Much as it pains me to admit it...

my mother was right.

Many years ago, we were discussing her sleep or the lack thereof. I told her that nothing would ever rouse me from my sleep (think, like the dead). She said, "Don't plan on having children. You'll never get a real night's sleep again."

All these years later, she was right. I may not have an actual human child, but I have felt it with my canine companion.

Sunday night/Monday morning, around 1:45 AM, I awoke to this awful whimpering noise -- "oooooooohm oooooooohm pant pant ooooooooooohm." I thought it was a dream at first, that Maddox was dreaming. A very short time later, I realized it wasn't a dream, it was him in obvious distress. I took him out of his crate, then outside. For ten minutes I stood by as he ran for his "corner" and assumed the position ... many times. I brought him back in, but didn't shut his crate door. I just let him lie on the floor.

In a way, I'm glad I chose that option. I awoke on Monday morning to find my backporch was a disaster area. Couldn't blame him -- after all, he had no alternative, as we don't have a doggie door. So I spent the time before going into work hosing out the backporch. I called the vet and got an appointment for today.

Last night, he didn't want to go in the crate so I left him there on the porch with the crate door open. But it was hard to sleep again. About 1:15, I woke to the sound of my radio and the jingle of "Sporting News -- FLASH!" I never got back to a full sleep again. I thought of everything that could have happened to give my baby such a rough time. This morning, I got up to go in early (and drop him off at the vet). The porch again had a couple of accidents, but nothing like the night before. But once again, another hose-down.

PetSmart luckily had some deodorizer -- a big ol' mamma-jamma supersize bottle. Of course, I got it -- their recommendations were superb. I cut a tire coming out of the parking lot (a whole 'nother story for another time). Finally, after a few things transpired, I ended up taking a half-day and going to get my doggie.

Poor Maddox --- he had some distress all right. E. coli is its name! So there are a few prescriptions for him to take over the next few days, as well as special food. In the meantime, my dad and I bleached the backporch twice, and allowed it to sit as recommended on Clorox's website. We rinsed it out, and used the deodorizer on it (also twice). Cloroxed everything that he had been in contact with. The backporch probably hasn't been that clean since the day it was built.

I have a feeling that he and I will both sleep well tonight........

Ouch, but worth it.

I bought a "newsed" computer last fall. I needed to because the old one was just dying a slow painful death. It came with a MUCH smaller hard drive than I wanted or expected. But then again, it was a refurb from the county -- they run mostly on servers, and didn't need much HD space.

I, however, do. So I had them take my old 40GB HD and put it in as a backup to the miniscule drive. I was going to store things there. And it worked.

A few weeks ago, I experienced something awful -- I was working in something when BAM! the small HD bugged out on me and immediately my old & larger HD kicked in. The problem? My newer drive ran Windows 2000 -- the old one, Windows 98. So everything would bug out, I'd have to shut everything off and start again. A major PITA, to be certain.

I spoke to our IT guy at work, and he made some recommendations. Told me exactly what to get. So yesterday, I went on my lunch hour and picked up the items needed...... OUCH! I needed a new controller card, a new HD, and some more memory. Little tip: memory is cheap now but is supposed to go up in price soon. Get yours now. And I got a 250GB HD ..... I actually could have lived with a 160 or so. They did not have them. I saw the 500GB and salivated. If they'd had a Terabyte one on display, I would have had a ..... well, I'd have been in heaven. (Yes, I'm a geek, thanks for asking!)

So now it's all installed, running well, and we're all happy at last!