Simon Update

Some of you know that my little guy went through some big trouble recently. This explains part of my absence from blogging. First, I was busy with a few events happening, which I did start to blog about, (and will be posting soon) but then Simon wasn't well, so I was occupied with him.
A couple of weeks ago, it looked, to both Jim and I, like Simon had a bit of a swollen face on one side. We were keeping an eye on it, but it seemed to go away. Then a few days later, it looked like his face was swollen again. The second time, we called the vet and booked an appt. to take him in. They assumed from our description on the phone that it was his allergies acting up. After all, it's spring and everything is starting to sprout and he has been itchier than normal.
Jim took Simon into see Dr. Woolard while I was at work, and upon examination, she found out that Simon had a cracked molar that had abscessed. That's why his face was swollen. By us giving him a vanectyl-p for his itching, it also took the swelling in his face down. They asked if Simon was an aggressive chewer and yes, he can be. He was prescribed antibiotics, and sent home for a few days. He was not to be given any other drugs, but antibiotics were to be administered twice a day for 5-6 days until they were well into his system and doing their thing and he was booked in for an extraction. We decided that while he was under, we'd have his teeth cleaned as well. It would save him the trauma of having to be put under anesthetic again at a later date.

This is how he looked a first. There is some swelling around his eye and nose.

Then things started to get worse. We were told that he wouldn't be in pain like a human would with an abscessed tooth and in fact, he was playing and running around like normal.

Things were really getting bad. I was really concerned. The vet assured us that this may happen and it may in fact pop before he was to go in for the extraction and if that did happen, not to be alarmed. That never happened. It just kept swelling.

This was the absolute worst. I took this picture the day before he was to go in for his appt. Later in the afternoon, the swelling started to go down and by night time, it was significantly reduced. I don't know if it did pop inside, or if it had just run it's course and starting draining on it's own.

He was not to eat after 10pm and Jim dropped him off at the vet's in the morning. I called to check on him around 1:30 and they said everything had gone smoothly, and in fact, while I was on the phone, Simon was standing up in his crate looking around. I was stuck at work until 8pm, so Jim picked him up around 4pm. They gave Jim the teeth - it ended up he needed 2 of them out! Both were cracked. The one that caused all the swelling looks a mess. Just as they were leaving the office, Simon was given an shot of pain-killers to help him rest through the night. Jim said it was sort of funny. He got Simon into the truck and he was all happy to be with his Dad, then the medicine kicked in and he just went all dopey and looked really stoned.

By the time I got home, he was pretty much passed out. Poor little guy! There was no bleeding and his face didn't seem to be swollen much at all. (The pinky colour on his thigh is from him licking. It's one of the areas that tends to get really itchy for him. Once we progress into summer, it's not as bad and by winter, it's usually gone)

He was looking much better now, even if he wasn't really feeling it at this point. He's high as a kite.

The next day he was still groggy and slept a lot. He did go out for his walk in the afternoon and seemed to be coming a long pretty well. Later in the evening, I put down a bowl of watered down kibble mixed with some canned food and he ate the whole bowl! Yay! He progressed like a model patient and look at him now

He's healed up in fine fashion. So, he had pre-op blood work done, anesthetic administered, 2 extractions (but they only charged us for 1), a dental cleaning, his heartworm blood work done, we took home his heartworm meds, they didn't charge us for the pain shot and they also threw in free mani-pedi. The total bill?

Can't quite see that? Here's a closer look -

Whoa! That's some bill, eh? But you know what?

He is worth every freakin' penny!

Cabbage & Butterfly

Last week Jim & I went to see Opera Hamilton's presentation of Madama Butterfly.

What a tear-jerker that is. The performances were top-notch and Ailan Zhu who played Butterfly has the voice of an angel. She gave me shivers. The whole thing was spectacular. We both thoroughly enjoyed it. If you've never been to live opera, you don't know what you're missing.
This isn't the performance I saw, but this is my favorite aria of the whole opera. Butterfly has been waiting 3 years for her beloved to return and she's singing to her maid about how she imagines their reunion will be. I find this part so sad because she's so hopeful.....


On the food front, I scored a massive cabbage at a terrific price and with those large leaves, made cabbage rolls. I had some frozen perogies that I cooked up with some onion, soy bacon bits & some Follow Your Heart mozzarella.

For the filling, I dig out my old Betty Crocker cookbook and use that recipe as a guideline. Instead of ground beef, I use Yves Veggie Ground and some extra spice to jazz it up a little. Cabbage rolls always turn out well for me, so I stick with this tried & true recipe.

Since I had a large cabbage, I also got some "little cabbages". I never used to like Brussel sprouts, but now love them! I par-boiled these, then baked them with a little olive oil, agave, salt & pepper. They turned out really yummy.
I've also been thinking about pineapple upside-down cake for weeks now and finally bit the bullet and made one.
Pineapple is another thing that, as a child, I would never eat. Now, I love it!

The top (or bottom, depending on how you look at it) it the best part of this cake. I love anything with butter & brown sugar (I use margarine with excellent results). Add nuts and I'm over the top.

This is another tried and true from a cookbook that I got from my mother years ago. It's never failed me. I used tofu instead of eggs and this cake came out so moist & delicious.

Did you happen to watch the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction? What a wide variety of musical artist they chose this year. I, of course, watched to see Jimmy Page induct Jeff Beck.

They've been life-long friends and played togther briefly in the Yardbirds...which morphed in a roundabout way into Led Zeppelin. After the speeches, they played together which is why I tuned in in the first place. Amazing guitarists, both of them.

(Quite different from Puccini, eh?)