A Hard Week...

As the week beared on, I couldn't help thinking about how my dog is being put down tomorrow. It seems like this was a thing that was never supposed to actually happen. Roxy has been a huge part of mine and my family's life for 9.5 great years. She has proven to be a loyal, loving, and companionate dog in more than one way. I remember first picking her out of the litter of 9 and saying that she was the one because she licked my face as soon as I had picked her up. Her face was all scrunched up with wrinkles crossing her in every which way on her forehead. Bringing her home was the hardest thing because she was to leave her mom, dad, and 5 brothers and 3 sisters behind. She cried as soon as she left and we felt as if we were doing something wrong by doing so. The first night of her sleeping inside, she was constantly whining because she missed her mom and dad so much, so in regard to that, we began putting hot water in milk cartons so it would feel as if she was sleeping against her mother. As soon as we would come home, she would have something torn up in or around the house. Dad's tools would be lying all over the floor, potatoes would be used as play toys, onions would be ripped apart with teeth. One of my favorite stories would have to be coming home and seeing white fluff everywhere. She had apparently gotten to the third shelf of a book shelf and brought down the Christmas "snow" used to set up villages on our tables and a kleenex box next to it and torn it up and left a giant mess of white fluff all over the entrance. Digging holes in the backyard was always a favourite past time for her as well, and lets not forget running away and having to go to the pound twice because there was blasting in the nearby construction sites. Everytime there was a stressful day at work or school, she was always there with a happy face and a wagging tail. Princess like qualities will definitely be well remembered forever, no dog has ever caused so much havoc.  Roxy would ONLY be sleeping on our beds, eating only the best food and disregarding anything else, walking with her nose high in the air, and expecting to be allowed to sit on the couch with everyone as if the floor wasn't good enough for her. As life slowed her down, around 8 years old, she was no longer able to walk due to a broken knee. She basically had every precaution taken, yet still maanaged to hurt herself after an attempted jump over our 8 foot fence. Once taken to the doctor, we were told that there was a 50/50 chance of her surgery working for her. Being as attached as we are to Roxy, we decided to go ahead with it. As soon as she got out of surgery we took every precaution we could to ensure she would not be walking around too much until she recovered, but it was clear that she was not recovering as fast she should have had the surgery gone through properly. We tried powder in her dog food known as Recovery, glucosamin pills, along with a wheelchair but nothing seemed to help. It is insane knowing that after all that, nothing seemed to help her and her life will be coming to and end tomorrow. I hope that she is soon walking again up in doggy heaven and comes to see us once in a while.

Fieldwork in a Cemetery

Wow, what an experience that was going into a cemetery and having to do fieldwork. I felt a little bit awkward going through with it just because it was one of those things that you wouldn't normally do on a daily basis or anything. I thought it would have been a little warmer that day, but with such a cold day, I just wanted to get out of there.

 It didn't help that the sun was coming down pretty quick either. It was a little traumatizing learning that there was such a large homeless population walking around or occupying the Pioneer Square

 I recall having them try and yell at us for being there like it was their land... Another traumatizing event was watching a homeless man poking himself with a needle or something of that nature right on the right side of my car. Needles were also present in the cemetery itself, and with taking a class on AIDS, it didn't really sit that well with me. Oh yeah, and don't forget the ticket I got for being
there 3 minutes over my time. It was definitely an experience I wish could have gone about better because by the end, I had three traumatic events happen in literally 2 hours...