My job may be in jepoardy

Today was a real Floridian March day with highs in the upper 70's, which we haven't had in FOREVER, so I took advantage. I went out first thing in the morning and sat on my screened-in patio by the pool to read the paper and enjoy a morning iced coffee.

Morning led into noon, and I ate my lunch and read a book. Eventually, guilt, not too mention the heat, led me inside to tackle cleaning the two rooms I didn't get to do over the weekend.

After I finished the chores, I kept on working, deciding to move on one of those resolutions I made for the new year- resolving to keep my house in order and to get into a cleaning routine like my good friend, Krista. She runs her vacuum and sweeps daily to keep a handle on things, and I thought if I could get half as good as her, I'd be a happy camper. The only problem with this scenario? Elliot.


You see, Elliot loves the broom and hates the vacuum cleaner. If I'm sweeping, then he is there prancing on the brush, eating the broom, batting the broom, and running through my dirt piles. If a neighbor is outside, sweeping a driveway? Elliot is howling inside the house, begging to released to attack the broom.

 As for the vacuum? The vacuum is destroying his world. It is a powerful machine that moves, and Elliot must bark and bark and run from it as fast as he can. He hides from the vacuum and peeks out to see where the vacuum is, and if it is near, then he barks some more.

Every time I get out the vacuum and Elliot starts the barking, I'm reminded of the time I visited my friend, Sharon, and her family in central Florida.

She has a black lab named Jake, who also doesn't care for the vacuum either. One day after a hectic day full of birthday cake and present opening, Sharon got out the vacuum cleaner to help pick up some of the wrappings and crumbs. Immediately, Jake started barking and hopping around the living room. Sharon ignored it by singing loudly. Her husband then began shouting at the dog loudly. The noise level was deafening.

Finally, Sharon's son, Ben, who was two at the time, took matters in hand. He calmly went over to the outlet and pulled the plug on the vacuum bringing everything and everyone to a halt. Then he smiled at everyone and gave a big sigh of relief.

Today, as I attempted to vacuum with my dog barking and hopping about, I thought about little Ben and his solution and decided he had the right idea.

Silence is golden.

So I turned off the vacuum and put it away and headed back outside to the pool deck, where I smiled and gave a big sigh of relief.