The Morning After...

Another day at the shop... I love it here! Last night we had a live jazz band that filled the house. Well sorta... There were over 30 people here. That is a lot for this shop! but according to the permit and the fire department a full house is 72. We would all have to be standing and facing in the same direction to get that many people in here I think. Anyway, this place absolutely rocks when music is going! It is a total blast!
I have a guy who says he sounds like a country Dillon, coming in on Saturday. Wierd guy, wants to do a sound check a couple hours before singing. It's a coffeehouse for goodness sake... but I dont know much about music and well he does... I bow to his expertise.
Anyway, with the jazz group last night i was really hopping and I am pooped today. I brought my little dog in to the shop today since she is kind of lonely at home. Before you go off on me let me say... my little dog is a Japanese Chin and is the cutest little dog around. She is also a very fiesty mean dog that likes nothing more than to look really cute so people will reach out and pet her and then she snaps at them! Fortunately she doesnt have many teeth and now she is almost totally blind. She is mostly comfortable at home where she knows where everything is. But I brought a little pillow that she sleeps on and for the most part she is comfortable. She isnt so sure about having strange people talking in her surroundings and not knowing who they are. We will see how she does though. She may be coming to the shop with me more often if she likes it here.
Dixie is the only dog I have ever felt I needed to apologize for.... daily! She is about 4 .5 pounds and is about the most worthless dog I have ever met. And I picked her out!

About 10 years ago Dan and I had a Shitzu. We got her from the humane society and when we got her she was 10 years old. She was a really sweet dog and Dan and I both really loved her. When she turned 13 she started having siezures. Not often just once in a rare while but I took her to the vet and he put her on phenobarb. She did fine for about 1 year and then the siezures came back and became worse. So I ran her to a different vet who did a blood workup and checked her over really well. After a brief time he told us that she had congestive Heart Failure and he gave us some heart medication and still the phenobarb. She did fine for about 6 more months and then she started to really go down hill ... We took her to the vet and he told us that she was failing. I could not stand the thought of having her put to sleep and took her home and cried. Three days later we made an emergency visit to the vet and we finally had her put to sleep.
I had been working out of the house when we lost our shitzu and after a few weeks discovered how much I missed her companionship. So, I went looking for a new shitzu. There were none to be found unless I wanted to pay a small fortune for one. So I started looking on the net .. first for shitzus in our area, then for small dogs. Up comes Dixie. She was a resident at a no kill facility. I wrote to them expressing my interest and the manager of the establishment wrote back with a form. The form was 10 pages long. I think it would have been easier to adopt a child! I filled out the form and faxed in to them but because the process was taking so long I grew concerned that Dixie was having to stay in a kennel when another person could have her and take her home so I e-mailed the manager and told her that if a good owner did present themselves while I was waiting for approval to adopt her then please let her go to that home. I hated the idea that Dixie was in a kennel longer than she had to be. Both of my other dogs had come from the humane society and neither of them ate while they were there. The manager wrote back and said that this was not a problem and that I needed to come meet Dixie. Seems she had had 10 visits so far from prospective owners/ownees and she had bitten every single one of them. I looked at Dan.. Dan looked at me and we agreed we would go see her the next day. So Dan and I drove to Arlington and met Dixie. She was playing with the managers dog and having fun and of course I was excited and tried to stop her from playing when Dixie bit me! It was love at first sight (at least for me) I wrote the check out and got in the car and the manager put Dixie in my lap. And she bit me again.
Just a few notes at this time.. First, Dan and I really had not come prepared to pick Dixie up that evening so we drove the Fiero. Now if you know a Fiero, you know that it is only a two seater and there was no room for Dixie anywhere except my lap. Second, Dixie is missing most of her teeth so when she bit it was more gumming but she does have a couple teeth and when they hit it hurts. Third, I love fiesty animals... always have.. they survive longer and live better.
Anyway we are driving down the road with this little fireball in my lap when Dan and I realize we hadnt had dinner yet and it was going on 7:00PM. So we pulled into the A&W and that is when Dixie realized how much she loved Dan. She had her first hambuger with us and has been our best friend every since that day. She still bites our sons and any one else (especially teens) but she loves us and only bites when we are playing and she gets a little aggressive.
So that is the story of how we got Dixie. I am sorry I bored you with her story but at least she didnt bite you! R

I own a coffeehouse!

I know it has been quite a while since I posted. Again I apologize but I do have a good excuse. In December my husband bought me a coffeehouse! It is a really big venture for me since I have never owned a business before. I am spending a great deal of time learning quick books, and how to run a coffeehouse and well it is an adventure! It is also a lot of hard work, long hours, tedium, and waiting and worrying and well the list goes on and on!
Since I got the coffeehouse on January 1, I (with some help from my friends and family) have repainted, remodelled and put up a folk gallery as well. It has been a huge undertaking as the space is 1200 square feet and before I took it over it was 1200 square feet of "not much going on". Since I took over I have scheduled activities each evening with live music two nights a week now. Sometimes I have it three times a week but that is not on a regular schedule. Anyway, I have quite a full house some nights and on others no one shows up and it is a dismal evening. In all it is still a crapshoot!
I frequently have people come in and ask me how my business is doing? This is rather a rude question I think considering it is my business, but people here seem to feel they have a vested interest in my survival as a business. It continues to amaze me just how insensitive and rude some customers can be but then the ones (who are about 99.5% of my customers in truth) are truly becoming friends I would like to have long after my business has expired.
For those of you who follow my art... I am still working on art pieces but it is slow in the coming. I have a rocking horse in the car that I am making for my grandson and I just purchased 7 new chairs to paint and do up for the shop. 4 of them came from the library and are really heavy duty oak. Yes I am going to paint the oak! they are not antique and not anything real pretty even but they will look awesome painted! I also have a small table that I purchased and I am going to turn it into a game table and put it out on the floor too. It is very nice and three of the chairs I purchased are the perfect height for the table. I still have several lamps at home to finish and get out as well. So yes, I am still doing my art, just not as fast as before I had the shop.
My grandson is doing wonderfully in Florida and both of his parents are doing great as well. He is growing so rapidly! I cant wait to see him again. My boys are great. Each is doing his own thing. Dan is working on becoming the Master Chief of the Coast Guard and Mollye is such an asset to him in this endeavor. David is in Boston and preparing to go back to college. He wants to study philosophy since he says he believes that education should make you more knowledgeable not necessarily teach you a career. To a degree I agree with him but my concern is that he is far to intelligent to spend his life as a "flunky" working in a printing company. However, he needs to find his own way and I think his path is rather interesting at this point.
Well, I guess this is enough for today. I will write more tomorrow (I hope) if it isnt too busy here. I wish you all well and bye for now. R