Thanksgiving and Sophie May Not

So here's the short of it,
Thanksgiving was very different this year, and Sophie May Not was a very bad girl. 

And here's the long

Today has been an adventure.  It been a very different Thanksgiving.  I've also had much more energy than I thought I would have. 

Late this morning, we went to Cracker Barrel.  I met Aunt Joyce and Cousin Daniel there as they were on their way through town going to David and Cyndi's for Thanksgiving Dinner.  We visited for about 30 minutes and then the rest of the crew arrived - Mommy Anne; Shelley,Lou, and Max; Liga and Valdis; and Alan and me.  I've never done Cracker Barrel for Thanksgiving before, and there were sure a lot of people "doing Thanksgiving" there.  We had a lovely time and it was nice for us to all be together for a while. 

We had several cars there and Liga left early so that she could get ready to go to work.  I was taking my time moseying home the long way when I got the call. When Liga arrived, there all over the living room was the evidence.  Sophie May Not had gotten one of my weekly pill boxes and a compact florescent light bulb still in its package.  She had chewed open the pill box and the florescent light bulb package was open and it was shattered all over the floor.  By the time I got home, Liga had the mess cleaned up, and had saved the pills in the dustpan.  I was able to count how many were missing of each one. There was no way to really tell if she had swallowed any of the glass from the light bulb! Once I had everything accounted for, I called the Emergency Vet Clinic and they referred me to the ASPCA poison control center.  You can bet I was pretty nervous about that call!  I was mostly worried about the glass and the Elavil - that's a medicine they have put me on for my neuropathy.  (That will be another blog entry altogether about using anti-depression medications for neuropathy).  After a tense wait the vet on the other end of the call told me that she probably had not ingested enough to harm her.  He was not particularly worried about her ingesting the glass.  He told me to bulk up her diet today and tomorrow with whole grain bread.  That apparently will bind up any glass she might have gotten and help her pass it normally in her stool.  Then he gave me the symptoms to watch for that would be reason to take her in to the Emergency Clinic.  Thankfully, she has not exhibited any of them all day.  What an afternoon! Our last dog wasn't  big enough to counter surf --- and the counter is so messy these days partly because I've not felt like doing anything at all for months! Anyway, I spent a couple of hours today working on the counter.  I still have a section to tackle tomorrow.  Sophie has been amazed today - every time she came near me I was offering her a piece of bread!  Right now she is snoozing away just across the room from me and seems to be doing just fine and dandy.  

Late this afternoon Cousin Mia came by on her way home from taking Clyde to the Atlanta airport for a quick Thanksgiving trip to see his Dad.  We had some great girl time making fried green tomato and turkey bacon sandwiches for supper and just chattering all about the kids, work, and stuff. 

It's not really late, but I'm beginning to get a little tired.  I think it's good that today wasn't a Thanksgiving like ones we've had over the years.  It's been hard to get through this first Thanksgiving without Dad, but it was easier that we were doing things differently than in the past.  Sometime during Thanksgiving Day Dad would always ask everyone say something they were thankful for.  I'm very grateful that Gene Howard was my Dad.  I am also very grateful that Mom is still here with us.