Texas Lady

Actually, it’s after 10 P.M. here, but I am enjoying a glass of Merlot.  I don’t know why I’m so tired because I haven’t done much today physically.  I spent 12 hours at work that were uneventful to downright boring and since I arrived home I’ve done nothing to speak of.  I cleaned out some of my Outlook folders, caught up with Facebook, medicated Maximus, Dusty and the fish tank, and put a coat of polish on my nails.  Ronnie cooked hamburger patties for dinner so all I had to do was throw it in the microwave and chow down.  He didn’t have to work today so all the dogs were so happy when I got home.  They love being with us, it doesn’t matter which one of us either.  That’s a really cool thing about our pack.  They all love each other and us equally.

Ronnie got his new hearing aids (remember that the dogs ate the last ones?).  Luckily we had insurance on them that replaced them for $500.  Since the initial cost was $6700 I thought a $500 deductible was chicken feed!  The upside is that Ronnie can hear me again instead of me repeating myself 80 times and then getting pissed because of it.  Downside is that he won’t wear them at home because the dogs are so loud.  Hello?  How the hell can he hear me without them?  Perhaps that’s the point…maybe he doesn’t want to hear me.  So, what did we buy them for?  He can’t wear them to work.  He can’t wear them at home.  So, they’re for fishing trips?

Tomorrow is my day off (?) which means a day of errands and housework.  I have 2 doctors appointments and Mimi goes for her nail trimming.  I decided that since she’s a biter I wouldn’t try to take her to Petsmart so I made an appointment for her at our veterinarian’s office between my two appointments.  And I still have to buy groceries.  We have a brand-new refrigerator that’s basically empty.  Also, I have ALLLL those files to finish sorting/cleaning out, the shredding to do, the serger to re-connect and test, a raft of patterns to sort so I can buy fabric, pillowcases and a valance for my office to construct.  The new lateral file is here (in the box) which will have to be constructed, installed and organized.  And before I can do any of this I need a long, hot bath—without any canine company to assist me.

Just bathing around here sometimes is a feat.  We both like a hot bath, a soak, reading books, whatever relaxes us since our lives have become so stressfull of late.  But neither of us chooses to close the door while we soak.  The result, of couse, is dogs, dogs, dogs in the bathroom.  Dogs like to lick the water off your skin (Bandit), lick water out of your cupped hands (Maximus), lick water off your body while they walk on your tummy (Dusty), roll on “your” towel (Mimi), relax on the rug while patiently waiting for you to get the hell out of the tub (Fancy).  Sometimes a relaxing bath is anything but.

Of late I have come to expect my life to be calmer than it is.  I have expected myself to be calmer than I am.  I have wondered why neither of these ideas is reality.  I wonder why, at the age of 60, I can’t make my life so…….when does that happen?  When does life slow down and your frayed nerves calm down, and your expectations lessen?  Probably right after you catch up on your rest?  I don’t know what that feels like, so I guess I’m still on this treadmill called Life.  Time for an Ambien….goodnight, Gracie.

Our girl, Fancypants, got her trip to Sonic after grooming today.  She ate half of her ice cream and half of my tater tots, neither of which were healthy for either of our girlish figures, but who the hell cares?  Fancy will be 12 in November and recently had a bout with cancer, and I was 60 in January with a hip that was not installed at the factory.  I don’t think either of us care if we have an hourglass shape these days.  They really messed up her haircut.  Her ears look lopsided and there’s little tufts sticking up along her back.  That may be the last grooming at Petsmart.  Normally they do a great job and she has a good time, but the entire grooming department has changed hands and I doubt any of the new employees has graduated from high school yet.  I should have known better, huh?  But you think a reputable store like Petsmart would do a better job of policing their departments.  Maybe there hasn’t been enough complaints yet to make them send them back to training class?  Maybe I should complain?  There’s a thought!

This was my second trip to Sonic.  Earlier I had Dusty and Gypsy there after their nail trims.  Dusty ate all of his ice cream as fast as he could then started shivering but a quick snuggle fixed that boy!  Gypsy was more ladylike and left half of hers to bring home for another day.  She has so much control! (I won’t tell you about the lack of control she exhibited by eating out of MY plate at dinner—-oh, wait, I guess I just did………..sorry, Gypsy!)

I left home with the three Chihuahuas at 11 A.M.  I dropped Dusty and Gypsy at home after their Sonic detour, but Fancy and I didn’t get home until 5 P.M.!  I had more errands than originally planned but I got a lot accomplished, too.  That before-mentioned filing cabinet in my sewing room is completely empty and outta there!  I ordered the new lateral file for the office and have to wait for them to deliver it.  In the meantime I get to go through all the files and shred a million sheets of paper.  I ran out of boxes to put files in so ended up putting the “to be shredded” in a laundry basket.  No one ever said I wasn’t resourceful.  “In my day” we had to do more with less; I don’t think you ever forget how to do that.  And I even got a trip to the nail salon for a mani-pedi with a glass of white wine!  Nirvana!!

Tomorrow I get to take Mimi for her nail trim since I ran out of time today.  I also need groceries and it’s a “Nana day” with my grand-daughter, Monica.  I probably won’t accomplish as much tomorrow but I bet I smile more.  What do you think?

TGIF?  It’s only Tuesday?  Yeah, maybe for the rest of the world but this is actually Friday night for me.  My work week is done, 48 hours down and the weekend is here….even if it’s Tuesday.  Sometimes I wonder how my life ever got this busy/full or whatever you call it.  There doesn’t seem to be enough time left to accomplish anything anymore, and if a little time shows up it’s usually when my energy hits a new low and it all goes to waste.  <sigh>  Such is the way of the world nowadays, I’m afraid.  No one has any time anymore……on the other hand, recently I saw a blurb on one of the news channels online that people were doing this, that and the other because they were bored.  Bored?  Really?  How the hell did they find the time to be bored?  I just don’t get it.  I’m so looking forward to retirement next year so maybe I can finally have the time to do something that I want to do instead of what I have to do.

I have several projects on-going for my sewing room that I hope to address while I’m enjoying my “weekend”.  I have to get rid of the filing cabinet, go through at least 500 files and get rid of at least 400 of them, whatever that involves (are we still under a burn ban?).  I have to find and buy a 2 drawer lateral file to replace it with.  Then I have to talk my husband into getting rid of the L-return on his desk so I have a place to put the new filing system.  That shouldn’t be extremely difficult since the desk he has came from a garage sale 15 years ago.  The desk is in great shape but the L has been moved unceremoniously in the wrong direction on more than one occasion, so where the twain meet there is an ugly split in the (particle)board.  The only reason it’s lasted this long is because that’s the place the printer calls home, but the printer will soon reside on top of the lateral file.  There.  Problem solved.

Next I need to purchase a dress form.  My mom has one but I haven’t seen her use it much, and I never even thought of buying one for myself…until this past week.  I’ve been a member of an online sewing forum for the past few years but lately I’ve begun to really get more out of the group.  I’ve decided to make myself some casual clothes and have been checking out tips and suggestions by various members and experts.  One recurring theme was the importance of having an accurate fit for patterns and how many times you should try on a garment prior to completion.  One repetitive thread in the conversation was that with a proper dress form you could get a better view of your project’s progress and how the garment would “hang” on your particular body.  When I did a Google search I found that the size dress form I need comes in purple.  Purple?  No kidding?  Purple is my favorite color!!!!!!  Too freaking fastastic!!!!!!!  Except they’re sold out and have to reorder them in my size.  Desolation…….. <sigh>

Also, tomorrow is grooming day.  Not for me unfortunately, but for the Chihuahuas.  Several trips involved to get 4 Chis beautified.  I’ll take 3 of them at 12:30, drop one to be bathed, trimmed, nails painted, etc., get the other 2’s nails clipped then take them home.  Will probably take them to Sonic for ice cream or tater tots first.  Then about 4:00 I’ll take the other Chi to get her nails trimmed and pick up the groomed one.  This, of course, will involve a second trip to Sonic because I can’t be partial with the “kids” because it might affect their self-esteem and/or their place in the pack.  I told Ronnie he has to do the big dogs’ nails but if he flashes those big baby blues I’ll cave and take them, too.  <sigh>

See any difference?  It’s not done; I still have ideas for it but I worked all night then came home and cleaned out that room, so I’m done for now.  At least now I only have to move one small box before I have a place to cut fabric.  When I was younger I would spread the cloth on the floor, pin the pattern to it and cut out anything I wanted, but that was 6 dogs and 35 years ago.  As it was this morning, Bandit found a spool of specialty serger thread I bought for a project that isn’t complete.  By the time I realized he had something besides his own chew bone, the thread was history.  I don’t think he ate much of it before I found him but it’ll never be able to roll off that spool again.  I should have taken a photo of it before I threw it away; it had bloomed into a mass of bright orange strands surrounding an oddly-shaped white core of questionable origin or shape.

The big dogs love the sewing room; always have.  There are always lots of things to chew, fabric to drag off and eat holes through, and little colorful bits to eat when I least expect it.  According to Ronnie, when he utilizes the pooper scooper in the backyard after a sewing binge the excrement is a little more interesting hue than normal.

The sweat is drying; time to find some PJs and head toward the bedroom.  Maybe tomorrow I’ll start on the file cabinet.  It has to be cleaned out, no doubt about that, but do I replace it?  down-size it? or utilize the extra space for sewing storage?  Decisions, decisions, decisions!

I basically have 2 corners of this house to relax in.  One is the one where my desk and computer sit and the other is where my sewing stuff lives.  At 2 A.M. this morning I was talking on Facebook, working on a computer and browsing a sewing website.  The sewing website had a forum entry that discussed where we sew and how we organize our sewing areas.  In a flash I was grabbing the camera and taking photos to upload to my sewing forum.  Since I recently completed some major-sized sewing projects, this week showed that there was still a sewing room under all that fabric.

After a couple of years parked in the corner of the “extra” bedroom, my sewing space still needs so much in the way of organizing.  Originally I had a cutting table where I could spread out fabric, measure and cut with precision.  But the cutting table was the first thing to go because I didn’t have enough room to walk around it, so now where am I going to cut cloth?  Ideally it will be on that table attached to my sewing table that has all those flowered boxes stacked on it….(yeah, that sounds good!), but since I’ve run out of days off to play in there I guess that will give my mind a while longer to contemplate the floorplan.

The boys sharing Hulu on the loveseat

Wednesday night on the loveseat for the TV watchers and sleepers.  I think the sleepers are taking up most of the room, don’t you?  But they don’t look like it’s effecting their viewing pleasure any.  I just went back to my office and minded my own business.

In our house there are TV watchers, computer geeks, and hobbyists.  We all have our designated area.  Ronnie used to have the entire living room for his multimedia room.  Now he has the half that Maximus doesn’t own.  Behind the loveseat is Max’s crate and Max’s treadmill.  In order to make this configuration fit we had to jam the loveseat into the side of the couch and move everything about 6-7 feet southwest.  This house is only 1000 square feet of living space so that doesn’t leave a whole lot for us.  We’ve been doing some rearranging lately so that we at least have a path in the house so it feels like a home again instead of a jungle.  I remember telling Ronnie at one point that if we ever had a fire in here we’d never be able to get out in time because of everything we’d be falling over and running into.  I was hoping beyond hope that that would give him incentive to clean out some of that crap in the garage but I guess I’m going to have to do it for him…..except I haul it to the street for the trashmen and he hates it when I do that.   I, of course, love the clean and being able to walk through the garage in a straight path with out falling over anything or without having anything fall on me.  I wish he shared those goals.  <sigh>>

Maximus stays!  Ronnie and I talked about rehoming Max and decided we couldn’t do it.  He’s come such a long way in the past 2 months and we have learned enough that we believe we can handle keeping him.  It helped that the people who asked about him weren’t being very responsible about it either.  They never submitted the application and when I set up a meeting they wanted me to drive over to their town instead of them coming to Maximus.  I thought that was irresponsible and ended negotiations at that point.

Then another girl called after we took him off the market but I told her we’d decided to keep him and that there were many more deserving dogs out there that needed to be loved.  I tried to encourage her to keep looking at shelter dogs.  She already has a shelter dog so is open to another for him to play with.  She seemed very sweet.  Perhaps if it’d been her that called the first time things might have worked out differently….but I always feel that things happen for the best.  And this will be another one of those things if we wait it out long enough.

And in the mean time, all of us are happy with the exception of Mimi.  Trelle, our trainer, is going to help us with that; we’re just waiting for an appointment now for them to come to our house and evaluate the situation with all the dogs together.  That ought to be interesting.  LOL

Time for bed.  Good night, George.  Good night, Gracie.

There is someone interested in rehoming Maximus.  I don’t know what to think about it; I don’t even have the application yet but am trying to put it in the right perspective in my head.  I know we don’t have a big enough yard for him and he would probably be happier with a younger family, and our lives would definitely be easier, BUT, he’s still my baby!  That’s where I get hung up–on the emotional part.  I love him.  I guess I’m just trying to figure out if love is enough.  I want him (and all of our animals) to have the best lives that they can, and I know he’s really more than we can comfortably handle.  But he’s happy with us, with our routine, with his canine brothers and sisters.  Other “rescue people” tell me that it’s a decision only I can make, and that’s the problem.  I’m having a problem giving him up.

I think if this new home is a good one the decision would be easier and I don’t know anything about these people yet;  they’re supposed to come meet him this weekend.  So I’ll try to reserve judgement until I have all the facts.  It’s just on my mind this morning.

Worked all night and I’m tired.  That’s when my emotions are the flakiest–when I’m tired.  It seems like lately I’ve been more tired than normal and I know it’s because I’m over-extended time-wise.  I have so many things to do, that I want to do, but there’s simply not enough hours in the day to do it all.  Then when I don’t do it all, I feel like I’m not doing enough.  It’s the mantra of 90% of today’s American women.

Actually if this is a good home for Maximus it would probably lower our stress levels around here somewhat.  He is still a puppy, and an 80 pound puppy at that.  So he requires a lot of attention and energy.  Guess we’ll wait until we meet the prospective adopters and see if it’s a good match or not.  Not any sense in worrying about it until the threat becomes a reality, I suppose.  LOL  This is the last time I bottle feed a rescue puppy unless I have the total intention of keeping it.  I’ve waffled back and forth about this puppy the entire time I’ve had him.  He just stole my heart; what can I say in my defense?  He’s just a sweetheart and I love him.  I just didn’t know he was going to be so danged big!

We bought the boys a treadmill and both of them love it!  Maximus will push everyone off of it so he can walk; he walks longer and faster than anyone else, and he’s even slept on it once.  I think they’re happy, don’t you?  Videos on my YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/caninenana

This morning I woke at 4 A.M. hurting, hot and my heart pounding from some bad dream that woke me.  So I came to the place I always go…..my computer.  It’s almost 7 A.M. now and I’m getting sleepy finally.  So I came here to talk to myself; it’s about the only time I have to myself anymore.  I used to smoke cigarettes (quit 22 years ago) and remember reading an article that said a lot of people smoke to have a reason to take a break from whatever they’re doing.  At the time, I seriously thought about that comment and realized that that was me.  Now instead of cigarettes I use the laptop to “take my breaks” from life, stress, reality or whatever.

My laptop tried to bite me yesterday.  I came home from work and had a virus on it.  Me, who preaches to others about their virus protection, had a Trojan on her computer.  From the scan I saw that when the little bugger hit my PC I was on my way to work; not even home for gawd’s sake!  But, as I always say, everything happens for a reason.  I learned a very important lesson, or maybe more than one: computer infections can affect me.  They can happen when I’m not even home or on the computer.  And I needed better antiviral software!  Hopefully I have remedied all that now.  I’ll know when the deep scan I have running is over if I’ve recovered or if I have to reload this whole shebang.  I hope it’s the former; the latter is not appealing at all.

On a happy note, my new iPad arrived yesterday so while my laptop was under the weather I had another toy to play with.  I didn’t buy the “New iPad”.  I probably should have but I’m cheap (not that my husband would think that).  So I bought a refurbished iPad 2, the cheapest model there is but sufficient for what I’m using it for.  I figure if I find I need more I’ll buy the more expensive model, but this should be just fine at least until I can get a refurbished “New iPad”, too.  I figure I’d better save some bucks so I’ll be able to buy that $7000 sewing machine I want for retirement.  That baby has everything and that’s what I want.

Sometimes I worry that I have no motivation anymore.  I don’t do a lot of the things I used to do; at least  I don’t find myself motivated to do the things I used to do.  It seems like I once got a whole lot more accomplished.  Now, I don’t feel like I DO as much but I’m a whole lot happier than I used to be.  I think I have become a BE-er instead of a DO-er.  Is that a part of aging, you think?  Probably so.  Younger folks kind of feel sorry for older folks because we can’t do all the things they do anymore, but they need not worry.  We’re a whole lot happier than they are and worry a whole lot less than they do.  It’s not a bad life just because it’s been washed a few more times and sometimes put away wet.  At least it’s clean and shiny where it’s not frayed around the edges.  It’s still living and that sure beats the alternative………..