When deciding how I was going to write about the events of this past weekend, I couldn’t find a suitable way to fit it all in. So, I’ve decided to do it chronologically. It was wild, stressfull, exciting, and definitely memorable.

Friday. 4:45pm
Alex calls to invite us out to dinner. We had already made a previous committment, but we were able to finish that early and meet up with him for dinner and dessert. His premise is to celebrate with Nathalie for her birthday, but I think I got the better end of the deal. He had bid on a silent auction item and won. And who did he think of to give it to? Little old me. It was a baseball themed gift, so I can’t fault him for thinking of his baseball-loving friend. So, what was in this mysterious gift?

Four tickets to a Naturals baseball game of my choice. Score! Plus a pair of autographed baseballs and an autographed photo of former Naturals players who have now moved on to the Big Leagues. Double-score! And at that game of my choosing, I get to throw out the first pitch. Are you KIDDING me? I have been wanting to do that since my very first baseball game, and especially since I’ve become a semi-regular at the Naturals games. Alex hooked me up big time.

Saturday. 10:30am
After goofing off at the house playing Demigod, a new video game I’m obsessed with, Naty and I get ready to visit the brand new Bella Vista dog park. We get Po ready to go, and make the trek north. The grand opening was to be at 10:30am, but we wanted to get there a little late. This way we’d miss the hub-bub, but still catch all the partying.

We arrived just before noon to an empty park. Apparently, everyone in Bella Vista arrives early and leaves early. Over 50 dogs (and their owners) showed up for the ribbon cutting ceremony. We missed the scene of all those dogs getting let loose to rough and tumble, but we hear it was very heart warming.

We played with Po and a couple of new friends who were also late arrivers for about an hour before we headed home. But, not without ice cream, of course. A quick stop at Dairy Queen and we were gone.

Saturday. 1:00pm
I noticed a puddle on the floor of the kitchen and immediately blamed everything in sight: the dogs for knocking over their water bowl, Nathalie for spilling her glass, Diego for leaving the freezer open. It didn’t matter that I was wrong.

Saturday. 1:30pm
Got a call from the tax lady. We got the last pieces of the puzzle in place, and now we know how much we owe for the year. More than last year. *sigh* It’s just money, right?

Saturday. 4:30pm
We discover that the puddle I blamed on everyone earlier is from our dead refidgerator. The compressor had quit and the fan was just blowing warm air throughout. Everything was melting. We grabbed our ice chests, dumped as much as we could fit, and, unfortunately, threw everything else away. We “borrowed” the fridge at the shop (Thanks, dad!) to keep what we could salvage.

Saturday. 6:00pm
The struggle with the melting fridge made us late to a dinner date with my father and some friends of his. We got to try out a new Rogers restaurant, Ronaldo’s. Tip of the day: GO THERE! It was fabulous. We at a ton of food, all of it delicious, and really had a nice time.

Saturday. 8:30pm
Confirmed: the fridge is dead. A goner. Kaput. No more. It is an ex-fridge.

Saturday. 8:45pm
More Demigod. I played for a few hours, let off some steam.

Sunday. 9:30am
We slept in. I heard the alarm go off vaguely in the back of my mind. I don’t remember turning it off, nor do I remember rolling over and going back to sleep. At some point I woke up to feed the dogs and let them run free in the backyard, but I must have gone right back to bed.

By 11:00 we had gotten ready and met up with Angie, Diego, and grandma for lunch. We had a nice lunch, then went shopping.

Sunday. 2:00pm
I’m pooped. The girls are still going strong, so Diego and I head home to fix a leaky toilet. It only took two trips to Lowe’s and only required taking the whol thing apart twice to get it fixed. Success at last! I also took 2 minutes to change a burnt out bulb in my car’s taillamp. Easy enough.

Sunday. 5:30pm
The girls are home. I open the fridge to start getting dinner ready when I remember, “Oh yeah. No fridge.” Luckily, I have the greatest wife in the world. She had gone shopping specifically for items that don’t need to be kept cool, plus enough to make a fantastic dinner. We feasted on rotisserie chicken, corn on the cob, white rice, and a nice salad. Thanks, honey.

Sunday. 9:00pm
Sitting on the couch, relaxing. Winding down. Thinking of all the things we got done, all the things that broke, and some of the fun times ahead.

Bed time. Lights out. Snore.

It all began with a throbbing at the back of my head. It started in the evening time, and I didn’t think much of it since I have gotten migraines in the past; probably not the most severe of cases, but enough to make me miserable. So, I took an Excedrin (my weapon of choice) and went to bed, a remedy that has worked flawlessly for me in the past.

The throbbing never went away. I laid awake feeling what seemed like every beat of my heart in the back of my skull. I couldn’t get comfortable, and it wouldn’t cease. I slept very fitfully, oftentimes waking up to that inceassant pounding.

Nathalie said, “You’re not going to work; you’re staying home.” I said, “yes, dear.” I’ve learned that when she gets that way, she’s usually right. A few hours later with the pounding as loud as ever she drove me to the doctor’s office. We both figured that it must be something greater than the traditional headache, because it just wouldn’t go away no matter how much acetaminophen or asprin we threw at it.

The doc checked me out and said, “Sounds like a bad migraine.” He had a shot he was going to give me which would knock it out easily. He also gave me a sample of a perscription medicine which is designed to prevent migraines. The shot, he said, would probably knock me out as well, so I should call in and cancel the rest of my day. Well, we left the doctor’s office and headed home. I tried to fall asleep, but the pounding just wouldn’t go away.

Later that day, it still refused to quit. We called the office back and re-scheduled another appointment for the next morning. I took both of the perscription samplers, still to no avail. The constant drumming on the back of my skull remained.

The look on the doctor’s face the next morning said he was as confused as we were. The shot did nothing, the medicine did nothing. So, Oxygen therapy was next. He hooked me up to a tank with a mask, and I had to sit and “breathe deeply” for 20 minutes of mostly pure oxygen. Halfway through, he came in and switched the tank out for a bigger one and a more impressive looking mask. He wanted to “up the dosage” and get a heavier concentration of oxygen. The theory being the extra oxygen content will relieve any inflammation of the blood vessels.

Nothing. Now, I’m worried. So the doctor goes out to have a consultation with his neuologist friend. Meanwhile they schedule a CAT scan to ensure there are no aneurysms or clots or other bad things. Now I get to sit in a machine while it spins around my head. But first, they inject me with a dye. The weirdest feeling in the world is when this dye gets into your bloodstream. Forget about it, I couldn’t describe it if I wanted to. I’ll leave it at this: your whole body feels like it is warming up from the inside-out, and heating up much too quickly. Oh, and you can taste your toes… or so it seems.

The good news? No problems anywhere. The bad news? The headache still persists. Although, “persists” isn’t quite strong enough of a word.

Finally he decides that a beta-blocker might help. Thankfully it does. So, now I’m on the same medicne they give to heart-attack patients. But, it works. That’s the important part. Right?

Here’s the kicker… I can still feel the headache, tiny, waiting in the back of my head, as if it is about to come back any minute.

We make an appointment with that neurologist whose idea it was to try the Beta-blockers. In his office, he puts me through a routine of questions and small physical actions to ensure there is no stroke or heart attack or weird brain things. He is confident that I’m fine, and that this is just a migraine. I tell him it doesn’t feel like anything I’ve ever felt before. He says that they can present themselves in different ways.

So, here I am. I’m on beta-blockers to prevent a migraine that feels like it could back at any time. I’m always slightly afraid anytime I do anything strenuous that THIS time, THIS will be what triggers it to come back.

And all I’ve accomplished is to give the doctors’ offices roughly $500 in the process.

Not long after Dominic and Cassidy leave baby Michael at our house, he and Naty begin to have some fun. I came home from work to find two smiling and laughing faces, although Naty seemed to be running out of energy much faster than Michael.

Here are three short videos from my cell phone, so while the quality might not be great, the content is the good stuff.

Video #1: Not long after I get home, he starts the “search for mommy”. He quickly figures out that she’s not around, but his expression is just so great.

Video #2) Aunt Naty plays a new game with Michael. He loves it! What you don’t see is the dozens of times he plops his head into her lap so that she’ll play the game again. It becomes obvious that he can keep it up much longer than she can.

#3) Finally, during our Christmas “Web-mas”, Michael starts to show off that he knows “Jingle Bells” but it quickly turns into a new, and hilarious nickname for his uncle “Doodoo”.

Our baby boy, Po. Here he is in one of his puppy classes. This is at the end of the class, after a long productive hour, the puppies get a few moments to just socialize. It is good for the dogs, and it is good for us. The puppies just jump into a pile, and let me tell you, it is too cute.

Have a little patience, as I still don’t have this whole video-upload thing worked out. It takes a while for it to load, but it should play after a moment.

And here are two more. I think this works.

This little ball of fluff and fur has made a big difference in our lives in just a short while.  He has shaken up our daily routine, forced us to rethink our sleeping schedule, and added profit to the stain remover’s bank account.  [He's actually really well housebroken in such a short time, but he's still a puppy and as such, has puppy accidents.]

Named after a cartoon panda who eats more than his fair share, Po has enlightened both our lives.  He’s our third rescue dog, and we are just so blessed to be in a position to have them in our home.  This is our first puppy, though, and what a difference that makes!  Maynard and Daisy took a little while to learn the rules of the house, but Po has to learn everything.

With Po, we are taking “formal” training classes.  We signed up spur-of-the-moment, and are very glad we did.  We have had 3 (and a half) classes (one cancelled due to bad weather was made up for during a quick private session).  Sure, the classes are designed to help Po grow and mature as a dog.  But, we all know that the classes are really to help Nathalie and I grow as dog owners [pet parents *snicker*].

We have learned a lot in animal training.  Reward training vs. punishment training.  Repetition, repetition, repetition.  And how to properly time your praise and your commands.  The timing seems to be the trick, helping Po (or any animal) learn what the word actually means.  We don’t speak the same language, but we can learn associative behaviors.  We learn what they mean with certain types of barks or motions, and they learn what we mean with certain types of phrases or hand motions. 

Po is quickly becoming the best “trained” dog of the three.  And we are using these new concepts to help Maynard and Daisy as well.  Sit, Stay, and Here are pretty simple.  But, proper manners when meeting a guest is going to be the BEST part of this whole experience.  How great would it be to have dogs that sat patiently off to the side when a friend comes to the front door?  Or when a strange dog wanders by?  Currently, all they know to do is bark their heads off and jump.  Sitting to great a guest instead of jumping would be a welcome change in the DiMaggio household.

It is also giving us a great distraction from any of life’s challenges.  Instead of focusing on the stress in our lives, we get to focus on this sweet baby-bear.  He’s too cute.  It really is like living with your own little brown bear.

Hopefully, I’ll get some good pictures (if he ever slows down any) before he grows up too much.