Who ya gonna call?.....

The weekend was about to start and I was enjoying a nice cuppa tea, reading my book last Friday night. Just when I was about to go to bed I thought..mmpp..gg…my throat hurts a bit..oh well…brush teeth..gargle..go to sleep.
At dawn I woke up with a very high temperature, when I looked at the ceiling it was moving (no, I didn’t have any alcohol the night before !lol) and my throat hurt so much and was immensely swollen. At a closer inspection the gland on my right side was so swollen it looked like I had swallowed a cricket ball. In short : I had not even recovered from the pneumonia/bronchitis and now this. I felt like …well.terrible.
Went to feed the bunnies and clipped Gorby, because life goes on even with a cricket ball in your neck and there is nothing you can really do on a weekend. I wonder if there ever has been research done in the timing of disease? I bet 80% of all viruses hit when you least expect it: on the weekend. There must be a method in there somewhere.
Anyway, I could not really stand up aymore after the grooming session of Gorby and I had to hop into bed where I stayed basically all weekend. The first weekend of nice weather I might add and the fever just made it that bit hotter..lol

On Monday morning first thing, as soon as the doctors office opened, I gave them a ring to get an appointment for that morning because my situati9on had not really changed for the better..on the contrary. “yes , I could get an appointment at the medical centre on Friday”, the receptionist said. I got angrier by the minute….”what???!!! FRIDAY???!” So I rang around for another doctor. There are not many doctors around by the way in the Yarra Valley. In the city of Melbourne , yes, but in the country, no. It is bad…so, I get more angry: not only about my situation, but also about the whole healthcare system. When the government honestly wants to improve healthcare and not have people doctor shopping...they will have to assign a certain amount of practitioners to a certain amount of people no matter where they are; city or country and make them practice and keep a tab on their patients health. Like in the old days : have a chat to you even when you are not sick so prevention and keeping in touch with your patients, not stepping in when it is already too late. But, anyway, I digress.
So I finally found a doc who could see me….30kms away..oh well, that’ll do..I am desperate for a diagnosis..especially after the last scare..

So There I was , Monday afternoon, feverish, feeling terrible and in pain, I went to a new doc and after telling my story for the umptieth time all he could say was:
1. wow..you have had a rough trot (which indicated to me he probably has enough money to keep horses)
2. well...what do you think? (who am I paying here? i could have stayed at home and ASKED MYSELF THAT QUESTION )
3. mmphmmm...i think you need a holiday (which also indicated he freelances as a travel agent or his wife works in that field)

What a joke...I have a gland the size of a cricket ball in my neck he couldn’t even find (a blind doctor would have probably been better!) , did not take my temperature but as soon as he listened to hear how my lungs were he mentioned "oh my you are feeling very hot!" to which I wish I had the audacity tto reply to "DOH I have 39.5C temp and my throat is about to explode, but you know what? I will pay the bill you will give me for giving me that wonderful diagnosis and hop to the first travel agent I find and immediately book a holiday to the the Bahamas (it is so wonderful there this time of year to go playing on my yacht...) for me, my sore throat, my rattling lungs, my fever and my gland the size of a cricketball. Do you think I need to pay extra for the gland to get it a seperate seat?"

Then I got home (after doing animal + food shopping on my way), lugging a big bag of animal feed into the bunny bunker, about to empty it in the safe feed container , when out of the corner of my eye I saw we had a new resident for whom I sadly did not buy any food, but looking at him , I'd say he would easily settle for me, the dog or the bunnies: A BIG BROWN SNAKE. !!!!!!

Thank God I was immensely pissed off after the doctor ! I don’t know how I did it, but managed in stealth mode to get dog out of harms way, look for a bag I could muster the snake in---or get a shovel, that unfortunately was as blunt as Santa Clauses' eh..behind..and went into attack mode. I had no idea I could sound like a mix of Linda Blair meets Braveheart, but there I was yelling ferociously at the slithering thing while I tried to kill it with my blunt weapon of mass distruction. I was WILD! I was F…. scared too: I hate killing anything, I can't even kill a fly let alone a big thing like a POISENOUS snake ! I am a Buddhist for Gods sake! I do not kill things!!!, but anything even coming close to killing my bunny babies and my dog , well, they are mince! The big brown snake kills 10-20people a year in Australia and when it bites you you only have an hour to get the anti venom! Looking at the track record of the closest medical centre that could only get me in by next Friday for my throat and lung condition and the fact that the nearest hospital is more than an hour away I would have been in deep trouble…. did I tell you they are also extremely fast? They slither at a speed of about 9miles per hour on a slow day..lol..and that is not counting their striking action! It is the second most poisenous land snake in the world !

I was EXTREMELY ANGRY though. Thank heavens the doctor was such a numnut. If it had been a good experience and I was all ohm and peaceful I wouldn’t have been able to pull it off I am sure..lol
I was still holding the snake angrily yelling at it and the world and my bloody husband, who thought it was much more fun to go to the gym after work 3x a week than work on the farm (now I see I can't blame him). Paul just got home while I was still screaming and shouting like linda Braveheart Blair..He didn’t even recognise it was me!

"where are you?" he shouted from the drive...

"Where do you think I bloody am you f….ing f**wit gymjunkie??!!! down here ! get your f***ng ass down her NOW!! NOOOOOOOOOWWWW!!!!!!!"I yelled.

Anyway, the husband released my deathgrip from the snake which was still trying to get away and finished the job. I think that might have been the nicest monday of my life.....




On Tuesday: I 'm still feverish, still have a gland in my neck that thinks its a cricketball and wants to play a 20/20 game with ricky ponting but if anybody as much as even utters the word " you better go see a doct…..."to me, I swear to God: I will bite their head off...lol...




I thought well, I will do it myself then and prepped mustard footbaths and lemon footbaths and actually enjoyed having to sit down with my book doing absolutely nothing. Me doing nothing was only possible because it is so hard to run around doing heaps of things while taking footbaths. Lol
the fever slowly went dow and the cricket ball in my neck was slowly diminishing in size..still felt like crap though.
And on comes Wednesday….back to work, as one does having animals that need lots of care. Then my best friend comes and visits and after I told her for the umptienth time :”wow, your eyes look really clear and shiny”, she got a bit emotional and said she felt so guilty…but…that she was pregnant. “WHAM!” somebody just hit my cricketball and thumped me in the stomach at the same time …

”I am so happy for you !!!! “I said while tears were falling down both our faces………

yes there were tears and ofcourse yes, it was emotional..and ofcourse yes, I was so happy for her..and ofcourse YES, I have mentioned to you before that Paul and I decided not to pursue the agonising baby adoption thing not too long ago..and ofcourse YES, I thought I was coping and putting the whole uterine cancer and total hysterectomy and its desolate painful loneliness behind me..and ofcourse YES, I thought I had healed…..and YES, .............it still ……..hurt.. immensely……

I don’t really know what hurt more though: the fact that my best friend was pregnant again but I could never be, or the fact that she felt guilty telling me…..I drank a couple of stiff drinks that Wednesday night, cricket ball in my neck or not. I was so angry about…well…everything…LIFE I guess…sigh….so then the day after , the way I always do , when LIFE gets too much , too hard or too tough: I work my butt off…lol


I feel better now, sweating out the frustration and (most of ) the anger towards (my) life and changing it into something of beauty: either painting, spinning or in this case making funky bunny batts. Okay, so I cannot create LIFE, but nobody can keep me from CREATING.

So without keeping you on the edge of your seats: get ready to drool and snaffle! There is only a small supply of everything …so please contact me by email (ixchel@rabbit.com.au) or on www.ravelry.com where I am Ixchelbunny or even message me on www.flickr.com where I am also known as Ixchelbunny. Drum roll !!!!!!!!!! here is this weeks fibre update !!!!!

Have a great snake free and healthy week !
((hugs)) Charly

Funky Bunny Batts
Hand dyed and hand carded with passion ;-)

Sunset sea 125grams AU$35 angora, merino, Angelina, glitz, mohair, alpaca, yak, soy, silk
(I love this batt: it was like making a painting on my carder :) ) -

SOLD: happily adopted by a WA fibre fan ;-)

Sunset sea

licorice funky bunny batt view

licorice funky bunny batt 152grams AU$38, angora, merino, silk, Angelina, glitz, yak, alpaca, quiviut

Copper sunrise funky bunny batt -sold-

Copper sunrise 132grams AU$36 angora , Navajo churro, quiviut, bison, merino, soy, alpaca, yak, wolf (natural dyes: walnut, mushrooms)

Eagle funky bunny batt -sold-

Eagle funky bunny batt 122grams AU$33, angora, merino, soy, alpaca, quiviut, yak, Angelina, glitz

Legally Pink funky bunny batt -sold-

Legally pink funky bunny batt AU$33 123grams angora, merino, soy, yak, alpaca, Angelina, glitz

Party Pete funky bunny batt AU$35 137grams angora, merino, soy, Angelina , glitz, yak, silk, alpaca

Party Pete -sold-

Ocean funky bunny batt AU$ 32 114grams angora, Navajo churro bunny soy alpaca quiviut yak Angelina glitz (pigments: indigo, wlanut, lichen)-sold-

ocean funky bunny batt

Rainbow funky bunny batt AU$28 118grams angora, merino, soysilk, glitz, angelina-sold-

Rainbow

Navajo funky bunny batt AU$36 141grams angora Navajo churro soy yak alpaca quuiviut wolf Angelina glitz copper thread (natural dyes: cochineal +walnut) SOLD

navajo funky bunny batt

Thanks heaps for your support and have fun!

RABBIT ON!!


Dates to Remember:

Bunny Spin in at the Ixchel Fibre Farm:

Saturday 20th of November and Thursday the 25th of November
Bring your wheel, spindle, knitting, crocheting and a plate to share with everybody. There is cake and coffee and tea and a lovely bunny to cuddle and lots of fibres and yarn!) very important ! Please let me know beforehand by email or message that you would like to come and visit so I can prepare the infrastructure and cake ofcourse !



Blog award part 2
I won! I won! Yes I received a BLOG award !

Now to tell you which bloggers I admire…which is a hard one, because I love so many
I know I promised you an overview of the bloggers I admire and I will do so I PROMISE!!! The full list will be published next week, after I get hold of the Australian cricket team to hit the cricketball gland out of my neck after which I can totally focus on making the BEST bloggers list for you !!! in the meantime please check out www. http://ztwistart.blogspot.com/. Chiara fabulously blogs everyday .