Chance and life

The annual OVMA conference.
A lot of people I knew who are considerably older looking this year. Done in the dungeons of Harbour Castle Hilton. A most desolate looking hotel conference centre if I must say.
I found out that B sent all his vets to conferences this year; to Florida, Las Vegas, wherever. And not cheap. The perks of being a fulltime vet at Annex. So I said to Joe; "you know Joe, I only got to go one day to the OVMA conference, of all things in downtown slushy old Toronto in all of 6 years I worked there." He laughed and said "I got to go on the other day" too. He missed the point. In all these years, 21 of them; I certainly haven't taken very good care of myself. Have I? Neither physically, financially, mentally. Or is that true? I have taken pretty good care of myself mentally; I'm doing what I want now; doing it well; it hasn't shown much yet money wise but I am doing good at it (colloquial talk now) and it makes me very happy, very happy. Eliminates all the people who have treated me poorly or not at all. Completely eliminates them from the picture, from the equation. BC, JP, SP, anyone anywhere who has tricked me, cheated me, not given me what I was due; they are out of the equation. Only my brother and our horses remain. So be it.

New Day
Urga downloaded great. I woke up Thursday morning to see it downloading like gangbusters. The night before it was stalled at "infinity". the symbol that means it'll take forever to download at this bitrate. Just sitting there stalled. Nothing happening. Nada. But sometime Thursday night a computer somewhere in Europe opened up and the bits and bytes came flying flying into my computer. And I watched as it hit 100% download by 6 am. And it is perfect; every scene every move, it's perfect. Only problem; it is in French and because I know the movie so well; I know what's going on but when I give a copy to Jill; what's she going to think? She's never seen the movie before and now she's going to watch a Chinese/Russian film made in Russia about Mongolians in French. Too much for tv.

1:05 The Goddess of 1967 is downloading very nicely, thankyou, at approximately 20 kbs. Nothing like the final torrent of Urga who crawled along at 2 kbs and then hit the homestretch at 100 kbs but still we are at 30% download and I expect that I could get it all by tomorrow if it doesn't hang up too much between now and then. the thing is, it seems to get more stable the longer it is on that particular torrent. It hung up every minute when we first started but now, if I'm not doing too much else with the computer, it won't hang up for increasing lengths of time. Like with Urga, towards the end of the download; into the 3rd day; it was very stable and I could do anything on the computer without anything happening; it would just continue kb after kb.

Guelph

Not a single call last night at BNVC. I lay down in the doctor's office on the narrow futon couch with Grrgles by my side; my trusty sidekick. Not until I turned off the Noma parabolic heater with its rotating head bright as daylight in the middle of June did I finally fall asleep. I was back in Guelph, younger, lighter, happier. Summertime, living in an old house that originally was quite dumpy, downtrodden but had been renovated by someone in recent years to a pristeen kind of antiqued glory and I was living there with my spouse (who I can't say but it wasn't Danny Mudrick or anyone I could identify). We had 3 rooms; two on the main floor opposite each other and one in the attic. The attic room could only be accessed by pushing up on a trap door and hoisting onself onto the top landing which, today would be an impossibility but you could pummel on the trapdoor and now a mechanism would allow the door to lift and a step to emerge against which you could park a secure modern age aluminum folding stepladder and this way, very efficiently access the top floor. The top floor room was large and roomy and airy and a had a gable window that faced a field of flowers. It was this room I gave to Habibble who had come up from Georgia with her mate of a hundred years; Karol. Or Karolchick which we liked to call him in the old European way.
Into this room she and he parked themselves. It was so good to see her; she too was younger and fresher and less timeworn than in the real. In this dream she was an accomplished equestrienne and she told me that she was going to really teach me to ride. (I can't ride worth a shit) There were only 2 keys between the 4 of us; one of which I had given to the renter or sublessee of the middle room opposite ours; a dour tall pale guy name unknown who I remember from the real past was a small plane pilot who lived in the house on Hampton Avenue for a short while. Ahh the joys of coop living; the people who come and go. What is this dream about?

Saturday Night

I am the voice of the voiceless;
Through me the dumb shall speak
Till a deaf world's ear
Shall be made to hear
The wrongs of the wordless weak.

The same force formed the sparrow
That fashioned man, the king.
The God of the Whole
Gave a spark of soul
To furred and feathered thing.

And I am my brother's keeper;
And I will fight his fight,
And speak the word
For beast and bird
Till the world shall set things right.

--Ella Wheeler Wilcox, 1850-1919

- "Voice of the Voiceless" by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
I found this neat poem on the web; someone named Pat Bumstead's blog.

A Spin Around The Middle Ages

We haven't got a name for the new recently turned 2 years old filly yet, my bro and I, so it occurred to me to use poetry as my guide. But it's been an awful long time since I read any and I seem to have lost the use of my reading poetry gene. (You know what they say; if you don't use it, you'll lose it).
But with the help of 5 viewings of Shakespeare In Love consecutively, I thought I'd start with Greek Mythology on my quest to find the right combination of words to name this filly. A name is not just a name; it can imprint you with what could have been, what might have been, and what may still be.
Starting with Greek Mythology I came upon a website devoted to a small town in Germany called Minden (the filly's mother's name is Minden Mist) which lead me to a website devoted to the Minden Fair in Ontario. Which led me to a poem by Rudyard Kipling about the Men who fought at Minden ( and I believe some were decapitated) which led me to a piece about decapitation and human sacrifice in Greek Mythology. which led me to http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/1172/does-the-head-remain-briefly-conscious-after-decapitation which led me to stuff about Other Mythology which led me to the middle Ages which led me to the Legends of Arthur and the Green Knight which led me to Middle English which led me to a website devoted to an eminent scholar at The University of Toronto named Ian Lancashire who specialilzes in all things literary and Middle English which led me (after just 4 hours sleep; I fell asleep at 3 am) to an interlude examining the use of the guillotine in France the ultimate story being the Marquis de Sade's commentary on the beheading of Madame -? who pleaded and begged for mercy on her way to the scaffold which disturbed me so much I had to turn the computer off. But the search commenced again this morning with a foray into a book about poor women in the middle ages (Poor Women In Shakepeare by Fiona McNeil) and a play by Thomas Dekker (ca 1550s) called the Shoemaker's Holiday which brings us full circle because Dekker was a contemporary of Shakespeare. But I still don't have a name for the filly. Maybe a literary type out there can provide one. The Mare's name is Minden Mist and the Sire's name is Bold n Flashy. I have about 2 weeks left before time runs out and I have to pay for the naming service. Right now it's free.

So I have 3 horses on a farm near Orangeville that my friend Maria recommended. It's a nice place and they do a good job. HOWEVER, the black horse scraped the side of his hind left shin on a fence or, who knows, he may have been rolling in his stall and wacked himself there. Anyways the shin is a little inflamed, a little swelling and the skin is burred with a little ooze. It's no big deal. He's not lame. I saw it about 5 days post injury. She called me up the day it happened or perhaps the next day and told me about it (okay) then she said "I gave him a little bit of penicillin" for it. So I flipped out; I mean, I didn't scream and yell, I told her emphatically not to be treating my horse with " a little bit of penicillin" until we've cleared what the problem is and if it does require penicillin. I said it probably would do better with cleaning and an antiinflammatory. I also I told her I generally DON'T use penicillin, usually opting for some other second generation cepha type drug etc pending culture. I also told her not to be charging me an injection fee (she said she didn't want me to flip out when there was a charge on my bill for an injection of penicillin) as she would be "practising without a license" but rather I would give her the meds to use or replace hers. I said any antibiotic should be used appropriately; the right dose for the right amount of time etc. Now she's all bent out of shape. I'm mad, not at her although I am a little mistified that she could be so stupid, mostly I am mad that veterinarians in general allow this shit to go on. It's a slippery slope I know, but it is so beneath the level of standard that I am used to.