Summer Solstice

This perfectly shaped California buckeye tree seemed like a good subject for the summer solstice. The lower branches have probably been pruned as a fire prevention measure. Its candelabra shaped blossoms caught my eye. The tall redwood behind it is nice too.

The summer solstice is the longest day of the year. Here in Santa Rosa the sun rose at 5:47am and will set at 8:38, but it is a long twilight and will still be light enough to see without a light at 9:15.

It already feels like a long day as we took our little Spikey to the animal ophthalmologist this morning, and the news was not good. He has abnormally high pressure  (glaucoma) in his left eye and the vet said she was sure that he would develop it in the right eye eventually. She said it is painful, even though he doesn't act like he is in pain. Her proposal was surgery in which she removes all the inner workings of his eyes leaving the outer layer of his eyes (think tennis ball) and replaces them with prosthetic eyes. She said she doesn't charge that much for the prostheses because she thinks the result is so much better than the alternative which is removing the whole eye. Once that is done there is no possibility of a prosthesis.  

When I told the vet that Spike came from Ireland she said that she rarely sees retinal atrophy in this country as there is a blood test for it. It is genetic so recessive carriers  testing positive are not bred. She said Spike's parents should not ever be bred nor should his siblings. She also said the glaucoma wasn't caused by the retinal atrophy but that spainiels were prone to it.

He's scheduled for surgery on July 6th. It's all a bit overwhelming, but we didn't want him to be in pain any longer than necessary. I won't be doing much commenting today.