Cold Caribbean

The temperature has dipped into the low 70's here and the winds have picked up. Today it has not been at all unusual to see people wearing sweaters. Our blood must not have quite thinned enough because we are really enjoying it. They call them the Christmas winds and they apparently are coming early this year.

Ginger under the weather

For the past few weeks Ginger has been peeing on our couch and while we thought for a while it was behavioral, it became clear last Tuesday, when she pee'd on Katie and didnt seem to know what she was doing, that it wasnt. We took her to the Vet yesterday who initially thought it was a urinary tract infection. Last night we started Ginger on medication but a long night of throwing up later it was clear the medication was not working. This morning we took her back to the vet and a urine test showed elevated glucose leading the vet to think diabetes. They kept her for observation and blood tests. This afternoon when we went back for her we discovered that the glucose was normal in her blood but she has low phosphates which looks like thyroid problems and may mean surgery. We brought her home and have to keep a close eye on her through Monday. Her tail is very grey which is apparently a sign of the imbalance. We will be taking her back Monday for more tests and a determination of whether we need to get her thyroid surgery.

You would be correct in thinking that none of this is cheap. Just to send the bloodwork to the U.S. for further tests includes a $65 Biological shipping fee. That is before you pay the lab fee's etc. We have to get another urine sample tomorrow and poor Ginger has been looking at us with big sad eyes all day after several hours of being poked and prodded by the vet. Keep a good thought for Ginger, she is a cat but in the ten months since we got her she has become part of the family and someone we care a lot about.

We did have some time to watch the Horns and the 28-24 win over the sixth ranked Okie State Cowboys. Texas continues to make Scott's Saturday's fun and he looks forward to the weekly call to Gary to talk about the game and the Horns. It is still raining every day down here and our roads have huge sinkhole size potholes that are as big as our little car and make driving down Selkirk an adventure especially at night and in the dark. The flooded road also means you cant see the pothole because the whole street is under water. They cant fix the road until the rain stops and the water recedes. We are definitely ready for the end of rainy season.

Rainy October

Hurricane season still has six weeks left in it but things are relatively quiet. Omar was well to the East of us and most of the areas of interest haven't had tracks into the western Caribbean. While the hurricanes are giving us a wide berth that hasn't meant a slow down in rain and for the last month we have gotten more than our fill of rainy season. Selkirk drive which leads from the main road to our street is flooded and we have to drive in the middle of the road because the road is angled to have the water move left and right and our little car would flood if we stayed to the left. Yesterday we did a 7 plus k walk in the morning for our graduation banquet benefit and we both paid the price in the afternoon. Walks like that start at 6:30 a.m. because of the heat so that meant a 5:15 wake up call. Katie worked on her pottery in the afternoon while I went to a sports bar and watched college football.

Of course last night was spent watching the number one ranked Horns dominate Mizzou and move to 7-0. Texas is putting together a nice little run of wins and they are definitely making for some fun Saturdays. Since the game was the ABC national telecast I got to watch the game from home and freak out Ginger and Gypsy who had never watched football with me before. The pacing, the stressing out at every play, the inability to sit down, they got the full treatment. The other good news is that with each Texas win the season tickets I have with Gary and Ken back in Texas to the games are easier to sell and for more money. We sold Mizzou at a profit and had already broken even on the first three Texas home games. At this point it looks like we will be able to sell our remaining tickets for an overall profit and have a profit for the year even with attending the Arkansas game. So Texas' success is a financial boon as well as my personal enjoyment at watching them win.

Happy Birthday Katie

We celebrated Sunday night with dinner at Guy Harvey's Island Grill overlooking George Town Harbor. Today we have a lot of rain so we are having a restful morning reading and having waffles for breakfast (made by Scott supervised by the birthday girl). We have changed our work hours so we now work from 2:30 in the afternoon to 10:05 which means more time earlier in the day to do things like snorkel or go for bike rides and not have to rush home to get ready to go to work. Right now the rainy season is hitting us pretty heavily most days but once November rolls around it will mean the ability to do more before we have to get ready to go to work.

Katie in Dallas to work on her Masters

Katie is back in the metroplex this weekend to do a literature review for her Masters class. The libraries here on island are not sufficient to get her the material she needs so we turned in our airline miles and she has been home since Thursday. She has been staying with her sister Mel and using the library at UT Dallas. Tonight she is staying with her Mom and Stephanie and she flies back tomorrow morning early. There has been a lot of rain on Grand Cayman the last two weeks but no major storms (knock on wood). The fall quarter continues rolling along and we are now looking forward to a trip to Miami in November for the seminar and then a visit with Kevin, Kristy and the kids in Orlando.