Andy had an epiploic foramen entrapment which resulted in emergency abdominal surgery. It has been over two weeks since his surgery so I am encouraged. The probabilities of survival for these sorts of things are not good.
I bought Andy last year. My friend, the horse trainer Chris Hitchcock, explained to me one day when Andy was being particularly rude that Andy was a Republican. I was needless to say horrified. I worked on him for several months and convinced him of the error of his ways. He endorsed Barack Obama in the early fall of 2008.
As it always happens, Andy's emergency came on very suddenly.
Earlier that week, I discovered that the company my husband's employer was competing against for a major project at Duke Hospital was none other than KBR. Given KBR's track record in Iraq (repugnant), I figured there was no way that my alma mater would hire them, but apparently they did . I wrote a strongly worded email to the president of the school, but figured that it was dismissed as sour grapes. This dismissal would be despite the fact that I have a relationship of over 30 years with the school, donating time and money -- more money than time. I never heard back from the president. I suppose you think I haven't given it enough time but I sent a similar email (okay, not quite as vituperative) to Erskine Bowles who runs the UNC School System (I am a taxpayer and a Democrat). I sent the email at about 7 pm one evening and at around 9:30 pm the same evening I heard back from Erskine saying he would look into it. He didn't make any promises, but he did respond. I could write further here about why Erskine might have made an excellent president for Duke or US Secretary of Commerce but I would be digressing.
After I sent the email to the president of Duke I also sent it to a couple of the development people I know there. I wanted them to know where my head was and also to tell them if they heard of my untimely demise, they would know why. With all I have read about KBR and Halliburton and torture and Iraq, etc, why wouldn't this cross my mind?
A couple of hours later after the horses, dogs, and cats had been fed for the evening, I settled in for a dull Friday night watching an episode of the second season of Damages downloaded from iTunes when I got a funny feeling about something going on behind the house towards the barn. Of course, this feeling was amplified by Cato who was madly barking and Halle Beary our German Shepherd watch puppy who was cowering.
When I went to the barn, Andy was writhing in pain on the floor of his stall. A 1500 pound horse in desperate pain is a sad and scary sight. I had to get him on his feet because the danger of this type of situation is that it is compounded if he rolls and twists his intestines creating an obstruction. I managed to get him up and out of the stall, called the vet and several friends, and eventually got him to the hospital where surgery was performed.
This type of colic could not have been caused by chicanery but there was a moment there when I was afraid that by expressing my opinion I had caused the potential death of my horse like that scene in The Godfather when the producer finds his prized horse's head in his bed after he refused to give Johnny Fontaine a part in his movie.
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