Never a dull moment around here

I've been trying to coordinate life & work and not making much progress. I took the truck into the dealer last week and they finished up on Wednesday. I knew it wasn't cheap and I was right. As there might be children in the room, I won't give you the exact figures, but let's just say there goes my Sony 52 inch Flat Panel HD tv this year. I had a major tune up and the air suspension replaced in the rear. It is one of those gianormus landbarges with a load leveling system that makes it great to pull a trailer. The only problem is that they tend to start to leak after a while and sparky is getting a bit old (9 years). She is running better but I think that one of the rear shocks still has a minor leak and will need to get checked out so I will probably take it back on Tuesday for a follow up. As I said earlier, I have a high level of distrust of auto mechanics and one of the biggest things they can do to loose my confidence is to have to return to refix it. I figure if I am investing my wheels and money in your business, you have one shot to get it right.

Trying to do the taxes but not making much headway. I pay the bills but momma handles the taxes. We hope to have it done before next weekend and are not expecting much of a return. With the current state of affairs, I am surprised we get anything at all, but at least I have a job to pay taxes upon, so that is a good thing.

Finally got the yard cleaned up this afternoon. Lots of pollen/oak in the air so I will be feeling that for a while.

Work is like a three ring circus and I sometimes feel my job is to clean up after the elephants. We are in the middle of testing our software upgrade which means a lot of early mornings/late nights to test the system. I am running tests this afternoon in preparation of a major week long test of the system. Starting tomorrow, we have our first full shake down test of the system to verify everything works. I think we are about 70% solid but there are some big holes to deal with. I have a bad feeling that the test next week will be rather ugly but no one wants to postpone this thing so we will have to soldier on. Should make for a long week.

I am pondering a decision and would appreciate any input from the peanut gallery. I've mentionned several times how much we miss Shadow (ok, it is mainly me). With our son off in college, we have fallen into that empty nester point of our life and it has been quiet around here. With the loss of the dog, it has been rather quiet/depressing around here without some canine antics. I guess momma is leaving it up to me to make that leap and I am pondering getting another one. I am looking at another Golden Retriever and have been reviewing two of the local groups around here who handle rescued dogs. I actually went out to a meet & greet yesterday to see the group and look at some of the available dogs up for adoption. There were a lot of great/beautiful dogs there but I wound up spending a lot of time with one great dog who has had more than his share of bad luck. I was not planning to get back into the pool so soon (or even at all), but we may foster one of the dogs to see if we can handle another one (or it can handle us). One of the groups allows you to foster dogs to help the dogs adjust into a normal life and also see if it is a good fit. Its been quiet around here lately (too quiet) and I sometimes miss the hassles you get with having a pet. This is funny considering that I was the one against getting a dog 13 years ago. Am I nuts? Perhaps, but I am seriously pondering the possibility of another mouth to feed and mutt to walk/pick up after.

Somebody slap me...