annoyance of the day: chris-less mornings

chris is out of the town for half of the week at some conference in phoenix. sure phoenix is only a 45-60 minute drive from our house so theoretically he should be able to drive home every night, but I'm not sure if his car would be able to handle the driving back and forth. so I'm stuck at home. with a dog and a new puppy. I feel like a single mother of two. this is what my morning consists of:

• try not to trip over ginger (who has to beat you down the stairs) as I rush to get pepper outside as soon as she wakes up so she can do her "thang"
• pour myself a cup of coffee
• wash face, get dressed, apply makeup
• let pepper back in
• sip some coffee
• "no pepper, don't chew on the table/couch/rug/cord/etc"
• give pepper something to chew on while I try to enjoy my coffee and "breakfast" (which just consists of a couple handfuls of cereal) and read some of my book
• rip the bottom of my pant leg out of pepper's mouth
• pry the throw blanket out of pepper's mouth
• make sure each dog has their own food (adult healthy balance diet for ginger and puppy healthy growth for pepper)
• make my lunch
• make sure ginger has plenty of water
• see why pepper is whining
• make sure towel is clean/dry in pepper's crate (which is upstairs in my room)
• give ginger a bone
• take ginger's bone away for being mean to pepper
• refill pepper's water bowl & food bowl in her crate
• get stuff together for work
• "ginger get out of there"
• try to put shoes on while pepper chews on them
• find and put toys or something for pepper to chew on in her crate
• give ginger attention so she doesn't feel left out
• take pepper outside again
• wait for her to do her business
• find treats to give to pepper for doing her business outside
• give ginger a treat for always doing her business outside
• turn off coffee pot
• go back upstairs to brush coffee teeth
• stop ginger from drinking out of toilet
• make sure all doors are locked (back door, bedroom balcony doors, garage doors)
• put pepper in her crate
• find cd's to take for the drive
• rush back upstairs to stop pepper from whining by remembering to put a sheet over the crate
• leave for work

all this while constantly keeping an eye on pepper to make sure she stays out of trouble and having to rush up and down the stairs is exhausting. it's so much easier when chris is there with me to help out in some way or another. and I always feel so rushed. I wake up an hour before I have to leave for work and I'm convinced that some my minutes go missing. sure I could get up earlier, but it's hard to get yourself out of bed at 3 in the morning. especially when you were just awake at 1 am to let pepper out.

I already feel exhausted this week and it's only tuesday.