As the title implicates, I am exhausted. I'm not just talking about being a bit tired or stressed, I'm referring to the fact that I'm losing my mind. I haven't slept for more than 4 hours straight in 2 weeks. Why, you ask. Well, between getting a new puppy, Baja, having massive amounts of stress about the new house and thesis, and becoming super ill, I haven't found time for sleep. So, if this post makes absolutely no sense, then I apologize.
So, lets see. Big change #1: Baja. about 3 weeks ago we fostered this cute little heeler/brittany pup from the local shelter. He was only 8 weeks old at the time. Of course, I should have known that Leighton would fall in love. Well, we took him back without too much griping from the gent on a Thursday night. Then, we heard that they needed fosters again on Saturday, so we watched Baja again. However, this time I noticed that from the second I picked him up he was sneezing and had some yellow mucus excretion. The next morning I noticed a ton of worms in his poop. Turns out he had kennel cough and worms. Poor little guy. At least the shelter got him to a vet right away and his health quickly improved. When we dropped him off the second time, we were told that 2 families were interested in adopting him. Puppies always go fast. However, Leighton had fallen so in love that he called the shelter within an hour of leaving him to tell them that he wanted to keep the little guy. Since we had fostered him, they were happy to let us adopt him. Now, let me mention something. I have had pets my whole life...from dogs to horses to hamsters and rabbits. However, the last time that I had a puppy (of my own) was when I was 13. My best friend, Genny's, yellow lab had puppies and my mom allowed me to keep one. Of course I recall my mother yelling at me to make sure Daisy didn't eat everything in the house or outside. However, I don't recall having to get up in the middle of the night to let her pee. Oh yes, that's because I lived in Texas! And dogs can be outdoors year-round (well, we still let them in sometimes when the weather is bad). So, you don't have to worry about taking them out at 3am. Now, Baja is a super intelligent puppy, but his bladder is not so much. I think his bladder has ADD. What's the best way to deal with ADD? "appropriate target goals to guide therapy"---yes, this comes from NIH. Well, that's our goal with Baja....target goal tonight will be 4:30am. I'm hoping he can last that long.....b/c mom is going to go crazy if he can't slowly learn how to hold it all night within the next week.
Okay, I don't want to talk about my dog's potty habits. I will say that within the first 2 weeks of having him, he's already learned to sit, stay, come, shake, "touchdown", turn around, and Leighton is trying to get him to do some weird agility training with chairs. Heelers are interesting dogs. I am working on minimizing the amount that he nips, although I am aware that all puppies nip. Heelers have a larger tendency to do this, hence the name "heeler." I should really refer to them as Australian Cattle dogs. They also have a tendency to run after trucks (at least that has been my experience as well as the experience of others). Thankfully Baja doesn't understand what vehicles are quite yet.
Okay, enough about the dog. I hope you dog lovers are enjoying this. We bought a new house! Yep, we will be permanent Park City residents. We've been taking loads of stuff over to the new place for the last few days and I am really falling in love with it. It isn't huge, but it's a 3 bedroom place in the mountains. I don't think I'll ever feel fully at home in Utah the way that I did in Colorado, but there are worse places to be. I just wish that there was more nightlife and a better culture. But what can ya do? At least some other amazing states are within a day's drive. And the scenery here is still quite pretty. Did I mention that Toll Canyon (the canyon right next to our house) was recently bought by Utah Open Lands? This canyon is a gorgeous area to hike/back-country ski and was privately owned. The owners told the residents that if they collected enough money to purchase the land, then they'd sell it to them for a reduced price (I think about $2 million less) than if they were to sell it to a private person that wanted to develop it. Amazingly residents from the neighborhoods in the area came together and raised several million dollars in order to purchase it! I'm always excited when land is protected, especially land that's basically in my backyard.
Well, I better get back to writing my thesis while the boys are gone. And maybe I'll actually get some rest tonight.....we shall see.
No comments:
Post a Comment