Well, no sooner than I had written my last blog about the beautiful days we have been having down here in San Antonio than this>>> It has been raining absolutely all day, and I now have big, muddy puddles outside… which means I have to carry our dog (Sprite) over the mud. Of course, I could let her just lumber out and enjoy the feeling of the mud between her pads, but I am opting to not give her a bath today, so I will just keep insisting that I am the only one who knows how to take her outside today.

You would think that with four adults in the house, "the others" would know how to let Sprite outside… but I am the only one who apparently knows how to bathe her, so I insist that I am the only one who knows how to avoid the tracking of the mud through the house. (Of course, I am also the only one who has ever mopped the floors in our house, although I am pretty sure that "the others" could handle that unpleasant task with great aplomb. (Ah… you  may wonder why there are four adults in the house…. spring break is here… regardless of the dreary weather we are currently experiencing.)

I am hoping that I learn my lesson and don’t show off about our gorgeous weather in the future… or at least if I do, I knock on wood…

Can you believe that it’s time for us to get out our Jane Haddam, Lee Harris, and Leslie Meiers books!? Yep! It’s time to start reading books that depict a sunny spring outside… Of course, if you live near me (San Antonio, Texas) you don’t really need to "bring the spring" into your house… It’s already here!

But, as I have said many, many times before… I love to read seasonal books. So, I will be getting my Easter Mysteries off of my bookshelf… (If I have any left!)

I know, however, that Spring isn’t here for everyone. My sister lives in Chicago, my college roommate lives in Iowa, and my mother lives in Colorado. I think that this is the time of year that they most wish they were my immediate neighbors. Of course, when Fall is just around the corner, I wish I were up where any of those three live… enjoying the beautiful crisp weather and the dazzling colors that nature displays. But, this is our time of year!  Our summers are hot, humid, and sticky. Our falls and winters blend into each other, and although we don’t see nature at its most glorious, we also don’t need to rake leaves or shovel snow/sludge. So, I can’t really complain about our other seasons…. although, if you asked my husband… he would assure you that I CAN (and DO!) complain.

Every once in a while I have to put aside some time to "take care of business"….. Balance my check book, take care of bills, try to organize my "real desk’s" mess, punch in our medications’ prescription codes, pick up our medications, get back to people, ETC.

I don’t know why it is that it now seems to take me a lot more time to actually fulfill these simple, everyday tasks. Maybe my husband and I take more medications than we used to, maybe we get more bills than we used to, OR… let’s be honest… maybe I just have too much fun when I’m at the computer!

I am lucky that I don’t "have" to sit at my computer all day, everyday. (I think that "24/7" is the current way to describe this "all day, everyday phenomenon.) I am pretty sure that if I were a data entry personnel, who "has" to sit at the computer "24/7", I wouldn’t enjoy it. And, actually, my neck would probably ache, my back would probably hurt, my feet would probably swell, my … well you get the picture!

But, I am so fortunate to only "have" to sit at my computer when I want to.  Don’t get me wrong… I am sure many people who "have" to sit at the computer all day enjoy it. My husband uses the computer a lot of his working day, and when he comes home, he manages to get in several more hours at the computer. But, he is also very "smart" with the computer, and isn’t as easily (nor as often) frustrated by the computer.

I don’t think that one week has gone by since I started using the computer (years ago!) that I haven’t been frustrated by it. I remember a time when I had to wait for my children to get home from MIDDLE school, so that they could fix my computer problem… (Middle school down here in San Antonio starts with the sixth grade!) And, they quickly learned not to describe what they did to fix the problem, since I wasn’t able (or willing!) to understand. They became my own personal technical support advisers, and their $2. allowances were an amount I could afford! 

Where does the time go!? It seems like only a few years ago that we added our dog, Sprite (not named after the soda pop… but the elfin-type of sprite, and the computer graphics term) to our family. But, it has actually been thirteen years. So, technically, she isn’t our puppy any more… but our aging dog.

We "adopted" her (as I said) thirteen years ago, when I was a member of several online mystery reading groups. It’s funny how I remember those types of details, but I can’t remember when (or IF!) I bought a book by a favorite author. Anyway, getting back to Sprite…

I must say, it is sad seeing her get old. This sounds as if I think that time has been kinder to me… But, thirteen years ago I was much more able to pick up our thirty five pound Sprite and whisk her up the stairs. And, of course, since I can’t carry up my cup of coffee at the same time, that means I go up and down the stairs twice for every time I actually want to go up and down. She seems to never want me out of her sight. (This has been the case since my husband and I became empty nesters… and carries over even when our children are home.) She truly is a member of our family, but somehow, she has become my dog… barking whenever I forget to get her off of the couch, whimpering when she wants to be taken upstairs, yipping when I forget that she is fed at the precise time her body’s clock has dinner time set, even moaning when I forget that she gets her pills at the exact time we sit down for dinner.

Lately, I have been having to carry her up our stairs every time I go upstairs. The only time that she is actually prepared to even attempt the staircase is at 9:30 PM, when she knows that she will soon be getting comfortable on my husband’s and my bed (or should I say "the three of ours bed"?!?). This ritual of having to carry her up SEVERAL times a day is getting a little tedious, not to say exhausting to me. But, she has been such a wonderful addition to our family… a true companion who listens intently to every little thing we want to tell her. How could we leave her downstairs by herself?

I do, though, wish that we had taught her that "STAY" really means stay… and not "follow me downstairs while I get another cup of coffee, and then take my cup of coffee upstairs before I go back downstairs to lug you upstairs with me!"