So, About This House Sitting Thing...

  So, faithful readers, it's been a few days since our last get together. I've been dealing with a nasty muscle spasm in my neck that's only now, with the aid of copious amounts of Advil and Tylenol, becoming manageable.

  On Sunday, Father's Day, Penny and I went out to do what was supposed to be a scavenger hunt in downtown Prescott. It turned out to be more of a walking tour that asked us to read all the historical plaques and gave us points for reading comprehension, like elementary school. Since we finished with a very high score we can assume Penny and I are capable of passing Grade 8 English.

  The tour was interesting and pointed us to the oldest saloon in Arizona where, 140 years ago, these guys were patrons:

  The event completed, we headed off to El Gato Azul for some tapas, courtesy of my wonderful children, which brings me back to Advil.

  Earlier in the day I noticed my neck becoming stiff, so I ate some Advil and ignored it the rest of the day... until I woke up at 3:30 am Monday with a godawful spasm on the left side of my neck running down into my shoulder. After crawling out of bed without screaming, I transferred myself to the uncomfortable couch, ate some more Advil, and attempted to make myself comfortable, unsuccessfully.

  While lying there I figured I'd see if there was something stronger I could buy when the stores opened, since the regular concoctions weren't working. To my amazement, I found that OTC muscle relaxants like Robaxacet, etc. cannot be sold without prescription in Arizona! I guess there's a state-wide problem with muscle relaxant abuse... "Hey Bill, you're looking very tight today (whips open raincoat), how about a dime bag of some nice muscle relaxants?" Maybe I should hang out behind the high school.

  Anyway, long story short, a combination of Advil and Tylenol for the past 36 hours has rendered me almost functional, thus I'm able to write today and bring you to today's subject: house sitting. Is it what we expected?

  It's been two weeks since Emily left for Alaska and we've been in charge of Radar and Spike. As I've written earlier, we've managed to tour around quite a bit and see virtually everything there is to see in this part of the country. We've hiked, golfed, biked and kayaked. We've seen all the weird and wonderful things we can find. During that time we've also done all the mundane things that go along with daily life. We've shopped, cooked, washed dishes, done laundry, walked and fed the dogs. We could be anywhere doing these things but, right now, we're doing them at Emily's house.

  Do we like it? In short, it's just like living at home, except it's in someone else's house. I'll call it "life once removed", familiar yet unfamiliar.

  The routine is different. Since retiring we've adopted a morning routine which goes something like this: wake up around 6:30 am, drink coffee, read the paper, do the puzzles, eat breakfast. This routine takes 2-3 hours, during which no physical activity and very little talking occurs. We like it like this. Being retired, there's no compelling reason for us to go anywhere right away, so we don't.

  Dogs don't read the paper, drink coffee or do the puzzles. We're awake and they want to go for their walk where we take them into the bush behind the house and let them off-leash for a half-hour. It's a nice walk and the weather has been perfect every day we've been here. The thing is, we don't get to sit around, drink coffee, read the paper, wake up, etc. because we need to do it early before it gets stupid hot. If we had a dog and we were home we'd go for a walk later, when we felt like it. Traumatic? No, just different.

  By the way, we're in the Mountain Time Zone which is two hours behind Toronto... except Arizona doesn't do Daylight Time, thus we're three hours behind. So what, you may ask. Well, the earth doesn't rotate differently just because Arizona wants to be different so the sun rises here at 4:30 am instead of 5:30 like everywhere else. Because everything lights up early it makes it difficult to sleep later than 5:30, although I try. Also, not traumatic although it feels a bit like permanent jet lag.

  I mentioned before that Emily is in a wheelchair and this is her house, so she's designed it to suit her, as she should. For us, not so good. The chairs are supremely uncomfortable as these two examples show:

  The kitchen countertops are about 30" high. which is great for her and not so great for us, being used to 36" counter height. The tiny feather pillows on the guest bed have caused my current neck issues and the uncomfortable furniture and low counters aren't helping my back. Oh, and there's no TV either. I'm counting the days until we leave.

  Ok, enough whining. It's more comfortable and spacious than a hotel room. The house is in a beautiful, friendly neighbourhood. It's air conditioned. The kitchen is well-equipped and has super appliances. We're going out to buy pillows and more drugs today, so I'll survive.

  What about the dogs, the reason we're here? Radar and Spike are great dogs, super friendly and very protective. Well, overly protective. Radar is aptly named. The slightest noise anywhere within 100 feet of the house gets him barking and, as Spike is the backup barker, it gets a bit crazy when someone has the temerity to close a car door across the street at 3 am.

  When we walk them we have to be alert to other dogs approaching on the same path. Radar has a thing about dogs that are bigger than him... and some that are smaller. Ok, he has a thing about all other dogs. Spike is afraid of small children having to do with some abuse when he was a puppy. Put all this together and you start to understand why walking them in an isolated backcountry area is the perfect activity.

  Other than that, the dogs are easy to care for. They're easy to feed, eating kibble and canned wet food, and they're relaxed in the car. Since it's unlikely we'll encounter dogs on this trip that are laid back surfer dudes I'm going to rate these guys an "A".

  The only other thing worth mentioning is the robot vacuum cleaner. Why would I mention this? It's not like I have to clean the floors, right? Well, it's an old robot and it doesn't have much battery capacity and it doesn't hold much dirt. Put all that together and it never finishes. We start it up when we go out and, when we return, we find it's a) charging and getting ready to terrorize us, or b) dead because it couldn't make it back to the charger or c) full. We don't resolve any of these issues until we're ready to go out again because it's FUCKING LOUD and we don't want it to run when we're here. Before we leave I clean it out and re-start it so that it can vacuum all the same places it did before it stopped, then stop again. You get the picture. It's like Robot Vac Groundhog Day around here.

  To sum it all up, it's like home. Someone else's home, but home just the same. In eight days (I did say I was counting the days) we hit the road again on our way to San Francisco and there will be a whole new list of things to get used to. In fact, I received an email detailing six pages of instructions yesterday. It's only two weeks this time so all the crazy things the owner wants us to do shouldn't drive me crazy. I know it won't drive Penny crazy because nothing drives her crazy... except me. Until then, it's time to start the robot again.