I Promise There is a Good Explanation...

Well it’s almost been a month, and I again have not updated my blog. I could give lots of excuses about work being busy, puppy puddles, moving dates looming, or hospital visits. But I won't. I'll just blog about all that stuff instead...

Work Being Crazy:
I have had lots to do at work. Usually I have a few minutes to work on personal projects to make life a bit easier. I picked up an Excel Visual Basic book so I could program in excel to make some of my daily tasks a bit more....automated. The last three weeks that book has been collecting dust on my desk. Not that it's a bad thing, but I haven't had time to come up for air in a while. However, that makes the work day fly by and I'm actually enjoying it most of the time.

Puppy Business:
Connor finished his fourth obedience school class on Saturday. He's amazingly smart and usually only has to be shown a trick three times before he'll start doing it on his own. In four weeks we have nearly mastered the following tricks:

Sit
Down (lay down)
Let's go (loose leash walking)
Be gentle (he's got mad sharp teeth...and gets overexcited with the treats)
Take it (so he knows when he can take a treat from your hand...gently)
Outside (ring the bell on the door to be let out.)
Leave it (works great on socks and slippers)
Settle (quit running and lay down...still working on this one.)

I've been puppy-sitting this weekend for Jessica while she is out of town and I finally figured out why the "Outside" only worked half the time. Today he went outside three times by ringing the bell, but also whizzed on the floor three times. Notice I say whizzed and not pooped. It finally occurred to me that he was ringing the bell to go poop outside, but not to pee. Then I realized my huge training blunder. The dog always got treats for going poop outside, but not for going pee. So why bother going outside if you aren't going to get rewarded properly? Right? Geez. It’s so much easier to go inside. And the carpet is WAY more absorbent than that stupid grass. Duh. So it looks like he’ll be getting “potty treats” for all occasions. I think he's been training me as much as I've been training him.

Hospital Visit:
I had some weird chest pain about Tuesday that felt like never-ending heartburn. When it still hadn't gone away by Thursday, I saw a doctor during my lunch break on Friday. He took an EKG, (graph of my heartbeat) and they noticed an extra "bump" showing up on the graph. So they sent me to the nearest hospital emergency room for more tests. After another EKG, a cholesterol test, a blood pressure test, blood samples, and a chest X-ray (these guys don't mess around) they found out that the sack around my heart was inflamed and needed some massive quantities of Ibuprofen to bring down the swelling. So no worries, there isn’t anything wrong with me…just a little tender at the moment. However, I can't complain about playing four hours of Sudoku in the hospital instead of working on a Friday.

Moving in a Week:
Next week I'll be relocating to a new apartment. I haven't even started packing yet. In fact I'm procrastinating right now. Thus the reason for the huge blog post. Luckily my family is driving up for the weekend to help me move the larger items in their truck. I don't think I can get the sofa down a flight of stairs on my own. I don't know how I manage without them sometimes. I also promised to keep the beer flow going over the weekend as a bribe...

Updated Myspace Page:
If you haven't seen it yet you may want to have a look at my new Myspace page. It's been completely decked out with the help of a pretty cool template. Drop me a line and let me know what you think.

So I think that wraps up what's been keeping me away from the blog lately. I know you probably won't hear from me next weekend, but I'll update everybody soon with the new address information...as soon as I have an internet connection again. Ugh. Something else I need to do...take care of utilities.