The first horizontal course being done, this morning we started the vertical course. In five hours we finished one side. Twenty junctions per bar, which means twenty wire ties per bar plus whatever we need to pull the mesh and burlap up flush with the rebar. M, W and I spent yesterday evening cutting up 1600 feet of wire: We estimate that this part alone will need over 2000 ties.Have I mentioned how much I hate rebar? Really it can't be said often enough.
On the Fritz front, we went to the vet yesterday afternoon to get the stitches out of his ear. OMG it looks terrible after two weeks in that rig. The vet wrapped his whole head in that stretchy self-adhesive bandage to hold the ear flat for another week, but an hour after we got home Fritz managed to get the mangled ear halfway out the hole the vet cut in the bandage so that he could hear, and he came to me in screaming agony. Dogs can talk, you know, and this one was saying "TakeitofftakeitoffTAKEITOFF!" He was thrashing around so bad I practically had to lay on him before I could get it cut off. Once I had the bandage off, he settled down instantly and went right to sleep.
Except for the fact that it's now flat and no longer filled with fluid, his ear looks worse than before we let the vet have his way with him. He's still being good about wearing the clown collar so he can't scratch it, and as long as he doesn't drag it in the dirt when it itches it seems to me it's better to let the thing have some air and heal. I'm going to keep an eye on him and leave things as they are for now. So far he's being good, but if he starts not leaving it alone I'll bandage it up again. I've got lots of gauze, which can't be less comfortable than that horrible stretchy stuff.
1 comment:
Hey Joel - a couple things...
About the rebar - there is a plastic or nylon 'widget' made for doing the unions you're wiring. I've seen them used in foundations. They snap on the rebars at 90 degrees with just a bit of foot pressure or a bit of encouragement from the butt end of a 2 by 4. I'm not sure of the cost - which would probably be a factor when you're using thousands of them. I suspect they run 20-30 cents each...
My dog (deceased 2001) had this happen with both ears a few years apart. The first time I went with the whole procedure as you've described. That ear never stood up fully again after the treatment. When the other ear developed a hematoma - it went untreated and drained within a week and wound up looking floppy just like the other ear that we put such a fuss into.
In terms of keeping the ear/s upright - even with treatment that may not result. I've come to figure that treatment is mostly useful if the ear starts to drain and continues to drain instead of healing up.
Come to think of it - once they took the lampshade off him and put the secondary bandage on the ear and head - he had it off within 6 hours of being home - just like Fritz and probably most other dogs!
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