Me and My Dog.

Bailey went in last week for his expensive vet visit.

They cleaned his teeth (after extracting several), and they were happy to report that his lower canines were intact. This is good, because those teeth help keep his tongue centered in his mouth, rather than having it hang out the side and making him look like a special-needs dog.

They also addressed the problem of his mouth infection-- a major infection of the salivary gland. They cleaned that up nicely, leaving his mouth full of dissolvable sutures.

They cleaned out his ear and found a polyp-- which they left alone, since he's 12 and has no apparent hearing loss.

Finally, they removed a cyst from his paw, stitched up the area, and wrapped it in a cute pink bandage. He was pretty groggy and crabby that evening, but now he's just fine-- he's on pain medication for another week! Lucky dog!

He's going to be just fine, thankfully.

So am I, it seems. Well, sort of.

My MRA showed that there were no issues with the blood vessels in the brain. Then why the pain in the back, neck, shoulders, and arms? Well, it's bone spurs on my vertebrae. I'm being sent to an orthopedic surgeon to discuss options-- of which there may be none. It might just be bursitis / arthritis. At any rate, it's not an aneurysm or any complication from my freakishly oversized cerebellum. That's something.

Bailey and I might just have a beer tonight, to celebrate our mediocre health.