One day of the following week we got the dog, my wife came home to him missing. My neighbor across the street found him. But after awhile he had to go somewhere so he enlisted my next door neighbor who finally returned him to us. He also reported that he howled most of the day.
My daughter had a birthday recently. We decided to get her first bicycle. My wife bought one while she was at preschool a couple a weeks back. We hid it in the back of one of my cars that isn’t running. Since it’s been that way for some time the thick layer of dust over the hatchback provided extra cover so it would not be seen.
I put off assembling it until the day of her birthday. Actually we had to stall opening presents for a little bit while I put it together. Fortunately it went together quickly, I started with the wheels and worked my way up. Everything was going along fine until the seat. It came with a seat, but was missing the post to attach it to the bike.
So we went and got a dog a few weeks ago. We heard about him through a friend who thought it was about a half hour drive away. It turned out to be about an hour. When we arrived everything appeared to be in order. The dog is a cute beagle. He was very friendly and liked the kids. As I talked to the now former owner the kids chased the dog around the yard and played.
When everything was settled we took him over to the animal crate to leave. Something smelled like poop. We checked the kids…Nothing. We checked the dog…he had been rolling around on the lawn and apparently rolled in some poop although most had rubbed off. The previous owner pulled out some baby wipes and we did our best to clean him up, but he still smelled awful.
We then loaded the dog in the crate and put it in the back of the car. Well, I guess we overlooked or brushed aside the fact that beagles howl. They howl when they are happy, sad, just about every emotion. Sad or just upset at the trip, he howled most of our hour trip home while the car smelled like dog poop.
Like many parents, mine attempted to capture all the milestones in a baby book. Mine seems to trail off close to an incident I had with my father’s van.
The street I lived on was a typical neighborhood with houses lining both sides. It was somewhat narrow, but with enough room for cars to park on the street and have two-way traffic. The houses, however, were based a little high. This caused the driveways to be steeper than normal. The garage was small and only fit one car so many families including my father had to park on in the driveway.
Like many young kids I like to play in the car, pretending I was driving, going on trips with my sister and our friends. One such day the neighborhood kids were over and I really got into the spirit of things. So much so that I put the car into neutral, and released the emergency brake. My father’s van rolled down our driveway and I started to panic. We kept going and went straight up into our neighbor’s across the street. I crashed into their car before re-applying the brake. We all bailed out of the van and I ran home to break the news to my dad.
Somehow this one failed to make it in my baby book of “firsts”.
So I needed to build a fence for the backyard. I figured this time I would do it right and buy the right tools. The only problem is I don’t want to pay for the professional tools. So I head on down to the discount tool store. I picked up an air compressor and nail gun.
I then headed to the hardware store to get the lumber. They did not have the post size I wanted so I return home. My wife checked around a few places and found a plumbing store that had the pipe but it was 20ft and they could cut it. When I arrived at the plumbing store they said they would not cut it. That was no matter since the pipe would have cost as much as the tools and lumber combined.
I also decided to build the fence as a gate since I may need to get cars or a motorhome in the backyard so I headed back to the hardware store for more parts. They did not have the hinges I wanted so I bought parts to adapt some. I bought a smaller size post and some other parts and headed home. By this time it was almost 2 in the afternoon.
As I laid out my materials I realized the smallest nails my gun could shoot were 2 3/8″ nails, but the longest I could use with my lumber was 2″ so I headed back to the tool store. As it turns out they don’t sell a gun that can shoot small nails, only long staples. I bought it and got back to work.
After working on the panels for several hours I was done. I stood back to admire my handiwork and noticed I put the hinges on the wrong side.
I had a pet dog named Smudgy when I was about Five. He was a short-haired german shepard mutt that looked like he had a dirt smudge on his nose. He was a great dog. he was always a good sport has I tried to climb on him and ride him like a horse. Of course I never succeeded but he always let me try. Once I took my sister to the park while my parents weren’t looking and smudgy circled us and protected us until my mom found us.
But like many dogs, he had a thing for searching out food or rather things that smelled like food or could be chewed on. As such he rooted around in the neighbors garbage. The neighbor did not like this and put out some radiator fluid which smells like fish. Smudgy drank it. He fell ill and we brought him to the vet. He gave us some pills that we used to have to hide in the food because Smudgy refused to eat them.
One night my dad went out and got us a new a baby sitter. She was nice and fun and even helped us hide the pills in Smudgy’s food. After dinner though, Smudgy stopped moving. The baby sitter did not know what to do. As my sister and I were wailing she took my favorite blanket and covered the body. She tried to console us until a few hours later when my dad came home. That was the last we saw of that baby sitter.
I went over to a friends house this weekend with my wife. They have a pet rabbit. I like animals so I let the rabbit get used to me so I could pet it. Eventually it came around and let me pet it. I did for a few minutes then drew my hand away. The rabbit nudged my hand which I figured ment it wanted more petting since that is what cat’s do. Instead the rabbit climbed onto my hand and attempted to mate.
Like many homes we keep a drying towel on the oven handle. With three kids this is not were the towel stays for long. The other day my wife was cooking dinner and as I walked in I saw flames in the broiler pan of the oven. I asked why my wife had the broiler on. She claimed she didn’t I pulled open the broiler and found this on fire:
At first we could not figure out what it was. Then we noticed our towel missing.
The old adage goes, measure twice cut once. This can be applied to many things, and in my case its more like measure 4 or five times, write it down on two separate pieces of paper, check twice more, then cut.
I wrote a bit ago about losing the cable to connect my camera to the computer. Well, after cleaning up the house, the office, and the car we decided it was time to get the cord ordered. My wife ordered it Friday. Saturday she was fumbling around for something in her scrap-booking bag and found the old cord. Another $30 has been liberated from my checking account.
With so many things always going wrong they tend to blend together. So when something happens that I feel I should write about I first have to write it down. Unfortunately that process has it’s share of problems too. Often times I lose the paper I wrote it on, or the reminder I used doesn’t make sense since I don’t put enough detail into it, or the most common, is my writing is so terrible I cannot even re-read it. Then there is the perfect storm, most of those things happen together.
So the other night my wife was complaining about one of my failed home improvement projects and I thought to write it down. The lights were already off, so I fumbled around for a pen and paper. I guess I should have been a little more picky.