the more things change the more they stay the same

Help me remember this evening, Internet. I went out of the house to a local SCA baronial meeting and .... had a genuinely good time for several hours in a row. I did it all with people in the flesh who I spoke to using my words instead of my keyboard. And no one goobed on me and no one was making chainmail keychains and no one kissed my hand (HATE the hand kissing!).

I know that a lot of my frustrations with the SCA are all about me and my choices for my free time and no one else's problem. So when I have a good time and at the end of the day think, "yeah, I would do this again if given the opportunity" I feel like I should pat myself on the back just a tiny bit.

I helped a lady make a hood pattern and I learned how to fingerweave (but still need to practice) and I chatted with friends and topped it all off with french toast for dinner! I call that a success!

We're going to University this weekend and I mailed off a pre-registration for a local event in November this afternoon. We're going to stay for feast, people! We never stay for feast! Someone feel my forehead, there might be something wrong with me! I can't stop using exclamation points!

So all this excess punctuation comes with a tickling feeling that I should be helping out more locally. I feel the pull to donate prizes for the upcoming event or help some folks make more outfits soon. I just need to rein that in a little bit for now. Because while I have a lot of enthusiasm right now I want to hold onto that feeling a bit longer and not replace it with angst and stress (which I'm really good at).

Forgive me if I keep my ideas on t-tunic designs to myself for a bit longer, but I'm cautiously optimistic. This may be the beginning of another try at medieval re-enactment and I want to take things slow. No hand-kissing until at least the third date.

catching up while trying to stay in the moment

I'm writing this from the middle seat of a flight back from Connecticut because it's the only time I've had more than 15 minutes to digest anything and put words to "paper." I could tell you how I haven't really disappeared and how I've been on Twitter and I've been really busy, but the excuses are all the same, so let's just be happy we're back together now. Since last we met our hero, I've been spending a lot of time playing with our new dog and fretting about pretty much everything else to one degree or another. The new dog Mollie, she really is quite spectacular. I convinced the Puddin' to let me sign her up for a dog obedience class that also comes with two months of doggie day care. So when we go to work in the morning, Mollie goes to "school" and in two months our dog will be able to fight crime. We'll see if she gets a cape and mask by Thanksgiving.

In the angst venue, it's nothing horrible, just me being a fret-monster about all kinds of stuff. Should we add onto the house or move? If we move how much house can we afford? When the lease is up on my car what should I replace it with? What should we replace Rich's truck with, if anything and when? Is Sarah's super expensive arthritis medicine helping her or is it just the glucosamine? How do we let Ms. Kitty snack whenever she wants while keeping Ms. Kitterson from becoming even more of a sausage with legs? How do we reconcile my compulsive tracking of money versus Rich's more laissez-faire attitude about day-to-day finances with our desire for us to share a bank account and be a team? Should I keep trying to grow my hair out longer because my stylist assures me it will be great even though I'm a horrible long hair caretaker and constantly pull it back into a ponytail at every possible moment?

It's a wonder I can sleep at night, particularly with two cats and a 55 pound puppy sharing our bed.

Even with my lengthy list of "problems," life is still really really good. I think I'm just feeling a little out of sorts. The unseasonably warm weather has put me in a mood, despite my tendency to be freezing in anything less than 70 degrees. We're moving all of our office (and phone lines and internet lines and office furniture and pin ball machines) to a new location at the end of the month and coordinating that has been both fun and exhausting, and it makes me mindful of how a move of our house would be as well.

But to temper my list of worries, some things have been pretty cool. Next month is my parents' 40th anniversary and their relationship is a testament to partnership in the face of everything life brings. I just spent all day looking at rare manuscripts and taking photos of artifacts while touring one of the largest special collections libraries in the country. The Puddin' and I are talking about all our house decisions as a team and that has a really good feeling to it. Last month we raced $100,000 cars around a track just like go-carts as a team-building exercise for work (I've always wondered if you could take a corner at 70mph). And I'm really looking forward to NaBloPoMo this November since it was so much fun last year.

I just need to remind myself to enjoy the days that are happening now and not fret so much about tomorrow.

the circle of life in dog years

Thursday morning I was standing in front of the tub with the water on, about to step inside when Rich called up to me from the bottom of the stairs, "Baby, I need your help. The dog can't stand up." Well, I'm not sure what that means, but I'm pretty sure it requires clothes. I turned the water off and headed out to the backyard to find Sarah standing just outside the back door shaking like a leaf. Rich had helped her stand up but she was unstable and spooked. Her back left leg was sticking out to the side and she wouldn't move. Meanwhile, Mollie the spaz puppy was going in and out the back door over and over and over as if to prove that her legs were working just fine in case anybody was wondering. I eventually had to pick Sarah up and carry her inside and set her down in the living room. She lied down, panting, and seemed exhausted. I went back upstairs to shower and spent the whole time in the shower thinking I would be getting dressed and going to the vet with my dog.

After my shower, though, she seemed to be doing better and could walk around in the house. We left her while we went to work and she made it outside on her own and back inside at lunch when Rich went to check on the dogs. She has good days and bad, it seems, and this was just a rough morning for her.

I left early for my nail appointment at 4:30 since at 4:15 I had snapped my left index fingernail off closing the trunk of the car and could no longer type. Because of various scheduling issues and getting a new set of nails, I didn't leave the salon until 7pm. This was just enough time to get gas before going to the local SCA meeting to help with sewing projects.

I stopped to get gas and as I was pulling out of the station, Rich called to tell me Mollie had gotten a dog bone stuck on her jaw and he needed help finding a tool to get it off. Something told me I wouldn't make it to the SCA meeting. I headed the two miles home to find a very anxious doberman pacing in the living room and my husband holding a hacksaw in the dining room.

"Uh, I think I'd just rather take her to the emergency vet." "Can you just look at it?" "She is scared already. I'd rather pay someone else to fix it rather than make it worse and traumatize the dog."

I later found out he had already tried wire cutters and several other tools before calling me, so I guess any trauma had already been done. We headed in separate cars to the ER vet (Rich had a hockey game later that night) and they took her straight back. Forty-five minutes and $134.80 later, the dog was a little doped up but fine. They had to sedate her and cut it off with a dremel tool, so I'm glad we didn't try that at home. This is what it looked like on the way to the vet (yes, you know you're a blogger when you point your camera in the back seat to document the dog's mishap online).

We got a young dog for our old dog thinking it would add years to her life. While that seems to be working well, our old dog (with her new arthritis medicine) has been overexerting herself a bit and paying the price. Meanwhile our young dog is, well, being young and sometimes that means going to the ER vet instead of the meeting you had planned on attending. I told my mother it's like having a young kid and an elderly parent in the same house at the same time. They both like to play together, but we're doing a lot of tending to both of them right now. We'll see how long we can last with neither of them in diapers.