Looney Tunes Vol 4

Click here to see the list of toons that will appear on the next Looney Tunes DVD set. 2 of the discs don't look so great, but the Speedy Gonzales disc looks good, and I am really happy to see "Operation: Rabbit" and "Roman Legion Hare".

Oh goody

The good news: on the 5th year I attend this conference, I finally get the king size bed I asked for. It's about time.

The bad news: The high-speed internet in this hotel is not free. It is $10/day. There's not even a free wireless hotspot in the lobby. I lugged my laptop all the way to Kentucky for this?! I'm more than slightly pissed, as you know how much I rely on the internet as my main form of communication with John. I just finished traveling all over the Maritimes and had free internet wherever I went, yet a supposedly higher-class hotel such as this resort makes you pay. GRRRRRRRRR.

Guess I'll be expensing this one, as I will need access for work as well as personal reasons.

Just ain't like it used to be

My flight to Montreal was uneventful. Not being able to take water on the plane really sucks as all that Air Canada gives you is a small glass, about 2/3 full. Going to be a very dehydrating day. I hate forcing liquid into me in a rush in the terminal before boarding, so I've avoided buying any bottles of liquid.

I stopped in the food court and had a burger, knowing that my choices were limited once I got past customs and security. By the time I finished, my luggage was waiting for me and the line for connecting passengers was pretty much non-existent. I got up to the customs agent, preparing for the inevitable dumb questions they ask whenever you have to check off that the purpose of your trip is business. She asked me where I was going, for how long, cutting me off as I spoke. She asked what the conference was for. I replied, it's for our point-of-sale software. She said she was confused and didn't understand. I told her it was a user group to discuss software. She then asked where the software was developed. I replied Nashua, NH. She gives me another confused look and says, in the US? Apparently this agent has never heard of New Hampshire. She then asked me if I was traveling by myself and let me go through.

The luggage guys in Montreal all seem to like me when I come through. I can always count on them to give me a smile and do the heavy lifting.

I proceed back through security, behind people staring at the items you can no longer take in your carry-on as though it were a shopping opportunity. I get up to the scan area and do the usual removal of shoes, unearthing of laptop from bag, and getting it all on the belt, hoping they wouldn't search both my laptop and bag like they did in SJ. My shoes and laptop came through fine, but my bag sat just beyond the gate for a good 2-3 minutes. I could see it, but I know the rule about not grabbing things until they're free of the barriers. Waiting, waiting, ok now it's coming through. I grab it but then the security guy grabs it from me for searching, after hugging and kissing his co-worker. The guy says to me, you don't look too happy about that. Well, NO SHIT, JACKASS. Do you think I'm happy to have you go through my stuff? Do you think I'm happy to not be able to take a simple bottle of water with me while I travel? Or remove my shoes? Or take out my laptop? Or have all this take extra time because as the guard, you could have taken my bag and searched it instead of smooching your co-worker? This is so much fun! YAY! Outside voice told the Jackass that my expression was because I was tired and he could search through anything he wanted.

I long for the good old days of air travel. Security is a necessary part of today's air travel, I have to agree. However, there must be a better way than having to beam with the sunshiniest smile I've got at the prospect of being searched. "You bet you sure can search through my stuff! I love it!"

My heart-on-sleeve tendencies don't help me in the least. Gotta work on my poker face.

On the road again

The time has finally arrived for me to go back and visit the "friendly" skies. Since this is the first time I've flown since the tighter carry-on restrictions were put in place, I did as much research as I could before packing my carry-on.

Despite a detailed list of allowed and disallowed items on the gov't website, I still ended up throwing my tube of chapstick away. United Airlines specifically mentions chapstick and lipstick in a tube is allowed. The CATSA website did not mention this specifically. I decided if a US airline thinks chapstick is ok, I'd probaby be fine. I guess not. I anticipated that may be a problem so I made sure the tube I brought wouldn't be missed if I had to throw it away. But it's still aggrivating to have conflicting information when you're traveling between countries.

I am quite happy to be air-traveling by myself today. Usually it's annoying as I can never leave my heavy carry-on with someone while I quickly run to the bathroom, etc. I have recently decided that it's better to travel by yourself than with someone who is so annoying you feel like punching the crap out of them. I will bear the weight of my carry-on with glee today at the prospect that I have no one else to worry about.

My brother, although he's been making what I think are terrible decisions, has been steadily growing more healthy. He started back at work this week doing half-days.

My grandfather has finally had enough blood transfusions that the doctors feel he is able to withstand pacemaker surgery. He is scheduled for this surgery on Monday as long as his check today is fine. I hope he comes through it ok and is better for it in the end.

Boarding time. I have to fly to Montreal, Chicago and the Lexington. 2-3h wait between flights. I brought lots to read!

Re-learing the relaxing

Relaxing. I need to remember how to do that. The past month has been very stressful for me, whether it be self-induced or outside pressures.

I have help at work now but it seems I am working even more than before. Even with help, I still feel buried and overwhelmed with the amount of things I need to do. I spent 3.5/5 nights this week at work, in addition to being there all day, and two days of those were travel. I am getting sucked into the vortex again. Being a salaried employee, I don't get paid overtime. I have to remember that I can never get everything done, and I am entitled to time for myself. Which, after working Friday night and not even managing to have supper, is what I've tried to do this weekend.

I spent yesterday and today reading True Believer. I hadn't read anything by Nicholas Sparks before, but I did enjoy this book and his style. It was a relatively easy read and I found myself absorbed by it. I've been commenting for weeks now on how much I needed to just relax for a week and read books. I may not have a week at my disposal to do so, but a long weekend is better than nothing.

For the first time I am not really looking forward to attending the conference in a couple of weeks. This year it has become a means to an end for me getting to California for a few days. The last couple of years have seen me teaching other users, which I admit I love doing. It's great showing someone a part of the software they never knew existed, and something that changes their outlook on their processes and procedures. I'm not sure where my melancholy is stemming from when I think about this trip. Part of it has to do with the venue. I can't say as I have longed to visit Kentucky. I'm sure it's a beautiful place, but it just doesn't hold the same desire for me that Tucson did. I had always wanted to visit Arizona, even before the "let's get together with a guy I talk to online" plan. This year it just seems like I'm thinking, "Kentucky, whoopee." I hope it proves me wrong, but I don't think anything will be better than finally arriving at John Wayne Airport and seeing my fiancé circle around 5 times before he can find a spot to pull over and pick me up. :)

I think the other part of the melancholy is just a feeling of seeing the same old, same old. Same people. Same topics. Same pressures to switch to the next big software. I have joined an exclusive customer group this year, and the conference will be my first meeting with them. Maybe that will spice things up a bit. This group meets 3 times/year, so I will be getting to do some additional travel for work to [usually] nice spots in the US. Round about February or so will be the next meeting, and it will most likely be somewhere warm. The last 2 meetings have been East, so if I'm lucky the next one will be West and again I may be able to tack on a trip to SoCal.

Lately I feel like John and I are back at Square One when it comes to moving. Things have been going at what seems like a snail's pace because we are waiting for decisions that are beyond our control. Someone asked me the other night about whether he would be here for xmas, and I didn't know what to answer. I had hoped he would be settled here by then, so I really hadn't given it much thought. Now I am throwing ideas around about going there in February. Something needs to break soon for us. This stretch between July and September is the longest we've been apart, and it has also been the most difficult. We've been talking by phone more than usual, especially after our tolerance for sitting in a chair at a PC has reached its limit. Nothing compares to actually being with the person, though. I continue to plug away at things and do what I can, but with my impatient nature, it's not easy. I would rather go through this waiting period than not have him in my life at all... but I can't promise not to be cranky that we're not together yet.

This week I am off to Yarmouth and Halifax for work. With the craziness that has been going on here lately, I am actually looking forward to getting out of here for a few days, even to the Evil City itself. A temporary change of view will be nice, and when I return, I can start packing for Kentucky, and more importantly, California.

Lunatic Fringe

Since my brother was admitted to the hospital, I have been up there every day with the exception of Wednesday (had to go to NS for work) and today (recovering from mental meltdown). It's been exhausting. He's been having some personal life issues in addition to his health problems, and those two things combined are just totally exhausting to deal with.

My parents are on opposite ends of one particular issue. Unfortunate, as I had hoped they'd be on the same page for once.

My brother's heart issue is improving and they have moved him out of the coronary unit and down to internal medicine. Apparently the staff in this unit don't bother to read charts and like to argue with you when you chase them down for the proper medication. Getting decent care has been incredibly difficult. If you don't have family present with you, I don't know how you survive in that hospital.

On the down side, my brother has been officially diagnosed with Addison's Disease. He will have to take a steroid for the rest of his life, in addition to being diabetic. The doctor says he will likely leave the hospital feeling better than he ever has, because they think this issue went undetected for a long time. So that part is good, but it will likely cause him to remain in hospital most of this week as they monitor how the steroid affects his blood sugar.

I took today off from hospital duty because I was thoroughly exhausted. I woke up early but forced myself back to sleep until 11. I did some errands. I took a long walk around the perimiter of the Nature Park, and the exercise helped to relieve a lot of stress. I watched some TV and did my laundry and ironing. It was good to have some time to myself. I'm actually not minding a Monday at work tomorrow -- work will be a welcome distraction from family problems.


In other news, I bought a new PC. My old PC had reached its upgradable limit, so it was time for a new one. I'd been putting off the purchase for quite a while, not really sure what I wanted and not wanting to spend a lot of money. While I was in Costco a couple of weeks ago, I found a PC and monitor that had both been marked down. The monitor is a 19" LCD, and it's nice having the extra room on my desk. The PC has an AMD Athlon dual core, 1GB RAM, dual layer DVD+/-RW drives, card reader, and other things I don't need but it was a lot of PC for the price, and should last me a lot longer than the lesser models I'd been looking at, so I am quite happy with it.

Brother update

My brother has had a "fun" few days. First, a mistake in his medication meant that he wasn't getting enough and set his progress back. Then, his IV came out and he wasn't getting enough insulin, which was sending his blood sugar sky high. He had a test today that showed a 30% reduction in the fluid around his heart, so we now know he won't need the aspiration. Phew. He is stronger now and can walk down the hall and sit up a lot longer than before. So overall he is doing better. He definitely won't be out until next week at the earliest though. He's being sent for more tests for other things, so they may move him out of the coronary care unit and into another unit after his heart issue is substantially cleared up. I don't care how long he's in there, as long as he can get his health back under control.

There are issues other than health going on which I can't discuss here, but I am really worried about him. I hope when he gets better he will start taking better care of himself, on all levels.

Younger brother in hospital

My younger brother was admitted last night to the hospital, in the coronary care unit. He has pericarditis, brought on from his bout with pneumonia that he couldn't seem to shake. It is serious but hopefully treatable with medication. We'll know more in a couple of days whether or not the drugs are working. If they show progress, great. If not, he'll have to have an aspiration (i.e., stick a needle in his chest and remove the fluid.)

I'm going to cancel the work trip I had planned to NS this week so I can be close to home. My mom has been up taking care of him. There's not a lot I can do per se, but I just want to be around in case I'm needed.

My grandfather had a rough week last week, culminating in his loss of eyesight for a brief period. After a blood transfusion it returned, but this is not a good sign. They are trying to get his platelets up so he can get a pacemaker, but they are just not getting up high enough. My aunt is up staying with him because he's a little dizzy and disoriented at times and can't really stay alone right now.

Please keep them both in your thoughts/prayers.

Heading out of town

I have a busy next few weeks, work-wise. I will be heading out of town for most of the next two weeks. These trips are a way to intro my new co-worker as well as take stock of our equipment. This week involves trips to Bathurst, Charlottetown, Moncton and maybe Amherst. Next week is Yarmouth, Halifax, Truro, New Glasgow and Amherst if not visited the week before. Then on the last week: Grand Falls, Woodstock and Fredericton, possibly all in one day.

Unfortunately this means I will have to miss most of Theatre on the Edge. I will be able to see the Dance Collective tonight, but then won't be home until sometime on Friday. After a long week of travel, and preparation for travel again all of next week, I'm not sure if I'll be at any of the weekend events. I'll just have to see how tired I am and what needs to be done around the house.

I'll be glad to get this over with. I don't enjoy long car trips. I won't be driving, but that sort of makes things worse because I also can't read in a car. The upside is at least it will help keep mileage down on my leased car. And I can go to Costco. :)

Too busy to blog

I've been too busy to blog this past week. Having finally hired help at work this week, I didn't have time to write anything and barely had time to answer personal emails. The week went fast, and I must say it's nice to have help again at work. Competent help at that. He's come up with a number of good ideas, which all involve a lot of work, but will make a lot of improvements. I'm looking forward to having a lot of this stuff implemented. I'm going to have to do a bunch of traveling in the next few weeks, taking him around to the various locations and introducing him. Not crazy about the travel part, but after that is done I should be back at home again until I head to Kentucky.

I've been very glad for this long weekend. I really needed an extra day off. Having to save every vacation day I can in order to be able to see John means that I can't take the occasional day off here and there to just relax. People keep asking me if I am taking summer holidays without remembering that vacation time is the only way I get to see John.

I spent Friday night at home, not doing anything in particular that I can remember. Saturday I got up, hung around the house, chatted with John and went to my hair appointment. After hair I went to church, where it was our first week with our new priest since the Redemptorists had left. Our new priest is a cousin of my recently departed grandfather, so there is a small family connection there. He said mass at my grandfather's funeral.

After church, I headed home to grab a few things and then up to the Peninsula for Dave & Jody's annual camp party. Thanks to Dave & Jody for hosting, and Dave for cooking my steak. :)

At the camp party, I discovered upon setting up my satellite radio that I was missing some channels. Apparently the company decided to remove some from the listing AND raise the monthly fee. I wrote them an email last night, expressing my displeasure. They gave me a standard, pre-written answer in reply. I would not agree with it, but I could understand if they had removed certain channels from the lineup and replaced them with Canadian content... but that is not what happened. They simply removed channels without any notification to their customers. I'm growing increasingly tired of being denied access to the same things as Americans, and this one I find particularly perplexing. It is a paid service, from what I understand is not subject to the same Canadian content regulations as traditional radio... so why are certain stations being blocked? Back in April, the Canadian listing dropped the ClearChannel content that was being offered in the US, which mandated commercials on certain channels. Those stations I don't miss, as I found them to be repetitive of one another anyway. But why block the movie soundtracks, tropical, opera, and hit list channels? I may be canceling my Canadian service and signing up for the US service soon. It's cheaper, even with the exchange factored in, and I would get more channels.

I just ran a spell check on this blog. Apparently Blogger's spell check does not recognize the word "blog." Oh the irony!

I finished reading Something Blue, which ended up being not as bad a read as I thought it would be. The protagonist is not the most appealing character at first, seeing as how she's very self-absorbed. Her transformation is what makes the novel worth reading. If you like chick lit, that is.

On Sunday my younger brother came over to pick up the Calais mailbox key. By the time he reached my house, he wasn't feeling well enough to drive back. I drove him home, stopped at the grocery store and Zellers to pick up a few things, then went back home to get ready for the pool party. Dad was waiting in the driveway with a giant truck full of wood -- my winter heat source. Unfortunately the truck is so heavy that it dented my new pavement. *sigh. It's still too soft to handle large trucks, but what can you do? I sought the help of Jenn & Stew to drive my car out to my brother's place so I could drop his car off to him, on the way to the pool party. That being done, I headed to the Valley.

The pool party garnered a very nice, sunny day, thankfully. A big thanks to Suzy and Chris for hosting and feeding - the burgers and cake were delicious. Despite my lack of love for pools, I did dangle my legs in for a bit and it was refreshing. That was as far as I was comfortable. :)

Today was my extra day off. I spent it sleeping in until 11am. I took an hour walk in some windy weather, which was starting to feel like fall. I got back and watched an episode of Star Trek. After that, I got to work on a couple of things that needed to be done. First was swabbing the deck -- there were a couple of dirty spots that needed cleaning. Dad may be coming over to apply the waterseal this week. After I finished that, I headed to the basement to move the 1/2 rank of wood remaining from last year. I didn't want the oldest/driest wood buried at the bottom of the pile. So I moved all of that over to the other side of the room, and will use that first when I have to start the stove again. The new wood will be ranked in its usual spot sometime this week.

Tonight I baked cupcakes to take to work tomorrow. I also read for a bit. I guess overall it was a good day off, but not long enough. I could really use a week off just to spend around the house. I have still been putting off that touch-up painting I need to do. I did buy some grass seed, finally, but haven't thrown it around on the lawn holes yet. Maybe I can work away at that stuff in the evenings this week, before I start hitting the road for work. I hate to start wishing for fall already, but since that's the next time I'm able to see John, it's on my mind. I miss him a lot.

Guy in black truck

A guy in a black pickup with a cap on the back stopped at the end of my court this morning and took a picture of my house. Possibly the house next door that is for sale as well, but I'm not sure.

I have no idea if the picture was because he likes my design and wants to build a similar house, or if he's casing the joint for a robbery. He didn't bother to stop and ask permission for the picture, so how would I know?

In all likelihood it's an innocent picture... but now I have to keep an eye on things just in case. I'm really glad I had an alarm system put in, but I hope it never has to come into play.

More booked

I stopped by the travel agency today to see about getting my ticket changed for September's conference. It was much easier walking in knowing exactly what flights I wanted my ticket changed to. They basically exchanged my old ticket for a whole new ticket. In the end, my portion is only going to cost about $170, woot! Much better than the crazy change fees I had to pay from Seattle.

So I am now all booked to leave here on Friday Sept 15 to go to the conference in Kentucky. On Thursday the 21st I leave Kentucky and head for SoCal. I'll have 4 full days in SoCal (including my birthday), then return home on Tuesday the 26th.

Booked

Tonight I booked my ticket to SoCal to go down for US Thanksgiving. Since I booked early and am flying only Air Canada, I was able to use the minimum amount of points. $115 in taxes, but that's a pretty darn cheap flight to California. I do have to fly to LAX again, but since I arrive on a Saturday, John will be able to pick me up. Going home on a Monday will mean a shuttle to LAX since John has to work, but at least I only have to shuttle one way. Bring on the turkey and football!

Still need to visit the travel agent to change my September ticket to add SoCal on the end of it. Last time I had to deal with a travel agent to change my ticket to SoCal, she didn't seem to have a clue what I was asking, despite being what I thought was very clear, and even using airport codes. The agent who booked my ticket is on vacation, so I think I will go up there in person and try to get it changed. That may alleviate some confusion... though I don't know what's so hard about it. I have planned out the exact schedule I want. Hopefully it will not cost too much to make the changes.

I also bought a lounge chair tonight. Superstore West had a bunch on sale and I decided to nab one since it's an end-of-season sale. I doubt they will get much cheaper than their already marked-down level. It's not identical to my existing patio set but is very close. Now if we can just get some nice weather, I can relax outside on the deck and read.

Back again

I haven't been blogging much mainly because I haven't had much to talk about. I've been pretty lonely since John left, basically doing not much else other than working.

Let's see... some of the exciting things I've been up to...

I had my driveway paved, which I mentioned in a previous entry, but here are a couple of pics.


Looks pretty nice, I must say. There's a good 3" of asphalt down so it's a very quality job. Also it was angled properly to flow water away from the house. No more crater wash-outs in the back! I opted to pave the front walkway. I could have done paving stones, or something a bit prettier, but frankly, I'll never get around to doing that. This will make things sooooo much easier in winter to plow and shovel.

I called no fewer than 6 people/companies about mowing my lawn. I only heard from 2. One was a company who came the same day I called and gave me a price of $30/mow. It would take a lot of mows to equal the price of a new mower, so I knew that this would be the way to go. The second person who answered my request seemed nice enough, but there was just something about him that didn't sit well with me. I found the 10 minute explanation of how my lawn was "weak" was unnecessary and I felt like I was being criticized. He also cut his wheels on my brand new pavement and left marks. GRRR. He was going to charge $40/mow and it would increase as my lawn got healthier. I just had a feeling this guy wasn't the right way to go, so I called the first company back and said let's go ahead. They are supposed to start this week. At $30/mow, it will be worth every penny.

Despite having a lot of time on my hands, I still haven't managed to paint the post caps and touch up the ends of the porch. Need to get that done.

I bought a new Paderno pot. 50% off because of some very small dents in the handle. The 4L saucepan now comes with a handle on the other end as well. This will come in very handy when lifting a potfull of potatoes.

I went on a quest for a comfortable, sweatpant-like pair of shorts that I could wear while walking. I looked everywhere, even into SportChek and Cleve's. I ended up with exactly what I wanted from Wal-Mart, for only $10. The sport stores were charging $30-40 for what might be good quality stuff, but really, I just wanted shorts, not a logo. What really got me were the 2 pairs of brand-name shorts I tried on in size 3 and 5, both of which were way too small. I was wearing a size 2 pair of shorts that day while I was shopping. Something is way off there.

I was invited to a wedding shower for my cousin, who is getting married this Saturday. The shower was yesterday. Knowing my cousin, I knew he'd want to register at Canadian Tire, so off I went and picked up some things off the list. With the help of Mare, I also got them an IKEA napkin holder like the one I have myself. Very, very handy. I hope they like it once they start using it.
As I was leaving the shower, my cousin thanked me for the gifts. He then asked me "So I guess you're not coming next weekend?" I answered, "uh, I didn't get an invitation..." I had assumed since our family was so big that they couldn't invite everyone to the wedding. Apparently he had intended to invite me and thought he had included my invitation with my mother's... except when my mother received her invitation, she wasn't speaking to me. He apologized 3 or 4 times and said maybe he messed up the invitations. So, I have no idea whether or not my mother got my invitation and didn't tell me, and I am not going to ask because I don't want to disrupt the current good situation. I do wish my cousin had sent an invitation specifically to me and for me if he had wanted me to be there, but not everyone has a mother who sometimes disowns her children.

Things have been going well with my mom so far since we've been speaking again. We see each other at church every week, and talk on the phone a couple of times during the week. John and I took her to lunch while he was here and they seemed to get along ok. Mum and I have plans to go to a church dinner next month together. I hope things keep going well.

It was nice to have an afternoon with family yesterday, but it was yet another scenario of people asking if I've set a wedding date. Um, no, my fiancé isn't here yet, and we won't be making any plans until he is here. I'm not sure if people think I'm going to change my mind on that or what.

Yesterday was also Banana Bread Day. I made 3 loaves yesterday morning, one for Anthony (whose love for banana bread is unrivaled), one for the shower and one for T-L, who had invited me over for supper. Tonight I made a 4th loaf because I kept getting an odd number of bananas and had to buy more to have enough, and then ended up with too many. The 4th loaf will be the last for now, though. I'll take that to work tomorrow.

I came home tonight and sat down to read TV Guide when my Dad showed up for a surprise visit. He came by to look at the lawn, and we talked for a while about a whole bunch of different stuff. Finally he suggested going for an ice cream at Dairy Queen, so I hopped in the truck and we took a drive over for some chocolate dipped cones, just like the good old days. Except they were very stingy with the chocolate coating tonight, it was barely covered and very thin. Anyway, it was nice to hang out with my Dad for a couple of hours. We discussed putting gyproc in the garage, my wood should be coming soon to be put in the basement, and the next project will be getting my deck sealed. He's going to bring his new airless sprayer and it should make quick work of an otherwise tedious project.

I am working on booking a couple of trips to SoCal. One right after my conference in September, and the other in November for US Thanksgiving. I've always wanted to be down there for the Black Friday shopping, and with stores right across the street from John... it will be interesting :) I actually expect to hate it, the crowds, etc. but it's the kind of thing I'd like to see once.

I had to make a hard decision this week. Judging by how slowly things are going with John's move, and the fact that he has no more vacation time, I am going to have to save every vacation day I can in order to visit him. This means there will be no Florida trip this year. I had hoped to be able to work it out, but it just isn't going to be doable. My Dad was disappointed when I told him tonight I wouldn't be able to do the trip, as he's been wanting me to be able to use the house. Keep saving your pennies though, and hopefully we can make the trip a reality in the near future.

Fog along the Fundy coast

High 18°C (64°F) except 25°C (77°F) inland.
Tuesday: High 19°C (66°F) except 28°C (82°F) inland.

There's quite a difference between those temperatures.

I went through winter and the usual shitty, rainy spring. I paid my weather dues. I'd like summer now, please, before it's too late.

The Devil Wears Prada

Being unmotivated to continue reading the book I had started, I picked up The Devil Wears Prada on Friday night and finished it this morning.

I'd like to go see the movie some night this week (other than Monday, have to work late.) Anyone up for going to see it?

Hydroseed redux

I have had 2 successful attempts at mowing my lawn, but as my Dad told me the other day, "there's a reason I gave that lawn mower away." I decided I either need to buy a decent lawn mower so I can mow the lawn without absolute exhaustion, or I need to price out what it would cost to have a company come by and mow my property.

On Monday morning, while John and I were getting up, we watched as a lawn mowing company came by and mowed 2 of my neighbors' lawns in about 15 minutes flat. Figuring a third house in the neighborhood would be an easy add-on for them, I called and left a message to request an estimate and mentioned that they already were doing two houses on my street. Their answering machine message time was too short for me to leave my phone number after I had given my name, address, and mentioned that they were already doing houses on my street. I called right back and left my name (again) and phone numbers, that their answering machine had cut me off, and said I looked forward to hearing from them. 2 days later and I still haven't heard a word from them. I'm not quite sure why I have a problem with companies wanting my business.

Learning from last year's hydroseed experience, I'm not waiting around for these lawn companies to call me back. There are too many in competition around here, there must be someone who wants my business. I have already called the company who did my hydroseeding and who currently does my fertilizer to get an estimate on mowing. I would make sense to have all of that done by the same company, but not if it costs significantly more. I am also looking through the online yellow pages to get a few more companies to call and get estimates.

If I'm going to part with my money and have someone else mow my lawn, I'm not giving it to a company who can't be bothered to call me back. You snooze, you lose.

Nope.

I am getting better at not crying until after I get to the aiport. I guess you could call that an accomplishment, but I wouldn't call it "getting easier." I don't know when we'll get to see each other again because I don't know whether he'll be starting a new job or moving to NH. I've also just hired someone to work with me and can't leave him alone in a new job while I take off to SoCal. We can't make any more plans until we get a few more answers. Please please please send us some answers.

It just hit me late last night and this morning that it's difficult to wedding dress shop when you don't even know when you'll get to see each other again, let alone when you're getting married. It doesn't deserve a half-hearted attempt, so I backed out of the trip to Portland this weekend. Again my apologies if I messed up the others' plans for this weekend. I think I just need some time alone to collect my thoughts.

My Dad dropped by yesterday and we discussed a few things about my house/yard. There are some things I need his help with, such as filling in the front yard wash-out with topsoil and sticking some sod down on it. The deck was too big of a project for John to attempt last week so it still needs to be sealed -- Dad says that can be done fairly quickly with the new paint sprayer he bought. Dad left me with a weed whacker, which John used to get some of the mess cleaned up in the yard yesterday. My 3 cord of winter wood will be arriving in the next few weeks, which means I have to make sure the basement is in order so it can be loaded in.

Last but not least, we discussed the driveway and its need to be paved. Paving is pretty much the only solution to the wash-out problems I've been having, in both the front and back yards. If you've been by my house lately, you'll notice the giant crater in the driveway around back from the rain. If I don't get it fixed, it will just keep washing the crushed rock away and carving streams in my driveway, in addition to lawn wash-out in front. When I walked back in my office this afternoon, Dad called and said it was being paved as we spoke. Apparently the guy he hired to do paving at his office had some free time this afternoon, so they're paving it right now. I won't be able to drive on it for at least 24h, but it will be soooo nice to have that done, especially this winter -- no more gravel all over the lawn come spring. Not sure how much this is going to cost me yet, but it's one of those things that has to be done before things get worse.

Having John here to share some homeowner burdens has been a tremendous help. A lot of people laughed at the fact that I had a list ready for him when he got here, but what they don't understand is that before he came we had discussed various things he could help me with while here. It wasn't a "surprise, you have work to do!" kind of list. He did get to a lot of things on the list and I am very grateful. I have one small thing left to do on the porch -- the post caps I bought 2 years ago still need to be painted and attached. I'll attack that this week, before I lose my ambition. I'm looking forward to the day when he'll be here full-time, and having someone else working for me at work again will definitely take some of the pressure off.

"Are you ever in your office anymore?"

Well yes, actually, I am. I happen to spend a great deal of time in my office. However, I frequently need to leave and go to the bathroom, help someone at their desk, take another phone call, drive around the Maritimes, and drop everything at a moment's notice. I am one person supporting the needs of 150 people, and sometimes I too need a vacation.

I have a landline, a cell phone, and a Blackberry. If you can't reach me, that's your problem, not mine. Don't call one phone number and complain that I never answer it without even bothering to try me elsewhere. Apparently you haven't learned that pissing someone off BEFORE you ask for help really isn't a nice thing to do.

Happy Canada Day!

If you're coming over today, anytime after 3pm is fine. It's a bit too windy for badminton, but there is lots of deck & relaxing to do. The back lawn is still pretty soggy, so as of right now I am not putting the net up just yet -- want to see if it dries out. I have a total of 8 chairs, so it might not be a bad idea to pack a camp chair in your trunk just in case. Not sure how many people will be able to make it, that may be enough chairs or it may not.

I have lots of paper plates & plastic glasses, real cutlery, and lots of pop as well. Bring your meat and booze and I'll see you later today.