Point Taken...

Louie disappeared this evening. 

For all intents and purposes, he is all black, so seeing him beyond the swingset is near impossible.  One minute he was there, the next minute he was gone.  Jason started the search, but when I laughingly came out and asked if he'd found Louie and he said "No," I joined in. 

I was searching close to the house and realized that as grown up as Charlie is, we really couldn't both be out and about searching, so I went in -- Charlie quickly let me know that I was not his preferred parent of the moment, so I grabbed Otis and sent him on a recon mission then sent Jason inside.

While Otis happily chased Oakley, I scoured the perimeters of our house, Bob's house and Garret's house -- as far as Louie had ever been, but I kept hearing a high-pitched barking from up near Butternut.  So, certain that that was Louie calling for me, stuck in some hole or something, I headed up the mud road and into the brush...in my flip flops...without my cell phone. 

After about fifteen minutes I heard Jason yelling for Louie and realized he'd successfully put Charlie down and was back on the hunt...not a good sign.  A dozen puddles and a ditch later, after stopping many times when the barking stopped, waiting for it to start up again, I gave up and began the trudge home, picturing Jason's, Charlie's and even Otis' faces when Louie still wasn't back by tomorrow. 

I realized that as annoying as it is to have to take him out in the rain every 30 minutes and still clean up his messes as soon as we come back in, I've grown to love the little critter over the past week. And as territorial and spoiled as Otis is, he would be lost without him...not to mention Charlie.  Jason would probably take it best of any of us, and it's his dog.

About one hundred yards from home I saw Jason shining his flashlight my way.  I glumly shined mine at him...hoping he realized it wasn't a sign of success, hating the thought of him believing I'd found Louie when in fact I'd just given up.

Then Jason yelled, "I've got him".  I was stunned.  I was prepared to learn and suffer from all the lessons having to do with neglecting our pets by looking away for a minute and not having a fence and the trauma this would cause Otis and Charlie, etc...but Louie was found!

He'd been in Bob's garage the entire time!  Did I mention that I saw the pedestrian door open and was going to look, but got distracted by the distant dog barks.  Yeah...

So, Louie's fine.  My OluKai's are quite possibly ruined.  Otis and Charlie are pleasantly sleeping.  And me, well I realized that as annoying as dog pee is, Louie is one of the family and I wouldn't have it any other way.

The genius figuring out the dog bowl

The genius figuring out the dog bed

Our Louie

A new strategy...

I need some advice...as crazy as it sounds, lately I've found myself envying people who "get" to go to a job every day and leave their to-do lists behind. 

I started working from home in September, 2006 and for a long time I cherished the ability do so much  while I worked.  During conference calls I can easily run/empty the dishwasher, change/fold the laundry, make the bed,  plan/start dinner, make a grocery list and more.  Plus,  since I take lunch whenever I feel like it, I can squeeze in grocery shopping, exercising, walking the dog, doctors appointments, cleaning the house, etc -- all while getting my work done ahead of schedule. 

In the past two years I've even been able to add Charlie's sick days, picture uploads, blogging, additional laundry, and volunteering my administrative skills for church.  With a managable workload and the ability to set my own deadlines for everything else, it's seemed like a win-win situation for a long time -- Jason and I have felt extremely blessed that I've been able to handle so many of the logistics and little things, so we can relax in the evenings and on the weekends.

But lately I find myself despising the fact that it's so easy to just run upstairs and change the load of laundry or empty the dishwasher or stop by the store on the way home from daycare...because I have no excuse not to do it, and in the end, I find myself stressing out over my spreadsheets because I need to change the laundry, then get upstairs to run by 11:30, so I'm done by 12:30 for a call, then finish my work and squeeze in a shower,  but still start dinner by 4:00 before I go pick up Charlie so I can play with him when he gets home...while finishing dinner and tidying up the house, running the vacuum to rid the house of dead grass and hopefully folding the load of laundry sitting in the dryer before Jason's shirts are irrevocably wrinkled...

Obviously, something's got to give, but I'm just not sure how to go about it.  How does one escape the guilt of saying no to herself and allowing the dog toys to remain in the middle of the living room -- especially when all of the people that work away from home would give their right arms to get a few more things done during the day and probably want to smack me for complaining (rightly so!)

I guess I just need to figure out how to give myself a little leeway on days when I have pressing deadlines or overlapping conference calls -- but how?  I feel like such a slacker when I don't get it all done, since I'm home all day, which leads to some very grumpy mornings when I look at my to-do list and my work schedule and realize that it's just not going to happen.  Any suggestions?

In positive news...we're making serious progress in other fronts...

Charlie is starting to earn his keep and do some of the heavy lifting around here:

and Otis is caving despite his best intentions: