Friday, July 6, 2007

I know, I know!

Yeah, okay, so it's been two weeks again. Well, we've been busy, and we're still learning to remember to make this a priority!

So, here's the quick & dirty: My Dear Husband is BACK!!! YEAH!!! He got back on Friday, the 29th, and the girls also got back from vacationing with their Mom the same day--so we had a mostly full house on Friday. Princess #1 still only stays at her Mom's, but we're trying to encourage her to give us some face-time, too.

Saturday was a great day--woke up and took one really fat dog to the groomers, and went home to work on the other one (also fat, but not as much so). I had taken them both to the vet's on Thursday night (they have to be current on rabies and kennel cough vaccinations before the groomer will work on them), and got the "your dog is FAT" diagnosis--Candy should weigh in somewhere between 70 and 75 lbs, she's sitting at 5 score and 2! Well, they're lazy, and to be fair, we are too--they don't get walked as often as they should; oh, and they were being fed more than a little bit too much, so they've been "cut back" now. Well, Brandy, our little Fox Wire Terrier, (Terrorist, if you ask me) has had cloudy eyes for a while now, and we noticed some time ago that she was now blind, but it hasn't seemed to slow her down a bit. He (the vet) ran some tests, and determined that she had glaucoma in both eyes--very unusual for dogs to get glaucoma in the first place, but there you are. He also said that the odds of her getting any of her sight back is slim, but that we could go through ridiculously expensive procedures to try and restore her vision. Bearing in mind that the words you just read are my paraphrasing of what he said, we just aren't as willing as some of our neighbors to spend thousands of dollars on a pup--dollars that might be wasted since he indicated the success of any such procedures would be questionable. I asked him what our other options were, and it looks like --PLEASE don't panic or be upset, because it really is okay--Brandy is going to lose her eyes. Not much different than she is now--she's already blind (which, I might add, happened very quickly), but the pressure associated with glaucoma apparently does cause some pain. Not that you'd know it from watching her--you can tell she's blind, because she walks right into things, but she doesn't shy away like she's in any pain. Anyway, we're topically medicating her now and waiting to hear from the vet on her bloodwork which has to be run before she can be put asleep for the surgery. Candy (the first one--the Golden Retriever) needs some dental work, but other than that, she's just a (squish your face together by putting your hands on your cheeks and exerting forward pressure towards your mouth when you say these following words) chubby puppy!

Okay, so dogs... husband... how about kids? Well, it sounds like they had a fun time in Florida--Princess #3 laments being the youngest and getting the short end of the stick. I gotta tell you, no matter who you talk to, the oldest will tell you that they had way more rules, middle children feel lost because they're not the first and they're not the baby... it's just tough being a kid sometimes. We continue to have trouble with getting Princess #2 to understand that we're on her side, still problems with the communication, but we continue to work with her. Just last night, the four of us sat and watched a ridiculously stupid movie about witches that couldn't stand the smell of little children so they (the witches) concocted a potion to turn them (the children) into mice--it was really nice to get to spend some time together, without Princess #2 barricading herself in her room. I often wonder: Mom, did I do that? Anyway, Princess #1 had the day off today, so they're enjoying their season passes at the water park today--they'll be exhausted tonight, I'm sure!

Let's see, what else? Oh, yes, we've had a major holiday since last I wrote! Our Fourth was kicked off a day early when some friends of mine from my previous hometown hosted a BBQ. Andy almost fell down the mountain (not really, but if he ever does, nobody will believe him), Princess #3 got to see a potato cannon shot off, and we ate entirely too much food. It really was great to get to catch up with Steph & Gary (& Reggie!), Andy & Jen (at least, what's left of her!), Stacy, Shannon, Kaylee & Millie & Sam, Brian, Mark & Deanna, more... Got to meet some new friends too, including Staci's "new" guy Jason. I tell you what, God is GOOD! It looks like another match made in Heaven, and I can't wait to see what the future holds for them. We got home late (we left about three hours after I was first asked, "Are we going soon?") and so slept IN on Wednesday--DH woke me up at 6 a.m. and I was having no part of that, so we passed out for a couple more hours. Got up and got some groceries (Super-Kmarts have some of the best canteloupe I've ever had on sale for a buck apiece right now!) and then went home and made some homemade ice cream. When we were at the store, Princess #3 tried to get me to buy some of that packaged powder ice-cream mix, so I told her to read the ingredients label to me. When she couldn't, I asked her if she could spell "milk, cream, eggs, sugar, vanilla" and she said yes, and I responded with some smart-alec comment that I wasn't putting anything into my ice cream that she couldn't pronounce or spell, and she wouldn't regret it after she tasted it. Well, we also got some super-sweet bing cherries (on sale for $1.39/lb at the local SuperK location because they're overstocked), and I pitted and chopped some of those into some ice cream for my husband, sprinkled some pecans on his bowl, and he was in Heaven--even compared it with Braums, and for anyone that knows my husband, that's no small feat! Okay, so there's no ice cream left--except maybe that layered parfait that I hid from the kids in the freezer--I guess it was pretty good!

When it came time for fireworks, we had to jumpstart the truck (which won't run without a charged battery), and then it died as we tried to leave. We quickly bailed out of the truck when it died getting out of the driveway, and it was a family effort to push it back up onto the driveway. So, we split up and then promptly lost the kids (it's not like Princess #1 waited for us, or anything. I forgot how you're always in a hurry when you're 18) trying to figure out where we were going. It doesn't help that the town moved their fireworks this year, and we're always the last to find out, but the kids knew... DH and I quickly decided in the effort to find parking that we didn't want any part of the insanity, so we dropped the chairs off and let the kids "do the fireworks thing" and we went home. It's a good thing, too, because we forgot that the puppies have a hard time with fireworks going off, so we were there to put them in the garage and give them some peace. Now it's back to the grind, and speaking of which, I do need to get back to work--my boss is such a slavedriver! I've got to wrap up a couple things before I go home for the weekend--no big plans this weekend, at least, not yet. We may be making another trip to my old stompin' grounds to check on the townhome--we were supposed to close on the sale last week, but our lease-option tenant didn't qualify for a mortgage with her credit. Imagine her grown son's surprise (he lives with her, as does his sister) to find that she was behind on rent and was about to have to find a new place to live... Ah, yes, I think I've just thought of the title for a new reality show to put on HGTV: Who Wants To Be A Landlord??? Subtitled with and What's WRONG With You???

Alrighty, then! Ciao for now, and don't ya'll be strangers, 'kay?

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