Biting It

Wow! So . . . a lot has happened in the last 24. Where do I even begin?

Our puppy has started digressing in his potty training lately. So, that's been frustrating. Plus, he basically ate the couch that I recovered that's in the basement. I mentioned before that the blow was lessened on that because I had dumped the wax on it, but . . . it's pretty sad. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it now . . .

I think Hobbes is mad at us because he thinks we haven't been spending enough time with him. He got used to us being around on the holidays, and now he's rebelling now that we're back to the daily grind. What's worse: he knows when he's done something bad in the basement. When we get home, he looks guilty when we go into the basement to see how he did (and he stays upstairs with his tail between his legs). It's so weird, but I know it's all because he's feeling like he's not getting enough attention. Hobbes is weird like that. He's perfectly normal when we're home.

When we got home yesterday, we saw that Frank had cleared the snow on our sidewalks AND driveway with his snowblower. It was so nice to not have to worry about shoveling when we got back. We knew we'd have to (it was snowing when we left that morning).

Later yesterday evening, Willi and I decided we wanted to nail down our plans for vacation in February. So, we did. While Willi was working out comparing options, I wrote Frank and Dolores a thank you note. When I finished it, I decided to creep out the front door to put the thank you note (sealed in a plastic baggie) on Frank's truck. I saw that there was snow all over our porch and front steps, so I tried to be careful as I stepped down. Unfortunately, I was wearing my hard-soled, no-traction slippers, and my feet went right out from underneath me, and I came slamming down onto the steps. I let out a pretty loud yelp when it happened, and I don't know how nobody heard me. I landed right on my butt. It hurt. I forced myself to get up, though, and I hobbled over to Frank's truck with my card all bent up, pulled his windshield wiper off of his frozen windshield, dropped in my card, and hobbled back to the house. I walked in the door, bawling. Poor Willis was standing there talking to me (he couldn't see my face), and he was so excited about the trip we were planning. Then, he saw me. After that, he let me soak his T-shirt with my tears while I sobbed into his shoulder. Man . . . did that hurt!

After about ten minutes, I tried to sit down, and once I sat down, I realized that I probably hadn't bruised my tailbone. So, I was pretty relieved about that. I did discover later, though, that I have a nice, huge, purple bruise on my right butt cheek. It's lovely. This morning, I didn't think I was going to be able to get up and do pilates because of the pain, but I went ahead and tried to do the yoga-infused pilates. I think that was a brilliant idea. It's mostly stretching and relaxing, so that helped make me less tense, which was nice.

We did figure out what we're doing for our vacation, and we booked it last night. We're going on a Carnival Cruise the third week of February (four nights), and it's leaving from Orlando and makes stops in two places in Mexico (one of them is Cozumel, I think, and I can't remember the other one because we looked at so many last night). I'm so excited! I've never been on a cruise in my whole life! We got a pretty incredible deal on it since we planned it last-minute. I can't wait!

I'm supposed to get my glasses tomorrow. Eek.

We're supposed to get our fireplace on Friday. Whoot! I think my parents are going to help us install it the weekend after next . . . so . . . it'll be awhile yet. We've gotta plot it out anyway, though. We probably need a week to work through all the details.

Never a dull moment. Never . . . a dull . . . moment.

Reagan Kennedy

Congratulations to Jody and Ben for having their fourth baby (and second baby girl) just moments ago! Two boys and two girls . . . what a crew!

What Christmas is All About

I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas! I'll tell you what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown: That's what Christmas is all about. Puppies, kitties, babies, love, and family (not necessarily in that order). . . . and puppy smiles. We got to see a significant amount of family this weekend. That was pretty cool. However, we now need a vacation from our holiday experience. I miss bein' a kid around Christmas . . . (and I miss the serious vacation full of eating and sleeping and watching TV and doing nothing). Oh! We have new cell phones now. We also have new cell phone numbers. Apparently, if you have a contract with one company and if you switch to a new company and do pay-as-you-go, you can't keep the same number. We weren't really expecting that. So . . . if you want those new cell numbers, get in touch with us. Our house phone number is the same, though (and will be the same for a long, long, long time). We decided to go to Cingular and get Go Phones with as little as we use the things. Plus, the reception on these things can only be described as INSANELY better than Verizon. Thank God for contracts ending (and now, not having a contract at all). Other than that . . . we've just been soakin' in the holiday season, and I've been tryin' to rip through book 5 of Harry Potter. It's such a sad book . . . Speakin' of sad: Willi and I had received United 93 from Netflix about a week ago, and we haven't been able to bring ourselves to watch it. I think we're just going to send it back without watching it. I don't think we can handle it . . . especially not around the holidays . . .

Christmas Card

That's my way of sendin' Christmas cards. 

Christmas Lights

I had made mention before that my neighbors' house is just crazy with decorations for Christmas. I also mentioned that I might get some photos of it. Well, last night, I did. Check this out:


This is the front—the view we can see from our living room.


This is an angled, side view of the house plus garage. Believe it or not, there are houses on both sides of this house, but you can't see them due to the illumination (and the darkness).


This is our next door neighbors' house. They're the nice people that are always doing nice things for us.


Here's the view from our next door neighbors' house towards our house.


Aaaaand . . . that's our house. We went all out.


Angled view of our house . . .

And there it is, folks.

We're workin' this weekend, so we hope everyone else is having some fun for us.

Chimney Sweep

Okay. After my long, boring post, I'll spice things up a bit with a photo post. It's about time, I suppose.

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This is a photo of Willi after he came down from knocking all the ugly paneling down in the attic. He looked so much like a chimney sweep from Mary Poppins, I couldn't help but to take pictures of him.


As you can see, he's not very happy about it.


Like . . . he's really not happy about it.

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Hobbes has figured out that he's cute, unfortunately.


See what I mean?


It's almost disgusting.


He's gettin' better . . .


So serious . . .


This is a pretty regular thing for Hobbes—looking at someone over the back of the couch.


I couldn't have all those photos of Hobbes and not have one of Hank . . . so, here.

That is all!

Ditka and Dog

Yesterday, Willi had to be gone most of the day from the office to go to an event in Chicago for work. The plan was for me to meet up with him later at Ditka's Bar and Grill (where he'd be in the evening with his vendor Weil-McLain). We realized that we'd not be going home between work and Chicago, so we decided to put Hobbes in the basement all day.

I worried about what he might be getting into while we were at work. I was praying that he didn't bite through an electrical cord that we missed . . . and I was hoping that he wasn't poopin' up a storm down there.

So, the work day ended, and I drove to Chicago to meet Willi. The drive was somewhat rough, and I blame that partially on the fact that I haven't really driven in awhile—especially in Chicago (Willi usually HAS to drive when we're going to work . . . he apparently just HAS to). It went alright, though, I guess . . . no wrecks. I did see something amazing while driving on Lake Shore Drive, though. Check it out:







The pictures don't really do it justice. It was awesome.

I also saw Ditka last night. I didn't run up to meet him. I'm not one to run towards a celebrity and be like, "You need to meet me!"

So, I just stared at him and thought about the fact that this guy has been on Saturday Night Live and movies. It was pretty cool.

He really does look like a bear, though. He's got a perfect cro-magnon head.

It was funny: everyone at Ditka's restaurant was dressed to the nines, and this guy comes waltzin' in wearing a black sweatshirt, black jeans, and wrestling shoes. It was hilarious. He looked comfortable, and he wore a look on his face that said, "Okay. Let's get this over with."

It was pretty cool. I will admit that. I don't mind Chicago so much, either. It's always so weird getting into the city and seeing the different kinds of people walking down those streets near Michigan Avenue. You'll see guys in fedora hats and girls wearing something you'd have seen a girl wear in the 50s. It's crazy. Then, you'll see the lawyers with mullets (I swear I saw one). So different.

We got home faster than it took me to get there. I came from Portage to get there, too.

When we got home, I was certain we'd find a poo-ridden basement 'cause the monster was down there. We opened the door to let him out of the basement so we could take him outside to go pee, and he was squealing. While Willi took him outside, I ran down to the basement to see what the damage was, and much to my surprise, there was NOTHING. That dog held all bodily functions from 7 a.m. to 10:30 p.m., and I'm not really sure how. I was astounded. I believe he might finally be potty trained . . .

Maybe we can start caging him less. We let him sleep in our room last night because he was so good. We may use the cage as little as possible now.

This was Hobbes in the car from last week:


Isn't he just ridiculous with his cuteness?

It's Friday!