Blood and candy

Today was a semi-big day for me. It could have been a big day, but I missed a few marks along the way.

It started with chainsaws. I woke just after 8:00 (after getting up previously at 11:00, 2:00, 1:30, 4:20, and 5:30) to a buzzing, whining noise. A neighbor a block away is having a row of very large, very old pine trees cut down. (I actually removed these trees myself several months ago - on canvas, at least.) There oughta be a law, I grumbled to myself, and realized that there probably was...but that it probably allowed chainsaws after 8:00 in the morning.

So I got up. I didn't have anything planned until my 12:15 blood donation. If I got my butt in gear early enough, I could stop at Radio Shack and pick up the cordless phone battery I had special-ordered to be delivered there, but that was a bit of a long shot.

I made myself breakfast, a high-iron cereal. As I finished I decided I would play with Scooter a bit. I looked in his box and saw that it was full of poop.

Well, not full, but there was poop there, watery poop. My mom had warned me that he had done this earlier. It looked like he hadn't gotten it on himself or his toys, but I had to change his blankets and wash out the box itself. I took him out of the box and let him scoot about the kitchen while I cleaned the box and reassembled it.

When I was done with the box I saw he had pooped on a rug in the kitchen. Oh, crap, he's sick.

We decided to take a stool sample from the blankets and take it to the vet's to be tested. I slid this module into my schedule for the day:

1. Blood donation, 12:15
Alt. 1: If rejected for donation due to low Iron, and if time permits, go to see 12:40 showing of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.
2. Go to Radio Shack to get a battery.
3. Go to vet's to get poop analyzed.
4. Go to Best Buy and pick up my repaired computer.

My blood donation went smoothly, though my Iron levels were just barely acceptable. Radio Shack did not yet have the battery - it isn't scheduled to arrive until Friday, I found out later. The poop analysis indicated that Scooter has roundworms - how he got them, or why they waited until now to show up, is anybody's guess, but we had to give him half a pill today and half a pill in two weeks.

Before I went to Best Buy to part with rather a lot of money, I decided to stop at Sam's Club to prepare for the holidays. I walked out with $40 worth of candy (good for about an hour of Trick-or-Treaters; I need to buy a lot more candy in the next eight weeks - my next blood donation is scheduled for Halloween, by the way) and more than $50 of blue LED Christmas lights (if you're looking for LED Christmas lights, now is the time to buy them.)

My computer...well, I'm glad I found out about the AAA 20% Geek Squad discount. Very glad.

And then I came home, suddenly feeling very tired. Probably the blood thing. Oh well.