Thursday, November 19, 2009

Excused Absence

Once again, I've been neglecting my blog.   *SIGH*   What can I say?  I've been distracted by all the usual insanity here at the asylum . . . again.  
Not only have I been busy tearing down and storing our yard haunt, but my youngest, my baby,  turned thirteen last week.  UGH, a teenager!  If things were crazy before, they are about to become completely out of control now.   I know this from experience.  Of course, this is the first time that I will be dealing with TWO teens at the same time.  In the past, due to the number of years between my children, I've always been fortunate enough to get one through the teen years before the next one reached the magic (or is it really a cursed number?) age of 13.  Silly me, my last two kids are only two years apart in age.  Of course, Jake and Heather are so close, they do everything together.  For the most part, that has been a blessing; I'll have to wait and see if I still feel the same way in the coming years.

Anyway, for Heather's thirteenth birthday she wanted to have a slumber party with 7 of her closest girlfriends.  Normally, that wouldn't be a huge problem;  except for the past several months, our little asylum has been running at full occupancy with Nick, Jenn, and the baby living with us.  Of course, I knew it would be total chaos ( as well as a probable violation of several city codes for maxium occupancy of a four bedroom duplex)  with that many teenage girls in the house.  But after all, it's just for one night . . .   The biggest issue was, where to bed down that many people.  Not that I expected them to do much sleeping, at least not until the wee hours of the morning.  It was finally decided that the only possible availible space was -  the garage.  The problem with that?  Heather's birthday is only 11 days after Halloween.  Not only was the garage still set up as a mad doctor's laboratory from Halloween, but on November 1st, everything from the front yard cemetery gets shoved into the garage until I can get it all packed away. (which normally happens over a span of months) So yeah, I've been extremely busy these past few days, tranforming our garage from a laboratory/storage space, to a party room for teens - all in less than a weeks time.
And because my husband has no idea what it takes to preform the sort of magic that I do on a daily basis, he scheduled Pete's neutering for the morning after the Slumber party !  Of course, we had Pheonix neutered the week before Halloween, and that made me a nervous wreck. Not only was I all strung out over the emotional guilt of abandoning my baby overnight at a strange place,  but I have to admit that dealing with a post-surgery animal was a bit more stressful than I had anticipated.  Not only are they unable to tell you if they're in pain, or if something isn't right, but they could care less about things like . . . surgical incision care, and infection.  They're just dogs, they aren't equiped with survival instincts that cover human situations like surgery.  I was actually amazed at how co-operative Pheonix turned out to be - the perfect patient.  In fact, as the days have passed, I am only sorry that we didn't have him neutered earlier.  I'm starting to think that most of his anxiety and bad behavior was testosterone induced.  He's just a happier, more relaxed, and contented dog.  He has actually become more playful and puppy like.



However, in comparison, Pete . . .   To put it as tactfully as possible, Pete is well, uh . . . psychotic as hell.  He has more issues than LIFE magazine.  Not only is he stubborn and willful, but he has separation anxiety, he's a fence climber with a wandering spirit, he's absolutely frantic when it comes to his fear of thunderstorms, and when it comes to licking and chewing . . . OCD doesn't even BEGIN to describe it !  He has done everything in his power to make his recovery time difficult for everyone; and as a result, it's taking longer for him to heal.  He refuses to leave his incision alone and he worries over it day and night.  We've had to put one of those goofy Elizabethian collars on him, keep him separated from the other dogs, and still, we have to watch him constantly. ALL he does is whinge and cry like a baby.  Once again, I've had to redecorate the garage, this time into a makeshift dog kennel.  Actually, it's more like a canine presidential suite!  And does he appreciate all that I've done for him?  Hell NO!  When I named our home haunt Howling Hollow Asylum, I had no idea that it would become so prophetic.  Pete's constant crying and howling is making everyone insane!!!  Every night when I go to bed, I pray that the hormones will work themselves out of his body quickly, and that the lack of testosterone will have the same effect on Pete as it's had on pheonix.  This really is our last hope.  If neutering him doesn't curb his dominance and his desire to fight with Pheonix, I have to find him another home.  It's going to break my heart, but I can't have that kind of violence and tension in my home.

In other news . . . I've decided to start looking for a job.  Roy has been laid off from his job (which really didn't supply him with enough hours or pay anyway)  and with the kids getting older, and the Holidays and the economy  being such a financial stress - well, I think it's just time for me to go back to work.  I've sent out a few resumes with my optical experience and I seem to be getting pretty good responses.  I know that over the past 20 years that I've been at home there have been a lot of changes (new equipment and products, computers, and worst bof all, insurance)  but the basics never really change much.  Besides, all the changes are really kind of unique specific to each office, so I would probably have to learn it anyway.  But I think I would much rather return to optics, than find work in my other area of training - teaching preschool. Not only is the pay and benefits better, but I think I've had enough of dealing with children. (or grown ups that BEHAVE like children)  Still, I'm really nervous and anxious about the whole thing - it just seems weird to imagine not being at home all the time, and I know that there will have to be new rules, and a lot of  restructuring at home  if I'm not here all day. ( my family doesn't exactly embrace change very well)   I know that in the long run, it will be a good thing, I just don't look forward to the short term stress.  So wish me luck, and keep my family in your prayers, please.
I'm still working on getting the Halloween photos uploaded to my other blog.  My stupid computer has been SO slow lately, I can only do a few each evening.  Hopefully, I'll have it done by the end of this weekend - I'll let you know.

Well, it's late and I need to sleep.  I'll try not to be so long between posts next time.
Good night  all.

*p.s. dog photo credits: my very talented daughter, Heather !

3 howled back:

christopherc said...

I likewise seem to be MIA with the blog thing... keep trying to find my way back to regular postings, but alas I can't seem to get out of this fog for writing.

As for the pups, it shall all be good and better! With the job and re-entering the workforce, you have my best wishes and thoughts. Right now I would hate to think of going back to a "normal job", but in the current economy I also realize I have a long, cold, hungry winter ahead of me and my little shop.

Eventually, I still hope to live long enough to retire and just have one big old party till I die on my feet!

Hope you have a fabuloous Thanksgiving and Holday season... talk to you soon!

-C

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Auburn~haired~artist said...

Dear Anonymous~

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