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Monday, Feb. 19, 2007 - 8:56 p.m.
I worked at total of 74 hours between last Monday and Sunday. 68 of them behind the wheel of my snowplow truck, fighting the Blizzard of 2007 on Tuesday, cleaning up the leftovers on Wednesday and Thursday, fighting blowing snow on Friday, another 4� snowfall on Saturday, followed by frigid overnight temperatures that caused black ice to form on the road, which I spent 6 hours breaking up on Sunday.
Tuesday and Saturday were 2 am calls for an early 3:30am start. Both of those days lasted until 7 pm.
No, a trucker couldn�t legally work those hours. But we are considered emergency workers, so the state throws the rule book out the window. I went to bed early on Monday night, fearing the early call up. Even so, I only had 5 hours of sleep when the phone rang.
Did I ever get sleepy while driving last week?
Oh yeah- many times. I took a couple of 15 minute power naps whenever I couldn�t stay focused any more. Yes, they could discipline me for doing that, but I don�t take any breaks, lunch or otherwise, on those 16 hour days.
It�s better to pull over than to run into the car in the next lane, don�t you think?
Why this photograph?
It is from 1993, and was scanned using my 5 year old, crappy scanner. That�s our friends Roby and Jill, holding Sprout.
Why am I posting it here today?
Well, the day I wasn�t looking forward to happening was last Friday. I had to take 2 hours of PB time that morning to take Sprout to the vet to have him put to sleep.
It was time.
Sprout was around 18 years old- nobody could tell for sure how old he was because we were his second owners. His health had stayed great (considering his age) up until December. He wasn�t eating well, and when I took him to the vet back then his weight had dropped to 5 pounds or so. He was only an 8 pound dog when he was young, but had been loosing muscle mass for the last couple of years.
A couple of weeks ago, we noticed that he was having trouble walking. He was still eating and drinking, but he didn�t seem to want to move around unless he needed to go to the bathroom.
At that point, I knew it was only a matter of time.
On Thursday, Lease called me at work to tell me Sprout wouldn�t eat from his bowl. She hand fed him a small amount of cheese, but that was all she could get him to take. When I came home that evening (7pm, of course, after another long day behind the wheel), I took him outside. He couldn�t keep his balance, and wouldn�t go to the bathroom.
It was time.
The drive to the vet to have a dog put down is one of the hardest things I ever have to do. This is the 5th dog I have had to make this decision for in my life, and it tears me apart every time.
I did what I could to keep the tears back until the doctor did his work, but it wasn�t possible. Sprout had been a part of our lives for over 15 years. Letting him go was not easy.
A little background on Sprout, our Brussels Griffon:
We brought him into our home after he was rescued from a �puppy mill�. He was estimated to be around 3 years old at the time, but their paperwork on their dogs was poor at best. He was called �stud dog� but the owner of the mill. He spent the first three years of his life in the basement of a house, with papers covering the floor. When the humane society people brought him up the stairs and set him down outside, he collapsed to the ground and refused to move.
He had never been out of that basement, and didn�t know what to make of the sun shining on him.
Coming from that environment, you would understand if he had a few problems associating with people. Not Sprout- he was the happiest dog I have ever seen. He got along fine with Roadie (the dog that gave this site her name- long story), our cocker spaniel/dachshund mix. He ended up outliving her by 6 years, even though he was older than her when we brought him home.
Every year during the Westminster Kennel Club dog show (ironically, televised last week. I was at work, Lease stuck in Springpatch due to the snow, and we both forgot to watch it�but I digress) they say the same thing about Brussels Griffon dogs while it is being shown- �These dogs have the heart of a lion and are one-person dogs, fiercely loyal to their master�.
Sprout got along fine with everyone.
But I was that �one person�. He followed me around the house wherever I went up until the time when his eyesight failed a few years ago. After that, it was up to me to take him with me whenever I went to another room. If I didn�t, he would hear me leaving and would bark until I went back and picked him up. For the last 18 months or so, he was also deaf. I still made sure he was in whatever room I was in- he seemed to know whenever I left somehow, and would get off of his bed and wander around the room until I picked him up.
He was a great dog. He lived a long a good life with us, with only minor health problems in his later years.
He will be greatly missed by all who knew him�.
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