A Trip to the Hardware Store...

Well today I was going to do some shopping at a local hardware store. I'm really starting to get serious about making my apartment more of a home than it is right now. Since I had gotten permission from the landlord to paint the place as I see fit. So I borrowed my Sis' car and went to the hardware store.
A couple of weeks earlier I had decided on the paint colors.
I got to the hardware store and had them prepare the paint. Planning on painting media/living room and bedroom in 2 different colors. Bought the paint and than shopped for painting supplies. About 2 hours later I was done. All in all I spent about 200 bucks.
After that came the fun part of having to carry all that stuff up 3 flights of stairs. And paint is actually quite heavy. Had to leave the stuff outside my apartment to get the rest. That did drive Daisy crazy. Although she's now good with staying by herself...with me being on the outside that's something that she barely can handle and she starts with her anxiety routine. So I left some stuff in the car and spent some time hanging with Daisy. Later that day we both went back to the car to pick up the rest of the stuff, before dropping the car back off at my sister's.
So there will be quite some painting in the near future. The only thing that I did forget is to buy a bigger ladder. Since the rooms in my apartment are about 12' high...a standard ladder really isn't of much use. So I guess I will have to go out and a bigger ladder at some point.

Computer Woes at Work...

Well, this can certainly be called the week of computer woes. On Monday our system was already incredibly slow. On Tuesday the server broke down entirely. Well, so the girls in the order department went back to writing each and every oder by hand.
The accounting department was off even worse. I couldn't tell anyone anything without the computer. But I still didn't get bored since there was a lot of stuff that I could do, that doesn't involve a computer. And usually I don't get around doing those things anyways. But some accounting work needed to be done and so I did it the old fashioned way...with the print out off all the accounts in use. Actually it is quite interesting and actually fun, since you have to use your head and think in which accounting class an expense or income actually belongs. Haven't done that since my accounting exam. With a computer you just type in a search term and get a list of possible accounts back. In the beginning going back to the "old way" is quite exhausting, but you get very quickly used to it.
On Wednesday the estimates about the possible date loss and therefor for the possible damage where somewhere between half a work day and up to 2 weeks. If the later part should turn out to be true...that would be an disaster! Each "computer expert" was telling a different story and trying to point out that his scenario would be the accurate on. Fact is that apparently all the experts didn't really know either.
On Thursday we got a replacement server. Well it was working...but things were quite slow. I spent most part of Thursday and Friday examining the accounting data and the data integrity. Apparently we got off with a blue eye. The data integrity turned out to be OK and we only lost about half a workday of accounting data. So we will have to re-enter that stuff. But that's certainly a very small price to pay. I'm quite happy that it turned out to be that way.

Daisy's first Day off the Meds...

Well today was Daisy's first day off the Meds and me being at work all day long. For me that was quite a hard day, since I wasn't entirely sure that she would be able to handle it without the meds. When I left Daisy did the same thing she had been doing while on the meds. No particular signs of anxiety. Just she watching me getting ready to leave. When I left I waited at the bottom of the stair case and listened for a couple of minutes...but nothing was to hear. So I went to work.
It was quite a difficult workday. On the one hand my head so wasn't at work...it was with Daisy and on the other hand we were starting to have trouble with our computer system.
When I got back home in the evening there was no sound of an anxious dog. She waited at door and was super excited. Took her out for a nice walk right away. As soon as I got back I reviewed the video tape and Daisy had been doing pretty much the same thing while being on the meds. She waited at the door after I had left. Stayed there for a couple of minutes. Then she checked every room to see if I had really left. After that she went into the bathroom to dig a little through the laundry. After that she went into the bedroom and slept in the bed. A couple of times she went towards the door to check on some noise that had startled her. But no signs of anxiety at all.
Apparently having been on the anxiety meds helped her to pick up the pattern of me going to work and coming back home again. On top of that I live in a very quiet building. Only 7 other renters and me living in a penthouse apartment is quite helpful with that as well.
So far I'm very happy that Daisy seems to be fine without the meds. She digging through the laundry and sleeping in my bed...well, that's something I can live with.

Taking Daisy off the Meds...

This weekend was the time, that I had decided to take her off the Anti-Anxiety Meds. During the last VET visit we had agreed, that after having been on the Meds for 2 month it was time to take Daisy off them and see if she can handle the separation from me without Meds. I was going to run out of Meds on Tuesday and I really didn't want to take her off the Meds while being all the long at work.
So I decided to take her off on Saturday and try a couple of different times leaving her all by herself, while recording the entire thing with my video camera. All the "Tests" on Saturday and Sunday worked perfectly fine. So it looks like she's gonna be fine. But only Monday will tell, since that's the first time when I'll be at work all day long and Daisy will be by herself and completely off the Meds. But considering how she was doing on Saturday and Sunday, I think she will be just fine.
I will definitely keep you guys posted on that.

Visiting Friends....

This weekend I finally got around to visit with friends and of course Daisy was going to join me. We left the apartment at about 4 pm and made our way to Vienna's Train Terminal West. Bought the tickets there. Boy, I just wish my train ticket would be as cheap as Daisy's. She pays 2.90 bucks and can ride all day long.
We got to the train on time and even got good seats. With me sitting the aisle seat that leaves Daisy the seat next to the window where she can relax and chill out. Unfortunately I can't remove the muzzle, since that has to be on when riding the train. And that's definitely something I don't like. But Daisy does actually fairly good with that.
We got to St. Poelten just in time to catch the last bus. We went to the Gastro-Pub at my parents. At first it was a little of a standoff between Daisy and Mandy, but very quickly the got along...meaning the pretty much ignored each other. That gave me time to chat a little with the waitress. Later Sandra joined us as well and it was quite a fun evening. Had there dinner as well. During there course of the evening there were up to 5 dogs there and they all got along quite nicely.
At 11.45 pm it was time to leave since I wanted to catch the train at 11.30 pm. Since there is no public transportation at this time I had to walk to the train station. Really didn't feel like paying 12 bucks for the cab...and it's only about a 30 minute walk to that station. This is the second to last train back to Vienna and it usually gets me back to the apartment by about 12.45 am.
All in all it was a fun evening visiting with friends and I'll probably be doing that once every 3 or 4 weeks. Always depending on my plans and of course on the weather.

Washer, Haircut & Hardware Store...

Well, today it was finally going to become reality, that my new washer/dryer combi-appliance was going to be delivered. I has delivery, since I wasn't going to drag that 200 lbs thing up 3 flights of stairs. So paying the 80 bucks for delivery was pretty much a no brainer. They had set the delivery time between 9 am and 1 pm. I was waiting from 9 am on. But spent time with a rather lengthy breakfast. Was more of a brunch style thing. After that I watched some TV on my iPad. Hour after hour passes by...but no washer. about 12.40 or so they ring the door bell and start unpacking the thing. I felt sorry for those guys. Especially one of the delivery guys was one tasty dish...and the red shorts did show his buns off perfectly. Yep they were almost to die for. Ups...guess I'm getting a little sidetracked here. It didn't take them much time to set up the washer and it worked perfectly. It better does, after all it's a 1000 buck appliance. I gave them each a 20 buck tip for there effort. For Austria that's considered more than generous.
After that I had to hurry to get to my appointment for a haircut. And I made it just in time. All with the haircut was fine, except for the price. Spending 28 bucks on a haircut is a lot of money...at least for Austria. Especially when that place used to be cheap about 10 years ago. But all the bitching didn't really help. I needed a haircut and that's what I had to pay for. On the positive side, I did find a cheaper place later during the day when I did my grocery shopping for the weekend. It's about half of it and that's the place I will be going to in the future.

After I was done grocery shopping I still had do do one more trip. This one to the hardware store. I had burned out the bulb of the lamp in my kitchen. And the light above the stove really isn't that much help. Who ever said that dimmed lights are romantic apparently never tried to do dishes or to prepare dinner with very little light. It's not much fun. So I get to the hardware store and turns out that light bulbs have become ridiculously expensive. Paying almost 20 bucks for a bulb is excessive as far as I'm concerned. Of course all the LED lights are fairly reasonable priced...but that doesn't help me if my kitchen lamp requires a bulb. So I had to deal with the price.
When I was at the hardware store I also picked up some paint chips. Well, I know that I said about 2 years ago that I won't be doing any painting for the rest of my life ever again...after having finished painting the entire house back in the States. Well, but here we are again. The paint job in my apartment is in need of a redo and landlords are no longer required by law to paint the apartments before renting them out. So this task will fall to me. And especially the paint job in my bedroom is driving me slowly nuts. I really dislike the peach color. On the positive side I will have an apartment painted in the colors I choose myself.
I had planned on visiting a few friends later in the evening, but after all that errands I really didn't feel like it and having a headache didn't help much either. So I decided to spend a quite Saturday evening with Daisy at home.

Dentist Appointment...

Well today I had an appointment at the dentist. On the weekend one of my crowns had fallen out and the rest of the weekend wasn't that much fun. The edges of that crown post are sharp and you're constantly with your tongue at it. So getting that taken care off today was quite nice.
I left work 1 1/2 hours early. Got to the dentist office, which happens to be just around the corner from my apartment, just in time. Just filled out some paperwork and then we got started. Putting that crown in was done very quickly and the entire appointment lasted about 15 minutes. I was told as well that I have a couple of teeth that are in need of some dental work. That doesn't really come as a surprise and I've know that for about 1 year. And eventually I will have that taken care of.
One great thing about being back in Austria again is that I don't have to pay for dental appointments like these by myself...it's all paid for by public healthcare and that is a big cost saver.

VET Appointment...

Well today was Daisy's 1st control appointment after having been on the anti anxiety meds for 1 month. Since the VET is about 40 miles away and I no longer have a car it was time for another railroad trip. Got up at 6 am took the dog out and had breakfast. After that we headed over to train station. Got the tickets and boarded the train. Boy, I wish I only paid as little as my dog does. 3 bucks for the entire day. We had a great trip, met a couple of fun students and of course the dog was immediate conversation starter. Got off the train and took the bus to the VET.
At the Vet we had to wait about 30 minutes. And Daisy did something she's usually doesn't do at the Vet. She actually socialized with a couple of dogs. The we got called in and had a little chat with the Vet. He's very happy how well the treatment is progressing and that Daisy is doing as well as she does. She will have to stay 1 month longer on the anti-anxiety meds. After that she will have to get off the meds completely and hopefully she's adjusted good enough and it won't be any problem without the meds.
Another thing is Daisy's failing eyesight. I've been noticing that she definitely doesn't see certain things. For example an empty plastic bottle placed somewhere in the room and she's gonna to run into it. I thought the might be due to the cloudiness of her lens. But the Vet did a more detailed inspection of her eye and he thinks that her retina is getting weaker and weaker. Since that is a slow process she can get used to that. So I started to talk to her way more than I usually do. With a dogs failing eyesight the owner has to be partially the dogs eyes. It's just part of having a senior dog. But besides from that she is completely healthy!!
Coming back to her anti-anxiety treatment. This being her second week of being all by herself in the new place, it turns out that she must have gotten used to the schedule that I come home. Usually this is around 6 pm. When I open the door an very excited Daisy is waiting for me. Yesterday  got off work earlier and got home by 4.30 pm. When I opened the door there was no dog waiting for me. I had almost closed the door, when she finally walked out of the bedroom. Apparently she has figured out the schedule and that's very good news. As I think that she will be able to handle being all be herself, when she's being taken off the meds in 1 month.
After the Vet appointment it was time to visit my Mom. We got to catch up a little and I also got to use the washer since mine has not arrived yet. As long as my alleged DNA contributer wasn't there it was fine. He walks in the door and a wave of negative energy hits the place and right away the dog goes into hiding. The thing with the negative energy does remind me of  certain TNG episode. And that episode is so much more fun than dealing with the useless douche! Well after 30 minutes I just had it and went over the the local gastro pub to catach up with my friend Sandra. And by 2 pm it was time to leave again since I had to catch a train to be in time back in Vienna again to go shopping for the weekend since that was something I hadn't done.
Besides the 30 minutes with the douche it was a quite eventful and for most parts a fun day...and Daisy is really become an avid passenger in public transportation. And it seems that she is enjoying it.