Okay, so I had this big long thing I wrote the other night after training as I'd had this moment where I just realized several really important things not just about training (in fact, probably relatively little to do with training) but about myself and why I do things the way I do and how pervasive the damaged done by punishment and negative reinforcment is and it just totally highlighted to me why I don't use aversive based methods and was very, very emotional and and and... *poof*... "Corel has an internal error and must shut down this ill designed piece of crap program". ARRRGHH!!!

At the time I was really upset because I just didn't have the energy to write it all up again and it REALLY was exactly what I was thinking and feeling. Right now I'm inclined to be philisophical about it. Maybe it was the universe's way of telling me to just get it out and let it go.

I'll actually sit down and write about what it was in a day or so but right now I am severely drained energy wise. Laurent is teething or maybe he knocked something out of alignment with the fall or maybe it's a growth/developmental stage or gods only know what... but he is VERY windy and waking up every 30-45 minutes, screaming, not able to take day naps, super over-tired and just generally NOT happy. It hurts so he wants to nurse (and nurse and nurse and nurse) but even that doesn't settle him. My poor beautiful boy. I can just hear his stomach gurgling and he crunches and arches in pain and wails before letting out the longest, loudest farts you've ever heard. Honestly, I've counted to ten-one-thousand slowly and he's still farting. It's probably a world record for farts. I wish there was something, anything, I could do... my poor sunshine boy is miserable with it and it's breaking my heart to see him so upset but everything we've tried so far seems completely u s e l e s s.

On the upside of things we met Nic's cousin Nina today and her son and daughter. OMG we have family here! We have NICE family here! *does a little happy dance* Ohhh... she is so nice and warm and easy to talk to and we had a great chat! We finally saw pics of Nic's dad as a child and Laurent looks similar in certain ways, as does Nic. Laurent got a nifty music toy that projects little figures on the ceiling when it's dark in patterns, so cute! She was so sweet and kept assuring us that she was so happy and would love to keep in contact but only if we wanted to and I was just falling over because here we'd been wishing and wishing we had some family here! An imposition?!? More like a dream come true! LOL

I also finally wound this skein of yarn I got a month or so ago. It's hand painted and hand dyed and YUMMY colors! Ohhhh... I really like how it knits up all bluey-greeny! I'm trying to make a hat out of it for Laurent because I've only got a small ball and it's expensive ($16 for 50 grams) and my ability is limited to say the least but I just have this vision of a beautiful sweater and longies in this stuff... it's sooooo gorgeous!!! Here's the link to the maker, Art Yarns but it doesn't show how truly rich and VIVID the colors are. They're just yumlicious amazing!

Anyway, I need to go, the poor dogs are staring at me pitifully begging for attention and preferably training because training is attention that results in rewards. Greedy little things!