State of the Boxer

That time of year has come again. Blue's yearly physical was this week. Along with that - I found a lump on his abdomen that had me concerned.

In the last year or so, we have lost many of our canine friends. With the exception of Harlow, all have been close in age to what Blue is now. Harlow, China, Max...all his buddies, age and sickness have gotten the best of them. Oh - and he misses them, and we know it. Even just this past weekend, he kept whining at our friends..."where is Maxie-boy?"....so sad.

So we are not foolish enough to think that we will escape such heartbreak with him. It's just more of a question of when. So, the yearly exam...with "the lump"...well...of course we were worried.

However, I am excited and happy to report...the state of the boxer is....HEALTHY!

She said the lump was nothing more than "ol' man lumps", his knees, heart, gums, eyes...all things we have worried about in the past - are good form. She even said "oh, what nice muscle tone for a boxer his age!" [I am pretty certain that Blue made a hpmf sound to this remark]. Muscle tone? For a dog how practically hibernates all winter? He who has almost worn a dent in our couch? Yessiree...muscle tone, folks.

So, we can ring in Blue's 10th year (Feb 14th) with a note of happiness. Let's hope he defies the odds, and his unfortunate 3 "branched" ancestry and continues this trend for several more years to come.

Blood

That Dr. was a smart guy when he said no more monkeys jumping on the bed.

So when Isaac didn't heed the warning last night, he and his friend were jumping on the bed. Isaac felt that he should make it a challenge. Jump off the bed, onto a chest, and then onto the floor. He failed to figure into the trick that when the distance down, is the same distance between the chest and end table, there is no room for error.

Well the error happened and an ER trip that produced 3 stitches later, he's 5 days from being good as new. The biggest surprise for me is that he never cried, he didn't even flinch. I have to give credit to the Dr. and the staff. They were awesome. He even walked out with swag: a slushie and a new truck with "wha-bowls".

We will also be able to remember the date pretty easy. Yesterday was Aunt LoLo's birthday. Hopefully she had a better one then him.

Courage of Detroit

For those that don't know who Mitch Albom is, he's an on again, off again sports writer for the Detroit Free Press. He has a couple of books, Tuesdays with Morrie and the Five People you Meet in Heaven.

This month in Sports Illustrated he was given a few pages to be a voice for a lot of us in Michigan to tell the rest of the country how we feel. Not that I expect it to change anything, but it's nice to see someone stand up for the state in a national publication.

Warning, it's not short...
http://tinyurl.com/MitchAlbom