**** You, Lou Reed! Part Deux

I've decided that this is a handy catch-all phrase  for when I'm really pissed at someone. I suppose it's not really fair to Lou Reed - I mean, other than sitting across from him on the plane one memorable night, I don't have anything to do with him (frankly, I can't even name a Lou Reed sing off the top of my head). But, the phrase has stuck with me, and so it comes into use again today. The target this time is a vet in Larchmont NY (who shall remain nameless, but whose name is the same as cheap wine). This moron completely f***ed up Cali and Brooke's paperwork, and now they are stuck in doggy prison at Heathrow Airport. When I got there, the DEFRA agent told me they couldn't leave with me, and even said Brooke might have to go to quarantine because the paperwork said her microchip was put in after rabies vaccine. To be clear, this asshole in Larchmont wrote that both dogs had been microchipped in October 2009. She completely made a date up - Cali was chipped in 2005 and Brooke in 2008. Now this woman may cause Brooke to have to go into quarantine.

Added to this is the fact that Virgin did not clearly state that the paperwork needed a raised seal - they said that as long as the vet was USDA certified, they could certify the paperwork - wrong! As a result, if the rest of the paperwork checks out tomorrow, they'll have to get EU pet passports. In the end, that might not be a bad thing, but still. I had to leave them there, and didn't even get to see them. When the DEFRA agent was telling me all this, he looked a bit concerned at one point - I think because I probably looked like I was going to pass out. There was  point where the world seemed to recede and all I heard was static. I pulled it together, though - a my mother's daughter, I could do no less! But, then I declined the cab back to the main terminal, choosing to walk the 15 minutes instead. There was one easy reason for this - I knew I was about to start crying hysterically, and really didn't want to do that in the back of a cab. By the time I finished walking to the terminal, I was reasonably pulled together again.

I'm trying to comfort myself with the fact that they survived the flight OK, and that it's a minor paperwork clitch, but I won't be at ease until they're here in the flat with me. Until then, I'm sending my favorite phrase across the pond to Larchmont, NY and hoping this woman's house gets invaded by all manner of pestilence in a freak biblical plague.