Sheba!

Sheba, the dog that I adopted from the local pet rescue, came home last Thursday. There are pictures here and a video here. So far I have been absolutely thrilled with her temperment and behavior. She is incredibly affectionate, completely housebroken and doesn't mess with things (i.e. trash) that aren't hers. She walks well on her leash, at least most of the time. Several people that we have passed on our walks have commented on what a good dog she is. She does have a small weakness for kitty chasing that we are working on. For now, I have put up a baby gate so that the cats can hang out in the bedroom in peace, though both (especially Cassie) are willing to come into the living room ocassionally. Speaking of Cassie, she is recovering very well from her bad asthma attack 2 weeks ago.

My dear friend Kristine Reed will be arriving here tomorrow afternoon. She is currently on spring break from UCSD and I am thrilled that she will be spending part of that time here. We have a lot of fun activities planned, including checking out the Jacksonville Zoo and kayaking at Cedar Key. I'm sure I'll have some photos to post.

Emu Egg

One of my coworkers found an unusual, large, dark green egg near our building today. After some online searching, we decided that it was an emu egg. Compare the photo to this one. The thought of an emu running around the UF campus is quite amusing. Some of my coworkers had the kind, but misguided, idea to "rescue" the egg and it briefly resided in one of our incubators. I tried to raise the point that "rescuing" this egg could yield a baby emu and then what would we do with it? Luckily, an expert was consulted who said that the egg was almost certainly dead, germ-ridden and could explode when warmed and should be discarded. We returned it to where we found it and concluded that someone else must have found it in a more remote (and probable) location, brought it to campus, and then discarded it when they got this same information. Who knows - maybe it's passed through several people already?

I had a wonderful time celebrating my nephew's first birthday with my family. There are photos here and a video here.

My female cat, Cassie, was diagnosed with asthma 7 years ago (it sounds ridiculous, I know). Though the condition has worsened over the years, it has been kept under control with oral medication. However, the pollen count here has been really bad this week and on Tuesday night Cassie had a severe asthma attack. I rushed her to the local animal emergency hospital and by the time we got there she was in very bad shape. They warned me that she probably wasn't going to make it. Luckily, she pulled through and was able to come home in less than 24 hours. It was a traumatic experience for both of us! For now she is on increased meds and has been instructed to "take it easy". Isn't that a cat's whole life? Taking it easy? Unfortuntately, this means I've had to delay the dog adoption for at least a week. The delay is disappointing, but I'm just glad that Cassie is still around. Hopefully I'll be able to bring Sheba (the dog) home next week.

dog!

Hello everyone. I am pleased to announce that I am adopting a dog from the local pet rescue center. She is a wonderful 4-year old bull mix. She will be coming home next Thursday (3.15.07). Her name is Sheba; I'm not crazy about that name, but she responds to it so I guess I'll keep it. I have been readying the apartment for her arrival (baby gate, kennel, bed, toys) and the cats suspect something is up. Sheba supposedly interacts well with the cats at her foster home, but it should still be an interesting adjustment period for all of us. Speaking of my pets, there are some new videos of Cleofus on youtube; just follow the "Laura's videos" link on the right.

Today is my nephew's 1st birthday - Happy Birthday Jacob! The family will be having a birthday party for him this weekend so I'm headed to Lexington tomorrow. I'm very glad to have the opportunity to join in the celebration - I've missed both of my neice's birthdays thus far. Next week is also my mom's birthday, so we'll be celebrating that this weekend too.

My research advisor, Dr. Lonnie Ingram, had a personal meeting with President Bush recently. The meeting is described here.