THE TRIP

Monday, the holiday, was another day at work with no computers. Tuesday morning was more of the same, but our new server came Tuesday morning and was working before our afternoon appointments. I never want to do that again. Things seem to have settled down since then. Freezing rain/ice storms will do that to a place.

So, after debating the stupidity of going camping after an icestorm blew through town, curt and I decided our trail-fever was worse than the cabin-fever we would feel if we tried to stay warm and cozy at home. That, and I really wanted to put that backpack of Leeloo's to good use.

So we packed up and headed down to the red river gorge for Leeloo's first backpacking trip. She was ever so proud at the trailhead, all spiffed out with her pack and her z-rest, milking all the attention from the other hikers that they could muster.

It was beautiful out, and there was plenty of time to enjoy it. The ice melted through the afternoon in a beautiful fog. We set up camp, and gave Leeloo her first dinner (I think the extra meals alone are incentive for her, I have never seen a dog so food motivated). Then, we headed out to explore the area a little. Found some beautiful caves and cliffs and trails others have started… the fog wore off in the late afternoon and we got some good views before heading back to camp to make dinner (#2 for Leeloo, oh boy!).

I have needed a trip like this for a while. The winter this year was unpredictable, an freezing rains are not something to get caught in, so our rare chances to get out were often spoiled before we could even hit the trailhead.

After dinner, we all curled up in the tent. Historically, this is where Leeloo tries to bring the tent down, or otherwise explores her environment as a plaything in all manner of inappropriate ways. She also is notorious for not sleeping through the night, but readjusting every 20 min, and when she finally does settle down, snoring vociferously. Last summer, we would camp near the car and when we couldn’t handle it anymore, would merely put her in her kennel next to us; problem solved. But, and this may be due to the fact that she walked 7-8 miles with us…who knows, this weekend she graduated to a full night in the sack with mom and dad. She crashed amazingly well, and a decent night of sleep was had by all (I never sleep well the first night out).

The next day was a wonderful mix of ridgeline, walking by the stream in the gorge, and crossing a loooooong suspension bridge. Leeloo was scared to cross the first time (imagine much crawling and encouragement with gentle pushing from behind, but once we crossed it and she received her victory treat (TREAT?!? Treat! Treat, treat, treat!!!!), she went back across it with no issue what-so-ever. On the way back to the car, we all enjoyed slipping about in the mud and crossing streams. All I can say is that all small dogs should come with a handle. Ingenious!

Once we were home, Curt and I seriously got to business and made a chicken-pot-pie. I have been fiending for one of these for ages. AGES! It was ever so tasty. We are geniuses. Mmmmm. Pot-pie! I will be eating the left-overs for a week! I am so excited.

i'm doing the electric slide...

it is official, we are paperless at work! the last thing to go electronic, our schedule book, has finally gone to that sad, papershredder in the sky. it is not too bad, other than the fact that we have about 20 9am appts booked every dya ubtil the overlap with the old system wears off, and the fact that all our drop-offs: tentative, scheduled, wellness check-ups, surgeries and otherwise are all jumbled together.

then (dut duh duh doom!) the worst thing imaginable happens, total system melt-down: grey screens of death from every computer. at 5pm (our busy last 3 hours of the day). we thickly came to realize that we could no longer: print out drug labels, print out estimates to show owners how much our medications cost, insert medical exam findings, check people out (accept any form of currency including credit cardds), call people to tell them not to come in, look at appointments to find out who is coming in, find out what vaccines a puppy needs, or do anything resembling a functioning hospital. anything. snake severed at the headcomes to mind...

i love banfield!

but in other exciting news, we are taking leeloo on her first overnight backpacking trip next weekend! yaahoo! we promise to take pictures.

happy valentine's day to everyone! (we made duck. QWAAAAK)

knitting!

i don't know what it is, but the crazies have all been out at the vet clinic.

and i've been under the weather, so it is completely amazing that *doot doo doo doo!* i have started knitting again! here are my first pair of finished socks and some gauntlets (fingerless gloves is the new chic term, but whatever) i made recently! soo proud. this yarn was fun, it is a shame that the socks kept getting interrupted by other projects and took me a year. so worth it!

it has also been really cold here. down to 8 degrees and such on a regular basis. and while leeloo is not normally into all that fru-fru dress-up stuff, i did make her wear a coat when we went out hiking as she is not aclimated to being out in this kind of weather. of course, there are no coats her size available at the store, but this one (lab sized) did fit after some very basic taking in of the belly-strap. it even looks fetching under her new backpack! we tried it out one day on our hike at a regional wilderness area! it should work great on longer backpacking trips, once she works up to it!

it has warmed up and become rather rainy here, but no complaints as i haven't scraped my car in a few days! in other news, curt is on neurosurgery this month which means he is very busy, but in constant need of friendly contact. we will try to get him out as much as possible, but if you don't seehear from us, that is why. i will, of course, continue to deal with crazies at work :)