Where Do We Go From Here?

The house is a wreck. I've been running here, there, and everywhere this week having some test or other done, and I've managed to keep up with most of the cleaning. But it's been damp out and the dogs have tracked in quite a bit of mud. So it looks dirty. And my mother is coming. To my muddy, dog hair covered house. I'll have to run the vacuum this weekend and whip out my Swiffer and take a coating of dust off the shiny things, swap out sheets, and wash comforters when I figure out who's sleeping where and when...

Sweet Pea is going to be my problem the next couple of weeks. She is a brat. Okay, I've made her into a brat by spoiling her rotten and catering to her every need and whimsy these past five years, never thinking it would turn around and bite me in the butt...but bite me it is...

Our morning routine when I wake up, the dogs all get up, let them out for pee ventures in the dark while I get the coffee brewing and organize my morning goodies: laptop, Bible, journal, coffee. Let the dogs back in, issue treats, vitamins, and chewies, and they all typically chomp away on their nummies in the livingroom before finding their way back to bed until the other folks in the house wake up several hours later. Ruby tucks her great white head back under my bed. Tuck is content either on the couch or he'll jump up on my bed, toss around the pillows and rearrange the blankets, possibly bury a chewie while he's in there for safe keeping. Pea, however demands assistance to be put back up in bed. She can quite easily jump on the futon in the office by herself, or on the couch or loveseat as well. Even so, knowing I am awake and available, she will park herself in the hallway, facing whichever room holds the bed she wants to sleep on, stomp her fat, bow-legged Basset paws, and whine until I come whisk her up and put her back to bed. No one else is allowed to touch her. She even runs from Bill when he's tried to help. Nope--Mama's job.

After my surgery on Monday, I won't be allowed to lift anything heavier than five or ten pounds, including a certain spoiled brat Basset...I can just imagine how well this is going to go over! I can't have her stomping her paw paws in the hall, waking up Grandma with her tantrums--I may just have to quarantine her to the livingroom where she'll have to content herself with the couch or loveseat for my time of incapacitation. The poor thing...how will she survive??