Patriotic Bath 02, originally uploaded by punquin.

I’ve been doing pretty well with the updates, right? Even though I’ve been so busy that every day feels a week long.

Monday: I did the doggy birthday party when I got in to work, as I posted about earlier. Afterwards, I did some work web updates before working the evening daycare shift.

Tuesday: Benny and I got up early and drove to the Maryland daycare location, which is also the corporate headquarters. I had an all day meeting/presentation for potential franchisees. Benny went into daycare the whole day.

Wednesday: I went into my office in the doggy daycare and did a quick bath for a dog that was about to go home before taking over the bath area for a photoshoot. I need to design a postcard advertising our upcoming charity dog wash, so I recruited Benny as my model. Since we support military and service dogs, I put up patriotic decorations and borrowed items from retail for the background. I used the last of my bath foam to make great bubbles that would stay fluffy. Benny did great – he only shook the bubbles off his head once. And he hates baths. I took a million shots to get a few good ones, but isn’t that how it goes with kids and animals? In order to get a “happy” face, I had to get him excited enough that he’d pant (making what looks like a smile on a dog). So, much to the amusment of the employees and customers, I set up the shutter with a 2 second delay, then would jump up and down waving cheese in Benny’s face saying “Bennybennybennycheesecheesebennycheese!” in a high pitch voice. It worked, but he didn’t always stay still.

After cleaning up from our photoshoot, I took care of a few graphic design deadlines, sent off the two best photos for approval, then headed up to work the pm daycare shift. I did 3 more dog baths (yellow lab, golden mix, and gigantic harlequin great dane who I had to take outside to wash). The evening shift has to make all the dinners, plus the dry food portion of the breakfasts for the next day, so I spent some time writing out two sets of food name tags and cross-referencing with the medication list while helping bring out the dogs that were getting picked up. Then I spend an hour in the kitchen making all the meals. (Probably only 100 bowls of food. Last Friday it was 160.) I finished just in time for the 6 pm rush of pick-ups (everyone gets off work and comes to get their dog from daycare. I spent the last hour sprinting back and forth to get dogs. I don’t mind it at all. I love seeing all the customers and dogs, and it is fun to see if you can recognize everyone so they don’t even have to ask for their dogs. After we closed, I handed out the dinners and got out of there. Danny and I went out for some Chinese food and a great little place we found recently.

Today: Today I get to work from home for the first time in two weeks! That is, unless I get a call asking me to come in. We’ll see… I know they are trying not to. I don’t really mind, except that it sucks away my day and I get home at 8 pm.

This morning I took Benny back to the vet for another quick look at his neuter incision. It is still really scabbed over 2 weeks later. The vet pulled off the big scab and said it is healing well, just slowly. He still has to wear his head cone if he is going after it (which I haven’t seen) or when he is alone. One good thing about the cone – it has graduated him from having to be crated when we are gone. He now stays in the kitchen with China.

This Weekend: Saturday is my birthday! I will be old(er)! Danny asked me what I wanted to do, but I have no idea. It is always so hot on my birthday. Any ideas? I don’t really have friends that I see regularly, so I doubt a party or get-together would be possible.