Good Things

Just a quick update.
Good things:

• Hobbit is slowly recovering. We had (have) to change our routine a bit and baby him a bit more and the medication schedule is rigid (I am so not used to anything being scheduled and inflexible), but we are adapting.
• Propane tank is not as expensive as we planned for AND the place we found has excellent customer service. (Thank you Blue Gate!)
• Insurance policy in progress. That was harder than it had to be. Seriously. Why does State Farm have excellent agent service and crappy claims service? Anyway....State Farm it is.
• My Aunt Deedle is coming from Texas for Thanksgiving! Yay! (Also, preparing for family drama that everyone says will not happen. Is everyone is apparently ignoring reality and living in a fantasy world of flowers and peaches? Seriously.) Keeping my humor about.
• Found a Kung Fu class Lil'Bug can take! (Thank you Julia!)
• Shepards Pie with lamb for dinner tonight.
• Playdates.
• Called insurance company. Good thing I did. Hospital submitted the forms wrong. Bills owed 800$ less than we were actually billed. This is not the first time this has happened. I now call and verify every single one of my bills, first insurance then origin. Sometimes it is one or the other, but it has only been right once (Anesthesiologist). I will be sad to change insurance companies in January though, because even though there have been so many mistakes, they have always worked to correct them and have been really REALLY nice about it.
• MidAmerican gave us another 4 digit refund! (Which in turn paid for the boiler repairs, ironic that the way I saved so much money is what broke the pipes.)
  

So that's life here. I'll post pictures a bit later. I have medication to wrap in dog treat and a load of diapers to wash and fold before I loosen the compost bin and transport it to our afternoon playdate.

Snacking Thoughts

We don't eat a lot of junk food. Now and then we'll eat chips and I suppose we (Dearest more than the rest of us) also drink soda (pop, Coke, whatever its called) and coffee (which I do not consider junk.....) but we just don't eat a lot of the processed convenience or snack food that are staples in most America's pantries.

We don't eat it because we don't buy it. If we did, we would. I know this because I am drawn to the bag of Ruffles and stash of Reece's peanut butter cups leftover from the party last week. If I bring home a box of Truffles or Twinkies Dearest mows through them in one sitting. But these things are EXPENSIVE and just look at the ingredients. Yuck (and yet oh so delicious.....).

We all need snacking food though. I don't deny us snacks. Here's what we keep on hand:
Tortilla Chips and Salsa.
Fruit, a variety every week. Right now our bottom fridge bin is full of apples from our picking outing back in September.
Nuts (cashews and almonds right now).
Dried cranberries and raisins.
Popsicles, the all fruit kind.
Yogurt.
Cheese and meat (Lil'Bug calls this a "naked" sandwich....)

Lil'Bug helps herself to any of the above whenever she is hungry. She knows that if she plows through it all then it is gone for the week so she typically doesn't. One week last summer she ate a whole box worth of Popsicles in one afternoon, but I suspect she was just thirsty. Also, some of those were homemade smoothie pops and actually had spinach and carrot in them too. So ha. She never binged like that again though and she never sneaks food.

Things I Have Recently Learned About My Food Processor....

And through experience I might add....

The food processor is an amazing tool. I use it to chop onion, mince garlic, and dice ginger. It does a better job for these if not overloaded. If overloaded, the items turn to mush.

Bread is hard. But not as hard as some people make it out to be. It is way easier with a food processor.

Food processor makes pie crust easy as pie. If the butter is properly chilled and not left out too long, the blades do the work of cutting up and in the butter. Then since it is really fast, you don't even have to re-chill the dough to work it. Time saver!

Something you should know about the food processor is this: DO NOT try and use it to mash potatoes unless you like potato glue. Not fluffy mashed taters but instead super runny, potato glue. Yuck. Also, sorry about that. Some things are worth doing by hand.

Ultrasound

So Hobbit had an ultrasound this morning. I am so glad that they don't have the same procedures for people (I've had 10 ultrasounds over the last 10 years) as he had to have his belly shaved and be held down. Yikes. Poor pup.

Anyway, there is no mystery mass. No enlarged organ. No nothing. His pancreas is tender and showing signs of abnormality. The specialist thinks he had a pancreatitis attack, though a mild one, and is in a lot of pain. That pain is likely causing him not to want to eat, he says. So pain meds for Hobbit on the menu. The vet also sent away for a blood test to confirm diagnosis. Not sure what else was going on, but all his organs are in the correct place now and the right size.

I still think there is something unknown, but I'll go with the flow on this one and make him comfortable and happy until we can do more or this passes. That's the update.