My odometer turned

(backdated entry)

Kari and Dirk went out of town this past week to see Cassi, who's playing for the Toronto Rattlers this year until March, when she'll come back home to graduate with her high school class. It all sounds so simple when you put it in a sentence like that, doesn't it? What this meant for me was:

Monday - come home from work, get Hunter and Nana squared away, pack my things and head to Kari's house to petsit for Abby, Maddie, Tobe, and Oliver (the dog they are petsitting), as well as the Major Beefcat Rascals, and Pennies the Petite.

From then on, the week became a blur. Partly because while ALL of these dogs are bed cuddlers, something about the disruption in routine (Tobe is attached to Kari and hadn't ever really been separated from her before) made it such that I went through the week with almost no sleep. The general routine that I've almost managed to block from my memory was to get up around 5 am having slept maybe 2 hours total through the night, get Kari's animals through their morning routine, head to the shop by 6:30 to get things opened, stay there until 8:30 when other staff arrive so that I can now go to my regular job, work all day, swing by the shop on the way home, run by my own house to make sure Nana and Hunter are okay, back to Kari's to get the critters through their evening routine, and then run forth and back between houses, FOP, the shop, errands, and whatever else, fall into bed around 10pm and not sleep for the night until it started over again at 5 the next morning. (Well, it was only the very last morning that we finally got it to be 5 am, and not 3 or 4. My naivete was such that I actually was worried I might oversleep and not open the shop on time every morning, so I brought both of my own alarm clocks thinking my ear would be tuned to them. My only need for an alarm clock all week was to lob it at the Catahoula dropping tennis balls on my head at 3 am.)

Don't they look innocent? Doesn't that huge bed look inviting? Sure - that's how they get you.

However, these two little guys were pretty darned adorable. Oliver (left) is the pug currently on loan, Tobe is the pug/beagle mix that Kari adopted this summer. I didn't know Oliver very well since I'm usually with the large dogs at daycare, but he decided that I was an acceptable port in this storm, and every night these two guys cuddled fervently against me all night long. I was so looking forward to easing my continued back pain by luxuriating in Dirk and Kari's new TempurPedic bed; however, I soon learned that being pinned by a pack of beasts does not allow for any comfort whatsoever, no matter the vast real estate of the bed nor its cost. They need lessons from Michele & Chuck's crew, where six of the 12 resident dogs can pile easily into your one small bed and remain comfortably close but adjust with every move you make without any evidence at all. My theory is that they actually levitate whenever I toss or turn.

Sleeping in my own bed tonight but since Dirk & Kari were delayed on their return, I still have to be over at their place at 6am for the breakfast routine. But somehow in all this I covered both the houses (Nana was a huge help with caring for Hunter and keeping things going at my house), covered both jobs, covered the combined FOP duties, etc.... but if my life were measured by miles I'd be about 240 years old by now. I sure feel it.