Let It Bleed. And Bleed. And Bleed.

Yesterday was filled with stress. The kind where it feels like an elephant is sitting on you. Even when you're able to hold the moment at arms length, examine it, reason with it, and you know it's going to be ok regardless. But the shit just keeps coming, like you slipped on the one turd holding it all in place. Aside from the time I spent with my lady friends after hours, I'd have just canceled yesterday all together. ("Everyone go home. Today's been canceled. It's much to shitty.")

My dog has a urinary tract infection. In case you haven't experienced this before, let me give you a little head's up: pints of coagulated blood-laced urine are perfectly normal.

I came home from rehearsal Monday to discover what looked like the scene of a crime, and by the look on my German shepherd's face, you'd have thought she committed one. I suspected it may have been a UTI, which is the only reason I didn't completely freak. I assumed it was my shepherd, because she's been on steroids for arthritis in her hip. Prednisone makes dogs (and humans) very thirsty, they drink a lot, and they have to pee more frequently. I thought maybe the medicine was causing her organs to failure. We thought, this is it. I examined her and thought I saw remnants of dark pee. Regrettably, I did not examine my red dog. Long story short and $200 later, we discover the wrong dog has been taken to the vet and subsequently had to endure a stressful experience, while the sick dog was at home, trying to push pee out so hard that we later discovered may have caused what looks like a broken blood vessel in her eye.

Yuck. Ow. Sweet Jesus.

So we've been cleaning up bloody pee and running load after load of laundry, waking up at all hours of the night, cleaning up more bloody pee and letting the dog out and in and out and in for the last three days.

The good news is, Zoe has only taken 2 rounds of antibiotics and she's already showing major improvement. She even did the crazy mad dash in the house when I called her in this morning, tail wagging. And there was a lot less pee to clean up tonight too. I am truly relieved.

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My review has been rescheduled. Will any potential raise be retroactive to the year anniversary of my start date, nearly two months ago? Outcome unlikely.

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Spring is just around the corner, Friends. Winter hasn't bled all my hopes dry. Good things are on the horizon, even if it feels a bit tight at the moment.