Disaster rides a fluffy white dog named after a horse...

Now Playing -
Running Down a Dream by Tom Petty

Life - 

It was all going so (Semi) well.... My mom and brother moved into the basement, our schedules were mostly meshing and we'd even started introducing the dogs to each other without teeth and hair flying.

Then Lindsay and I had to go back to work. We put Ludo and Pooka in their kennels like usual and left. Apparently, Pooka took it upon himself to bark the entire time we were gone, only stopping to drool horribly and bark some more. Great Pyrenees are herding dogs and when we are home, he likes to make the rounds, checking on everyone. I think being locked in his kennel was usually a good thing, he could rest secure in the knowledge that all of the inhabitants were locked up safely. Now that we have people in the basement though, it freaks him out.

We've tried everything. Moving the kennel, insulating it and the room with blankets, lots of toys... nothing doing. So then we moved on to bark collars. All the citronella one did was make his fur lemony fresh and it only rarely heard his bark. Last night, we tried the sonic collar, and from what we can tell, last night was the worst one yet. Pooka barked non-stop and I think the collar freaked him out even more. When we let him out of his kennel, he looked like he'd been doused with a hose and left in a sauna. He was even weak on his feet, desperate for water from all of the barking.

All we have left is the shock collar. If my brother's dog was nice, all we'd really have to do is have the boys sleep downstairs with my mom at nights. It might make him a bit more restless during the days when we sleep, but all would be well. Instead, we'll either have to hope the shock collar works or try and finagle some way of having my momo sleep upstairs with our boys when we're on shift, locking Scout in the basement. It's not super fair to Scout, though she is the reason Pooka has to be locked up when we're gone and someone else is home.

I don't know, I'm kind of at a loss, my wit's end.  Also, my Sony DVD player that I've had without a hitch for over 8 years suddenly decided to stop working yesterday. So much for this move helping my damn karma. Unless karma wants me to get so pissed off and frustrated that I murder a nun.

It's also pretty negative on the transferring front. Both districts would take me, but they can't, thanks to the company's ridiculous Shift Leader Initiative, which will require any store I want to transfer to to lose two assistants rather than one - one to be replaced the useless and horrible shift leader position and then one so that I could come over. The best laid plans........

Writing - 

Trucking along on this, I've made a good revision pass on the first six chapters. I'll likely want to do a second before sending it out, but I'm liking the added scenes so far.

The Last Sentence - 

He didn't want to lose the key, so he carefully threaded it onto the chain around his neck beside the key to his apartment in New York.

From - "The Whispering Ferns" (WIP)