Thursday, May 04, 2006

Feeding Scarlett

I gave Scarlett her first liquid feeding tonight. I boiled an egg and mixed the yolk with the jar of baby food chicken that I bought the other day. I mashed it through a tea strainer then thinned it with some water. I divided it into 1 CC, 2 CC, and 4 CC servings and froze most of it. What was left became her meal for tonight. Well, part of it. I started her off with ony 1 CC. I thinned it down with some more water, added a generous amount of Nutribac, and the medicine the vet gave me. Getting it into her was a bit more of a challenge. For such a little critter, she was surprisingly hard to hold on to. Cody helped me and we managed to get her fed. Now she just needs to keep it down. Doing that, I finally got a good look at her. She does appear to have lost a little weight, but she is no where near skin and bones. If she can hold down this liquid meal, there is hope for her yet.

I told sensei tonight that James and I needed some attention. We have a black belt test in less than a month, and neither one of us feel ready. He responded with his usual, "oh, you'll do fine." So I said that we feel he is brushing us off when he says that. He said, "naw, naw, it's not like that." I replied, "but that's how we feel." And it is almost like we've become invisible in that class. He needs to be letting Barrett and Josh teach the regular class (they are brown belts, after all) while he works with James and me.

He's still planning on having us tested June 3. There is going to be some seminar in Oak Grove, LA that weekend, and he was going to have us tested there. But after class tonight (!) he finally called Mr Worbington and he told sensei we needed to test in Greenville. Mr. Worbington is going to call around and see if enough of the board can be there then. I'm glad, in a way. I'd pictured us at this big seminar in front of a huge crowd of spectators making fools of ourselves. The crowd would then laugh at us when we didn't get promoted.

There is another lady who is supposed to test for her nidan, and she refuses to test anywhere but Greenville. As it appears, it may just be the three of us there.

I'll let you know.

3 comments:

Buck said...

I've been following your travails with sensei and was wondering if there's another dojo nearby? It certainly seems you're not getting what you need at your current dojo.

Becky G said...

I wish there were. There is not even another dojo of a different style nearby. The closest one is nearly a hour away.

Perpetual Beginner said...

I feel for you - both with Scarlett and with the dojo. It's always difficult when the people running the dojo can't see the problems they're creating with their students.

Keep us posted on both fronts - best of luck!