I’m getting more and more used to this whole “work” thing, even though I have to admit it’s not really my cup of tea, sitting in an office, pushing papers around and typing up this and that for such and such, but since I started, I’ve kind of gotten to like it to a certain extent. I guess that’s what happens when you have pleasant co-workers, though.

In other news, even my writing, as in my stories are moving forward, though it will probably be some time before I actually bother to update what I have, since I’m also rewriting some of them… a bit.
Also, a pretty ancient story of mine, featuring one of my first characters ever might actually be fit to read in a couple of weeks. It’s very easy to see that Iwrote it when I was a bit younger, and a bit more immature (yes, I’ve actually been more immature than I am nowadays, believe it or not) but I’m still going through it and still tweaking it where I feel it should be tweaked, and poking it into place.

Other than this, expect a completely new take on an old idea of mine, one I’m sure you’ve never heard about, or even bothered asking about, but nonetheless it will be posted…eventually…when I’m not lazy. Or hungry. Or tired. Or upside-down.

You know it’s fall in Gothenburg when the sky opens up and a waterfall decides that your head is the place to be. Nevermind the fact that you have an umbrella, because if that’s the case, the water will bounce right back off the ground to soak you from head to toe anyway.
Don’t get me wrong, I do like the rain, but only during the summer when it’s warm enough for me to go out in it and not turn into a small, shuddering, blue ball covered in blankets and pillows in a desperate attempt to regain some semblance of my normal body-temperature.

On the plus side, this means the dog won’t be wanting any ridiculously long walks at any point, as he made very clear this morning, by refusing to go outside at all. When a dog looks at you with an expression of “Don’t make me, there’s a huge shower out there!” there really isn’t much you can do but give up. He’s not going to let you forget the misery you’ve put him through if you don’t.

Visiting friends is always fun, visiting friends on their birthdays is always a blast, but when one has a young, newly neutered dog along for the ride, well we’ll just say there will always be a few surprises. Him deciding that the carpet in her hallway looked like a toilet when he became too excited, well, that was the worst of it. Still, we had fun after we’d taken him out for a quick walk.
Somehow it’s almost scary to think that I have friends who I’ve known for nearly seven years and we’re as close now as we were when we met. Today was just one of those days when I realised, however, that we’ve changed a lot, both in our way of thinking and our way of handling things, both positive and negative. I realised that the Birthday Girl had grown up a great deal more during the past few years than I myself have. Where she has progressed I’ve regressed. Still, admitting it is the first step in taking charge of it, right?

In other news, I’ll finally be able to play piano again! A few years ago I gave away my Baby Grand because I didn’t really bother playing it. As the days turned into months, months into years, however, it dawned on me that I really did miss it and oddly enough, my prayers were answered just a couple of days ago when an acquaintance of mine decided that she was getting rid of hers and said that “If you can take it out of here, you can have it”, so of course I said I’d take it.
Now comes the real problem, though… finding strong arms to help me.

A week has passed since Rowdy came into my life and I have to say that as the days go on he seems to become more and more like the dog he should be, rather than the confused, uncertain ball of fur that he was when he came. I’m still insanely pissed off at his previous owner, however.
I’ve never had a pet before in my life, but when my boyfriend and I decided that we were going to get a dog I tried to find as much information about dogs, how to raise them, train them and keep them healthy as possible. Rowdy’s previous owner, however, doesn’t seem to have even tried. He claims to have owned dogs in the past and I can only wonder how long they lived and how well they felt.

When Rowdy was dropped off, he was jumping all over his previous owner, who didn’t seem to react at all, he was marking every single tree, lamppost, stone that he possibly could and, relentlessly pulled at the leash while we were walking towards the apartment. Though we had been assured that he was used to having contact with other dogs, this was clearly an exaggeration, because the moment we met another dog he would immediately try to rush forward and play, while whining loudly. He is eight months of age and has no clue as to how he should act towards other dogs.
Other than these problems, which can be dealt with in time, there was one other quite immense flaw in the man’s caretaking of this poor creature. For those of you with any knowledge of dogs at all, you’ll know that, up to about a year of age, pups are supposed to be fed a certain food, food with various proteins that aren’t in food for adult dogs. Well, apparently Rowdy’s previous owner had no clue about this, and had been feeding him the wrong food constantly.

I could go on and on about all the things that make me want to smash the man’s face in with a rather large, rusty shovel, but I won’t.

I will, however, tell you that we’ve decided to keep the little mutt and see to it that the remainder of his life is lived well. He needs to be trained up, sure, but he’s a clever little thing and he learns at a disturbing pace.
Soon he’ll be a completely different animal than the lost, uncertain soul he was just eight days ago.

For the past couple of weeks, my boyfriend and I have been looking for a dog that would fit our lifestyle and finally we thought we’d found one, a mixed male of eight months old. I was ecstatic when his previous owner came to drop him off, two days ago, no doubt that was why I didn’t notice a major problem until yesterday.
The dog, who we’ve named Rowdy, is nervous. Very much so. Yes, to a certain extent it has to do with the fact that he’s not quite used to the apartment, or me, but even so, his way of acting when I correct him while he’s misbehaving, or the way he lies down the moment I tell him “no” in a firm voice seems wrong, he seems downright scared.

When we take him out, it’s almost like trying to control a dog that’s both deaf, blind and just plain stubborn. He pulls at the leash constantly and if I shorten it to point out that he’s supposed to walk beside me, he panics and tried to jump up on me instead.
He constantly jumps on us as well, this ball of energy. I’m attached already and I’d love nothing more than to keep him, but… I don’t know if I’ll be able to work up his confidence enough that he’ll stop acting as if the entire world is out to get him.

I can only wonder why his previous owners haven’t worked with him at least enough that he can walk with a leash without pulling and having his nose attached to the ground, no matter what speed he’s moving at.

I don’t want to give him up, in fact I’m scared to, but I know that, if I want him to become a stable, calm dog, I’ll need help and lots of it.