Unemployed ...with Dogs

I have been unemployed for about two months. My choice to be unemployed; bad vibes at the place I was working and it didn't look like improving for awhile. Nepotism coupled with gender discrimination.....hmmm.....that sounds even nastier. At one point the FamilyMember said to me "I have so much respect for your husband that I won't use profanity to his wife."

Sounds good on the surface. But what's the point of respecting my husband? My husband isn't the person putting up with the crap that's being dished out at this place. FamilyMember doesn't even know my husband. FamilyMember would have a lot less respect for my husband if he knew that my husband thinks he's a dumbshit. Just cuz MySpouse has testosterone doesn't make the two of them best buddies.

Best buddies they never will be. FamilyMember has a long way to go to measure up to hubby's standards. MySpouse grew up with five sisters. Growing up with all those girls he got to see and hear the results of gender discrimination and sexual harassment. There are things he will never do or say to a female. I sneer at Politically Correct most of the time; a euphemism is a euphemism. But PC beats the hell out of idiocy.

Sexual harassment and gender discrimination are topics on which to endlessly rant. I won't bore anyone with that today.

Here's the 'dogs' part of the title. Okay, not an elegant segue, but it got us here.

I'm unemployed, not doing paycheck-bearing labor. Labor without a paycheck, yes, plenty of that. I used to work at a place that had lay-offs fairly frequently and I liked that. Except that I'd be so busy when I was laid off that it was a relief to go back to 'work'. This time is a bit like that.

I am cleaning and de-cluttering my poor neglected house. In between cleaning, I function as a doggie door-opener. About 24 times in ten hours. They go outside for periods of two minutes to 15 minutes. 'They' are Lab-mix littermates, a female and male, 3 years old. Lilac, the female, and Jackson, the male. 'They' are our surrogate children.

I did learn something about parenting from my human children: It's best to have offspring who will never want to drive your car.

Lilac and Jackson want to go in and out a lot (!!!). Actually, I'm okay with this. It's freakin' cold here. The kind of cold that makes utility company shareholders dance with glee. 'They' live at the same temperature that we humans do: 70 degrees when we're up and about, 60 degrees at night so that I don't have hot flashes/night sweats. It takes conditioning to spend more than a few minutes outdoors. I don't begrudge them their ins and outs.

When I really want to get something done I tell them nope, got to work. Stay in for a bit, there's nothing to bark at anyway. The neighbor to the north has taken his dogs back inside and the neighbors to the south have gone to work. The sanitation trucks have come and gone, so no, nothing to bark about.

Time for a nap.