The wound has been getting worse instead of better. On Saturday, I noticed that it smelled bad, and I called the vet. They told me to come in on Monday (today). As I'd feared, the infection is bad. The vet thought it smelled "almost like gangrene." The focus now is on saving his leg, although I donÂt think IÂd consider amputation to be an option at his age (15). We went through that with a dog years ago. It was quite an ordeal for her, but she was a lot younger. And we had a lot more money then. The vet gave him fluids under his skin and a DMSO treatment. She gave him two shots of antibiotics (two kinds), plus a steroid. I have to soak his leg with warm water and Epsom salts, for 15 minutes, four times a day. Then I have to squirt DMSO on the wound. I have to keep the bathroom floor mopped, and change his bed every day. And give him a liquid antibiotic twice a day. So far I did one of the soaks. Mickey tried to lunge out of the sink a few times, but mostly he didn't fight. I was hoping he could just stand in the water, but he had to sit. I had to bend over, and it was harder on my back that I'd anticipated. Afterward, his towel and my apron went right into the washing machine. All I can say is IÂm glad IÂm off work all week, and IÂm glad I hadn't planned to prepare and serve a Thanksgiving dinner. Let's hope and pray this works. Since you said the wound was healing at the time you discovered it, why is a collar now needed? Good question. The wound looked much better when I first brought him in a week ago. Today the vet took his collar off and said maybe he can get some of the infection out by licking. Then she changed her mind and said cats' mouths are filthy and their tongues like sandpaper, so they can do a lot of damage. So she put the collar back on. I pointed out that he must have been licking it before I discovered it, and it looked not bad a week ago, but she said it looked much bigger than it should have because of licking. What are you opinions on licking?

Today at our local Walmart I found postbound scrapbooks for $3.50. There were 3 to choose from, but I only bought 2. O One was light purple and the other was powder blue. They were 12x12. They came with 10 pages and included 10 refills. I thought they were nice, so I bought one each for my nieces to scrapbook with. I also saw Little Mermaid Hot Off The Press books, but with only having boys I passed on them. The scrapbooks I got were not in the craft section. They were in an aisle on the bottom shelf with a bunch of other miscellaneous items such as weatherstripping, hair items, etc.

Very surprised to see this come back up, but so happy to be able to share and help! kathec, I'm so glad my kitchen could be of help to you! We have decided we love our 2nd island. It is a great buffet surface that allows for easy flow of traffic even with groups of people. roseofblue, thank you for all your kind words. The ceiling fan is not in the kitchen but in the living room which is open to the kitchen. Unfortunately, the air does not get to the kitchen at all. That is one thing I regret, not putting some means of circulating air into the kitchen. It gets pretty hot with that induction range going. (Since you asked, I think it was about $3200 before a rebate of 10% in the form of a cash card.) I still absolutely love the color on the walls, and still amazing to me that a blue can actually feel warm. The fun memories have already started with the weekly pizza-making and bread making and menu planning and school work (oh.. well, I guess that's not so much fun, memory making, but definitely the kitchen is a central part of our lives). firsthouse, I hate that you haven't been able to enjoy that gorgeous kitchen/house just after you've finished it! I guess it's better to have all that travel after it's finished rather than during the process. I have 3 monthly calendars, a weekly to-do, and a magnetic bulletin board, all from Storables.com. If I have two months in advance right in front of me, I'm more likely to write things down and not forget them. So I have Sept/Oct/Nov right now. They do get erased when the kids try to write things on them, but overall I think they work well. They are definitely not glamour items like the Pottery Barn ones but I just needed functional. The bulletin board is, though. I love it; it has a layer that takes pins, covered by a metal layer which consists of pin-sized holes all over. I also mounted some metal strips from Storables, under the shelf, on which I have hooks for keys and magnets for grocery lists, etc. On the weekly to-do chart, I transfer the week's events from the month calendar. That's really my brain. I also got a pocket for mail; if I remember to put it there instead of on the table, it works well. I don't know if ebse ever posted her finished kitchen to the FKB, but hers was my inspiration. I just couldn't bring myself to spend that much money until I saw that I was using such a system. I am still in training, so not using it consistently yet, but working on it! phoggie... thank you! The granite is Impala Black in a leathered finish. It is a fairly common stone, I believe; it looks darker leathered than polished.

Kevin, your post was interesting and touching, but, in my estimation there is a difference between something that you have made an effort to collect and the things that you have acquired through just living and now have an emotional attachment to. For the old guy sitting there among the debris of his life it is the story of him and the ones he loved. For me and my coffee mug collection it is/was about the fact that it just captured my fancy. I got infatuated with a couple of mugs that I bought new in a video store, of all places. This was during the administration of the elder Bush. One of the cups was political and one was SNL. They were so intriguing. That followed with a couple of cups of Mickey Mouse and I was on the trail of coffee mugs. Most of my mugs do not reflect pop media culture. There are ones that celebrate old cars, cartoon characters, witty sayings, small and large business, things that once were but are now gone, different government agencies, a few social causes, and a couple quirky ones with photos of loved ones on them. There are many other subjects on the mugs. There is no one theme to them. Each of them caught my attention at a yard sale or GW store. And that is the reason that they came home with me........they made me smile. They were the precursor to printed t-shirts as give aways. Now everyone gets a t-shirt with some logos or some such printed on it. I dont think that there are very many of these mugs being produced anymore. There is a difference between the emotional baggage of the household items that once made your home and the things that you collected with intent. I dont have an emotional attachment to my collection. I enjoy it. I have emotional attachment to the things that made my home or that came to me preloved by those that I loved. Those are the hardest things to part with. By the way, we do use the mugs. I rotate them in and out of service. When we used to have friends and family around the table, everyone got to choose their own mug when the coffee pot came out and it was just a fun little bit of interaction. I even used them at daughters wedding to serve the coffee. It was a bit of an unexpected quirk and a light heartedness.