Vet Day

Thursday was vet day.

Cisco got off easy - he just got his vaccinations. He hasn't reacted too badly in the past to his annual jab, so I'll plan on giving him a couple of days off and see what he's like on Sunday.

Waiting for his turn. That's his buddy Blue inside the barn waiting for his shots.

Phantom was lucky to have me spend my hard-earned money on her for this visit. She got her jab as well, so she'll have a week off until the huge, sore lump that she inevitably will have goes down. For the last few years, she's had the nasal flu/rhino and a single 4-way injection (WEE/EEE/WNV/tetanus). They now do a 6-way injection with everything in the one jab, so I decided to try that one this year. She's going to react to it no matter what, but hopefully no worse than normal with the 6 way.

Next, she had her teeth floated.

She's not very good about getting her teeth floated. Never has been. Hand floats or power float, hasn't made a difference. She will fight through the sedation and has always needed a top up (or 3) to get done (except once).

I always warn the vet that she's not a cheap drunk. I suggested that he look at her file as to what was used for her sedation when she floated two times ago as that was the best she had ever been.

Phantom was sedated, the speculum set up, and he started. And immediately said that he would have to work fast because she was already not impressed.

Her teeth weren't that bad so it didn't take very long. He commented that she did not like her tongue touched and that seemed to be what really ticked her off. At times she would actually pull her tongue right back which I guess isn't very common. He said that might be useful to mention next time she gets done.

Once the procedure is done, Phantom goes back to her normally chill self. Which means that she takes forever to come out of her drug-induced nap.

Just a wee bit of an awkward stance.

The wall in the aisle held her up for the first half-hour. Then I popped her into a stall to finish her snooze. After about an hour and 15 minutes, she had perked up enough that she was rooting through the bedding for loose pieces of hay, but since she wasn't pounding on the door to be released from jail, I knew that she wasn't fully awake.

Thank goodness for wall pillows.

I took her out for a short walk. The site of her vaccination injection was already starting to swell a bit so I wanted to get her moving. She was perfectly capable of keeping up with me and keeping her balance, so I turned her back out. She crabbed at the boys when they approached her and made them scatter so I figured she wasn't too dopey.

That's Cisco creeping at the gate. 

I brought her back out of the paddock shortly after to eat her grain. She really wanted it, but was still half asleep. Reminded me of those videos of toddlers eating with their eyes closed and generally ending with them falling asleep in their plate. She didn't fall asleep, but it took her twice as long to eat as she normally does.

Phantom gets the next week off and hopefully I'll be on Cisco either Sunday or Monday.