SoOoO Much to Say Part 2 in Book Six: Trying to Hold On 2019

Alright y’all… between the Memorial Day Weekend and Work keeping me busy… this is kind of all being done at once. SO… I separated it out into various portions to hopefully make it easier to read. The best way to read this is Chronologically so… in the following order.

SoOoO Much to Say Part 1
SoOoO Much to Say Part 2
SoOoO Much to Say Part 3
SoOoO Much to Say Part 4
SoOoO Much to Say Part 5
SoOoO Much to Say Part 6
SoOoO Much to Say Part 7

BEGIN Part Two

At about 11:00 or so on Saturday, my Sister In Law texts us to come out to a Renaissance Fair with her, bro, and niece. Some positives and negatives on that. Negative? I have a guest, so I’m likely not going to go (though I do, ultimately, let him be the final deciding Yea or Nay on it). Positive? Wife could still go and take the dog; which would give Wife some much needed “out of the house, with other people” time and give the dog some much needed “crowd exposure and exposure to stranger dogs”. Negative? It is a 4 hour round trip drive. Positive? I think Wife really needs this. Especially since she isn’t actually engaging with me or our guest at all… she should go do something with her weekend time instead of just… keep sitting on the couch, watching TV, playing cell phone games. BUT even though I’m encouraging her to go, I continue to impress upon her that it is entirely her decision. A decision that took her 80 minutes to make. Not an exaggeration. Between “Do you guys wanna do this?” text and “Sure” text was exactly 80 minutes. Wife arrives after a 2 hour and 15 minute drive and meets up with the Family. As Wife predicted (and pre-complained about) the Family left the Ren Fair within about 2 to 3 hours after she arrived. However, upon her return… it sounded like it was a good time. Nala really got to meet a lot of strange dogs, Wife got to enjoy the outdoors and doing something with her day… she even got a little sun exposure!

Ultimately… if nothing else… I’m glad she did it so that she could interact with other people. I mean… I can appreciate it if she’s an introvert. But the fact that she basically keeps herself in the house, doesn’t have the courage to talk to our neighbors, doesn’t do anything with other people… she’s becoming Socially Agoraphobic.

Shortly before Wife came home, MBFITWW and I decided on an Anime that Wife would likely enjoy. It is called Golden Kamuy

The Wikipedia Summary is: Saichi Sugimoto, a veteran of the Battle of 203 Hill in the Russo-Japanese War, works as a miner in Hokkaido in order to provide for the widow of his dead comrade. He hears a dubious story about a hidden trove of Ainu gold, the location of which is hidden in the tattoos of a group of convicts who escaped from Abashiri Prison. When he discovers that the story is true, and that multiple other groups are in pursuit of the gold, he decides to search for it with along with Asirpa, a young Ainu girl.

Why would this appeal to Wife? No magic, no sexuality, historical fiction focusing on Survivalist Practices and Cultural Food Exchange while also maintaining enough action and historical reference to be exciting but nerdy.

I thought it was a good show and I hope that I can see a new season of it get created. How much of it did Wife watch? Zero. None. Absolutely Zero Percent. Despite our ardent invitation to her during dinner, she decided to stay upstairs watching Horror Movies instead of descending into the basement to spend time with her husband and our guest.

At this time, I finally got a call back from my parents. They’d been busy on Saturday morning, but I wanted to talk to them about the Hawaii Trip. They were kind enough to offer to pay for our airfare, so I wanted to confirm the process for that. You see, when someone offers to pay for something… I immediately consider that it could mean one of two possibilities. Either, they want us to set everything up and they’ll reimburse us the costs or they want to set everything up to make sure they are getting their money’s worth. My parents made it clear that they were intending on the former. We spoke some more and discussed places in Hawaii to visit that they had enjoyed. Flipped the call to Speaker Phone as MBFITWW will be a guest of my parents’ house when he, Wife, and I crash there for Anime Iowa in July.

One thing I haven’t discussed much yet is how Nala was reacting to our guest. The first time she met him, she was very wary. To the point that Wife and I and MBFITWW had to sit in a room with Nala for about an hour before she settled down enough to stop barking, approach him, and sit without agitation.

This time? Totally different… which isn’t necessarily great news, unfortunately. This time… she absolutely loves him!! Which means she wants to spend all her time with him… which means she wants to spend all of her time jumping on him, jumping at him, excitedly biting. Like… NALA. If you like him and you are excited that he’s here… bring him a toy to play with and/or sit there and allow him to pet you. But… y’know, she’s a puppy and has a lot of energy and has a lot of trouble regulating her emotions. Which creates problems. Because it means that despite her really wanting to be around our guest… we have to keep her separated a lot of the time because she doesn’t play nice. Which, I feel, creates a bit of a feedback loop. We keep her away from MBFITWW, she really wants to see him, so when she sees him she explodes with energy, so we have to separate her and it feeds back on itself. Worse still, Nala is still only at about 90% with her understanding of the basement space.

On Saturday, after hanging around the basement and repeatedly being told to stop biting; you could see her mind shift. She suddenly stood bolt upright and raced upstairs. I followed and, sure enough, she was waiting by the back door. I let her out, she peed and pooped. GOOD GIRL! She figured out (1) don’t bathroom downstairs; (2) how do I indicate bathroom when I am downstairs?

Though, Sunday Morning… she was funny. Typically, our morning routine is as follows:
I wake up, hit the head and take my pills. I let her out of the bedroom, refresh the water in her bowl and open the door to the basement area (her food is kept at the top of the stairs) where I fill her dish with food. She follows me to her food, sits, gets excited as she hears the food hit the bowl, then joyfully prances to her food/water area waiting for me to set the food down. After I set the food down, she smells it (not eats it) then sits in front of the door so that she can pee/poop. As I typically have to go to work and Wife is asleep, after Nala comes back inside, she trots over to the bedroom door, where I let her back in to the bedroom and she falls back to sleep on her dog bed. That’s the normal.

Sunday Morning? I woke up, hit the head and took my pills, and let her out of the bedroom. She follows me to her food/water area, and things are as normal. But as she’s sitting and hearing me put food in her bowl… she catches a scent. It is at this point that I realize… damned MBFITWW slept downstairs on the couch again! Nala races down the stairs, excited at another opportunity to greet her friend. I race down after, trying to be quiet. I’m too late to prevent her from leaping onto the couch, but I grab her before she has time to make physical contact with the sleeping form! Thank goodness!! I put her outside where she pees/poops, then bring her back to the bedroom. I go back to sleep as well.

I awake a few hours later and take Nala back outside. Who knows, maybe she has more in her… better safe than sorry. First, I close the basement door to keep her from going down there! We come back inside… MBFITWW is still asleep, Wife is still asleep. So I just watch some TV with the dog. Wife wakes up and uses the basement door for something… which Nala immediately capitalizes on. She races for the door and bolts downstairs as though Barry Allen has suddenly possessed her tiny dog form. I race after her and make it downstairs just in time to watch this little brown body fling itself into the air, joyfully flying towards the couch. This time, our guest certainly wakes up as Nala starts licking his face. I apologize profusely and grab Nala to take her back upstairs! Silly doggy.