Tuesday, June 20, 2006

I Believe

I am clueless as to how to help or console my friend so all I can do is ask for prayer from many. My friend Suzie found the love of her life 6 or 7 years ago, married him in Hawaii in a truly fantasy wedding and later had two beautiful boys. Last week, Mark, her husband, was diagnosed with a brain cancer. It's the worst kind of brain cancer to get. Suzie and Mark need all the help in the world to weather this situation. Pray for them. It doesn't matter if you know them or not, you know someone who is in loving marriage, raising children and needs a lifetime to be a part of those gifts and you know the need for a father and husband.

Wednesday, June 14, 2006

Deja Vu

At 10:30 this morning, Mom calls me and her voice is shaking and she asks if I am having a good day. What's wrong? I ask. She tells me that she let Seamus and Winston out this morning as she always does and went and got a soda. A few minutes later, Seamus comes back in the house and she looks outside for Winston. He doesn't answer her when she calls, so she walks around the side of her house and sees the back gate wide open. She runs back in the house and to the front and sees Winston running down the street. Quickly, she runs to her bedroom grabs a robe (since all she had on was her night gown). Puts Seamus on his leash and goes running after Winston.

Winston saw them and came running to her but wouldn't let her grab him. It's a game with him. So for another 10 minutes of playing catch with an insane beagle, Mom finally grabs him when he stops to mark the neighbor's bush.

Two days in a row.................Little Man is going to get expelled from doggie day-care if he's not careful - oh and by the way, Dad is in the dog house now for leaving the back gate open. I don't envy him!

Winston's Big Adventure


Yesterday, I took Winston to mom's house before work as I always do. He runs to her room and snuggles in to bed with her and Seamus. Around 10 a.m. she took both boys backs to my house to hang out in the backyard (mine has more room to romp and play). Then she went to her part time job. After noon, she decided to leave them at my house while she cleaned her floors. At 3:00 p.m. she decided to go get them - as she drove up my street she saw Winston walking across the street back into my front yard. Paniced she stopped the car (in the middle of the road) jumped out and called Winston to her. He immediately came running to her and got in the car - then to her surprise Seamus also came running.

With both dogs safely in the car, mom pulls into my drive way, still shaken she gets out to investigate how they got out. There was no sign of an escape point. She then called me still upset that they got out - I left work to check out my backyard and go calm mom down.

It turns out that mom didn't realize that the new fence latch was hanging up and that just shutting the gate wasn't totally securing it (there is now a lock on the gate). My neighbor, Harold, tried to get the dogs back into the backyard but Seamus growled at him, so rightfully he backed off. He saw them at noon, so they were out terrorizing the neighborhood for three hours. Seamus would lay on the porch watching Winston and when he could no longer see him - Seamus would get up and go to where ever Winston was then walk back to my house with Winston in tow. Seamus was the hero yesterday - if Winston had been alone I would probably still be looking for him.

Today, I have to go get Winston a tag for his collar - somehow the other one came off and is lost. Had someone pick up Winston there would have been no way for them to know where he belonged.

Enough for now - I am just happy to have my baby home and safe.

Sunday, June 11, 2006

I Work More Away From Work

This has been an exhausting weekend! Aren't we supposed to relax and unwind on the weekends? The work on my front porch post is complete - FINALLY! Before I state that I want to refinish another piece of woodwork, someone please remind me how hard this was. I sanded off at least four to five layers of white paint on that darn thing. The project lasted three weeks because dana was solo on the sanding project and my back didn't like it. I had to take it slow but I did it none the less. Last week, Dad brought over his monster air compressor - Black Max (yes, that's the brand name) and sprayed painted the post a super high gloss. It looks really good and now with all those layers of paint gone the wood grain really comes through. So I needed to finish up the front for the project to be complete. Today, I re-hung this wrought iron bell on the post - it's not my style but I keep it for kicks. Then I noticed that with this heat wave, I couldn't keep one of my planters watered enough for the Lamb's Ear plants to survive. So off to Lowe's I go for mulch. I spread two biggie size bags in soaring heat and viola! the front projects are complete and I feel good.

Project two, this weekend was to prune out some tree limbs in my backyard. Some of my mature trees are not doing well since too many young trees are crowding out the sun. I have to remove approximate nine skinny but substantial trees to let the sun shine in. I was able to remove the top portion of five of those trees until Dad can come in with chain saw for the main trunks. So I had a lot of foliage to bag and get ready for trash day. I didn't make it - what's left will be Monday's job.

Today has been a hard day for my little man, Winston. He's had two pretty hard episodes with his reverse sneezes, so his allergies must be acting up. He's learned that when these happen, he runs to me so that I can perform the tick the vet taught me to stop them. It really takes a lot out of him - poor guy. We are planning on vegging out the remainder of the evening and go to bed early.

Enough for now.