Jan 13 - 19

Being normal is not something my wife and I are used to. Raising special needs kids, and now that they are adults, you learn to adapt, but things are not what you would see in a normal household. When you add Cooper and Phoebe (the 2 crazy dogs) to the mix, it doesn’t get any more normal. In other words, our house is complete “chaos”.

So to remedy this living arrangement, every few months, my wife and I get away. The other night we rented a little cottage up in Nevada City to hopefully see normality. We go for a walk, we go out for lunch and dinner and we watched some TV. Just before we go to bed, my wife looks at me and says, this is not our normal. I need normality. So, first thing this morning we got up early and packed up and came right home.

Of course once we get home we both wondered, why did we come back?

Jan 6 - 12

Do you ever think we had weak moments when we decided to have children or pets? The newborn baby is so cute, but as it is awake all night, you think, did I think of all of this?

Now the child reaches the terrible twos and again you question your decision-making.

Ok, now they are a teenager and know everything about everything, and you can't tell them anything. Again, do you question yourself?

Now you decide you want a puppy. After all, they are so cute. Like the baby, they are up all night, but at least the baby wears a diaper. Now the puppy has chewed off the leg of the kitchen table. Again, do you question your logic?

Now, you try and leave the puppy alone in a room and it howls for attention. Or like Phoebe, it sees its reflection in the glass door and screams because it thinks someone is trying to break in, so you open the door to show her there is no one there and she takes off out the door.

At this point, do you question your decision-making abilities? I don't even question my decisions, I know (oops, I can't put in print what I am really thinking) how lucky I am.

Dec 30 - Jan 5

I decided I am going to Amazon to search for and purchase a DNA detector. I hate it when I find a substantially large surprise and can't figure out which dog it is from. This way, I know who the culprit is. I have cameras in the house because my son used to, and still does, sneak snacks, but the dogs seem to be aware of where the cameras are located and only do their business in camera-free zones. Next time we get dogs, I will make sure they're not smarter than me.

I hope everyone had a nice Christmas. I, for one, am exhausted.

Have a wonderful New Year!

Dec 23 - 29

So every night my wife and I try and take the dogs out to do their business around 6 pm and then again at 9 pm, before we go to bed. Now most of the time it is a struggle to get them to do anything. I try all types of things even singing them potty songs in hopes that they will complete their mission. When they finally go, I feel like I have accomplished a miracle. So the other night after about 5 minutes they both went at the 6 o’clock time. Then at 8:30, we took them out again. This time my singing proved to be fruitless. So at 9:00 we went out again, and after 10 minutes, I gave up because they just sat there and stared at me. So I let them in and put them to bed, but I was very nervous because we let Cooper sleep on our bed with us. We apparently made it to 5 am and I took them out and after some time they did their business. So I started thinking that Cooper went 11 hours without an accident, and I am oh so envious.