We were supposed to go to a friend’s house to watch the debate, but a fire broke out. This is the view from my backyard. This fire was closer than the previous fire.
I called and cancelled, but I don’t think our friends were happy. They said we could keep an eye out for the fire from their house. They have a rooftop deck where they said we could hang out.
I did my usual prep in case of evacuation. I have my “go” bag, money, my mom’s flute and my great grandmother’s cookbooks in the laundry room, right next to the garage. I locked kitty in a room with her carrier, so I wouldn’t have to search the house for her. I didn’t want to leave our house and our cat to go to our friends’ house. It turns out people one mile away from us were evacuated. The fire went from six acres to 600 acres in less than an hour. Now it’s at more than 3,000 and not contained.
I looked back on what I was doing one year ago. Much of the same. Watching and learning about a fire nearby.
How do you prepare for an emergency?
Would you be comfortable leaving your house with a fire close by?
Olive has discovered a fun game to play while I make the bed. She jumps on the bed and hides under the covers. Her crazy polydactyl claws get stuck .
Last Thursday, I had a dental appointment to get my teeth cleaned. An hour before my appointment the power went out.
I checked my iphone and the power company predicted power would be restored in four hours. They didn’t give the cause.
I called the dental office to let them know I couldn’t get my car out of the garage because the power was out.
The receptionist told me to pull the red cord and then I could manually lift the garage door. I hung up, pulled the red cord, but couldn’t lift the garage door. So I asked my husband to try.
“No. I’m not going to mess with the garage door,” he said. He wanted to leave well enough alone and wait for the power to go on. “Just call them and reschedule,” he said.
The dentist was able to swap my appointment with somebody on Monday morning. It was all good.
A neighbor called us and said she was at the hair dresser and would we please go to her house and invite her husband over. He had been walking their dog when the power went out. He was sitting freezing in the back yard with their dog. He had exited the locked house through the garage and without power, the buttons to open the garage door were worthless.
The wife said she asked him to come over to our house, but he didn’t want to be a bother. My husband returned with our neighbor and Rascal, a poodle bichon, a few minutes later.
The power was restored a few hours earlier than predicted and life was good.
But then Friday morning came. We had an electrician over to see why a few outlets inside and lights outside don’t work. My husband clicked to open the garage door for the electrician. The motor went on but the door didn’t open!
I saw a sticker with the garage door company name and number. I quickly called them in a panic. After all our dishwasher AND garbage disposal already quit working earlier. I was worried everything was going wrong in our “new” house all at once.
The garage door repair man came a few hours later. I told him we had had a power outage the day before and I didn’t know if that had anything to do with the double-sized garage door not opening.
“Did anyone pull on the red cord and manually open and close the garage door?” he asked.
“No, absolutely not,” my husband said. “We didn’t want to do that for the exact reason that we could hurt something.”
I was standing slightly behind my husband and sheepishly raised my hand. “I did,” I said.
The garage door man climbed a ladder under the garage motor, pressed a lever and presto! The garage door worked. The price tag: $230.
“Why didn’t you tell me you pulled the red cord?” my husband asked.
“You didn’t ask and the dentist told me to,” I explained. My husband shook his head and walked away.
The garage door man said he’d service our garage door and he also fixed the buttons outside which have never worked. So, now we can also get locked out of our house if the power goes out while we’re on a walk.
What embarrassing things have you done that compare with me pulling the red cord?
I had a terrible night’s sleep last night. Here’s the short version:
My daughter got COVID, she wasn’t at home but was with our friends in Santa Barbara. Our dear friend was making my daughter homemade chicken soup when Waffles the Pug got into the chicken bones.
My daughter decided to not “wait and see” but rushed Waffles to a nearby vet.
She sat in her car while the vet’s aide brought Waffles in. I was on the phone with my daughter, alternating with our friends in Santa Barbara for most of the night. They let her take him home and wanted him back first thing in the a.m. He does indeed have chicken bones in his belly.
My daughter called at 8 a.m. yesterday freaked out because Waffles wouldn’t eat breakfast. If you know anything about pugs this is a serious sign something is wrong. I asked if she’d taken him for a walk and if he’d eaten some grass. She said, yes, he ate grass and threw up but he was still obviously in distress.
I asked if she was taking him to the vet. She said they were on the way to the emergency hospital.
That evening she called me crying hysterically. Oh no. They gave Waffles an ultrasound and found a mass in his small intestine. It wasn’t moving so they’d have to operate. They also told her it was risky because he’s a pug and they don’t always do well with anesthesia. They said he’d die without the surgery….
More Waffles History:
Last year when Waffles was with us during COVID shut down he ate half a package of pork chops that my husband put in the sun to defrost — styrofoam and plastic wrap included. He ate poisonous berries from the ficus tree and ended up in the ER. When my daughter was in college, he ate an adderall one of my daughter’s college friends had dropped on the floor. Another ER visit.
Waffles the pug
It’s not like he’s not well taken care of, but he is incorrigible. It literally takes one second for him to put something he shouldn’t into his mouth while you’re not looking. My daughter is blaming herself. I’ve told her it’s not her fault.
Baby Waffles
I guess it’s a good question. What is it about pugs? Also, as a mom, I’d like to scale back on the drama in my life. I’m terribly worried about my daughter’s health as well as Waffles.
Have you had an animal who is incorrigible and always getting into trouble? What kind of trouble? For my fellow pug owners, do yours act like Waffles and try to put everything in their mouths?
