Well, work is starting to make a bit more sense, as I settle in. I always forget that things look much more complicated when you know nothing about them. But when you break things down into individual bits, they look much less intimidating. So I am working on two customer proposals–small things, really–and getting estimates from various people, and adapting existing presentations and getting marketing (I hope!) to create another small case study that I can “borrow” for my proposal. But it’s starting to rock ‘n roll.
It turns out that the organization is a lot smaller than I thought it was; today I got someone to explain to me how the various pieces “sew together”. Instead of a bunch of confusing pieces, it turns out to be a pretty logical arrangement–I always find that things make more sense when I understand the underlying logic. So that’s all good.
What is not so good is my lovely snake, Isis. (There’s a photo of her on my website in the snakes section, and also under the “textile arts” section–that’s her with me in the photo of my wedding dress.) I got her into the reptile vet this morning and he thinks she has severe pneumonia and that it’s probably gone septic (systemic). We’re starting her on injections of Baytril, they’re doing a culture, he recommended that I move her off the coconut husk I’ve currently got her on and onto Astroturf, and I’m supposed to turn up the heat in her cage to about 85 degrees. Seven days later, back to the vet.
I’m hoping she comes out OK. I know a lot of people don’t like snakes, but Isis is a wonderful and extremely friendly snake–especially for her breed, which is supposed to be kind of nippy. I’ve had her for over ten years now. I remember her when she was just a baby–small enough to fit into the tip of a tennis shoe! (She escaped once, early on, and we actually found her in my shoe. Good thing I looked before putting it on!) She’s now over seven feet long, and way to big to fit into a shoebox. But still very sweet. Rainbow boas live 30-40 years at least (according to the vet), so she could easily be with me for another twenty or thirty years. I’m very, very fond of her.
Anyway, I’m spending tonight switching out the substrate (putting in Astroturf), and I just bought two new heating pads for her cage. Tomorrow Rob (my ex) is coming by to help me inject her with the antibiotics–she’s too big now for a single person to manage it, so he’ll be coming by every night for the next week. The vet warned me that by the third day, she’ll be getting verrrry cranky about the injections. Apparently they sting like hell. So I need a second person to hold her in case she decides to bite me. (Can’t say that I’d blame her if she did.)
Poor girl. I wish there were some other way to give a snake antibiotics, but you can’t feed them pills, so it’s injections or nothing. I hope it clears out the infection.
The vet also pointed out that she had several layers of retained eyecaps (which is what happens when the skin over the eye doesn’t shed successfully–it builds up in layers until the snake has trouble seeing). On his advice, I bought some wetting solution for hard and gas-permeable contact lenses. I’m supposed to keep her eyes damp (dripping it on her eyes) for three or four hours, re-wetting every twenty or thirty minutes, then run her through a warm, hot towel to take off the retained eyecaps. I have the sneaking feeling that this is my karma coming back to bite me…I never should have made that crack about chameleon tongues. [grin]
Anyway, I’m off to go clear her cage and install Astroturf…I do hope she’s OK.
Tien
