3 broken things

There are three broken things in our house right now.

1. Judah

J's Auntie is visiting for a few days to spend time with the cuddly little snot machine

He is coming down with a cold (I think). His nose just started running today. Poor little guy has been leaking clear slime out the nose for most of the day. His breathing sounds really wet because of it and so far he has had a hard time sleeping (I think his little snores are waking him up). This is the first time Judah has ever gotten sick... At least, I think this qualifies as being sick. Those are his only symptoms though, so I'm not sure if this counts. Hopefully, he will wake up tomorrow feeling better.

2. Gert

Gert has a bum knee. She has been keeping her weight off her back leg since Thanksgiving time. We have been making her take it easy and limiting her walks and refusing to play with her (to which she fiercely objects).  We assumed she had strained a muscle or something from playing (non-stop) with all of her Oregon doggy friends... But, she just hasn't gotten better. I took her into the vet yesterday to see what was what. The vet could feel her knee cap pop out of place, which can sometimes happen with little dogs. The bone that her knee cap is suppose to fit into might not be grooved deeply enough to keep the knee cap snug and in place. The vet also feared that she had injured the ligament between her upper and lower leg bones (right under the knee), so today she had to go back to the vet for X-rays.  She was such a good little girl that they did not need to put her under to get the x-rays. She let them move her and manipulate her legs and hips into place while being awake. The X-rays have now been sent off to the surgeon, but it looks like that ligament is effed up, which means she will need to get knee surgery.

3. The boiler

We finally broke down and called a plumber/heat guy to come take a look at our heating system. The guy was at our place from 8am-6pm dealing with our boiler. Whenever he would get one thing fixed, it became apparent that there was an additional problem with another part. He has to come back tomorrow to keep working at it, but hopefully the end is in sight (at least with the boiler part, it turns out our thermostat is not communicating with the boiler which is yet another problem).

The boiler was put in by some of the previous owners. And, well, they didn't do the best job or put in the highest quality appliance (to put it mildly). The first year we lived here we had the radiators serviced and found out the engine to the boiler was installed UPSIDE DOWN. Oi. Looks like the boiler is not very good and there have been loooots of complaints about this particular model. Part of me wonders if getting it fixed is just throwing good money after bad. Is it just going to keep breaking down bit by bit? New boilers are expensive, but at least that would (hopefully) be a one time shot instead of constantly battling what appears to be quite a lemon of a boiler. Sigh.

I do love owning a house, but it sure was a hell of a lot easier when we were renters and the landlords had to take care of all that shit and they had to do it ASAP.