Is It Football Season Yet?

You ever get the feeling that, somewhere in this world, there is a voodoo doll of you lying around with pins in the ankles? That's what my day was like. Seriously, there is something strange in the air right now. I guess there was a full moon over the weekend, so perhaps the changes in the gravitational pull are just now kicking in will continue to wreak their havoc well into the holiday weekend. I'd been on such a good luck roll lately, so you know it had to end sometime. It started a couple months ago when I entered a pet photo contest on dogster.com. VPI Pet insurance was sponsoring a contest called "Spring Cleaning" and the theme was pictures of your dog or cat getting their baths. Naturally, I stuck Kirbles in a sudsy little bubble bath, put some bubbles on her head like a little cone-shaped hat, made her do her best puppy-dog eyes, and entered that in the contest. Thanks to her pretty little irresistible face, we won! I got to choose between a doggie gift basket worth $250 or just a $250 Visa gift card. I was very curious to see what doggie items could possibly be valued at that amount, but the practical side of me chose the gift card. The next thing I won was another dogster sweepstakes, where so many random winners received a free pet dental kit. Believe me, we needed that! Then, just a couple days ago, I found out I'd won another online contest that I had completely forgotten I'd even entered! Back in January, there was a contest on tvsquad.com for the "Lost" Death Pool. (The inside sources had said there would be 3 character deaths in the upcoming weeks so it was our job as fans to name them in the order they were to die.) The prize was a set of hand sculpted "Lost" figurines. I tied for 1st place with someone else and, as the tiebreaker was a random name drawing, I lost the tiebreaker. But, then they emailed me and said they were able to get a 2nd set to send me. So, whoo hoo! My streak continued! Then came today. One of the first things I did at work this morning was dial 9-1-1. It's not every day you get to do that, you know. (That makes the 3rd or 4th time I've had that honor, not that I'm counting or anything.) :) The crisis was a pregnant patient, not quite at full term, who presented with severe abdominal pains, somewhat different than regular labor pains. When they took her back to a room, she was shaking from head to toe because of the pain and didn't think she could make it to the hospital in a car. So, I got to call the ambulance and have the paramedics come wheel her out on a stretcher. Of course, the doc was called to the delivery almost immediately, which necessitated rescheduling the entire morning. The delivery was actually very quick, and Doc was back in the office before lunchtime was over. However, the bad stuff didn't end there. Right when she got back, we were all sitting at the table in the break room. So, she sat down with us and started to tell us about the delivery when CRACK!! The wobbly chair she was sitting on cracked right out from underneath her! It was almost like one of those Bugs Bunny cartoons when the entire chair just flattens underneath Yosemite Sam in the old western salooon, or something. Weird! Little stuff like that just continued to happen for the rest of the day. We found out my cousin's car got stolen in Chicago, and I got to deal with some other patient drama issues (while trying to deal with a caffeine-withdrawl crash which makes it even harder to be polite!). Kisses is supposed to get spayed tomorrow morning, but Mom's feeling kinda uneasy about it just because of the way today had gone. Oh, and on that note, did I mention we have a new family member? Her name is Madison and she's just six weeks old and weighs less than a pound! We aquired her by default when Gail's son found her in a dumpster, abandoned by her mother (so we presume). He gave her to his girlfriend but she couldn't keep her, so we agreed to take her in and foster her for a while. Of course, in our house, "Foster" means "permanently adopt." So, now we're back up to 6 kitties and 3 doggies total. OH! And some other news on the subject of new family members: Guess who's getting married! No, not me. No guesses? Shall I give you a hint? Well, his name starts with a T, and ends with an "oby." Yep, that's right. Toby has met the woman of his dreams and is planning a wedding date of Oct. 11, 2008. Originally it was to be Jan. 11, 2009. (Why? Well because it's his birthday and he figured the best way to make sure he never forgot his anniversary is to get married on his birthday. No, I'm not kidding! That, and it's also the anniversary of my grandfather's death, and he wanted to put a positive spin back on that date.) But now the anxiousness is setting in so he's decided to move it to Oct, which is my grandparents' wedding anniversary and our cousin Briana's birthday. Yes, important events in my family tend to happen on the 11th day of the month. Interesting, eh? So, there's a lot of wedding buzz and planning going on around here. Any other news I can think of to spring on you? I'm sure there is, but give me time to think of it first. It's been a long day. Tomorrow's not looking any better either. Is it football season yet?