On Tuesday night, Lakesyde’s Have a Good Morning, whose call name is Aurora, came home to join our family. She was born on Martin Luther King’s birthday, meaning she’s eight weeks old. She’s named after the Roman goddess of the dawn, and we chose the name because she represents the dawn of a new day in our family. She weighs just over eight pounds, is adorable, and is cute and surprisingly funny for a very active puppy. Her picture appears here. For those of you who don’t know me, that’s me holding her. We will probably call her Rory.

The other dog in the picture is Nero, who is fourteen months old. Nero and Rory have a common grandfather and both came from the same breeder, so you can get a pretty good idea of what she will look like when she’s fully grown. He’s a good looking guy.

Augie, who’s nearly ten and a half years old, won’t have anything to do with her. It took about two weeks for him to accept Nero last year, so my guess is that will happen again here. Nero, on the other hand, either wants to play with her, or he’s busy being jealous that nobody’s paying attention to him. That’s to be expected, I guess.

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I have ranted here at length against Google’s plan to scan entire books and make them available on line for free. The Writers Guild and the national association of publishers have both sued to try to enjoin this program on the grounds that it constitutes copyright infringement, litigation that I have wholeheartedly endorsed. While Google remains unrepentant and wholly in favor of its program of massive copyright infringement, it seems to be trying to make an attempt to satisfy some of the concerns of the authors and publishers.

Google is now offering to permit publishers to sell e-books that would be fully downloadable from Google’s web site. Google claims that the publishers will be able to set their own prices, and that consumers will not be permitted to save a copy to their computer or to copy pages from the books. Former Congresswoman Pat Schroeder, the president of the Association of American Publishers, gave this plan faint praise: “I assume in this they would have to be asking the permission of the publisher, and we would say, that’s very good news,” she said. In other words, from her perspective the only saving grace here is that Google is at least asking permission under this program, unlike its other scheme. From my perspective, the fact that they’re asking permission is the ONLY saving grace about this program, and even then, it’s no saving grace at all if the authors don’t get paid royalties from it.

Supposedly, this program is intended to permit publishers to boost their book revenues, but I fail to see the logic of this. If I’m the consumer, and I can’t save a copy of the thing or print it out, what’s the point? Why would I spend my hard-earned money on something that I’m not even permitted to retain a copy of the work that I’ve paid for?

In my mind, there is only one acceptable solution to this problem. Offer links to Amazon.com, where the customer can buy the actual book, or sell them a real e-copy that they can download and keep but which also ensures that authors will be paid royalties to compensate them for the fruits of their labors.

I remain intransigent in my opposition to Google’s programs and remain equally unshaken in my support of the lawsuits filed by the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers. Anyone who values books should be, too.

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Today, I was finally able to get back to work and get back to writing. After losing Cleo last week, and with having to entertain Nero so much, there wasn’t much of an opportunity to write. I also didn’t have it in me, and I didn’t have the wherewithal to do so. Susan and I went to the movies this afternoon, and when we got back, I felt energized.

I sat down tonight and got back to work. I am nearly finished with the tenth chapter of the Dahlgren bio, but it’s been nearly two weeks since the last time that I touched it. I put in a good 90 minutes on it tonight, filling holes and fleshing out some points. I have a few more things to plug in tomorrow night, and then it’s done. When it’s finished, it will be just a few days before Ully Dahlgren left his father’s house in Washington to help lead what became known as the Kilpatrick-Dahlgren Raid. So, I have two more chapters of narrative of his life to go, a conclusion that sums up his life, and then an appendix that deals with the legitimacy of the so-called Dahlgren Papers found upon his body when he was killed, and then it is finished.

I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. The question is: is it the end of the tunnel? Or is it the headlight of an onrushing freight train speeding through the tunnel at me? Time will tell. Stay tuned.

But, at least I’m back in the saddle.

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We took a ride out to our new house site today, and were really surprised to see that it’s largely framed already. They were putting the roof trusses on when we got there today. What makes it all the more remarkable is that it was raining at the time. I am genuinely amazed at the speed with which the early phases of the construction of this house has occurred.

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Yesterday was one of the most difficult and emotionally draining days of my life. After writing what was posted last night, I just kind of sat here on the couch like a zombie. I was emotionally and mentally exhausted and could not focus on anything. I finally decided to go to bed about 10:30, and couldn’t sleep. On one hand I was spent, but on the other hand, I was too keyed up to sleep. Fortunately, the other two dogs wanted lots of love and attention last night–they lost a loved one, too–and Nero spent the whole night in bed with us.

It was just as hard at work today, trying to get back into my normal routine and focusing on the business matters that require my attention during the daytime. I was partially successful, but I kept seeing poor little Cleo laying there, and it was hard to focus. I got done what I needed to do. My partners and our staff were all wonderful–supportive and understanding, which helped me get through the day. Tonight, I’m just too drained to even think about writing. It’s a quiet evening watching TV and surfing the Web.

The problem is that Nero, at 14 months of age, is a fountain of boundless energy. He constantly wants to play, and constantly wants attention, and without Cleo to keep him occupied, it falls on Susan and me. Augie is too old to keep up with him. It’s constant and it’s nonstop.

Several months ago, we had decided that if we lost one of the older dogs, we would get another puppy as quickly as possible so that Nero would have another dog very close to his age for a playmate. Then, when the other older dog passed, we would not get a third dog again, limiting ourselves to two from then on. Seeing Nero trying to get Augie to play and his relentless pursuit of us to play only reinforced our belief. So, I called Nero’s breeder last night to see if she knew any other breeders with a litter coming up, and she indicated that, unlike last year, not all of her puppies were spoken for, that she has a litter that is ready to go home on Monday, and that she had three little girls from that litter that were available for adoption. Their bloodlines are very, very similar to Nero’s, and they will actually be cousins of his. So, we decided to go ahead and take the plunge. Our new puppy will come home on Tuesday. We have to come with a name for her that’s consistent with our Roman emperor theme. That way we will have two dogs within a handful of days of being exactly a year apart in age, and that should give Susan, Augie, and me some relief, as Nero will have a new playmate for life.

At first, I thought it might be a bit unseemly to get another puppy so quickly, but life is all about timing, and when this opportunity presented itself, we just couldn’t allow it to go by. So, even though Cleo will only have been gone a week, we will already have another puppy. The new puppy could never replace her, and I don’t expect her to. She will be her own little angel, and we will take her on her own merits.

Of course, this also means housebreaking and very sharp little puppy teeth for the second time in a year. Our existing house has almost no carpeting. Nearly all of the floors are hardwood, with some tile. Only three rooms in the house (Susan’s office and the two spare bedrooms) are carpeted. None of the rooms where we spend the majority of our time are carpeted. So, if the puppy makes a mess it will be easy enough to clean up, whereas, if we wait until we move into the new house, it will have carpeting throughout. So, that’s another benefit to doing this now instead of waiting even longer.

I will always love and miss my Cleo. But, it’s time to move on. It’s time to live life and enjoy the company of the ones we still have.

Thank you so much to everyone who took the time to pass along words of condolences. They meant a lot to both Susan and me, and they helped give me strength to face the world today. Even though I don’t actually know most of you personally–and only know you from the Internet–you are all in our prayers, and we are in all of your debt.

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Cleo came into our lives very unexpectedly in 1997. We had two dogs then—Caesar, who was three, and Augie, who was not quite two. We were content with two dogs. They entertained each other, they were great company for each other, and we could handle two without too much trouble. We were not expecting or planning on having a third.

We were getting ready to leave for a vacation, and made arrangements to board the boys with the woman who trained them. When I called to make the arrangements, she told me that she was glad that I had called, that she was going to call me, and that she had a beautiful year-old female golden retriever who needed a home. Susan and I both agreed that we needed a third dog like we needed large holes in our heads and we said no, thanks.

When we dropped the boys off at her house, she said, “You have to at least meet her.” She went downstairs, got her, and within thirty seconds, the three dogs were attached at the hip, playing and running and chasing. By the end of our vacation, we didn’t have the heart to separate them, and she came home with us. That first night, she was a total spaz—hyper, and into everything. She kept us up most of the night. Then, the next day, she went into heat. That was a real joy. We looked at each other and wondered if we had made a mistake. Fortunately, she settled down quickly.

Her original name—given by her first owner—was Brandy, but it definitely didn’t suit her personality. We changed it to Cleopatra, Queen of the Scioto, or Cleo for short. She was definitely a queen bee, and it really fit. Within a couple of days, she knew her new name. The boys loved her, and after Caesar died and we got Nero just over a year ago, she quickly became his favorite playmate/chew toy.

Cleo thought that she was a ferocious watchdog. She would bark at anything bold enough to stray its way into the yard, be it leaf, squirrel, or stray piece of paper. It was her job to protect the house, and she did so, tail wagging the whole time. The neighbors next door got a tiny, adorable Cavalier King Charles puppy—who weighs maybe four pounds—and Cleo, the ferocious 84 pound golden retriever, would bark at this tiny interloper. We always laughed about it.

At the same time, she was a sweet girl, very loving and very gentle. Almost from the moment we brought her home, she was my baby. She only wanted to be with me, to be loved on by me, and to be near me. She had this silly toy—literally a ball with legs and feet—and it was her baby. She took it everywhere with her. Her favorite thing in the world was to fetch ball with feet, and I had made the mistake of teaching her to bark to tell me to throw the ball. Needless to say, there was a LOT of barking around here.

The poor baby must have come from a puppy mill—we know almost nothing of her pedigree—because she had nothing but one health problem after another. Fourteen months ago, she had surgery to remove a stage three mast cell cancer tumor from her side, and we knew then that we were on borrowed time with her. We made sure to enjoy every minute with her, to play with and love her as much as possible, and to cherish this time that we knew we shouldn’t have.

That borrowed time ran out yesterday. During the night on Monday night, she apparently had a stroke. When I tried to get her to go outside yesterday morning, she had a lot of trouble getting down the steps, and she lay down in the back yard. This was a girl who always had a weight problem because she would eat anything not nailed down, and the idea of her not coming in to eat worried me. When I got her back inside, she refused to eat, which was very unlike her. Not realizing anything serious was wrong, I went back upstairs, and she eventually followed me up. When I went back down for my breakfast and to let them out, she was noticeably limping and having trouble, and I had to help her down the steps.

When Susan got home from work yesterday afternoon, she noticed that Cleo was showing the same signs of stroke that her own mother had shown—weakness, sagging facial features, lethargy. She called the vet, and we took her in. We left her over night for observation, and Susan brought her home this afternoon. The vet wanted to see if she might improve in her own surroundings, so she brought her home, but her condition had deteriorated. Susan practically had to carry to get her to move. She wouldn’t eat, and she was exhausted.

Finally, we made the decision that we dreaded. We knew she was on borrowed time, and the poor thing had had so many surgeries that the last thing we wanted for her was for her to have to suffer. We had decided that if it came down to keeping her a little longer or ending her suffering, we were going to end her suffering. So, we made the inevitable but necessary decision and I carried her to the car and she went for her last ride. We held her and petted her as she shuffled off this mortal coil. She left us quietly and peacefully and is now in a better place. Once again, she’s playing with Caesar, young, healthy, happy, and frolicking.

There’s a new angel in heaven tonight. I miss you already, Cleo. And I will see you again some day. Wait for me.

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I got an e-mail from Ted Savas about five minutes ago indicating that the printer has fallen behind and that the estimated shipping date for my book has been shoved back from March 21 to April 6. While I certainly understand the delay, and am well aware that it is not Ted’s fault, it nevertheless doesn’t much please me.

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The published eulogy for Ulric Dahlgren has been a mixed blessing. On one hand, it’s been a treasure trove of useful information, much of which has found its way into my manuscript. On the other hand, it’s been one of the most excruciatingly frustrating sources I have ever used.

My issue with Major Morrison has been well-documented here. Thanks to help from all of you, I was actually able to solve that particular riddle. Last night, another especially frustrating one re-surfaced.

Here’s the latest tantalizing and frustrating tidbit from the Reverend Sunderland’s eulogy, which refers to a two month period that Ulric spent with his father in Charleston, beginning mid-November 1863 and ending January 22, 1864, after the amputation of Ulric’s right leg due to his combat wound. After returning to Washington, he had about three weeks before reporting for what became the Kilpatrick-Dahlgren Raid, in which he was killed:

“During ths time, he composed an article detailing the operations before Charleston in a style at once so calm, so clear, so comprehensive, as to silence all cavil and dispel the groundless complaints of the ignorant and impatient. This article, which has been printed since his death [on March 4, 1864], sounds to us now like a voice from the mouth of the grave. It was published over the signature of ‘Truth,’ which was ever more to him, by far something more, than simply a nom de plume; it was the substance of his character, and the animating spirit of his whole life, and never more conspicuously did it shine forth than in this last complete vindication of the siege of Charleston–a paper freighted in every line with a candor, a majesty, and self-evidencing power which only belongs to the truth itself–and which, being at the same time a work of filial affection, as well as a patriotic and public defense of the national prowess, might well stand for the crowning work of all his intellectual efforts–for the last-written testimony of his hand, which alas! he was so soon to seal by the offering up of life.”

How’s that for a tantalizing tidbit? Since I first read the eulogy a couple of years ago, I’ve been trying to locate this article. Obviously, I would love to be able to at least quote this article in the book, and even include it in full in an appendix. However, many months of searching have been fruitless. My researcher and I have reviewed every Washington, DC newspaper between January and April 1864, as well as all of the Philadelphia papers and the three major New York papers (Times, Tribune, and Herald), and we cannot find any evidence of this article anywhere.

This eulogy has truly been a mixed blessing. Although it’s provided some really good material that has never been used by anyone else, it has also been an astounding exercise in frustration. I’m open to any and all suggestions as to where else to look to try to find this article.

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I couldn’t get an appointment with my doctor’s office until tomorrow afternoon, so I don’t have a formal medical diagnosis. However, thirty years of unpleasant experience with sinus infections tells me that the symptoms I’m experiencing are those of a nasty sinus infection and not just the common cold. I felt so bad today that I actually left the office at 12:30 and came home, which is something I never do–I think I had one sick day in 2005, and then it was the flu. I feel like I’ve been hit by a bus–did anybody get its number?–and am in desperate need of a good night’s sleep. Hopefully, starting antibiotics tomorrow will get me back on the road to feeling like myself again.

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A couple of weeks ago, I posted about my frustration with being unable to identify a Major Morrison mentioned in the published eulogy of Ulric Dahlgren. I was frustrated because Major Morrison is featured in a terrific anecdote that I want to include in my Dahlgren biography, and without being able to do so, I didn’t believe that I could legitimately include the story. The inability to identify Morrison really frustrated me. When I did that, I did so hoping that one you might be able to help solve this terribly vexatious problem.

Fortunately, I was not disappointed. Several of you chimed in, including Lee White. Lee did a database search and identified one likely candidate: Maj. Charles J. Morrison of the 1st D.C. Infantry. Bryce Suderow, who assists with my research in Washington, D.C., was able to locate several of the annual circulars published by the Rittenhouse Academy in Washington, and sure, enough, the name of Charles J. Morrison appears in the 1856 circular, along with the name of one Ulric Dahlgren. The eulogy mentions a chance meeting between Dahlgren and Morrison on the road to Harpers Ferry, and the 1st D. C. Infantry was assigned to the defenses of Harpers Ferry. So, it appears that we have solved this particular mystery, although I have to admit that I did not expect to ever do so.

There’s just one problem. Maj. Charles J. Morrison resigned his commission in April 1863. The eulogy, given in late April 1864, makes it clear that both Ulric Dahlgren and Major Morrison were both dead by then. So, although I am about 90% certain that this Charles J. Morrison is my guy, I’ve ordered his service and pension files from the National Archives, and if the pension records confirm his death between April 1863 and the delivery of the eulogy, then there will be absolutely no question that this is my guy. As it stands, the evidence is strong enough that I would be willing to take this case to a jury and feel good about my chances of winning the case.

So, to my loyal readers, I owe you one. Thank you very much for taking the time to not only indulge my rantings, but to help me solve seemingly unsolveable mysteries, too.

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