I'm Back!

I hope you missed me. I need validation.

Well, the two weeks of suck that have been my life lately are coming to an end tomorrow. Last week and this week we've been short a person there at the offices of TheCompanyIWorkFor, and yes, I've not been one of the people gone. Vacations. I haven't had one yet. It's been so busy there it's basically gone like this: San answers the phone, gets all information for whatever task, explains the caller will get their call returned, but not to get too excited about it being in the near future. She gives me what she's written, I get to work on it. I have a folder full of stuff and am working on two and three things in it at any given time. Even with all I did on Monday, on Tuesday at 9:00 am I still had 11 things in my folder left over from Monday. It's been pretty much that way all week.

I got home from a nice weekend at Mr M's on Sunday past, called the folks to see how they were doing, and found that my mom, aka Granny, was back in the hospital. Same thing, infections, and I guess we'd all been lured into some false sense of security because she'd been doing so well. It had been a while since she was in the hospital, and we thought she might finally be turning a corner. But she was released yesterday, so that was less than a week in stir, which is pretty good for her.

Milo and I have been plugging along. Our walks are getting longer each day, which is wearing me the hell out but he seems to really enjoy it, and he's becoming quite the good leash walker with the exception of his excruciatingly irritating habit of barking and lunging at people and other dogs while he's on the leash. I thought last week we ourselves were turning a corner when I was having some success getting him to calm down, but it's not working. It drives me crazy - when he's off the leash, he loves everyone. No one bothers him, he doesn't want to attack person or animal. It's when he's leashed. I want to get into his little head to find out what's going on.

Anyway, as I mentioned, Monday night, Milo was sick. He threw up several times, his stomach was making some really awesome twanging noises, and he was very listless. He sat on my lap almost all night. I was worried because, well, because he's just a puppy and I'm his mom, OK? I get hinky.

Anyway, Milo had an appointment for his second set of shots on Tuesday afternoon, so I left work early and high-tailed it to the vets, where Milo was proclaimed full of "personality galore," given his shots, some heartworm medicine, and I was told to rest assured that he was very healthy, he just probably ate something that made him sick. Which I'm sure was true, as there was grass in what he was throwing up. And later that night he was back to his old self, as energetic as ever, evidenced by the fact that tonight he chewed the cord to my turntable clean in two. The first thing he's chewed up. I was not pleased.

So now it's almost the end of the week, I have a Hackensaw Boys concert in my immediate future, and I didn't have one single nervous breakdown. And it's almost the weekend. Did I mention that?

Some pictures, though.

I took a picture on Saturday of Alice the Cat, Mr M's pet. See, I've told you about the problems between her and Milo. Well, this weekend they met face to face, and not under a bed. Right there in the kitchen.

See, Alice ventured out and there was Milo, and he wagged his tail and barked (remember, he wasn't on his leash), wanting to say hello. Alice immediately took up residence in the corner of the kitchen and would not move, and so Milo quickly lost interest and walked off. After a half-hour or so we lost sight of Alice and assumed she had gone back to the bedroom. But when I went to retrieve some plates, I found her.




















Yes, she was on the counter, in the corner, behind the coffemaker and the toaster oven. And the blender. Just sitting there, unmoving.

Later we would find her hiding in the corner behind Mr M's bass clarinet. So there you go. Milo likes her, she doesn't like him.

Then before I left on Sunday, Sherman decided we should make a joke picture.




















See, he's in the crate, Milo's free. It's a joke. Get it? (If you don't like it, blame Sherman.)

And finally, a picture taken a couple of nights ago. Milo loves to sleep in this position, just letting it all hang out.

























Actually, this afternoon during lunch he did this outside in the yard for about fifteen minutes. In the hot sun. Not a piece of shade to be found. Boy, was it hot today.

And that's about it for this week.

Betland's Olympic Update:
* I get to Hucklebug tomorrow night!