although I'm not exactly sure what glory is to be had from winning an argument about whether or not Chris Evans is the most beautiful human being ever to grace the earth (which he is). 

On the rare occasion that I don't get left on the side of the road after one too many of this pointless altercations, I sometimes maybe end up with a boyfriend. Most unfortunately, these tend to be the kind of men that are convinced that there is someone for everyone out there. When I say "I'm totally cool with dying alone," they say "There is someone (I assume they mean themselves) that will love you unconditionally, just you wait and see!" NO ONE loves another person totally unconditionally. And if they do, they're foolish. No offense to any of those men that might be reading this, by the way. You're all lovely lads and please don't key my car. 

Now, every time a man says this to me, I almost want to laugh at them because I know without a shadow of a doubt that one day in the near or, if they are very determined, semi-distant future, I will do or say something or a collection of things that will so thoroughly put them off, they won't be able to hear my name for years to come without flying into a homicidal rage. Probably one of my more predominant worries these days, however, is that eventually there will come a lad who will, heaven forbid, have the cojones to defeat me in a battle of will, Petruchio-style. 

I was never a great fan Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew... The ending was frankly depressing. In fact, when I was in junior high school, I played a part in that particular comedy (don't ask which) but even at that age I was certain that I never wanted to end up like poor Kate.

The horror...

Today I Drew This

More Excuses

Once upon a time, I decided I was going to start an awesome blog with lots of hilarious drawings and many entertaining words. Unfortunately, it sort of went the way of most things I put my mind to; I was really excited about it at first and then after a while it fell by the wayside. Certain persons who shall remain anonymous took it upon themselves to badger me about it every now and then, but I didn't really do anything about it.

I had told myself that once I got my fancy-pants new tablet, I would be cranking out all sorts of magnificent work, but turns out it is way harder than I thought to figure out how to post from that thing. Maybe there is some sort of secret trick or something that only Elite Bloggers know, but I sure as shoot haven't figured it out yet. I finally realized that I would have to use my laptop to post anything, which made it that much more difficult to build up any sort of drive. Suddenly blogging became an impossible chore.

Add to that the fact that due to whatever unnamed environment factors, I have been pretty much incapable of coming up with anything amusing or at least entertaining, let alone hold it in my brain long enough to make words and pictures about it. Usually anything hilarious that I could think of would come to me in the dead of night, in that strange waking dream that comes right before total unconsciousness, at which point there wasn't much I could do with it. Let me assure you though, it is hilarious inside my brain. 

Frankly though, whatever excuses I may come up with, the biggest reason I haven't written all that much lately is just sheer laziness. What little free time I had that could have been spend doing some actual work or even blogging was spent on far more useless things. The laptop was being used a lot less for working and a lot more for this:

Moral of the story is: I'm going to blame Nigel for not doing amusing things more often that I could write about. Slacker.

Probably Science

My dearest and most beloved readers, I have not been the awesome blogger I promised to be some time ago. I told you all that I was going to get myself a tablet and that was going to make it so I could draw many awesome pictures and post every ten minutes or so. Unfortunately, I have also been in A Fight with the Universe lately, so naturally the Grand Scheme of Things made it so that it was nigh unto impossible to successfully post anything. Eventually I ended up just drawing the pictures on the tablet and then editing everything from my laptop again. That story will come later though, right now here is a little filler from a conversation I had a while back. 

There has been an unsettling fad in popular music as of late that goes by the name of "One Direction." Now, don't get me wrong, I have enjoyed a song or two of theirs (I can never really tell if it is one song or two; the name "One Direction" must be referring to their song-writing style) and I can understand the appeal. They are pretty catchy. The thing that unnerves me, however, is the subject matter of their songs. On the surface it seems like they are saying "Hey, I love you because you are cool and stuff." But deep down, they are really saying "You have low self esteem and that's what attracts me to you! You're vulnerable!"

After a few hours of heated discussion, Nigel and I came up with the following formula for being popular and make tons of dollars as a pop star/boy band/celebrity in today's society: