Part 30 ~ The Adventures of King Ben & Zeus the Big Dumb Dog

If you missed the start of this series, you can find it here. A lot of things will be the same or very similar.

Last night I was reminded of how not smart I was in letting Ben take that long nap. I was reminded five different times. That’s how many times Ben got up, and I had to corral him back to his bed. The sixth time he got up was around 12:30AM and I just let him get in bed with me. The last time I checked the time was a little after 1:00. I have no idea what time Ben went to sleep. I know he’s not taking any naps today!

I was awakened at 5:15 by Nature and her call. Ben was at the bathroom door in a short time telling me “Gramma get out!” and beating on the door. And so begins another day at Casa Cuckoo…

6:30 meds and uncovering and lighting of Sven was followed by Daughter’s text of departure and later arrival home. I tried to get a picture of Diesel Cat sleeping in Ben’s jail, but Zeus kept getting in between me and Diesel. It is beyond ridiculous how jealous the Big Dumb Dog is.

After Daughter got home and got changed she asked Ben if he wanted to go lay down with her. He said “okay” and continued to watch his tablet. Daughter prompted him several more times and he got up and went to her room. She said “You’re welcome” as she followed him. I told her to send him out when she was ready to sleep, then Zeus and I went back to my room.

Ben stayed with Daughter for an hour or so, but she kept getting  up and if she didn’t come back right away he’d come looking for her. Finally he just moved to the living room to do his chalk thing.

He was working on this when I gave him his meds at 10:30

Daughter came out of her room a little while later and said she couldn’t sleep and she wanted to order fast food. She said “I’m hormonal. Don’t judge me, monkey!”

Who am I to judge anyone?

After meds I had put Sven in the shower. He’s gonna get spoiled with this daily shower stuff. He’s a Desert animal, fer cryin out loud! I went to do the toothbrush thing on the scales on his head. He kept moving away…

I removed the offending object and left him alone for a little while. Then he had his nom noms (cilantro and blueberries today) and laid under his lights, digesting.

The fast food arrived and was eaten. Daughter immediately started feeling tired. (I told her it would happen) I told her to go lay down, she’s off tonight. She wants to keep to her schedule though, so decided to stay on the couch. I told her about her snoring a few days ago…she didn’t believe me. Of course not, she doesn’t snore. Yeah, okay…

She did fall asleep and she fell hard! Ben was back and forth between the living room and my room and he wasn’t quiet about it, or calm.

Around 2:30 Ben was playing Bongos on Zeus and Zeus was getting excited and starting playing a little rough. He’s always been a ‘mouthy’ dog, but when he’s excited he nips. He’s playing, but his teeth are very sharp and it hurts. (He doesn’t break the skin) So Ben was beating away on his Zeus Bongos and Zeus was barking and nipping… ON MY BED. Either the noise penetrated the food coma or Nature’s Call was too strong to resist because I heard Daughter go into the bathroom.

Ben went from Bongo Zeus to standing on my bed and falling backward… while I was on the bed and Zeus was trying to get on top of me and away from the falling Ben. Of course that’s exactly the time that Younger Daughter called.

I texted her earlier that a package came for her. She was calling to say that she and Partner would probably come by today to get it. She knows the chaos of Casa Cuckoo, so it didn’t even phase her when I switched from talking to her to telling Ben to stop or yelling at Zeus to quit barking. She told me to let her know when things were calm here. That gave me a good laugh. I told her to come by whenever. If it was too crazy I could hand her the stuff over the fence.

The Crackerjack Hour ended around 3:30 (when his meds kicked in) and there was calm. Unfortunately, it was just an intermission.

He came into my room and pulled my hoodies off the hook and said “You have to get dressed. You have to go to the store.” I grabbed his plastic bat and one of the paddle-ball paddles and started banging them together like a hand drum. I handed them to him and he started beating them. I did some silly robot moves and stopped when he stopped. He thought it was hysterical.

I thought everything was okay when he put them aside, so I sat down on the bed. He started banging again and I grabbed a tin (my choco stash) from next to the bed and started banging too. Then Zeus started barking and wouldn’t stop, so I had to stop. Ben ran into the living room.

It was quiet for a few minutes. I noticed his tablet was still in my room, so I plugged it in.

On my way to the bathroom, I saw Ben sitting on the couch picking at his big toenail. if you’re squeamish, you might want to skip ahead Ben is a picker. He picks at scabs, he turns small bumps into huge sores (there’s a dime size sore on his chin right now), he peels his finger and toe nails completely off, if his lips get chapped he picks that too.

I asked if he wanted his tablet, trying to distract him. He started saying “You have to get dressed. You have to go to the store.” Really? Again? I was in the bathroom and he was sitting on the couch still picking. Daughter tried to stop him, but he ran to another room, finished pulling the entire nail off and came back to tell her he had blood. She took him into her room and put a bandage over it.

He came into my room with that same freaking statement… I asked him if he wanted to take a bubble bath. He said “okay”, so I went to run the water. It was only 4:15, too early by regular schedule but I was willing to try anything to keep him from losing it. I used the shower-head to make a LOT of bubbles and got him into the water.

Younger Daughter stopped by while he was in the tub, so that was lucky timing. She got her package, gave me a cupcake and a Hello Kitty she found at the dollar store for Ben. She grabbed a soda and a juice, said hello to Ben, helped me bring in the 16 boxes of juice Amazon had delivered, then left.

Ben played in the tub for about a half hour and then opened the sliding door and started tidal waving the floor. Daughter told him to close the door if he wanted to splash, but that’s not as much fun as drenching everything, INCLUDING A NEW ROLL OF TOILET PAPER, in water and bubbles. She went and got him out of the tub.

He sat on the couch in his robe, eating chicken nuggets from the fast food delivery and watching his tablet. Meds at 5:30 and entering the homestretch… bedtime is within sight.

It has been an up and down day today. I forgot to mention that when I was reading my email this morning I had a notification that a Blogging Buddy friend had bought me an Amazon gift card. I have a Juice Angel, Daughter has a TP Angel, and now I have an Amazon Angel… I keep offering help and I keep getting gifts. I am SO blessed! Thank You again, my Amazon Angel!!

For a long time it was very very difficult for me to accept help or gifts and I very rarely asked for help. Then I realized how much joy it gives me to help others and I thought about what a jerk I was being by not letting people help me. I was being a proud, selfish asshole and depriving people of their joy. So now I gratefully accept anything people want to do for me.

I still want to pay it forward. Energy needs to stay in motion… kindness needs to move from person to person to person… with kindness we can change the world, or at least our part of it.

 

I should probably end here. I’m getting all sentimental. My ‘Pollyanna’ is showing. Can you believe this is the THIRTIETH episode? Thirty adventurous days in a row, and who knows what will happen tomorrow…