At least Diego will give me a hand paw...

I am so ready to get out of this desert. I don't know what it is about this area, but it is a weird vortex of fake people and self-servitude. Perhaps because we're so close to LA? Any transplant will tell you that this place is definitely different.
It's been almost fascinating to see how people are reacting to my leaving; there are those that ignore the effect that it's having on me and focus on how it is going to affect them; "You can't leave ME!" Then there's the I will never show any approval for what you do people; "Moving where? A new town where you won't know anyone and you'll have to start all over. Good luck..." I've quickly learned that "Let me know if you need anything!" quickly translates to "Let me know if you need anything so I can politely tell you that I'm too busy to help you."
Everyone that knows me knows when I'll be on my way -- and yet some of the people that I most expected to care have completely forgotten. Forgotten probably isn't the word... more like they are either too busy or it simply doesn't register on their radar of priorities, I guess. Fortunately, I've had a few surprises here and there, where an amazing phone call or visit completely makes up for it all.

I'm not thinking about it anymore. My next few days are completely dedicated finishing up with the packing, continuing the nightmare of the garage, and THEN getting the house up to Ready to Show to Potential Buyers condition. Today was spent trying to take care of the latter; I spent a lot of time painting what was supposed to be painted and scraping paint off of what wasn't supposed to be painted -- simply reinforcing my "if you want it done right, do it yourself" mantra.

So.. that's about it. I spent a great evening last night with the surrogate parents, and for the first time, I got really really excited about the future. It also made me completely terrified of not having my father around for all this. It was an interesting pang of fear which I've been quite successful at avoiding by simply not thinking about what is going on and what is yet to come. I keep telling people that I'll get excited once I get there, because frankly, I am far too overwhelmed with everything else to even crack a smile. Moving in itself is crazy and stressful -- and I have the joy of compounding it with the fact that i've never moved, this is my childhood home, I have to sort through my dead parents' belongings, i'm preparing this home to be on the market, and i'm alone in this insane endeavor. I'm by no means having a pity party... It's just somewhat humorous that there are so many factors that are making this ridiculously difficult. I'm getting pelted by lemons... and my lemonade pitcher is in storage! Ugh!

On a funny note, I took a break from scrubbing floors to train Diego to shake. My older dog, Socks, mastered this on her own. She is just one of those dogs that does it anyway so I took advantage of it. Diego? It took a little palatable encouragement. He managed to learn it in 20 minutes, which is impressive... but it needs some fine tuning.

I sit on the floor with treats when I work with him, and he never moves his gaze from them. I can't get him to look at me; he just starts throwing every trick he knows at me. I mean, I understand his logic -- these silly repetitious actions = food. So I tell him to sit and he starts snapping, barking, giving his paw, and when all else fails, he plays dead. Oh, and he wags his little tail while he plays dead. The big scary 80 pound doberman holding as still as possible and wiggling his little mechanical tail.
After this little bout of "Look what I can do!" I finally get him to sit patiently. Treat. Shake? Treat. Down? Treat. Okay, get back up, let's do this again. Sit? Treat.
I wait a second to make sure he's paying attention, then..
SMACK. Ouch! WTF? Paw to my face. Here it comes again. CHRIST! DIEGO STOP THAT!
He doesn't know any better... He outstretched that paw and went as high as he could with it. That's the most enthusiastic shake ever!

Treat.

I think i'll just stand when we work on his tricks from now on.