Kari Neumeyer

High on life, no thanks to the walk-in clinic, Part 1

As a presumed side effect of the TMJ that has plagued me for about nine years, I suffer severe headaches from time to time. The first notable one throbbed on one side and was accompanied by nausea and light sensitivity. I had driven the half-hour to work and was struggling to look at my computer screen when I realized, “Holy Sh*t, this is migraine.” I’d never had one before. My doctor’s office happens to be closer to my office than to my home, so it was easy enough to go there and get diagnosed. I can’t remember exactly what she gave me, I think it was a pill, and they left me in the dark exam room while I waited for it to take effect. I was afraid to leave before the headache was gone, so when my doctor came back about 20 minutes later, I told her I wasn’t sure it was better. I thought the migraine was better, but I could still sort of feel it lingering, you know?

The next thing to try would be the Imitrex shot, which as she described it, “feels weird.” You feel a zing and a tingling that goes up through your head and out, and when it leaves, the migraine goes with it. I’m sure people who have had the shot could describe it better. Her description kind of freaked me out. I felt better enough, I decided, drove home and never had another migraine again.

A short time later, though, I had a tension headache that did not ease up for three straight weeks. I had acupuncture, therapeutic massage, heavy drugs, and physical therapy, but I think it just went away on its own. That was four years ago, and since then, I’ve had bad headaches here and there, but nothing like what I’ve already described.

Monday morning, as I was getting ready for an awesome day at work that consisted only of taking pictures of salmon being cooked, eating salmon, and proofreading (which, don’t judge, is something I really love), I started to feel a familiar dull ache around the crown of my head. I popped two Aleve (yes, TWO) and went on my way. When I returned home from my big salmon lunch, I settled into my favorite proofreading chair and fell asleep. I woke up, carried on proofreading, and noticed the headache had returned. By the time I picked Rob up from work, I was slightly dizzy from the headache. After we came home from dinner, I returned to my proofreading chair to make up for the time I missed on account of my nap. At about 9 p.m. I stood up and moved to my computer, and as I sat down, my head started to throb and I thought, “Oh, this must be a migraine.”

Conveniently, I already had an appointment with a craniosacral therapist for the next morning. It was my seventh session, and so far this is the only treatment that has had any lasting benefit for my jaw. He dons a latex glove and massages inside my mouth. Pretty intense. (Probably deserves its own post someday, but let’s move on.)

I thought he might be able to make the throbbing go away. But what if he didn’t? I still had this huge proofreading job to do. I couldn’t just come home and suffer the throbbing. Should I go to the emergency room? Didn’t seem like the most efficient plan. I knew that ERs didn’t consider migraines life-threatening (and once read a “Overheard in the ER” site where ER staffers mocked people for considering migraines “emergencies” when they got them several times a month.) And no way I could drive the half-hour to my doctor’s. I probably shouldn’t even drive myself to craniosacral five minutes away. But Rob was at his second day at a new job and I didn’t want to ask his parents to drive me to my doctor.

I had the genius idea to go to a Walk-In Clinic that takes my insurance and purports to “offer immediate medical services for non-life threatening medical conditions.” (Note: that’s a direct quote from the website and I object to the hyphenation. How do you threaten a “non-life”?)

After my head and gum massage, my head still throbbed. Every time I stood up or changed incline, I felt like my brain was throbbing right behind my eyes. I wasn’t nauseous, though, or light-sensitive. And the pain was dead center, not isolated to one side. So maybe it wasn’t a migraine, but I thought the Walk-In doctor would be able to give me some drugs and make it go away.

I waited more than an hour, alternately reading the subtitles of a Planet Earth special about whales, and closing my eyes and leaning my head against the wall behind me. If I remained perfectly still, the throbbing stopped and I just felt a regular tension headache. I’d had the foresight to bring my Nook with me, but even if I could have read it comfortably, I didn’t want to undermine my claims of a “migraine.”

When I finally saw someone, it wasn’t a doctor, but a physician assistant. She was concerned that my headache did not follow the pattern of my one previous migraine. (Can one migraine have a pattern?) I described it as “A worst headache ever,” and it changed with movement. She didn’t want to treat it as a migraine in case it wasn’t a migraine, because it might be something else. She advised me to go to the emergency room for a CT scan. She’d note in my chart that she’d told me to go there, so insurance wouldn’t think I just decided to do that on my own. I should tell them at the ER that I’d been sent there from the Walk-In Clinic, and they would triage me accordingly.

Instead of saying, “So, do I get my $20 copay back because you have done absolutely nothing for me?”

I asked, “What else do you think it could be, if not a migraine?”

“Oh, you know,” she said (I’m paraphrasing). “Buried aneurysm.”

She left the room to write me a note and I waited another 20 minutes wondering, “Should I call Rob? Do I really want him to leave in the middle of his second day at work? I’ll just go by myself. It will be fine. But what if it is an aneurysm? At what point do I call Rob and tell him, ‘Hey, I’m at the ER. Gonna have some brain surgery.'”

I started to freak out a little. And cry. And feel pissed off that every minute I spent waiting for the Walk-In Clinic to release me was a minute I should be putting toward my ER wait. When the nurse finally came back, she told me that she had been trying to reach my doctor to find out what I took for my last migraine, but no one answered the phone there. I could have told her that you can never get anyone on the phone there.

I went to my car, head throbbing, and called Rob. When he answered, I wailed, “I’m freaking out,” and filled him in. He very calmly came up with a plan to have his mom pick me up where I was and take me to the ER. That’s when I realized he couldn’t come get me himself anyway, because I had driven him to work. He’d have to take the bus home to get his car.

He told me later that when he first heard me crying, he assumed something bad had happened to the dogs. Of course he had. That’s always my first fear, too. Not that he then thought, “Oh, phew. The dogs are fine. Kari’s just having an aneurysm.” No, he thought of Bret Michaels, infamous Lothario and lead singer of the band Poison, who went to the ER a few years ago with the worst headache of his life, which turned out to be a cerebral hemorrhage.

In Part 2 of this thrilling tale:

The Physician Assistant’s note fails to bump me to the front of the triage line, and I start to doubt that I have an aneurysm at all. I realize that my detour to the Walk-In Clinic was a complete waste of time, but it’s not until well into the next day that I start to wonder about that $20 copay. What did I pay for exactly? Do I have recourse to ask for a refund? I mean, she probably spent as much time “examining” me and writing my “note” as she spent with the out-of-town baby with an ear infection who came in after me and left while I was waiting for Rob’s mom to pick me up. But the P.A. didn’t DO anything for me. I was at the Walk-In Clinic for TWO HOURS with a throbbing headache that could have been a brain aneurysm!

Is that my fault for making the wrong choice? I could have gone straight to the ER, but I went to the Walk-In thinking it would be more efficient for me, and not waste the time of those busy ER doctors treating real life-threatening ailments. My visit to the Walk-In Clinic was a gamble where I bet $20 (and two hours of my time) that they could help me, and I lost.

Pack of Two: Someone else’s dog book

I’m making the transition to an e-reader, and planned not to buy any hard copies of books for a while. I have so many on my shelf I still need to read, after all.

I couldn’t help myself during my most recent visit to Half-Price Books in Seattle, though, because in the dog section, I saw a book called Pack of Two. The cover featured a view of the back of a woman beside a pointy-eared dog and the book seemed strikingly similar to my own memoir. A woman’s love letter to her dog, who just happens to be a shepherd mix.

As it turns out, Lucille is not very much like Isis at all, and the book isn’t really a memoir about her life with author Caroline Knapp. I wish it had been, mostly because that’s what I’m writing, so therefore it’s what I enjoy reading. Except when I start to read a book that I think is like mine, I get scared. “Oh please don’t be so much like mine as to render mine irrelevant.”

This time, I felt like I was reading a dog version of the early episodes of Sex and the City, when various women and men on the street addressed the camera and told their personal stories. In Pack of Two, Knapp shares dozens of anecdotes about people’s close bonds with their dogs. She’s done a lot of research and this is a pretty good book, but it isn’t what I wanted, and I didn’t learn anything new. Nothing I haven’t heard before.

My biggest complaint is that the pictures of Lucille at the beginning of each chapter are black and white and hard to see. I want more pictures of the dog. Something to think about for my own book. I only just figured out with my last submission that I should be including photos when I share pages with my writing group.

summer fun (3) — Gratuitous photo of Isis, Summer 2010

Coming soon: My reviews of Going Home: Finding Peace when Pets Die and A Good Dog: The Story of Orson, Who Changed My Life, both by Jon Katz. One inspired me to read the other. I think Orson’s story parallel’s Isis’ a little more closely, although I’ve only just begun the book. Pretty sure I know where it’s headed, though, after reading Going Home.

Leo Pride

Much to my great shame, we have another dog in a reactive dog class. I thought we were past this, but Leo lashes out at bicycles and joggers and other dogs when we’re on walks. I’ve been reassuring myself that he’s not really reactive. Not like Isis. Leo’s problems are leash specific. Of course, this is how it started with Isis, so it’s a good thing we have some experience and can nip it in the bud.

The first level of our class had us in a classroom with other dogs, where they hid behind covered X-pens and worked one at a time. Leo was a little bit stressed out, but did well. I didn’t consider this practice for real life, though. We don’t need Leo to be able to see another dog on a leash inside a room, we need to be able to pass them on the street.

We advanced to level 2 of reactive dog class where we meet in different locations and practice being around other dogs on leash. He rumbled at the other large male German shepherd during the first class, but in the following two sessions, he was fantastic. His body language was relaxed and he was able to look from the other dogs back to us. Rob said, “I think he’s cured.”

More significantly, he’s been doing really well on our walks. I walk him alone, using a Halti and two points of contact lead. We go in the morning before work, when there’s not a lot happening on the sidewalks.

A major obstacle continues to be the golden retriever who often hangs out in her front yard and barks at us, making it impossible for us to pass. I think Mia could get by, but I’m not sure, because Mia shows some limited barrier frustration. She’ll bark at another dog from the car. Not usually when she’s on a leash, but you never know, this golden is special. The golden set Isis off and she sets Leo off, where other barking dogs behind gates did not and do not. If she’s out front, we have to turn around and go the other direction.

We’ve made big progress with bicycles. Lately, when we see a bike, I make a kissy noise (in place of a clicker, because I don’t have enough hands), and Leo whips his head back to look at me and get a treat. Jackpot. This is exactly what I’m looking for. He sees something scary, and instead of barking at it, he checks back with me, where I let him know it’s all cool. Here, have some dried lamb lung.

This morning, we saw the golden (I’m pretty sure it was the same golden) on a walk, heading onto a small stretch of trail we often cut through on our way back to our block. In the not so distant past, my strategy would have been to skip the trail and go around on the sidewalk, but I decided to use the golden as a training exercise. When Leo saw her, he perked up and lost interest in me. I had some trouble getting his attention, and had to back up and move him out of her line of vision several times. Clearly it was stressful for him to follow this dog, which is why I kept a good distance and slowed down when they slowed down. I just wanted to show Leo that he could walk behind that dog and nothing bad would happen. He did not need to bark at her. I would keep him safe.

I heard the sound of feet on gravel and realized a jogger was coming our way. Leo has yet to master the jogger. Especially on a narrow trail. Usually, I walk off the path and into the bushes in hopes of getting him to look at me and my treats instead of the rapidly moving person. I’m pretty sure he has barked and lunged at every jogger that has passed us on this trail. Sometimes the person passes us all right, and I’m in the middle of saying, “Good boy,” when he barks and lunges at his or her backside.

Our cues usually go like this: I see the jogger. When I see that Leo sees the jogger, I say, “Easy.” And then when he barks, I sigh, “All right” in a fairly emotionless manner, which is my cue that he has not done what I wanted. Some trainers use “Oops” or “Uh oh.” Never “No.”

I hope that “Easy” hasn’t become my cue for him to bark and lunge, but I think there have been a few times at least that I’ve said it and he hasn’t barked, and then I reward him for that. Anyway, the “Easy,” “All right” cues are sort of a reflexive damage control. I’d rather keep Leo calm enough that I don’t have to say, “Easy.”

So when I saw the jogger, I moved Leo straight into a bush and held onto him by the back of his harness. (Not ideal, but it’s the only way to ensure he doesn’t lunge.) He looked at the jogger and then back to me, and I gave him some dried lamb lung. Then, another jogger passed from the other direction! Again, he looked at the jogger and then back to me for his lamb lung.

This may seem like a small victory, but he already was stressed from the proximity of the despised golden, which increased the likelihood of an outburst. And two joggers came into his field of vision fro different directions very quickly, moving very quickly, and he did not bark.

I was enormously proud.

Hating the phone

Each of these things happened today, reminding me why I prefer email to the telephone.

A female robot answered the phone and asked me to dial the extension of the person I was trying to reach. “If you do not know the extension, dial zero-zero.” I dialed zero-zero. She said, “Please dial the extension you are trying to reach.” I hit zero again. “Please dial the extension you are trying to reach.” I hung up.
I tried again later and reached the person. He asked me to call back on his cell because of static on his land line. When I called him back on his cell, he was echo-y and hard to hear.
A receptionist at a doctor’s office returned my call. I answered. She said, “Hi, Carrie.” And then my phone went boop boop and the call was disconnected. Mia and I were on our lunchtime walk at the time, so I put my phone back in my pocket and called back a half hour later when I returned to the office. The receptionist said, “I tried calling you earlier, but our phones must have disconnected.” Uh huh. And you just decided not to try calling me again? Great customer service. (My phone identified the incoming number as the doctor’s fax machine, so I couldn’t exactly call her right back, could I?)

Just when I was ready to slip into total misanthropy, I had an in-person experience that surpassed the electronic one. I needed to print out 100 copies of a double-sided color 11×17 document. I thought it would be a pain in the ass to put the file on a flash drive and take it physically into the Office Depot that is two blocks away. Instead, I uploaded it to their website, but the site wasn’t able to process my company’s store credit card.

Whatever! Irritated, I yanked open my desk drawer and pulled out a flash drive. It took me longer to delete the files that were on the flash drive than it did to save the new file and drive the two blocks to Office Depot. I worried that Mia would be too hot in the car as I waited for the strange copy ladies to finish with other people’s online orders.

Strange as they were, they had my documents printed in less than 10 minutes.

Bonus: What I thought would cost $250 wound up costing $76 because of some business discount I might not have gotten if I’d ordered the copies online. So there you have it. Score one for the old-fashioned way.

The problem with produce

Rob’s not a huge fan of most fruits and vegetables, so he was keen on using a juicer for a rapid infusion of nutrients. We borrowed one from his parents and enjoyed a week of concoctions that were mostly quite tasty. But the Jack LaLanne juicer is a bitch to clean and for every two glasses of juice, we had a big container of pulp left over. It seemed wasteful to me and inferior to eating the foods whole. After all, I enjoy most fruits and vegetables (cauliflower and celery are the only ones I actively dislike), and when you drink your veggies, you miss out on the fiber so you don’t feel as full. Our daily juices weren’t meal replacements; I actually felt hungrier after a glass of juice.

Then there’s the price. I have tree-hugger guilt about buying non-local produce, but our farmers markets are so expensive. Last weekend, I was supposed to buy fruit for a barbecue. I circled the stalls at the Saturday market several times to talk myself out of driving to the nearest chain grocery store to buy a pre-packaged plastic container of pineapple, mango and kiwis grown elsewhere. I forked over $13 for strawberries, raspberries and blueberries. Meanwhile, Rob bought a couple of pre-packaged veggie trays at Costco. Only one got eaten, so on Monday, we juiced the leftover berries and $10 of broccoli and carrots from the veggie tray, yielding just two glasses of juice. Not a great value.

It’s just so hard to eat healthy and locally sometimes. I suffer from paralysis at the grocery store. I don’t know what to buy! I don’t want Ecuadorian bananas or Argentinian pears, I think I’ll buy some processed veggie burgers instead. That’s better for the earth, right?

For years, I’ve been eating a lot of my lunches at the Skagit Valley Co-op deli. Last winter, shortly after I finished reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, I noticed how clearly the co-op produce department labeled the origins of its goods, and for months, I was the proud consumer of Washington pears, squash and kale. Surprisingly, the food co-op carries imported produce too, but at least the country or state of origin is labeled clearly, unlike chain stores that tell you only that your food was grown somewhere in the U.S.A.

Today after I picked up my co-op deli lunch, I went to the produce section to select peaches, an avocado and a tomato from California (close enough); kale and spinach from this very county, and green beans from somewhere in this state. I plan to eat all of these items whole. The avocado and tomato are going on that veggie burger and processed white bun from Costco. What? They’re left over from the barbecue.

Kari after dentist

I’d never had nitrous before, not even recreationally, but last time I had a crown done, I felt a little freaked out, and kinda wished I’d had the gas. So today, when I had two fillings replaced, I asked for it. That’s right. I won’t pay $30 for a fluoride treatment that my insurance won’t cover, but drugs? Totally worth that much.

And I learned something new. Novocaine has epinephrine in it. I was not aware of that. That’s why I started feeling jittery after five or six shots last time!

Today’s dental work was done on upper teeth, so two shots did the trick. But I had the added discomfort of excruciating TMJ, which made “Open Wide” quite uncomfortable.

The nitrous, though… How magnificent! The floaty feeling reduced any anxiety I might have felt from the loud noises in my mouth. (My jaw still hurt, but they put a little bite rest between my teeth to help me keep my mouth open.) Meanwhile, my mind spun with ideas for the wonderful blog I would write about the experience, but frankly, I can’t remember anything except the title, which is derivative anyway.

I felt like I was in a movie with fast edits depicting a drug-induced blackout over the soundtrack of a drill. Like: Flash! My dentist’s face looming over me. Flash! The assistant asking if I’m doing okay. Flash! Rinsing. Flash! Suction.

When I first matured into needing dental work such as crowns and a root canal, my dentist, whom I adore, suggested that probably my teeth were cracked around the fillings because I grind them. Ridiculous. I don’t grind my teeth.

I didn’t think I clenched either, but that denial has become harder to maintain since I’ve worn grooves into my night guard.

While participating in a TMJ study at few weeks ago, I told the School of Oral Medicine doctor that story, under the assumption that clenching my teeth must be the cause of my TMJ after all.

He said perhaps I was clenching because I have TMJ, not the other way around. Fascinating.

Find strength in what remains behind

Last night, after a very inspirational writers conference, I watched an episode of It’s Me or the Dog that left me rather emotional. Not that the family in question underwent any moving transformation or anything. This crazy woman had rescued four dogs. One was “aggressive” and fought with another. Trainer Victoria Stilwell helped by having them walk the dogs side by side.

Side by side. That simple.

I cried after the episode because we never were able to walk Isis and Leo side by side.

I’m in a fragile place, because I’ve reached that place in the memoir. The last seven months of Isis’ life were very difficult for her and me both. I decided to press pause and go back to the beginning. Hey look, Isis is still a puppy and we just got her. Yes, that’s a much better place.

Before I went to bed, I flipped a few channels to find something a little less heartwrenching. What’s this? Splendor in the Grass is on TCM! I’ll just watch a few minutes…

… Or the rest of the whole movie.

Does any movie better capture teen romantic angst? Seriously. My ribs constricted against my internal organs during several key scenes in this movie, just as they had when I first watched it, like, 20 years ago.

In the movie, Natalie Wood goes nuts after Warren Beatty dumps her. And he dumps her because he really, really wants to have sex with her, but he can’t because she’s a “nice” girl.

Granted, I have a sophisticated enough understanding of mental illness to recognize that not all girls go nuts after boys dump them. Surely Deanie Loomis (Wood’s character) had some predisposition toward a psychiatric episode. But what if she’d been allowed to have sex with Bud? Could she have married him and not gone crazy?

Either way, I cried for the second time last night. And then I went to bed.

Oh deer, get the fawn out of here

This one’s for book two.

I have a wonderful leash designed for walking two very strong dogs side by side. A waterski-like handle attaches to a rope that attaches to two bungee-like cords that attach to my dogs. There are three swivel mechanisms to prevent the dogs from twisting up the leash, although nothing to prevent the dogs from getting the other’s leash trapped under their leg, or walking around me so that my legs are tied up, but mostly we’ve been successful with this leash.

During Snowmageddon 2012, when I’d had the leash about a week, Leo stretched his bungee out by lunging mightily at the university women’s cross-country team that had the gall to run en masse on the narrow trail we frequent. A few months later, he chewed partially through the rope, but it’s still strong enough to hold him (I’m pretty sure) and anyway, I tend to keep a hand on the leash very close to his harness, to keep him right next to me throughout the walk. Helps manage outbursts against bicycles and joggers.

dogwalk2 — Leo likes to hold Mia’s leash.

dogwalk3 — The leash as its meant to be used.

This week, during my writecation, I’ve been walking the dogs in the late morning (in part because I’m lazy and like to lounge on the couch for a few hours, and in part because we can avoid bicycle commuters that way). Yesterday, I saw a deer with two white-spotted Bambi fawns in a neighbor’s front yard. I backtracked to get a better look and wished I had my camera. Leo noticed them. The deer looked at us, we looked at them, and then we were on our way.

This morning, I was walking on our street when I saw a man with a beagle waaaay up ahead. On my left, a man was weed-eating his lawn. I don’t know this man, but I’ve met his girlfriend, who recently adopted a shepherd named Rudy. We see her walking Rudy a couple of times a week and crack up every time, because really, what’s cuter than a six-month old German shepherd bouncing along beside his owner? But I was concerned primarily about the beagle, so I crossed the street with the dogs and when we reached the opposite sidewalk was startled to see a deer right there, fully exposed on the front lawn of someone’s house.

Oh my god. It’s a deer. And a little fawn, thought I, and both of my dogs, who started to bark. Mia had come around the wrong side of me, so her bungee was wrapped around my legs. I held on tight to Leo’s end of the leash, below the frayed part, and untangled myself, fully expecting that by the time I had the leashes straight, the deer would be gone.

But no. The deer in this town need to be more afraid of stuff. Momma Deer just looked at us, and I swear to god, actually took steps toward us. My dogs are barking. I’m holding my ground. I look over my shoulder to Rudy’s dad, who has turned off his weed-whacker, and complain, “They won’t run away!” He nods and says, “She has two babies over there.”

After way too long, I decide to abort and go back the other way. I try to guide my dogs away, across the driveway of this house, but the deer keeps coming toward us. Then, finally, she runs away from us, up the driveway and into the bushes… and my dogs go after her, with me attached by the water-ski handle.

I’ve planned for this. Mia (the perfect one) once pulled me off my feet when a dog startled us all by barking from behind a fence. In case of emergency, if both dogs started to run away and it wasn’t safe for me to drop the leash and let them go (let’s say there was heavy traffic, or they were about to run off in the woods after a deer and her fawn), I would fall to my butt and hold onto the leash for dear life. I could still be dragged on my butt, but I thought it a more strategic position than falling on my face.

However, we were on gravel, and while I thought to myself, Here’s where I should fall to my butt, I did not, and instead fell forward on my hands and knees (with Rudy’s dad watching!!) and let go.

Since I knew I had an audience, I turned back and said, “Now I’ve lost them.”

I wasn’t actually worried about losing the dogs permanently, but as I made my way toward the bushes, which led to a wooded path, I heard screaming.

Oh shit, they’re killing the deer. Or her fawn! Oh god, why didn’t the deer run?

Just then, the fawn bolted past me, like a freakin’ cartoon, back toward the house. I heard a thrashing that must have been her mother trying to get around a chain link fence.

My dogs stood in a small clearing and I realized the screaming was just Mia whining because she was tethered to her brother and couldn’t get to the deer.

“C’mon guys!”

They looked at me. But Mom, the deer!

“C’mon!” Keep the voice, light, encouraging.

Mia whimpered again as Leo tugged on his end of the leash and they climbed over a fallen tree to get back to me.

“You guys are craaazy.”

I brushed myself off, got hold of their leash, and because I love a punchline, called out to Rudy’s dad as we approached the sidewalk, “Well, that was exciting.”

His next door neighbor, who was standing on the porch, said, “I’ll bet.”

What’s that supposed to mean? Does he think I have vicious deer-eating dogs who shouldn’t be allowed in public? Or does he hate the deer because they eat his roses?

Who cares?

We carried on with our walk, and when I saw an orange tabby cross our paths, I said, “You do not want to be here. Better run, little kitty.”

That’s right. I’m the crazy bitch who threatens neighborhood cats.

If you liked The Hunger Games and Harry Potter, you’ll love Shadow and Bone

I mean that in the most sincere, best possible way. And I don’t mean that Shadow and Bone (written by my close, personal friend Leigh Bardugo) is irritatingly derivative of those young adult fantasy powerhouses. Rather, it is an incredibly original book that happens to share some of the qualities that make those books so seductive.

True confession, while I’ve always enjoyed sci-fi fantasy in my film and television diet, I don’t read too much fantasy, and I haven’t tended to pay attention to young adult fiction until it crosses over. But that changed last week when I attended an event on the Fierce Reads tour, where I heard Leigh and fellow YA Fantasy authors speak about their books. Rob immediately got Cinder on audio, so I’ve been listening to that while driving, and reading my signed copy of Shadow and Bone in bed every night. Interesting parallels between the two, actually. Apparently there’s something happening in YA fiction with kick-ass girls who have the power to save the world. I’m cool with that.

Shadow and Bone is the first book in The Grisha trilogy, taking place in an alternate world infused with a Russian folklore aesthetic, and layers of history and geopolitical intrigue that is surprisingly easy to follow. At the story’s core is a fight between good and evil (literally light and dark), magic and a love triangle.

Note: The following plot commentary does not spoil more than I would want to have spoiled for me before reading, but if you prefer to go in blind, you could go read the book before continuing on here.

Alina Starkov is the heroine (and yes, it’s totally fine that she goes by Starkov and not Starkova, okay, purists?). I found her as engaging, inspiring and relatable as my girl Katniss, and superior in at least one way. My one complaint about Katniss as a character is that she was awfully dense about Peeta’s feelings for her. Seriously? It never crossed your mind he might really like you like you? Alina, on the other hand, responds to the men at the tips of her triangle in a more believable way. She recognizes her feelings for Mal, and she has a perfectly understandable fixation on the Darkling. I found both relationships intriguing and would enjoy seeing her get it on with either (or both!) of them.

Alina is like Harry Potter because she gets sent to Magic Boarding School, but don’t worry, she doesn’t have to spend seven years there. Her transformation as a character, her coming of age, if you will, comes through as she learns to wield her power.

I loved every page. The action sequences, the description of the clothes and scenery, the relationship drama, the unexpected turns of the plot. I’m enormously proud and excited for Leigh and eager for book 2.

Special thanks to Village Books for hosting the Fierce Reads tour. Not only did I pay full price for Shadow and Bone (which I haven’t done since Mindy Kaling came to Seattle), I bought local!

Mia’s first birthday (as far as we’re concerned)

A year ago this weekend, we met an angel whose muzzle was grayer than I expected. My first thought upon seeing her was, “This isn’t the dog for us.” But she hopped into our car so willingly that she instantly was ours.

She changed our lives. We were still pretty much in a pit of despair after losing Isis. Mia brought balance and joy, and became the big sister Leo never knew he always wanted.

Mia is nearly a perfect dog. She destroys her toys, but not the furniture. She only barks at other dogs when she is in the car. She never lunges at anything when she’s on a leash. She comes to work with me and sleeps quietly at my feet the whole day. Until 4:30, when she starts to whine: This is boring, can we go now?

Her anxious whine sounds like, “Squeak squeak whistle whistle,” and she doesn’t like to be left alone. I never took her to daycare with Leo, because in my imagination, she would think she was being abandoned again. Of course, she’d probably get over it after the first time, but I can’t bear to put her through that. I’d rather take her with me or leave her with Grandma.

She’s pretty much guaranteed to steal whatever toy or bone Leo’s working on and not give it back, but that’s Leo’s fault. He should keep a closer eye on his things.

She has two potentially annoying habits.

1) She likes to sit in the backyard so much that sometimes she doesn’t come in when we call her. That’s fine, we can just leave her out there. But when we try to play with her, she stands with one foot on a ball and barks at us, refusing to give us the ball, or let us catch her, or put funny hats on her for a birthday photo.

2) She steals Rob’s spot. I actually find this hilarious. Rob less so. Whenever Rob gets up in the night, he can be sure to find Mia on his pillow when he returns. Once she was in the kitchen when Rob got up, and we heard her nails screech across the floor as she scrambled to jump up on the bed beside me. It takes both me and Rob to spin her around so there’s room for everyone, and Mia usually moans and growls dramatically at the disruption.

These are bad habits with can live with.

Leo has really grown as a model this past year. Here he shows Mia how to do Blue Steel.

June 4 is the day we observe Mia’s birthday. It’s her first birthday with us, but let’s say she’s 8. Happy 8th birthday, Mia!