It's been a year...

Today is our anniversary. Raquel and I have been married for one year. Raquel believes in low-key celebrations of birthdays and anniversaries so I got her a dozen roses and we went out to eat. Nice and simple.

Greg, I sincerely apologize for missing your birthday. So please accept my belated happy birthday wishes. I hope you had a good one.

This weekend was very busy. Adam came over and we put up a fence for the dogs. There was already a fence between our house and the one neighbor's house - a chain link fence with privacy slats. We decided to put up a privacy fence between our house and the other neighbor's that also blocks the back alley. We were able to get about 95 percent finished. Still need to finish one small six or seven foot stretch, but we've got it blocked off so the dogs are fully contained. We'll get that part finished and then it will be just a matter of some finishing touches. The fence project was spurred on by the need to keep rabbits out of the yard and keep the dogs in. Dover the MinPin escaped a couple of times and the neighbors didn't seem too pleased. Also, seems the dogs didn't like being left outside on their chains and expressed their displeasure by barking which in turn disturbed some neighbors who work nights/sleep days. Now, everyone should be happy. The dogs can run free, don't seem to bark as much, stay in the yard and we have some privacy. Now maybe when we have our baby, she won't need a shock collar.

This sucks, part II.

I hate to sound like a broken record, but once again I had typed a post and was ready to publish it when I hit the wrong button and lost it all.

The long and short of the post was that we went to the OB today and found out we are going to have a baby girl. The sonogram shows a nice little 7 ounce bundle of joy minus the hardware! Didn't want to know the sex just yet? Too bad, pretend you're dreaming, tell everyone you dreamed that Raquel is going to give birth to a little baby girl, and be amazed at your psychic abilities when she does.

You may ask yourself why another sonogram when we just had one done not too long ago. Well, Raquel seemed to menstruate this morning. The OB wanted a sonogram to make sure everything is fine with the baby. And it is, everything appears normal in the baby's house, no blood in there. What caused the menstrual-like bleeding? Not sure, but it could be just about anything. The OB said it could be anything from lifting something fairly heavy to walking up stairs, and that it isn't uncommon.

Time to let the dogs out before we all turn in for the night. Bye.

This sucks.

I had typed a post and was ready to publish it when I hit the wrong button and lost it all. I decided it wasn't very interesting so forget about it.

Actually, I did write about my little alien baby. I think Raquel was abducted by extraterrestrials and they implanted one of their babies into her. You can clearly see the photographic proof on our web page. Even if it is an alien, I will still love it.

Then I wrote about Family Day at the base today. Raquel didn't want to go so I spent the afternoon drinking beer. Not much beer. I don't drink very often or very much. Just don't feel the urge or the need. After a hard day of work, I'd rather eat ice cream than drink beer. Don't get me wrong, I like a good beer.

After that I wrote about Raquel and liver. She apparently loves liver so she made liver and onions tonight. For her. I don't eat that s&!t. I've tried liver before and it tastes bad. She was having difficulties preparing it tonight because the smell made her a little nauseous, but she really wanted to eat it. She made it through and enjoyed eating it, yum yuck. I'll stick to the regular meats, thank you.

Too bad I lost this post.

The answer, my friend, is duct tape.

I was thinking about diapers today. I'm not very familiar with the latest developments in diaper technology so hopefully what I was thinking about doesn't even matter. I was thinking about how sometimes a diaper comes undone on one side or the other and what to do to resolve this problem so as not to waste a perfectly absorbant diaper. The first thing that came to mind was a hot glue gun. After careful thought, this didn't seem like a good idea because I don't have a glue gun. Besides, if I did, I would have to wait for it to heat up and that would probably take too long.
I thought about SuperGlue, but I was worried I might glue my fingers together. Boy would I feel stupid with my fingers glued together.
So then I thought of stapling the diaper. But I ruled that out rather quickly, sharp edges, might cut myself.
Rope? Not practical.
Belt? No loops on a diaper.
Duct tape? Of course, the handyman's secret weapon as Red Green would say. And duct tape comes in various colors now so it could conceivably blend in with whatever fashion statement the baby is making.

I don't think so.

Well another week has gone by. We survived the babysitting ordeal last Sunday. Actually Adam's kids were really good except the little one constantly wanted to pick up Peanut. Three year olds just don't have the agility to properly handle a puppy. Poor Peanut is not very big overall, but he is surprisingly long, especially when he stretches out. Zoey loves Peanut and would not let him be. She was very good with him when she was sitting and he was on her lap, but she couldn't pick him up without choking him. He tried to escape under the bed once and I saw her drag him by the tail before he could get far enough under. I tried to explain to her that if she doesn't leave Peanut alone, he will become scared of her and will simply hide when kids come around or even worse, bite them. I don't think it sunk in entirely, however she does remember that my cat scratched her face a couple of years ago under similar circumstances.
We didn't go to a movie with the kids because there weren't any suited for kids that Raquel and I hadn't seen already. We took my niece to see Freaky Friday (which I actually enjoyed), we took another niece to see Spy Kids 3D and Finding Nemo. We actually had taken Adam's kids to see Nemo previously, and the little one said she wanted to see it again, but I really didn't want to see it for a third time right now. Maybe I should have gone to see it again, and again, and again to get used to watching the same thing over and over in preparation for our kid. Maybe I'll just lie to my kid and say the VCR/DVD player can only play a movie once a week. Maybe I'll just give in and let the TV/VCR/DVD player babysit my kid like so many other parents do.

We'll know more about our kid this Wednesday as we go to the OB for the first time. Poor Raquel has had a lot of morning sickness but 7-UP and crackers seems to help. We should start bargain hunting for baby stuff. Soon it will be getting cooler and the garage sale season will be over. We also need to buy some maternity clothes for Raquel. So many things. If only we knew what size diapers the kid will need, we could start buying some now and start stocking up. I can just see me at Sam's Club next year hauling out a case of Pampers every week. And baby food. Maybe our baby will be born with teeth and will eat real food right away. There's always plenty of our food left over. Maybe our baby will get potty training done in record time. I think 2 weeks is reasonable. Don't you?

What do you expect from me?

So it's Friday and I'm finally posting something. But what to say?
Well, I changed the look of my web page, finally. It was looking rather antiquated and Greg's page is looking good, so I knew I had to do something, but what? I know one thing is for sure: I don't know squat about Adobe Photoshop.

I know what you're thinking: Dwayne, even my preschooler knows how to use Photoshop. Well good for you and your protogé! Maybe junior wouldn't mind stopping by and showing me how to use it then.

Today we got a book (my very first online purchase, fyi) delivered to our doorstep. Seems like every mother out there says to read What to Expect When You're Expecting. So we purchased said book online but in Spanish so Raquel can read up on what's going on with her body and what she can expect to happen. And they say kids don't come with owner's manuals. Guess those cost extra.

Don't know what all is going on this weekend, but we may have to babysit a few hours on Sunday. Maybe we'll just take them to a movie and McDonald's to eat up a couple of hours. Wish us luck.

Well that's enough for the moment. See you next time.

Thanks to Greg for ignoring remembering my birthday. Yes, I'm another year older, but I think I'm mostly a year better. I don't feel any older than I did on Saturday, or even last year for that matter. In fact, I still feel like I'm in my twenties, except I have to pee in the middle of the night a couple times.

And speaking of birthdays, today is my older sister's birthday. She is one year older than me. That's right, I was her early first birthday present. Happy Birthday, Sharon!

I can't say enough good things about the new look for Greg's blog as well as Deb's blog. Spot on!

I get a three-day weekend this coming weekend followed by a four-day weekend for Labor Day. Maybe I'll get my blog a new look. Maybe I'll get the webpage somewhat modernized. Maybe I'll sleep a lot and play Playstation.

A belated happy birthday goes out to Deb. I always forget it's her birthday and this year I've got more things on my mind than normal so I hope she understands.

Greg has updated the look of his blog as well as Deb's blog. He's also put a nice new look on his web page that matches his blog. By the way, the new look for Deb's blog is really good. It was very difficult to read before.

I know my page looks old and cheesy. I need to play around a little and get it looking better. I actually think I prefer the blog. It's easier to maintain and update and has a clean look to it. Plus I can display pictures in it as well. If I can't get a satisfactory look to my web page, I may abandon it and just go with this blog.

Unfortunately I don't have much to say at the moment so I'll close for now.

I read Greg's blog all the time, just as I've always read his web page. Occasionally I read some of the blogs that he has links to from his blog. Today I read Donna's blog about her piñata experiences. I gave a chuckle about how the first one was really hard, literally hard and was almost impossible to break.

My beautiful wife Raquel asked what I chuckled about. Before I could explain, I had to ask her if she knew about piñatas. She said she did and I told her about the difficulties of breaking open Donna's first piñata. Raquel thought it was strange that kids here in the U.S. hit their piñatas with a stick, why don't they use a knife to pop it open? Just to make sure we were on the same page, I had her tell me about the piñatas in Paraguay.
Keep in mind that I'm not the best Spanish speaker nor do I understand everything spoken to me in Spanish.
Apparently piñatas in Paraguay are somewhat pressurized so that when the birthday boy/girl uses a knife to "pop" the piñata, it "explodes" or perhaps "bursts" the goodies among the partygoers. Not a large blast but enough to spread the goodies out a little. Sometimes for fun, they put flour in the piñata along with the goodies so that the revelers get covered in white powder.
I think that would be hilarious to see. Maybe more fun than a blindfolded kid whacking someone in the groin or about the head and face with a stick. Someday I will experience a Paraguayan birthday celebration.

In other news, we went to the doctor on Wednesday to confirm that we are going to have a baby. Now we need to get an OB so when our baby decides it's time to leave the cozy confines of Raquel there will be someone to catch it.
Everyone has been happy for us. Many ask if I want a boy or a girl. Well of course the first priority is to have a healthy baby. I think I want a little girl until about age 9 or 10 and then I hope she suddenly becomes a boy. And I don't mean becomes a boy like she goes Melissa Etheridge on us. I just think a teenage boy is easier to deal with than a teenage girl. No matter what, we just have to do our best and hope the kid becomes a good person.

The boys just came in and are excited to be back indoors.

Of course this photo is a couple months old, they are much bigger now.

Look what we've done!

Well sort of. That's me as a baby. I don't know how old I am in this picture but I sure am chubby. Anyway, Raquel and I are going to have one of those soon.

That's right. Dwayne is going to be a daddy. According to Greg, it's going to be a great thing. I suppose he's right. By then, Dover the MinPin might be out of his shock collar and so we won't have to buy a new one. Just kidding, I wouldn't put Dover's collar on my baby, I'd buy a new one.

I don't know if I can handle the pressure of keeping a blog.

It really is stressing me out. I don't see how Greg can do it. I suppose I really could post more often but what if I don't have anything to say?

Actually I have to praise a product that Raquel and I bought recently. As you may have previously read, we have a MinPin and a Min Dachshund. The Dachshund is really quite calm and when we are outside with him, he generally doesn't need a leash or chain. The MinPin, however, is quite spastic. Given the opportunity, he will dash away to see what the world has to offer in the way of smells with absolutely no regard to his safety and oblivious to our calls for him. Usually, the only way to catch him is if he finds something really interesting to smell or has to pinch a loaf.

Anyway, after a few escapes, one of which took him all the way to a busy road (luckily there was a cat nearby to distract him long enough for Raquel to snatch him), I decided to look into a shock collar. Not for me, for the dog.

Okay, I know some of you may think a shock collar is cruel, but let me explain a little first. This collar has a remote with two buttons. One button will cause the collar to emit a warning tone. The other button is to deliver a "shock". The idea is that the dog will do it's bad behavior, you send a warning tone. If the dog continues with the bad behavior, send another tone. Finally, if the dog still doesn't respond, zap him! Trust me, Pavlov had it down pat. Our MinPin quickly associated the warning tone with the shock and he responds to the tone. He's rarely disregarded the tone and is a different dog. He's so much calmer now and we feel confident letting him loose outside under supervision. Sidenote 1: the shock is adjustable and should only be turned up enough to get the appropriate response from the dog (pissing himself or yelping is not an appropriate response--TURN IT DOWN!) Sidenote 2: I put the collar on my leg and tested it before putting it on the dog. I turned it down after yelping and pissing myself.

I know, it's been a week since I posted. Sorry. I'll try to do better.

GREG AND DEB HAVE A NEW DAUGHTER!! Greg wrote in his blog that she is absolutely beautiful. Twice. I'm sure she is. A big welcome for Julia Hope Lee!

Raquel and I took my niece back home on Saturday. I enjoyed having her here for the week, even if she did beat me at Tony Hawk 3. I will practice and I will beat her and then I can do the trash talking. While we had her here, we saw Finding Nemo. Raquel and I had already seen it, but it's good enough to watch again. We actually wanted to see Pirates of the Carribean again but my niece didn't want to see it for some reason. Then Saturday, we went to see Spy Kids 3. The only reason I wanted to see it was because of the 3-D. The movie wasn't much for me, but I absolutely enjoyed the 3-D effects.

Well I could write more but I need to get this posted and get to bed.

PS: There WILL be an update to the webpage in the next few days.

Don't have much time to write right this moment. Raquel and I are taking care of my 10 year old niece this week. Actually Raquel and the neighbor are taking care of her while I go to work. The neighbor has a daughter about the same age and she and my niece seem to be getting along extremely well. Plus they have a swimming pool.

This weekend was hectic. We were able to go for a motorcycle ride on Saturday. We went to visit my grandmother who is recovering from surgery. The visit was nice, the weather was gorgeous, and the ride was terrific, our longest ride yet. We put about 160 miles on the bike. I know that's not a lot, but I don't have many miles this year and my tushie hasn't gotten adjusted to the road yet.

Saturday night we went to see Johnny English. It was pretty funny. Raquel laughed so much that she almost hurt herself. After the movie, we watched Merry Christmas Mr. Bean because I knew she'd laugh at that also. Well she did and again she almost hurt herself.

Sunday we went to a family reunion down south. We drove 3 hours to spend about an hour and a half looking at people I don't know or people I recognize but don't know. On the way home, we stopped by my mom's house and waited for my sister to bring my niece over. I believe my sister was lucky enough to farm out all of her kids for most of the week.

Last night, I played Tony Hawk 3 with my niece. She's proud of herself because she beat me at it. I see several rematches coming this week. She was talking a lot of trash for a ten year old.

Well I better cut this short.

I just don't understand our dogs.

If we go somewhere and lock them in the basement, they go to the bathroom down there (no big deal, it's unfinished but we'd prefer if they would wait til we get home).

If we partition off the house with a baby gate so they only have access to the kitchen and mudroom, they seem to be perfect angels and not make any kind of mess. Even after three plus hours.

If we let them have run of the house for, say, only 20 minutes, they pee at least twice each, poop a minimum of three times, and drag down something they shouldn't have (like a decorative pillow).

Last night, I took them out kind of early. Then Dover (the MinPin) woke up at about 11:30 and I knew he needed to go to the bathroom. I got up and he was already off the bed wanting to head out of the bedroom. The door was partially closed and before I could get my shorts, t-shirt, and shoes on, he managed to open the door and go into the dining room and start peeing. I grabbed him as quick as I could and got him outside to finish the job and cleaned up the mess.

About 5 a.m. this morning, both dogs kind of acted a little ancy so I took them both outside. Peanut (the MinDachshund) is a great little dog. If we are outside with him, he doesn't need a leash or chain. He usually goes pee within a minute and usually poops in about three to five. He followed this routine this morning and I put him back inside so he could eat, drink and go back to bed.

Dover's routine usually consists of waiting for Peanut to pee, then he pees. Lately it's been waiting for Peanut to pee then he sniffs that and pees over it. Then he chases bugs, eats anything that he can get his mouth around and generally avoids pooping. During the week this isn't so bad because after about five to ten minutes, I bring him back in and start getting ready for work. Raquel then keeps an eye out for signs of him needing to poop and takes him out.

Like I already mentioned, Peanut followed his normal routine this morning at 5 a.m. (which is almost an hour earlier than normal). Dover did his normal thing too, acting as if he wasn't going to poop. So inside we went. I puttered around in the kitchen for about two minutes, opening the back door window as it was so cool outside and turned on the fan. By the time I got into the dining room, I saw it.

There was a little bit of poop by the front door. Not really poop but closer to diarrhea. As I got closer I could see a trail of it leading into the living room. It was everywhere! It reminded me of a scene from Dumb and Dumberer, When Harry Met Lloyd. Actually two scenes from that movie. I spent the next half hour cleaning it up. It took almost a whole roll of paper towel, and a bunch of pet stain remover. Luckily I had just bought an eight-pack of Brawny. We need to buy some more carpet stain remover.

Raquel actually got up and helped with the cleanup. She's terrific. Most spouses would stay in bed and let the other one finish what they started.

That's been my morning so far. It looks beautiful outside. Maybe we'll get to ride the bike today.

We did go see League of Extraordinary Gentlemen last night. Raquel really enjoyed it, and I thought it was okay. I can't recommend it as a must see, but it wasn't bad.

Well that's it for now. I'm tempted to lay down for a minute.

Greg seemed to be quite pleased that I started my blog. He mentioned it in both his webpage and his blog. Can't wait for the t-shirt. By the way Greg, you have http: twice in the link to my blog so it doesn't work.

Work is sort of settling back in to normal. We finished the floor and the painting is done. Now we just need to finish tidying up and get on with the day-to-day stuff. I've got a young lady that needs training, but I need time to prepare and time to do other things at work. I wish I had at least one day a week or maybe every two weeks where I could work on things without interruption.

Looking forward to a three-day weekend. I really hope to get out on the motorcycle. Raquel loves riding too. We've only gone for a couple of rides, the longest being about 50 miles. We need to ride up to Wisconsin to visit Greg and Deb so she can see if she really likes riding.

I want to see a couple of movies this weekend. Unlike Greg, I can still get out and see movies whenever I want. Raquel loves going to the movies. Even though she can't understand very much english, she enjoys them anyway. I would like to see The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Johnny English. I saw that Jon didn't give League the highest rating, but I've never read the comic book so I don't have expectations. But I know where you're coming from Jon.

I forgot to mention that we went to a concert last Sunday evening. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers came through Peoria and the base had a bunch of free tickets. Of course the seats were in the nosebleed section, but free is free. Luckily for us, the gentleman who runs the civic center used to work at our base and he upgraded our free tickets to darn-near-the-stage tickets. The opening act was Mavis Staple. I must admit I had never heard of her or the Staple Singers before, but she/they were pretty good. After a short intermission, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers came out. Now I must admit, Tom Petty has been around for a long time and has lots of hits, but I never really would have thought about going to see him in concert. But I'll tell you what, those guys were awesome. I wished we could have stayed for the whole show, but there were several factors that caused us to leave after about five or six songs. First, I'm old. Second, I had to work the next day. Third, it was really loud (see first point). Fourth, the dogs were loose in the house (okay they didn't have access to carpetted areas, but loose is loose and see previous post about housebreaking). Fifth, it was smoky in there for a No Smoking arena. Sixth, I'm old. But did I mention that these guys are awesome? I hate going to a concert only to have the artist butcher the songs, but these guys sounded better than their studio versions. Honest.

Well I should close now, I've neglected my beautiful wife long enough sitting here in front of this blasted computer.
Bye

It worked! Now I can ramble on and maybe people will read this. If only I had something interesting to say.

Last week I was in Richardson, Texas. Richardson is just another part of Dallas, really. I went there to learn a little more about our voice mail system at work. Raquel and I drove there (about 680 miles). That's our second long trip within a month. Last month we drove to Lanham, Maryland (Washington D.C.) so I could learn a little about our network switches. To summarize both trips, eastern Ohio, western Pennsylvania, western Maryland, West Virginia, and Missouri are very pretty, lots of rolling hills (some small mountains) and trees. The truck performed wonderfully and was quite comfortable. Gas mileage wasn't too bad for a big truck running AC, about 17 mpg. Learned a lot on both trips, but I'm not sure how much I'll remember when the time comes to use the info. Blah, blah, blah.

At work, we've spent the last three days painting the walls, stripping and waxing the floors, and rearranging furniture. I must admit, the office really needed it, but that's three+ days "wasted" that we didn't take good care of customers, accomplish training, or take care of paperwork. Tomorrow should be the last of it for a little while, although we do have some new furniture coming in sometime soon.

Raquel is settling in nicely. Everyone thought there would be a tremendous culture shock for her, but she's handled everything in stride. She's seen a lot of new things in a very short time and loves her life here. In a couple of weeks, she will have been here for three months but it feels like she's been here for a lot longer. I don't mean that in a negative way.

The puppies are getting bigger and bigger. Dover weighed in at about 14 pounds and Peanut was about 8.5 pounds. Housetraining is coming along sporadically. Just when we think they understand, we find a present somewhere in the house. Hopefully they will get with the program soon.

Okay, enough for now. Bye.

Hello and welcome to the first posting in my blog. My name is Dwayne and I created this blog at the request of my friend Greg. Okay, so his pleading was to everyone that checks out his page, but I figured why not?

First of all, let me explain the name of my blog. My nickname is Sluggo. No good story behind that, just one night a drunk guy called me that and told everyone else and here I am six or seven years later still known as Sluggo. Well, a friend's little girl couldn't pronounce Sluggo when she began to talk, it came out YoYo. That's similar to when I was really young and a little neighbor girl couldn't pronounce Dwayne and it came out DuckWayne. So I have many nicknames - Sluggo, YoYo, DuckWayne, Slacker, Drain, DrainPipe, Midway and Midway Kid.

That's all I'm going to write for the moment, I want to post this and see what it looks like.