#1 Son Enjoying the Benefits of Halloween - Halloween 1988

Word of the Day

Discombebopulate - To be in a state of confusion as a result of loud car music, thereby causing one to lower the car stereo volume in order to better read a an address number on a house or building, or to pay a toll.

Gypsy had her first "accident" in the house. *sigh* My fault. She was playing happily at my feet while I was folding clothes and .... oops ... If I'd been REALLY watching her maybe I would have seen her "tell". What I do know is that I'm sure this wouldn't have happened if I'd been watching better. Well...at least she now knows that piddling inside the house isn't going to draw praise and adulation. I swatted her little behind and took her right outside. Then I cleaned up the piddle and sanitized. She got to sit outside...all alone...without company until I finally relented and brought her back inside to be with me.

As far as the rest of her housebreaking, she is doing just fine at night now. I put her to bed last night at around 9 PM and she was just fine when I got her up at 6 AM. She's lasting the entire night now. Unfortunately, she doesn't vocalize at all. No barking. Very little whining or crying. She needs to tell me that she has to go outside somehow. All my other dogs used to tell me that they had to go outside. Maybe my Mom will have some suggestions.

We got an acceptable estimate for the repair work on our back patio ceiling. The guy that was a "no show" finally showed up yesterday. His estimate came in at about 1/3 of the cost of the other estimates...even when we weren't comparing apples with oranges. HTP and I decided that we could do the actually painting ourselves after all the drywall and texturing is completed. The main mess will be all the scraping, taping, doping, caulking and texturing work. The guy explained that drywall really shouldn't be used outside because humidity will loosen the drywall tape and dope which is water soluble. He said that we shouldn't have a problem again if we make sure and paint every three years. Only, the thing is, the ceiling started to fail while the house was still under warranty. We noticed the drywall problem on our initial walk-thru and thought it had been repaired. I suspect the builder just slapped a band-aid on the problem and camouflaged it. HTP and I think it's because there was so much rain during the time they were working on that aspect of the patio. I don't think the tape ever adhered properly in the first place. We noted that there are other houses near us with the same problems. I think I'm going to call our HOA and find out just how many of this same problem my other neighbors may be having. Oh well...we're still taking care of the problem. HTP and I always save all our receipts when it comes to home repair and improvements.

Murphyism of the Day

Gerhard's Observation

We're making progress. Things are getting worse at a slower rate.

Noteworthy Quote of the Day

As long as we respond predictably to what feels good and what feels bad, it is easy for others to exploit our preferences for their own ends.

-- Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi