Limitations

Wow, I'm tired. I have pretty much been going non-stop for the past four weeks or so. First there were two weekends working on the bedroom floor, followed by two weekends absolutely crammed full of errands, appointments, family functions, and social engagements. Last weekend involved a long drive out to Kristin's farm in Elgin and yesterday I had another long drive (an hour and a half one way) to a benefit dinner for the special school for autistic children that Baby Zach attends. Before going to the dinner, I had to take Achilles for his annual vet check-up in the morning (he was very good for the vet and got an excellent report card) and then go get my hair done and buy a dress for the event. You would not believe how hard it was to find a decent cocktail dress at the mall. I went to five stores and spent at least two hours before I finally found what I was looking for at Nordstrom. It was worth the effort, though, because the dress I found is awesome. I'm going to wear it again to the annual Lilith Fund benefit dinner this week.

But I digress. I am realizing that I just can't physically do all of the things that normal people can do. A day like yesterday just absolutely wears me out, and after four weeks of similarly busy days, I am about ready to drop from exhaustion. I am dying for a weekend with absolutely no plans and no obligations.

Tug of War

Here I am playing tug of war with cousin Kristin's dog, Ace, out at Kristin's farm on Saturday. Ace loves to play fetch, but he's not so good at letting go of the stick to let you throw it for him again.

Achilles and the new floor

There was one minor problem with the new floor. Last night after I went to bed, I noticed that Achilles seemed to be wanting to jump down off the bed but was afraid to. He hung his chin over the side of the bed for awhile, whimpering. Finally, he jumped down and I realized what the problem was. The new floor is rather slick -- much slicker than the old carpet, that's for sure. When Achilles jumped off the bed, he skidded and slid across the floor into the wall.

He eventually hopped back up onto the bed overnight and then stayed there all day. He wouldn't budge. Not even for breakfast.

This afternoon I ran out to buy a couple of little area rugs to put down next to the bed to give him a non-slip surface to jump onto. He didn't meet me at the door when I got home, which is when I really knew how serious the problem was. He always, always greets me at the door when I come home. I took the rugs upstairs and he was still on the bed, looking scared and forlorn. I put the rugs down and tried to coax him to jump, but he just sat there and shivered. Finally I grabbed his collar and helped him down onto one of the rugs. He was ecstatic. He immediately thanked me with lots of kisses and then ran downstairs to be let outside.

He's a quick learner, because he's been hopping on and off the bed at will for the rest of the day. Poor thing probably thought I was playing a very mean trick on him. I felt so bad when I saw him sitting on the bed, whimpering and shivering, looking forlornly at the floor. Thank goodness the rug thing worked like a charm.

(Almost) Finished!

It was back to work on the bedroom floor today, and it is very nearly done. I still need to fill in the gap along the far wall, but it is going to be a pain. There is only about an inch that needs to be filled in, and even less towards the center of the wall because apparently the room's lines aren't perfectly straight. It won't be easy to cut all of those tiles lengthwise to fit, and there was no way I was going to attempt it today, as by the time I'd gotten that far my hands were so swollen and sore that they were nearly useless. I just moved all the furniture back and will finish it in another week or two.

I'm really happy with it now that the room is basically done. It is most definitely not a perfect job, but it's such an enormous improvement over the nasty old carpet! Once I've done the upstairs hallway and computer room, as well, hopefully over the next few months, I don't ever want to have any carpet anywhere in any house I own for the rest of my life.

Once again, my hands, knees, back, and feet are absolutely killing me, but it was worth it. I'm so glad I finally got going on this project. It desperately needed to be done.