What a weekend !

The picture shown her is one of Clare at Mum's house taken on Sunday, 20/11/2005. I can't believe she's almost three.

Well it all started Friday night.

I had a seminar on handling aggressive dogs. It was conducted by a man who is a trainer but who also consults for Law Enforcement agencies around Australia. The seminar was good, somewhat lengthy and I was pretty much stuffed by the end of it.

In the middle of the seminar I receive a text message from Ruthie informing me that my Dad has turned up and wanted somewhere to stay for the night. Her question to me was, "When are you coming home?". I left about 15 minutes before the seminar completed and got home at about 2320. I was pretty much knackered at this stage.

I had a quick chat with Dad for about an hour. I viewed some pictures from his new digital camera. The shots were taken in England from his recent holiday.

I eventually got to sleep around 0100.

Up again at 0730 getting ready to run my dog training classes. With the forecast of rain, I must admit I wasn't exactly looking forward to going, however the rain didn't come down so I was pretty happy. More importantly Dad had come up and actually saw me run a class. Now that was good. I've spoken to him about it before. He was hanging around the background taking pictures .

After dog training finished, we quickly got home, did some tidying up and had a 45 min cat-nap.

At 1530 Mum arrived, she hadn't seen out new house. So in she went. She nodded approvingly and gave some nice tips for the garden. Ruthie had prepared a lovely meal, which I cooked on the BBQ. Mum dropped off her Apple Mac for me so I could install Microsoft Virtual PC 7. She wanted to play some shareware games. Everything went pretty well except for the fact that Mum's iBook only has 256mb of ram. Things were VERY slow going..... Mum departed to return to Geelong at 1930 and I kept working on the computer. I kept working until 0130. arrgghhh! At least the job was 'almost' done.

After sleeping in until 0830 Sunday morning. Clare and I got in the car and headed down to Geelong to deliver Mum's computer back to her. Of course a few more games were installed. Lunch, etc... Clare was a little darling though. She was a little clingly but she just loves me. We had a great day.

We quickly drove back to Melbourne, with Clare promptly going to sleep with being in the car for a couple of minutes.

I quick dinner with Ruthie and I headed off to Four Paws for the Advanced dog demo team training session. The training went really well. I must say the best thing I saw was Donna's work with Hudson. Truly awesome. The best 'crawl' that I've ever seen in a dog. WOW! Molly went pretty well, distracted a few times but otherwise she was 'ok'.

Ruth and Clare picked me up and headed home. Clare thankfully was fed, milked, clothed, teethed and was ready for some stories. Stories took place and I attempted to get Clare to sleep. Her usual trick once you've settler her down is to ask you, "Hold my hand Daddy!".... I say, "I'll stay for one minute then I'm going...." The minute takes place, you try and leave and of course she wants more. This time I said, "no.... you've had you're minute, it's time for bed..." and promptly walked out of the room. Some tears took place with Clare crying, "I want my Daddy..... I want my Daddy...." I let her cry for a minute and headed back in. Some quickly settling and for some bizarre reason she went off to sleep. Amazing. I realise now, that if I say something to her she must realise the consequences. I have to stick to my gun and do what I say....

Ruthie was stuffed by this stage and in bed with her clothes on . The kitchen was a mess so I decided to clean up. The problem is the cleaning took me until 1130. Another late night.... Why do I do this to myself? I was dead tired, had a huge weekend yet I stay up. I just couldn't bring myself not to tidy up. The house was a mess. It's not that had to clean up. I understand ruth is tired and she's pregnant. Thank God that men don't have to go through that .

I can't remember when, but Clare snuck into our bed sometime during the night. I wake up with Ruthie carrying her back to her bed. I think it was around 3 or 4 am. I woke up this morning feeling very tired and slightly dazed.

I need sleep! Tonight however, i've got my appointment for the hypnotherapist to stop smoking. I'm ready to stop smoking. I really am, I want to get fit again. I don't wait ruthie to smell smoke on me. I know I can do it!