The vet said that Isis could indeed begin having grain again. She is allowed a cup of grain two to three times per day along with a quarter cup of corn oil morning and evening. I have my doubts whether Isis will actually eat the corn oil. She has objected before to things being in her grain. We will see. The corn oil is a high fat supplement that can help horses with insulin resistance gain weight. With an IR horse, you don’t want to add a lot of grain to their diet. Instead, you look for other ways to increase their calories without increasing the starch or sugars.

After a week on this regimen, she’ll be allowed to have 1 1/2 cups of grain 2-3 times per day with a third of a cup of corn oil twice per day. She can also go back on her regular hoof/coat anti-rainrot supplement (yay!).

I have a few magazines to whom I’m considering submitting poems. Of coruse, that means dragging out all of the old poem files and reviewing what is there. This is a poem I wrote several years ago in the middle of a conflict with a friend. It’s not my best work, but some of the imagery is interesting. Comments welcome.

Polite Conversation

She said she was fine
her tone indicating otherwise
a gathering of flies picking
carefully through the conversation

Once, we shared our inner worlds
where closeted skeletons
greeted each other as friends.
We fought rabid–river rides
tumbling–turning in our make–shift raft
but always catching each other
before the current engulfed us.

She spoke now in staccato utterances
phrases chosen like steps
through piranha–infested water

The Bay Wonder Mare has been losing weight. Not just a little, but quite a bit. The barn owners were concerned and so was I. Isis hadn’t seemed like her normal self. She seemed lethargic and quiet. Dull. I taped her tonight. Before the surgery, the weight tape said she weighed 950-985. Tonight, she taped at 812. I’m calling the vet first thing in the morning. We have to be able to put her back on some grain and hopefully her supplement to help fight off the skin crud she has.

This is just too funny. Apparently the English subtitles for the Chinese version of Revenge of the Sith are the result of English translated to Chinese and then translated back to English. Wow. And I thought some of the translated user manuals were bad! Memorable quotes include: “Our dichotomy opens the combat,” “he is in my behind,” “the backstroke of the West.” Hysterical.

Revenge of the Sith: Backstroke of the West

Russian and German archaeologists think that they have found traces that could lead to the legendary Viking trading center of Wiskiauten. Interesting read if you are into archaeology.

Archaeologists find traces of legendary Viking centre By Thoralf Plath

This week has been a study in opposites. Isis is a more mature, mellow mare whose Egyptian and Crabbet bloodlines mean that she has the looks with a lot of common sense. Rajiyyah is a straight Egyptian, so she has lots of looks and not as much common sense. She is a sweet, intelligent horse who will listen when you say it’s all right. She is very spirited but doesn’t have a mean bone in her body.

Isis is glad to be home and has been making steady progress. The rainrot is starting to disappear. The swelling on her neck is slowly disappearing. Her incision looks good. No heat, although there is still some swelling. Last night I took her for a walk and graze on the road (the “runway”) between the back pastures. It’s a good little walk up a slow incline with tasty mowed grass (lots of clover). Isis immediately headed towards the runway and we were off up the hill. Rajiyyah heard Isis and charged down the hill to walk and trot along the fenceline where Isis was grazing. When the other horses in an adjoining pasture cantered up, Rajiyyah took off with her tail over her back just prancing and playing. Isis kept grazing. Rajiyyah bolted around,kicked up her heels, reared, and came back next to Isis by the fence. Snorted. Isis kept grazing. Rajiyyah raced around some more. Isis kept grazing. Finally, Rajiyyah stopped and stomped her leg and whinnied. Without seeming to notice Rajiyyay, Isis walked farther up the runway and kept grazing.

Silly kids.

After several years without development, Adobe has finally announced that it will end-of-life the SVG Viewer. Support will be discontinued on January 1, 2007, and downloads of the viewer will cease some time early 2008.

This is unfortunate because Adobe SVG Viewer (SVG) is one of the better, more complete implementations of the SVG specifications. One of the reasons cited for EOL-ing the viewer is supposed native support in some browsers. While there has been progress in this respect (both Firefox and Opera have implemented portions of the SVG 1.0 spec), neither of these implementations can match the features available in ASV.

Only Isis would get rain rot confined in a stall. Go figure! Since the colic surgery, she has been off of grain and therefore also off of her supplement. It is now painfully obvious to me just how much her supplement helps her. When I first started her on Joint Combo Hoof and Coat, she was nearly bald from rain rot. After about two weeks on it, she started fighting off the rain rot by herself. That was two years ago. She hasn’t had a bad episode of rain rot or the nasty crud on her legs since then.

Until now. I was leading her out yesterday evening and noticed that she had dark spots on her socks. Not a good sign. Dark spots and raised areas that feel like dime-size lumps. I felt one and knew immediately what it was. It peeled off in a dark skin with a yellow, pussy underside and angry red skin underneath. Yup. Same nasty stuff called “scratches,” a nasty bacterial problem that normally just effects horses on their heels. It’s also called dew poisoning because the horse can get it from going out in moist grass (i.e. dew). Normally horses just get it on their white socks.

The worst case of this she ever had was several years ago. The dew poisoning coated all four of her legs from where the hoof joins the leg (coronary band) to her hocks on her back legs and half-way up to her knees on her front legs. Her back legs were s bad that she was lame from it. Her legs were so swollen that her tendons were not visible. I fought it for a month before having the vet out for some advice. It took a course of antibiotics and several different types of topical creams before the dew poisoning finally receded. In all, it took three months.

And here it is coming up again. She has the small spots and then larger dime-size spots of it. I’ve been treating it daily with stuff. We will see how it goes… I wasn’t expecting to have this come back so quickly. She isn’t in the wet. Her stall is cleaned twice per day. There really isn’t any reason that I can see that she should be getting this — unless just walking around in the grass is enough. Sheesh.

I can’t wait until she is allowed back on her supplement in 20 days.

The Bay Wonder Mare(tm) continues to enjoy being at home. The first day she was home, she seemed to relax. Her entire body language was softer — as if it was safe for her to finally show just how exhausted she is. She has been getting out twice per day for good grazing while being lead on a leadrope.

I put Rajiyyah’s stall ball in Isis’ stall. She glared at it and backed away from it. She nosed it once, and then left it alone. I don’t think she has touched it the entire time. Rajiyyah immediately mouthed it and had it bouncing around. Goof ball.

Isis came home last night. Got on the trailer like a champ and hauled quietly back. She settled in immediately, happily munching hay and looking around. Her body seemed to relax again to realize where she is. I called the vet school twice to verify the amount of hay she’s allowed to have and whether she can have a mineral block. I’m going back out to see Isis after work today.

Recovery will take a total of 90 days before she is back to doing anything under saddle. Normally with a colic surgery, the horse is kept in stall rest for 30 days from the day of surgery. With Isis, we’re going to try and keep her on stall rest for 30 days from the time she came home — which makes a total of about 6 weeks. While she’s on stall rest, she’s allowed to be taken out and grazed on a lead rope. After the 30 days, she is allowed turnout in a small paddock so she can’t run around too much. After that, back to regular pasture turnout.

That’s the general care. Her incision site looks great. We have to monitor it for any signs of infection. She did get a minor infection where the catheter was in. We’re keeping it clean, helping it drain, and putting DMSO on it twice per day until Monday 9/11. She was also given three doses (1x day) of Gastroguard, an item that helps prevent ulcers.

One thing about Isis’ blood work results surprised me: antibodies for tapeworms, which indicates that at some point she had tape worms (not that she has them now). The results of the fecal test are not back yet so we don’t know if she actually had them now (unlikely because of the regular worming schedule she’s on).