Thursday, October 30, 2008

#13: Met with Mortgage Guy

Tonight we met with our mortgage guy, and it was a great meeting. One of my friends worked with him when she bought her house, and I can see why she selected him. He did a great job of answering our questions, and explained everything really well. He is pretty much the total opposite of the mortgage lady K worked with when he bought our house, and I am so glad.

Good thing for Thursday? Great mortgage guy meeting.

Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Update-A-Thon

Continuing with the updates. . .

(#22) I've started marking vacation photos that I think would be good to print and frame, but I'm going to hold off on actually doing this until we move. I will be totally knocking out my list once we move, it seems!

(#23) Yeah, as it turns out, PNV must have made my eyelashes grow, because I think they're pretty long now and the idea of wearing false eyelashes for some fancy occasion seems silly. I'm going to mark this item as something I want to revise.

(#24) I've been to the gun range with K a grand total of once (pre-list), and he's owned hand guns for like 7 or 8 years now. I feel like I should be confident using a gun if there's going to be one in my house--even thought it's not out or loaded. My brother became a gun fanatic when he married into a family who hunts, so surely between he and K, I will get to the gun range again.

(#26) Still working on finding the perfect panties. I am really liking a gap body bra (I think they call it a t-shirt bra?) that I bought a couple of weeks ago, so that brand/style may work for replacing my old VS bras.

(#27) Making progress on this, with the help of a book and tips from Pioneer Woman.

(#28) So not close to making vacation photo albums, unless you count organizing my digital photo files on my computer into folders. I need more free time!

(#29) Fourth wedding anniversary = November 6th. No photo albums in sight. And K is a graphic designer! I don't want to distract him from other (house) projects by asking for his help on desiging a photo book. . .for now.

(#31) I knew I'd do well on my reading list--I love to read. I tend to read in spurts, though. When I'm really busy, I only seem to find time to skim through magazines and read books for my book club. But I'm ahead of schedule of this task, hooray!

(#32) So far, so good. I do need to write several thank you notes that are birthday-related, but I plan to work on these in between trick-or-treaters on Friday night. I'm behind! Having a chance to use pretty stationery is a good motivator, though.

(#33) I keep losing and gaining back the same 3 pounds. Current goal: not gaining weight over the holidays, and getting back on track with exercise.

(#34) Actually, I'm going to sell my bike and buy a new one that's easier to ride. Eventually.

(#35) I have a group of girlfriends I grew up with, and after high school, we spread out to different colleges and different lives. But we kept in touch and remained close. After college, we decided to reunite yearly in different locations. That was--wow--about 10 years ago? We met in New Orleans our first year, followed by Sedona, Boston, Portland, Chicago, and Minneapolis. But at some point, our group of gals started getting married and having babies. So a yearly trip became more difficult, or a yearly trip included husbands/boyfriends because we we traveling to someone's wedding. That was so not the same as hanging around in our pajamas and talking about the elementary school days. Now, four of us live in Austin, one gal lives in Houston, and one is in Minneapolis. All but two of us have kids. We were hoping for a get together this year, even if we just gathered in Austin, but so far it hasn't worked out. I really, really hope we can all get together in 2009. It's been too long!

Wednesday Good Things:

*packet of Tylenol in my desk drawer at work. Morning lifesaver!
*news that KXAN is back on Time Warner. Hip Hip Hooray!
*office vending machine re-stocked the bottled Starbucks frappuccino drinks after months of an empty slot. One of those was exactly what I was craving this afternoon. Sweet!
*Hershey's Special Dark Miniatures. (insert Homer Simpson-style drooling) A little Froggi tipped me off to these, and I broke down tonight to buy a bag. SO glad I did. Also glad that I exhibited a little self control and only ate three. New favorite: Special Dark Mr. Goodbar. Mmmmm.

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Update O'Rama

Hip, hip, hooray, we're meeting with the mortgage guy on Thursday! (#13) This will be a huge step in finally, FINALLY, starting the process of putting out house on the market. I mean, other than all the other crap on my house "to do" list that I've already finished. I've only wanted to move for the past two years. Now if only K would get his rear in gear to clean out his office/man room. . .


So, right, #14--put our house on the market. Spring has come and gone, but we have actually been working on this item. Well, let's say *I* have been working on this item quite a bit, and K helps out here and there. Most importantly, he finally wants to move as much as I want to move. Let's just hope that the local housing market works for us on this item. Ideally, we'll list our house and find a buyer practically immediately. At the same time, we will find a house we love (#15) and be able to buy it shortly after selling our own house. So we won't have to have any transitional housing, and we'll be able to use our considerable (to me, anyway) equity towards the new home purchase. We'll be selling cheap, and that's fine with me.


(#16) I have cleaned out the guest room closet (which is my auxilliary closet), but since I still have all the give-aways lingering in my trunk, waiting to be dropped at Goodwill, I'm not counting a second cleaning, yet. I know there will be more cleaning and purging, especially when we move, so I think this task will be easily accomplished. Oh, how I dream of having a master closet where I can keep all my clothes instead of spreading them out all over the house.


(#17) A project I envisioned for moving time, and one that K has started already. Well, he's taking photos of his guitars, at least. (eye roll)

(#18) I've had my Accord (Cherry) since 2002, and she has almost 110,000 miles on her. But, I've decided that I'd rather have a new house than a new car (#19) for now. I will need some sort of four-door vehicle before the baby I'm not even pg with yet arrives, so I'm not feeling rushed. As long as Cherry is running smooth, I'm not looking to replace her.

My car is usually full of crap. I have a bad habit of using it as a storage space, so there are often books, jackets, etc. filling the passenger and back seats. But, I've had her in guest-passenger-worthy shape for a month (#20). Except that the trunk is full of junk. So, I'm not going to start the six month count on this one just yet.

Our pantry (#21) is still in amazing shape. I LOVE our walk-in pantry--it's our closet under the stairs. I'll miss it when we move. Whatever our new kitchen ends up being like, it definitely has a lot to live up to. Our kitchen is huge. Seriously, I have friends with homes twice the size of ours (okay, just one friend with a house that big), and their kitchens aren't nearly as big. We have tons of counter space, a giant pantry, and we've replaced the appliances with stainless. Plus, we installed the floor ourselved. The only thing keeping it from being our dream kitchen are the white laminate countertops. (That and it's not in our dream house, of course.) I know we've been totally spoiled with such a great kitchen!

Tuesday Good Things:
*Morning kitty. Lately, when I open the door to the bedroom in the mornings, kitty is waiting to run in and jump on K in bed. Kitty starts purring like a machine as soon as his paws hit the mattress, and he walks up to K's face and head butts him. Then, he'll either stand there until he gets petted, or he'll look for a place to curl up next to K to wait for petting. This morning, K wasn't very awake, so kitty had to give him a little punch/knead combo until he responded. It was so stinkin' cute! Then, I picked him up to take him to get his food refilled, and he snuggled up in my arms (I was wearing a fuzzy robe) and didn't want to get down. I just wanted to squuueeeeeze him!

Monday, October 27, 2008

More Updates

I missed my deadline for #6, which was baby M's first birthday in September. What's particularly patethic about missing that deadline is that I started that gift at her mama's baby shower, in the late summer of 2007. Mama A suggested that our close group of girlfriends have a small baby shower with us and our moms (her SIL threw a huge shower for her several weeks earlier), and one of the things we wanted to do at the shower was have everyone write down a funny Mama A story or baby advice, or a nice memory, and make a little booklet for baby M. Except that two of the moms and one of the gals couldn't be there due to last minute emergencies, so we were down to four girls and three moms. Only Mama A's mom brought a note, which she read at the shower. It was a sweet and wonderful message to her only daughter about the upcoming birth of her daughter, and I think everyone else at the party got intimidated. No one else wrote down a message. Well, knowing my friends, I knew I'd need some time to harrass them and nag them until they finished their messages. I'm still missing messages from two of the gals and all of the other moms. I'm thinking about just framing the Grandma A message with a photo for little baby M and calling this one DONE. I'll have to check with the other gals, first, of course.


I've done a great job of using my grocery sacks and cute lunch bag, so I'm glad I was able to cross those items off already.


I am behind on cooking dinner with sides at least once a week, on a weekday! (#9) I should be a lot closer to 50. But, cooking a full dinner during the week just doesn't always happen. I am getting better about planning ahead when I go to the grocery store, so I'm hopeful that by early 2009, I'll be knocking this one out of the park on a regular basis. I've cooked three dinners since I last updated, and I'll add the newest recipe once I retrace my steps and find the link again. I think that I'll stop blogging about every meal I cook, and only blog about the new recipes.


My pile of loose recipes grows. (#10) I have a lot of recipes that are only saved in my computer, so those aren't really an issue. The problem is everything I tear out of Cooking Light, Real Simple, etc. I'm thinking about going with a big binder & clear plastice sleeves for those. I also really need to cull through them and take out the ones I'm really just never going to make.


I can't bring myself to bake bread or yeasty goodies (#11) during the summer--too hot. I'm really intimidated by kneading, though. I saw a tasty-sounding recipe for beer/cheese bread the other day, so I might start out with that option and see if I can baby-step my way toward this goal.


Summer is also too hot to grill (#12). Well, it's too hot for ME to use the grill, because I don't want to have to stand there and feeling like I'm broiling while I wait for my meat to finish. Right now, the weather is ideal for hanging around outside, though. Maybe I'll actually use the grill in 2008! If not, we're definitely looking for a new house to have an awesome outdoor area where I won't mind grilling in, say, December. Or March.


Monday Good Things:

*Sent flowers to a friend whose day need some brightness.


*Wearing the new red panties for the first time, giggling.

Sunday, October 26, 2008

Sunday Good Things

*Post-church lunch at Phil's.


*Tiny Mexican vanilla Amy's ice cream.


*Being on a sugar-high w/ K.

*New shoes & bag on sale + coupons!

*Iced grande non-fat chai.

Saturday, October 25, 2008

Saturday Good Things

*Sleeping late.

*Kitty taking a nap on my lap while I read.

*Date night with K; dinner at Mandola's, cinnamon gelato for dessert.


Friday, October 24, 2008

October Nephews & More

#4 on my list is spend quality time with my nephews monthly, and I had a chance to visit with two of my favorite little fellas last weekend, when my family gathered for lunch. As soon as we stepped on to the porch, the metal mail slot in one of the front double-doors popped open and a tiny face peered out. Nephew #2, C! I leaned down and played peek-a-boo with him a little bit, until he ran away giggling. As it turns out, 19 month olds don't have a long attention span.

Nephew #2 loves stickers. My mom keeps a sheet of happy face stickers on hand--I suspect they were a potty training aid for Nephew #1--and N2 had a couple of stickers stuck to his face and arms. He handed me a purple happy face, so I stuck it on the end of my nose and wiggled my nose up and down for him. Instant fascination! I knew my stupid human tricks would come in handy eventually.

I also played a little bit of chase with Nephew #1, who is about 3 and a half. (Holy crap, he's already 3 and a half!) All kids sure do love to run away and peep around corners. Our kitty is the same way, heh. I sustained a little bit of a broken heart when SIL's brother and wife stopped by to pick up their daughter (who'd spent the night with my brother & SIL), and Nephew #1 was jumping for joy to see his other Aunt. Stories from my SIL about how much he loves his Aunt V, and how she's his favorite are hard enough--but to see it in person (on my birthday!), sigh.

I managed to win him back later though--I asked him to help me open my gifts. haha! I also showed him the gifts K had given me at lunch. One of them was a book with scary mystery stores, and Nephew #1 was very curious about it. When I explained that the stories were scary, he said "It's not for little boys." I agreed, and told him it was for grown up ladies, like me. His response? "And like my mommy?" Yep! Another book I received was what I like to call the Funny Kitties Book or Cats with Bad Grammar. Yep, it was the LOLZ: I Can Has Cheezeburger? A LOLcat Collekshun. I flipped through the book with him and tried to describe the cats in funny ways. He thinks every cat who is laying down is sleeping, though, despite what I told him. He did laugh like a tiny crazy person when we got to a couple of pictures of kitties "driving" cars. It was time to go, but he didn't want to leave because we were having so much fun with the funny kitties. I think I'm going to always have to have that book in my purse now. My memaw always had gum (Wrigley's Spearmint); I'll always have pictures of funny kitties.

So, for the first 5 items on my list over there, I've only really had success with the nephew visits. We're working on #1. We've been saving extra for a new house, so I haven't created our extra investment plan yet. I've been too lazy to create a master list of all "in case of emergency" info. I am waiting for input on on of my friends to complete #5. That one is really frustrating me, so I just need to remind her more often that I want to wrap that up.

Daily Good Thing(s):
*I'm looking forward to dinner & drinks tonight with some girlfriends.
*Weather = Still Awesome

Thursday, October 23, 2008

Good Things

The last week or so has kind of been a crap sandwich.

I hadn't felt the October love for several days after facing disappointing news and hassles with contractors. I was keeping my chin up, though, until last Friday evening (around 8pm) when K found out that his Dad & Uncle Ed were planning to arrive in Austin the next day to visit their brother (Uncle Jack). Evidentally, Uncle Jack had a stroke a week prior, and his daughters (who live in Pflugerville) had told FIL & Uncle Ed that they thought he wasn't long for this world. Their unexpected arrival put a crimp into my weekend plans. . .which included having fun with my husband and celebrating my birthday on Sunday with a family lunch. Instead, I spent Friday evening and Saturday morning doing things like giving the guest bathroom an extra scrub and washing a load of guest towels & sheets. I must admit, I did consider for about 30 seconds that K may have planned some sort of surprise birthday get together at our house, and news of their arrival was an excuse to get me to clear the calendar and the clutter. Luckily, I came to my senses and realized he knows better than to think I would cheerfully uber-clean our house for my own party. Plus, he's only surprised me once in the nearly eleven years we've been together. I like to call that surprise "when we got engaged."

Anyway, to keep the story of the not-going-as-planned weekend short, let's just say I spent the whole weekend feeling selfish, annoyed, and a little depressed. I'd hoped to celebrate my troubles away, and that wasn't happening. I simply don't deal very well when things don't go as planned, even though I've had plenty of experience in that arena.

One of the things I'd planned to start around the time of my birthday weekend was a report on how my "73 in 730" list is progressing. I started the list on my 2007 birthday, and plan to finish on my 2009 birthday, so I thought this year's birthday would be a good opportunity to reflect on what's going on with the list, as well as catch up on a few things I'm behind on reporting. At the same time, I've realized I need a jolt out of my funk. So in addition to re-examining my list, I've decided that I need to find at least one daily good thing to report until Thanksgiving. Another blog I enjoy includes a daily Good Thing, and I think it could be a great motivator for me to stay positive.

Today I happen to have a list of Good Things:
* The crew working on the exterior of our house showed up before I left for work (earliest arrival ever!)
* K called me at work and told me a funny story about our kitty, who had been feeling puny the past couple of days but is now on the mend
* The internet made me laugh
* The weather is awesome, and I love it
* I had a cup of delicious frozen yogurt, generously paid for by surprise by a co-worker

I'm feeling better already. Next up, I will bombard my blog with updates!

Thursday, October 16, 2008

The Other, Part II

My doppleganger Valerie Jones is at it again.

Actually, since I first mentioned her here, I have discovered that there are, in fact, more than one Valerie Joneses out there who are not me.

One of them used to row with the University of Victoria team, and is regularly invited to reunions and events.

One of them lives in the NYC area and recently received a couple of rejection letters for Assistant Editor positions.

One of them has a mom who loves Paul Newman, can't get used to her daughter's new married last name, and who is urging her to NOT paint blue stripes on her walls.

One of them received a reminder from the Arlington Public Library that her book is due in three days.

One of them is having a party somewhere in California, and has received quite a list of appetizer options from her caterer.

And, of course, there's the one I've mentioned previously who joined match to look for love. It seems she either found what she was looking for or realized she wasn't receiving her match emails, because it's been a couple of weeks since her matches were directed to me.

But one member of the Valerie Jones army joined myspace today, and evidentally she won't be logging in any time soon. All of her log in information came to me. Yep, log in name and password, right there in my "in" box. Oddly enough, the email was addressed to "Jordan." So I alerted Tom--or whoever is actually in charge over there--that THIS "Valerie Jones" is not signing up for myspace.

Although now I am wondering it there's a Valerie Jones out there who is thinking "I didn't order curtain rods online, and I don't live in Texas!"

A Little Less Conversation

Scene: evening at home, on couch.

Me: My monthly visitor arrived today.

K: Oh. (forehead kiss)

Me: You know what this means, right?

K: We get to do it a lot more!

M: Well, I was going to tell you that I need to monitor things better or differently this cycle, but, yes, I guess this does also mean that we get to do it a lot more.

K: Hmmm. Do we need to do it more than once a day?

M: (one eyebrow raised) I. . .don't think so. I mean, probably not.

K: Maybe you should check your book just to be sure.

M: What book?

K: The book with the sticky picture. You know, the book? With the sticky picture?

M: ???

K: You know, the big book! The sticky picture!

(I stare at him in confusion for a minute, then it dawns on me.)

M: OOOHHHHHhhh, Taking Charge of Your Fertility? Is that the book? I haven't read that in a while, since I went off birth control. . .wait, what is the "sticky picture?"

K: You know!

(He makes a hand motion. It dawns on me that he's referring to a photo of EWCM. He makes a "yuck" face.)

M: haha! That's what you get for peeking over my shoulder when I'm reading, Mister Twice-A-Day-Plan!

K: I'm willing to do whatever it takes.

Fin

Friday, October 10, 2008

Agnes Skinner

Until Wednesday, I didn't know that Principal Skinner's mom was named Agnes.

Recently my husband, who is a huge fan of the Simpsons, told me that lately he's been thinking about Agnes Skinner. Evidentally, there was a Simpsons episode where Homer was Henry VIII, and various other characters portrayed Henry's wives. At one point in the episode, Agnes lays down on a bed and says "Climb aboard the king maker!"

Creepy, right?

Just let me put this story in context: K told me that he remembered the episode when he asked if I was "ripe" (his loving term for ovulating) last week. When I heard the story, I'm pretty sure I gave him the same look he gave me when I explained (after he asked) how ovulation prediction kits worked. The look can best be described as imagining yourself thinking "WTF?" Um, I guess I should be glad he has a sense of humor about the TTC process?

Wednesday, October 8, 2008

Monday, October 6, 2008

#42 Finally Get Wedding Dress Cleaned

Finally!

Since our wedding--November, 2004--my wedding dress and veil have been hanging, dirty, in the guest room closet. Sure, I kept them in the bag from the store where I bought the dress. And I loaned out my veil almost twice (once in 2007, then I took it to MN for a second friend to borrow, but she ended up deciding to go without). With a (hopeful) move and our fourth anniversary looming, I knew it was finally time to get moving on this task.

In June, I placed my order with wedclean. They sent a box and instructions for packing up my dress. Naturally, this box lingered in the guest room for a few more months. But at the end of September, I followed the easy instructions, packed up my dress (strips of packing tape included!), and only worried a tiny bit that I'd never see it again. But, I received an email when my dress & veil arrived at wedclean. About a week and a half later, I received another email that my dress & veil were clean and on the way back to me. After one slightly creepy trip to the after hours UPS pick-up (wedclean requires a signature for receipt), and I have my dress and veil back home and clean.

. . .And back in the guest room closet.

Updates!

I am starting to get a little bit behind, so I wanted to clear the decks and add a bunch of updates at once.

Last week, I finished reading The Book of Fate, by Brad Meltzer. I already posted my review on goodreads, so I'll just add that I really enjoyed the book. I had an opportunity to meet Meltzer a few years ago at a book festival in Florida (I was visiting relatives), and he signed a book for me. I don't recall the title of the book off-hand, but I do remember that part of the story took place in tunnels below the White House. For some reason, I was compelled to tell him that the dorm I lived in during college also had tunnels underneath. I'm sure he was like, "Ooooohhhkay." But he pretended to be interested in my lame story, and I thought he seemed very nice and smart. He's one of the authors on my "always read" list.

As an aside, sometimes I really embarrass myself when I meet famous people.

Also last week, I made calzones one night, so I've crossed another weeknight dinner off the list. I realized that I need to make new recipes on the weekend and do more of the old favorites during the week, so last week was a good example. When I make calzones, I use reduced-fat crescent rolls (the kind that come in a tube at the grocery store). I spread one side (a rectangle made from two unseperated crescent rolls) with spaghetti sauce, then add whatever meat/cheese/veggies we have on hand, and cover with cheese and another rectangle of crescent roll dough. Bake at 375 for 13 - 15 minutes, and eat. I always make extras, thinking I'll freeze them, but usually we end up eating them as leftovers. One weekend, I just need to make a bunch of these, actually freeze them, and make a weeknight dinner even easier on myself!

I'm steadily crossing off my list of things to do around our house to prepare it for listing, and this weekend knocked out almost all the upstairs painting. I just have a little bit of trim left to paint in the bathroom. Then, I'll have trim painting in the kitchen, painting the kitchen ceiling, and just a few touch-ups left. Well, I'll probably help K paint a wall of the garage, since our contractor has agreed to fix the hole in the wall his crew accidentally punched out last week, and we don't want the wall repairs to be noticeable. It shouldn't take too long--and it certainly doesn't have to be perfect.
That's the other good news for today; our contractor came out this morning to take a look at the areas around our house where his crew screwed up last week. He admitted they had screwed up, and would fix those areas. The meeting went much better than I expected, although of course it's still going to be like pulling teeth to get them to complete the job. (For example: 40% chance of rain today? Sorry, no workers. Sigh.)

Friday, October 3, 2008

Actual Fudgeyness

It is kindof a rip off to expect fudge and get complaints about a fudgin' motherfudger, isn't it?

So, I am happy to present something to fill the fudgey goodness void: Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge Crunch Bars, from Cookie Madness.

I made those no-bake bars for my last book club meeting, and they were not only easy to make, they were delicious. The gals loved them, and K loved the leftovers. I'll definitely make them again.

Incidentally, Cookie Madness is an awesome source for tasty treats. Every recipe I've tried from that site has turned out to be a huge hit, especially the one I now consider my signature dessert. I always give credit where credit is due when I share the recipe, but more often than not, I claim that particular recipe is a secret. Shhhh!

WTF

Let's say the 'F' in question refers to the appetizing photo of fudge I posted on Wednesday.

Fudge is the color we selected for the trim of our house. Several of the items on my to do list over there ---> involve preparing our house for sale, selling it, and then moving to a house we both love. There have been a few setbacks. Let me back up a bit.

K bought our house a couple of months before we got engaged. At the time, we'd been together for six years, so I suspected a proposal might be forthcoming. I was involved with the home selection process to a degree--he pre-screened all of his choices in his price range, and we both happened to like our house the best. He's lived there for five years now, I moved in about six months before the wedding (shhh! don't tell Dad!). We've done a lot of work on the house, starting the day he closed. We've painted every room of the house, swapping out the prison-wall grey to lovely shades of sage, yellow, dark green and blue. We've redone the kitchen floor, updating it from a roll of crappy linoleum to nice tile. We've added or changed out ceiling fans and fixtures throughout the house (and still have a few left, actually), and we've upgraded the kitchen appliances to stainless. It hasn't been easy, in large part due to the crappy "work" the previous owners did around the house--in many cases, we've been fixing their half-assed attemts to hold stuff together. But we've done it all ourselves, and our house looks pretty great on the interior, if I do say so myself. I personally have wanted to move for the last two years, but K is finally fully on board and we're slowly moving forward to get it done.

The exterior is another story. We knew that in order to attract buyers, we needed to make repairs--at the very least. We started with siding estimates. We nearly fainted when Sears quoted us $20,000 for the job. After a few other estimates, we decided to look instead to just doing repairs and fresh exterior paint. We didn't want to put more money into our house than we'd get out. So we ended up hiring a company (that came with great recommendations), and also fit our budget better than the other estimates we received.

Unfortunately, the company hasn't impressed us at all, and after last night, we're considering firing them.

I faxed over the signed contract Wednesday, September 24th. I included a note with some questions, and asked the guy to call me. He called me Friday, the 26th. He said his crew was wrapping up another job in the area and would be over towards the end of the day to start powerwashing. He's also drop off paint samples then. Upon arrival at home, I saw that the paint samples were there, but no work had been done. Monday, I called him with our paint choices (fudge! alabaster!) and asked when we could expect to see his crew. He thought they'd start work the next day. To our surprise, they showed up Monday afternoon and half-assed the powerwashing. K took a look around the house after they left, and found some pretty large areas they missed. He left our guy a voicemail. Tuesday, despite the lack of a call back, the crew showed up again and powerwashed again. They left for lunch (when K was arriving home for lunch) and didn't show up again. Wednesday (yesterday), they actually started doing some work. Not a lot, but it was something. I called the guy (who still hadn't called us back) and asked for an estimated date of completion. He thought they'd finish the repairs by the end of the week and start painting next week. That is, if it didn't rain. If it rained, they'd get back to work four days later. No idea why such a long wait was required, but, whatev.

Thursday night, we came home to find that the work that had been done on the outside of the house was sloppy, uneven, and unprofessional. Several areas where they replaced the trim were crooked. Many of the panels they replaces weren't flush with the old panels. It was bad. But, even worse: there are holes in the interior of our house. A big hole inside our garage, and four small holes inside our kitchen. I don't know if their nail guns were set wrong or if they just don't know what they're doing, or what, but we simply cannot live with that type of workmanship.

I walked in the house last night to K leaving a very strongly worded voicemail to the guy. K has decided that he can't be the one to talk to the guy right now because he would only be yelling at the guy and that isn't productive. Not to mention, the guy has never returned a call to K. He's answered when I call, or he's returned my messages. So this morning, I called the guy. Luckily, he answered. I went over the problems, and he had some excuses (including telling me that the damaged areas on our house were more numerous than he originally estimated, so he brought in five extra panels--which, frankly, is not my problem), but he agreed to stop work until he could personally take a look at the areas we are unhappy with. I don't know how it's going to turn out, but I do know it's a total pain in the ass that we shouldn't have to deal with and it's pissing me off.

Plus, KXAN is off the air and I had to get ready to GMA in the background this morning. I'm cranky, and I'm using a lot of an F-word that isn't Fudge lately. (Thought not at all with the guy; as much as I wanted to. Motherfudger.)

Wednesday, October 1, 2008