One Month

Well, it's been a month since I said goodbye to my Quigley. It's been a month of ups and downs, but I find myself feeling okay most of the time. I am lucky to have great friends and family to support me and help me through the tough times. There are little things I miss though. Nobody barks at the door to go outside anymore . . . Quigley was the only one to do that. These guys just go outside whenever I remember to let them out. And I can actually leave things on the counter without worrying that they will go missing. The two remaining dogs can be left in a crate without me wondering how they will escape. There's nobody softly snoring on the back of the couch while I check my email, read a book, or watch TV.

Farley and Billy are truly doing their best to fill the hole in my heart. I am lucky to have these guys to keep me busy. I know this has been tough for Farley - he has been quieter and less active since Quigley left. Billy, however, acts like nothing has changed. He is the Energizer Bunny, that's for sure.

The big news around my place is that I have decided to find Billy a new home. Many people would read this and think that I'm a horrible person. Some people would even venture to tell me that (not in so many words, but . . . ). Yes, Billy is happy with me. Billy is happy with anyone. He loves me, but that doesn't mean he can't love somebody else. Billy is not a good fit with my family - he is so active and energetic, and with me working all day, he doesn't get the exercise and attention that he deserves. He is not neglected, but he needs to be kept busy. He absolutely adores children, and he should be somewhere that he can hang out with them whenever he wants to. Also, I have to think as a breeder too. I no longer have a female to work with as far as breeding goes. The female that I co-owned with friends came down with health iussues and had to be spayed. So that avenue is closed to me. My household has a strictly enforced limit of 2 dogs, and since I don't pay the mortgage, I have to follow that limit. Billy is a lovely dog, and I would hope that he would make some very nice puppies. But without a girl to breed him to, I am stopped in my tracks. Hence the dilemma I have faced in recent weeks.

So I talked to some friends, and as fate would have it, a good friend of mine had a friend looking for a well-bred black and tan male. We started emailing, and voila! Billy has a new mom. He won't be going until early October, so that I can try and finish his championship (just 2 more points!). This way I can spend some quality time with him before he goes.

The new home is Puppy Heaven. There are kids there, and another dog, too. And enough attention for at least 5 dogs, but all given to him (by his new mom). She is over the moon, and although I know it will be sad to let him go, I couldn't be happier with this home. It's exactly what I wanted for him.

People can think of me what they will, but in my heart and head, I know that this is the right thing to do for Billy and I.

Geeks of the world . . . Untie!

Okay, this post is just going to prove how much of a geek I am. But most of the people that read this blog on a regular basis already know that :)

The other day, my mom bought me a present. A new book. Now, I love to read, so any new book gets me excited. But I have been wanting this particular book for quite some time. I had been trying to hold off on buying it, so somebody could get it for me for Christmas. Luckily for me (I have NO patience), I didn't have to wait that long. The book in question? Lynne Truss' "Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach To Punctuation." So far I have only read the foreward and the introduction, but it is a great book! Since I consider myself a budding writer, proper punctuation is important to me. And the fact that it is presented in a humorous and straightforward manner just makes this book even better!

Believe it or not, this book was a #1 New York Times bestseller, so apparently I'm not the only closet punctuation geek out there.

I look forward to sharing my thoughts on this book when I'm done. It appears to be a light read, so I should be able to polish it off in a few days or a week. Watch here for the review!

Fun Times

Well, I have to say, I didn't know being feminine could be so much fun! I've been in a bit of a panic lately, because I have this beautiful dress to wear to my friend's wedding, but I am a total loser when it comes to makeup. I can do the absolute basics (powder application, mascara, lip gloss), but anymore than that is a real challenge for me. I don't want to wear this fabulous dress but look like drek, so I asked a good friend of mine for some help. Like a champ, she came through for me.

We had a blast today! We went to Shopper's Drug Mart and bought the essentials . . . I didn't even know brown eyeshadow came in so many shades! I had fun "learning" some of the basics, especially from somebody who really knows. Then we went to Moxie's for lunch (okay, not a necessary step, but I was starving), and just had fun chatting. We never run out of stuff to talk about, and we always have a great time. Then we came home and "made me up." It wasn't nearly as hard as I thought it would be, and I actually think I looked pretty good.

Then I put the dress on, and we did a photo shoot. Granted, the sun was in my eyes (so I look like I'm making a face in all the pictures), but my shoes looked HOT! I am doubly proud, since not only did I apply my own makeup, but I walked through the house, onto the deck, and down onto the lower level in my new shoes. Without falling, tripping or breaking the heels. Not bad for this self-proclaimed slob.

I don't feel comfortable posting a picture of me in the dress on my blog, so feel free to email me if you'd like to see a picture. Or ask Vicky to share it with you - I did send it to her!

PS I haven't washed the makeup off, cause I am just feeling so glamorous!

MORE Shopping!

Okay, I have to say that my tolerance for clothes shopping is never very good. But today I tried to find a top to match the most insanely coloured skirt EVER. It was so cute when I bought it - bright pink with a sort of paisley print. But I'll be damned if I can find the right top for it. I think my mom and I went into every store in Fort McMurray today (granted, we have very limited shopping) and I tried on many, many tops. I discovered that Reitman's has the most whacked out sizing scheme ever . . . NOTHING fits! I was feeling sort of whale-ish by the end of it all. I did find a top, and I think it will be nice, but today was just exhausting.

So, at an East Indian wedding, apparently you're supposed to wear a different outfit for each part of the wedding. I found this out yesterday . . . but I guess I should be grateful that I found out at all. Friday night is the Mendhi party for the groom (my friend) and his friends and family. Luckily this won't be too formal, so I can wear the top and skirt outfit that got completed today. Then on Sunday, I need two outfits. One for the ceremony, and I'll be wearing my new dress to the reception that evening. This will be more dressing up than I've done ever. Hopefully there will be pictures to prove that I actually can look nice once in a while ;)

So Business Law is done . . . and my MBA is slowly drawing to a close. I actually only have 3 courses left to do now. One is an independent study course in the fall, which results in a 25-30 page paper. One is probably another kind of economics course (I'm not 100% sure) that will be delivered in the standard format (lectures, exams, etc). And then our "Capstone" course in the winter session is a paper, a presentation, and another paper after a trip to Houston. The trip is optional, but they highly recommend it.

It's hard to believe that I'm almost done. I can't wait to have FREE TIME!!!!!!

Really, it's interesting!

So, I re-read my last post, and I realized that nobody would ever believe me that Business Law is interesting. Heck, before the course started I was planning ways to keep my eyes open for 8 hours of law lectures. But I swear on a stack of bibles (which is legal, by the way) that the class is really interesting. The fact that the prof looks like Mister Bean definitely helps . . . and he kind of talks like a Valley girl, what that upward lilt at the end of every sentence. And he has one wicked sense of humour!

I got another very sweet gift in the mail today. I am totally awed by the kindness and generosity of people. My friend from Texas (the one that lives in San Antonio) sent me a beautiful memorial coin, in memory of Quigley. Very thoughtful, and something else to make me cry. But it will be something nice to have, for sure.

I went shopping with my mom after school today (wow, does that sound juvenile or what?). I am attending a wedding over the Labour Day weekend, and I have no nice clothes or shoes to wear. Living in Fort McMurray, the options are HUGELY limited, so I wasn't holding out a lot of hope for finding anything. The first shop we went to had a dress that looked awesome on the hanger, and like a garbage bag on me. I guess being overweight does not make clothes look better. So I was feeling sorry for myself and kind of depressed. But my mom convinced me to plow forward, and so we did. We went to a shoe store. Oh my goodness, apparently when you wear size 9 WIDE shoes, nothing pretty fits your feet. All I could find were big, clunky (comfortable) shoes that would not look nice with a dress. UGH.

At the third store we hit paydirt (well, considering the prices, THEY hit paydirt). I found a beautiful (and unique) brown dress that I am sure nobody else will have. I also found some wonderful new shoes (made in Italy, copper coloured and so sooooft) and a pretty Swarovski crystal necklace. Thank goodness my mom was treating! I will hopefully be wearing the same dress for my grad dinner in the spring . . . so some of you might actually see pictures of me wearing it.

It's nice to have a shopping story that actually turned out well. Doesn't happen often for me!

Business Law . . . Interesting!

Well, I have to admit that when I looked at the course outline, my first thought was "how am I going to stay awake all day talking about law?" But today we had our first two units (a whole day of classes) and it was actually really good! I feel like I learned a lot, and actually enjoyed the lecture too. Thank goodness I hadn't really gotten a head start on that paper - the topics that the prof handed out aren't even CLOSE to the outline I had. So sometimes procrastination pays. And just like with trying to eliminate a bad habit in my dogs, that rarely rewarded bad habit has just been HUGLEY rewarded, so trying to get rid of the bad habit is even tougher.

I have a really bad headache today . . . so I guess it's official that the IV treatment done last week wasn't as effective as we'd hoped it would be. As in, it wasn't effective at all. Sigh. All those pincushion treatments for naught. Oh well . . . I'm going to give it more time before I write it off completely, but it means suffering through headaches for a few days.

Mom and I went for a walk with Billy . . . she's looking at peoples' front yards, trying to get ideas for what to do with ours. I'm simply trying to tire Billy out so I can have a half hour to work on school stuff without having to jump up and take a kids' toy away from him, food wrappers, or something else. He enjoyed the walk, but isn't really that tired. Damn!

Guess I should go get some reading done. With a week long course, procrastination takes place in units of minutes, not days ;)

What a day! Whew!

Holy smokes, when your mother asks for help with a few chores around the house, run like hell! Or at least, if MY mother asks for help, definitely run as fast and as far as you can! The other day she mentioned that she needed some help with stuff around the house, so I agreed to lend a hand. What a huge mistake LOL

Mom rented a U-Haul cube van so we could do a couple of trips to the dump. I was thinking, oh some garbage around the yard or whatever. Yeah right! My brother and I hauled THREE couches (heavy, heavy, heavy) and an armchair, as well as debris around the yard and a rabbit hutch to the dump. Oh yeah, and a lawn mower and an old BBQ. It was a lot of work! My arms are still sore from the IV sites, so I was feeling just wiped right out. Sweating like a pig (I know, I know, I'm such a lady LOL) Anyhow, my brother and I had fun at the dump, tossing stuff all over the place. For some odd reason, we found it really hard to "toss" the couches very far, but we had plenty of fun anyhow.

Then we had to pick up my elliptical machine from my friend's house. This friend has been out of the country since early May, and I bought the machine a couple of weeks prior to that, and I still hadn't picked it up. Yeah, I'm embarassed. Anyhow, we picked it up today, and just MOVING it was a work out! It weighed a freaking ton! It was at least as much work as the three couches. We were both aching after that.

THEN . . . yes, not done yet . . . my brother and mother trimmed umpteen branches off the maple tree out front. I was personally a little disgusted with still being working at like 2:30pm, so I was inside, hiding with my niece. We were watching the most thrilling Disney movie called "Ice Princess." Ick, totally Disney. TOO Disney, in fact. So our last load to the dump was a cube van FULL of branches and leaves. They're not fun to toss either . . . with all the branches and stuff, they don't get any air at all.

So now I'm tired . . . soaked in the hot tub for a while, and am going to bed nice and early. Tomorrow I have a paper to work on, dogs to groom, and stuff to do. Let's see if I get even half of it done ;)

Away, but not gone . . .

Sorry I've been absent lately. I'm feeling bad for not posting in a few days, but I was, shall we say, indisposed. As those of you that know me well know, I get headaches on a very regular (essentially daily) basis. I've been seeing a neurologist in the city that recommended this IV treatment to break the cycle. Basically I go to the hospital twice a day and get IV treatments. The first IV site was in my right wrist, and I had to wear a splint, so I could hardly type at all, let alone update the blog. Last night they had to move the IV to my left arm, which seemed like a good site, but it "came out" overnight, so I have a new IV site in my left wrist. Tonight is my last treatment, and I can NOT wait!

Farley's also been under the weather - he's had the runs for a week now, poor guy. I did take him to the vet on Tuesday, but the bloodwork was all good, well within the normal ranges. So he's on a treatment which seems to be helping. The two of us make a fine pair!

I know I'm copying my friend, but here are some blogs that you should visit:

Visichy - my good friend Vicky's blog, it is a hoot to read! (http://visichycockers.blogspot.com)
Rokairan - Vicky's sister's blog, it is extremely well-written and interesting. When the new TV shows start in the fall, I imagine she will start her reviews again (http://rokairan.blogspot.com)

Those are two blogs I visit every day, checking for updates. They're well worth reading. I get plenty of inspiration from Vicky's blog, but I don't want to copy ALL of her ideas in one post, so I will keep this entry short ;)

Thanks to everybody that visits and reads . . . I'm glad somebody thinks my writing is worth reading on a regular basis!

What a beautiful gift

I came home from work today to see a large box sitting on the dining room table. I wasn't expecting anything large, so I was curious as to what it might be. I was surprised to see it addressed to me, from a company called "TreeGivers." I kind of had a vague idea of what it was (not sure how many options there are with that kind of company name), but was still in the dark for the most part. So I opened the box. And once I took the newspapers and tissue paper off the item inside, I cried like a baby.

Two of my very special friends had a tree planted in memory of my Always Angel Quigley. It is being planted in Alberta, and I think it's a wonderful way to complete the circle of life. From Quigley's death comes birth . . . and that is exactly my kind of thing. There is a framed certificate, and a lovely note that was included as well. Now every time I drive through the province of Alberta and see a sapling, I will wonder if it's Quigley's tree.

Thank you to two VERY special ladies . . . this gift has truly touched my heart.

Not Much Is New

Not much is new lately, however, in the interest of posting regularly, I thought I'd write something. Should be real entertaining for you to read . . . but whatever.

I have had a supremely lazy weekend again. Of course, I have NOT worked on my paper at all. Luckily there are several hours to go until the weekend is officially over, so I still have time to change that. And I DID do some reading for the Business Law course, so I haven't totally wasted my weekend :) How's that for NOT procrastinating 100% (oonly about 95%).

I did get Billy groomed up too. I usually groom him on Sundays, after we've been to the off leash park, but he jumped into the hot tub on Saturday night, so he got done then. BRAT! It's really getting old now, it's not funny or cute. It's just a royal pain in the butt that I have to change all plans and groom my dog (don't get me wrong, I didn't actually have plans, but I could have . . . sometimes I do have a life). I used a different shampoo and conditioner combo this time, just to see how it would work, and I'm not quite as happy with it. Guess we'll go back to the usual. It's just that I have so many bottles of stuff that I thought I should try something new.

Farley has the trots . . . I had a moment of severe panic last night, thinking that this could really be something serious. I would assume that once you have one pet get sick and pass away, you go through a period where you think everything is majorly serious. However, his attitude is still good and he's not dehydrated, so I'll try to get him in to the vet tomorrow, and take it from there. I tend to worry more than necessary, so it's probably nothing, but I'll let my vet make that call. After all, I haven't seen them in a couple of weeks . . . I'm starting to miss the place ;)

Not much else to tell . . . just wanted to try and be more regular (no, not THAT kind of regular, you smart ass!)

Keeping Busy

Well, in all honesty I'm not keeping *that* busy, but I should be. School starts again in a couple of weeks, and I have a nice big paper that I could be preparing for. But somehow I keep managing to put it off. Anybody that's read much of this blog knows that I am the queen of procrastination, and this assignment will be no different. The paper is for a Business Law class that I will be taking (a week-long intensive course), and if I was smart, I'd get a head start on it. But there are good shows on TV, good books to be read, and good stuff to surf around for on the 'Net. So I have yet to do any actual work yet.

The boys are doing fine. It's still weird for me to say the boys and mean only two boys instead of three. The numbers feel off now, as if the order in the house has been disturbed. I'm hoping to convince my mom to let me bring in a third dog (you know, to restore order to the galaxy) but I'm not holding out a ton of hope. We'll see - so far this is a work in progress. By no means do I think that I could EVER replace Quigley (give me some credit please), but I think a new dog would keep my mind off of things. Of course, training Billy would accomplish the same thing, but a new puppy would be WAY more fun!

I got a new CD yesterday, it's a Broadway musical soundtrack. Definitely not for young kids, it's called "Avenue Q." It's a RIOT! Very racy stuff, but pretty funny and the tunes are catchy. For anybody that is into musicals at all, I highly recommend it. I got it for a good price on eBay, so you don't have to spend a lot on it either. It seems to be a take on Sesame Street (with puppets and everything), but definitely NOT Sesame Street content.

Other than that, not much is new. Work has slowed down a bit, since the people I was covering for are both back. That definitely makes my life a bit easier. I've had enough to keep me on my toes, but not enough to make me feel stressed. Just the way a job should be :)

Well, this will be a short post . . . just wanted everyone to know that I'm surviving. Thanks for all of the emails and notes about Quigley, it really has helped me a lot.

The "Happy" Basket

Well, I have to say that yesterday was one of the toughest days I have had to make it through. Granted, I'm young, and haven't suffered many losses in my life (thankfully my parents are still both with me, as is my brother and all of my close friends). But still, Quigley was a family member, and letting go was not easy. I knew it wouldn't be.

I am a member of several online groups for Cocker Spaniel owners, and the outpouring of love and support was amazing. Not only were there messages posted for Quigley and I, but I received many private messages and emails. It sounds corny, but I could almost feel their prayers holding me up. I'm not a super religious person, by any stretch of the imagination, but I do believe in God and the power of prayer. For me personally, yesterday just cemented that. I have belonged to these groups for several years, so some of the people are as close to me as the friends that live right here.

One friend and her husband made me up a "Happy" basket. Tons and tons of delicious chocolates, a very cute purple jewelled notebook and matching pen, and two Adam Sandler movies. Happy Gilmore (which I had recently told them was one of my favourite movies of all time) and Billy Madison. It was such a thoughtful and loving gesture, and I was touched by it.

Farley was pretty subdued when I got home from work. We brought him to the vet clinic with us, because I thought it was only fair that he get a chance to say goodbye as well. He has lived side by side with Quigley since he was 8 weeks old, so this is a big loss for him too. I know he's grieving, and it makes me sad. But I am so thankful that I have him to hold close and cuddle with. He still wants to play with his toys (that's so ingrained it will never change), but he spent a lot of time very close to me as well.

Even Billy was changed somehow, although I can't put my finger on it. He tends to be oblivious to most stuff, but he was slightly calmer yesterday. Only slightly though . . . I don't want to go overboard.

July 2006 has been a month that will go down in my personal record books as one of the worst days ever. That being said, at least I got the month to spend extra time with Quigley and spoil him more than normal. I'll always be thankful for that.