- Look Familiar?
It happens to the best of us. You wake up on a Monday excited to tackle the week ahead, jump out of bed and before your feet hit the floor it starts... Muckery.
I don't let days like this get me down, we all have them so I figure what's the point in letting it get me down. In my mind it's better to just plug away and eventually it will pass. Well last week I had one of those days. It was so bad in fact it ended up with one of my furkids at the emergency vet. Although it was quite annoying at the time, eventually it all worked out and looking back I even found some humor in the whole episode. So I thought I'd share it so the next time one of you is having a case of "The Monday's" you might think about Greek Girl and realize we all have them. You're not alone, just breathe and it will pass (a lot faster too if you try to find some humor in the situation).
It was Monday morning, I had a commercial audition in the city so I got ready and drove in like any other day. The audition was in a silly part of town where there is no meter parking for miles. The few meters that are available are either taken or too far away from my destination that by the time I walk to the audition; I will end up having to turn around to go feed the meter again because they are only one hour meters. So after driving around in circles I decided to bite the bullet and park. It would be $50 bucks for one hour. My audition appointment was at 12:10pm.
I think it's funny that casting directors give out appointments and have a cow if anyone shows up late. On the other hand they can make actors wait for hours as if it's no big deal at all. So I walk in and it is like a giant romper room. Toddlers and young kids everywhere literally bouncing off the walls, parents on iPads and cell phones totally oblivious to the fact that their kid are acting like animals. I sign in and ask the assistant who is doing the sign in's if she has any idea if they are running on time. She looks at me like I have six heads and says "Appointment times are out the window today, I can't give you a time just wait". I'm thinking oh gee nice, I'm glad I made it on time and am paying $50 to park.
I sat down and began to take it all in. We have a word in the Greek language for what was going on "χάος" it means Chaos! So after basking in the chaos for almost an hour they had seen a whopping one set of people for the role. It was for a family: a mom and two young kids for a food product. I could not wait any longer due to the $50/hr parking garage, so I asked if I could leave and come back - little miss sunshine aka the assistant said OK.
So I went back to the garage paid the $50 bucks, retrieved my car and drove around for about half an hour to find some meter parking. Finally after what seemed like forever I found a spot on the corner of 30th street and 3rd avenue. I had to be extra careful to park not touching the white line (or the parking natzis will tow the car) yet far enough from the car behind me so my car would not get hit if they tried to leave. I maneuvered Jillian Jetta in the perfect spot which wasn't easy I might add as she is a 6 speed. I got out, fed the meter, got the receipt and walked back to the car. Put the ticket on the dash and was set to leave to walk back to the audition. No sooner do I lock the door does the guy behind me yell out the window he is leaving that I can have his spot.... UGG now I'm already on the meter clock. See you have to be back to the car by the time on the meter or guess what? You guessed it a ticket. So in cecil the turtle mode he leaves and I back up to his spot. I grab my stuff and run the four blocks back to the casting.
I go back upstairs (runnning four flights of stairs as the elevator is old fashioned and the operator is out to lunch) to find no movement in the casting order. Apparently the software broke and in all the time I'd been gone they only saw one more group. Ov Vey! So I wait, and since I had to be back to my meter within an hour to avoid a ticket, guess what happened? Yup I had to leave again to go feed the meter. So I ran the four blocks back to the car, fed the meter, and returned. Finally after almost three hours of total Muckery I was able to be seen for the casting. I did a great job and kept my cool despite the circumstances. It didn't hurt that they paired me up with some adorable kids who did a great job.
I left and got over to the West Side Highway just in time to be stuck in afternoon rush hour with all the other people who live outside the city and commute in. I finally got home about five. At this point all I want to do is workout. So instead of feeding the furkids like normal, I decided to give them a treat to hold them over and feed them "after" my workout. I gave them all small pieces of the fruit from the smoothie I was making with my Nutribullet in addition to some doggie cookies.
Right about then the monsoon started complete with thunder and lightening and torrential rain. One of the furkids "Pepe" is horribly afraid of thunder so I had to stop and get his doggie drugs in him fast (all natural no worries a little melatonin and "Rescue Remedy" drops to calm him down). I changed into my workout clothes and was about to go down to the workout room when I heard a bunch of commotion from the doggie room.
I rush in and find "Punkin" turning blue and four piles of throw up. Her eyes are all bugged out and she doesn't even look like herself. I grabbed her put her in the car and rushed to the emergency vet in the pouring rain. It was raining so hard I couldn't see. Thank God I got there in time... she threw up a piece of apple at home but I didn't realize she had stolen one of the other furkids apples because we found out later this is what was stuck in her throat.
They X-Rayed her and found that in addition to swallowing an entire baby carrot whole she had a triangle shaped thing stuck in her throat. They did emergency surgery to push the item down with a tube. They were unable to get it into the stomach, only to the bottom of the esophagus. They had to wait overnight for the specialist to come to do the next step which would have been endoscopic surgery to push the item from the bottom of her esophagus where they got it the night before into her stomach.
Needless to say it was a long night. The 6am X-Ray showed the triangle in the same spot. Then at 11:30am the vet called me to tell me they would try one more thing before doing the endoscopy which would have been another $1,200 or more. They fed her a tiny amount of baby food with some powder dye on it. Then re X-Rayed her, this time they found the little triangle was in her tummy. They called me to tell me I could take her home. With medicine and no hard food for a week, as her little throat was all inflamed from the trauma.
- "Punkin" being sprung from the emergency vet!
The moral of the story... Sometimes you can make a bad day worse by putting off something. Although it wasn't intentional and I consider myself to be a very responsible dog owner, I put off feeding them when I got home because I wanted to workout. Which I never got to do anyhow because I had to rush "Punkin" to the vet. I didn't want to wait for them to eat, then take them out in the rain to do their business. I figured it'd be faster to give them a snack and feed them after. Even though they have dry food down all day, they love their special mash I make them every day. Had I just done it when I got home I quite possibility might never had had to spend a long night and a ton of money at the emergency vet.
An expensive lesson, but never give your furkids anything that is not mashed up or soft enough to go down their throats. The vet said they see dogs with apples stuck in their throats a lot. So the next time the Mondays come creeping up on you just sit back, take a breath and smile. The rain will stop eventually and if you find some humor in the situation somewhere, it will make it go a lot faster. Looking back on it I realized you just can't make this tuff up. Life, it happens to the best of us... enjoy it, it's the only one we have.
