Forcing It

Last night I got home from another one of "those days" just to find that Mike was having one of "those days" too. And we had a long conversation, complaining about this and that, bad luck, what-ifs, and the ever popular what-are-we-going-to-do-about-it.

Usually in these circumstances, I set myself in front of the TV and eat my way to some sort of mild satisfaction. But Mike was going to go in the garage and try to get work done, and I figured it might do me some good to do the same.

So I went up to the office and attempted to clean and re-work the furniture. It was actually pretty frustrating at first and I had the urge to just quit. Nothing was turning out very well. My bookshelf was just too tall and skinny for the space I was trying to put it in - but I really need it for my books and am not in a position to get a new one.

Then I had this amazing flash of genius. Tip it over. That's right. I had a tall skinny thing and I needed a long short thing. So I just laid the bookshelf on its side against the wall. It fit perfectly, and I could still put all my books in it - just all stacked on top of one another. Plus, now I had a nice skinny top shelf surface for pictures and nick-nacs and whatever.

That made me feel a hell of a lot better. And it got all the books out of the guest bedroom. I hope to force myself to do more tonight.

Your Name is Mud

Mud room. Ever since my friend finished the renovation on her dining room, I've been thinking about turning my mud room into a dining room. It adjoins the kitchen. It would work.

In fact, I've been thinking about it more and more since I calculated that I could in fact finish the floor in there with the leftover hardwood from the upstairs.

I know I know I know I know I know.

The cardinal rule I set for myself when I set out to finish my upstairs was, and I quote, "THOU SHALT NOT START A NEW PROJECT UNTIL THE UPSTAIRS HATH BEEN COMPLETED."

Me starting new projects usually results in lack of doneness everywhere, as opposed to lack of doneness just here and there.

But I just can't help thinking - we've got the hardwood. It's sitting right there in boxes, just screaming to be put down in that room. And I know it's not that easy, because we already have plans afoot for that room.

First, we'd have to rip out the double windows at the front and replace them with double french doors. Then we'd have to replace the other window in the room with a new window and get rid of the original single gross entry door at the side.

Then we'd have to relocated the doorbell and exterior light and all light switches next to the new door.

Then the drywall would have to be repaired, new wainscoting and chair rail trim installed, and everything would have to be primed and painted.

And even when that was all done, we'd have to purchase some slate tile and install around the new doorway (for your gross feet people) before the wood could be installed.

Not to mention that I've been tinkering with the idea of making the ceiling in there sloped.

You can see now how I get into trouble by starting these projects. I try and pass it off as some easy cheap weekend thing - and then it turns into a major gut-busting months-of-labor type of affair. I don't know why I get my kicks like that. It's sick, isn't it?

Too Down To Trim Up

Ok - I just wrote a huge thing about this and that and why I've been feeling down. But then I decided I don't really want to share today. And I deleted it.

Probably because a number of people have warned that it's dangerous and stupid to publish your thoughts online and made fun of bloggers to my face. Normally, I would whole-heartedly disagree.... but in current state of mind I'm a little bit sensitive to suggestion. Not that I share my blog with these people who would wonder "what's the point?"

To summarize - I've just been too bummed to do anything lately - for a multitude of reasons. And Mike has tried his damnedest to snap me out of it, but I can't help worrying about well, everything.

So despite having all the gear to finish the upstairs, it's been just sitting in the basement, some half stained, some unstained, some un-cut.

That all changed this Sunday. We put up the office window and base trim, wired the bedroom and office smoke detectors, and put a coat of stain of both sets of closet doors. Although we did also discover that we didn't have enough base trim to cover the room. It had been so long, we had just forgotten! Plus, we ran out of stain.

An office window.closet trim (door trim was already there)


notice the baseboard trim

see the smoke/carbon monoxide detector? now just one hole to fill - the office ceiling fan.

If we can finish the doors and install them this week - both upstairs rooms will be 99.9% done. The only remaining projects up there would be the attic crawl space doors, office ceiling fan, and the bedroom window trim.

And since we lifted the house, the bedroom windows went crooked. So they actually have to be physically taken out and put back in straight before we can trim them. (Our carpenter will have to handle that one.)

Next on the docket is the stairway/hallway. I'd like to finish it next the same way we finished the upstairs. That is: Buy everything needed to finish it and don't stop until it's done. That would include all materials for the banister and catwalk railing, lighting fixtures for the hallway, paint for the hallway, a couple light switches, and trim.

Not so bad right?

We probably won't be able to finish that until we get back from our vacation Oct 1st. And who knows what the money situation will be then - so I shouldn't say anything.

Frustrated Days and Chili Cheese Dogs

I never had a chili cheese dog in my entire life. Which is why Mike was so shocked when I told him I was making them for dinner. He said, "Are you kidding?" But it had been a frustrating couple days and I was feeling disappointed that he had to work late and couldn't finish staining and installing the upstairs trim.

I must admit, with the Nathan's hot dogs and the crock-pot chili and some shredded mexi-cheese.... I made a damn good chili cheese dog for a person totally unfamiliar with the art of sloppy-bad-for-you-foods. I'm always refusing to make Man-wiches, so I think that's partially the reason for Mike's shock.

Monday, I think, was the last day we did anything. Mike was unhappy on how the brushed on, then toweled off stain was turning out and got out his paint gun. And that worked quite well - until water in the air compressor air started spitting out.... (for we are without a separator) Water and oil based stain... not the friendliest of combinations. I haven't gone in the basement to see how it turned out. Mike tends to be dissatisfied with stuff I think is perfectly wonderful - so I never know.

On the same day, Mike put down some Summerguard fertilizer and he's been watering the heck out of the lawn every night trying to combat some of the browning. And it's worked! I can't help wishing I had some more seed, but I know I have to resist the temptation to fill in the gaps. It's way too hot right now to plant.

Hard to believe tomorrow is Friday. But I know Mike is working late again tonight. I'm rambling. I have the weirdest little feeling that nothing's going to get done over the weekend too. I've been too worried about bills I haven't even gotten yet. And now I've got myself wondering what's for dinner tonight too.

A Little Door'll Do Ya

So I've managed to calm down about Saturday. Mike was nice enough to give me half of his Sunday - which is usually "guys day" - to work some more on the upstairs.

First thing, we made a trip to the HD in Plymouth, since the one in Wareham was all out of the size bi-fold closet doors we needed - plus we needed more finish nails and some fertilizer. (Yes, our precious lawn is suffering.)

And - get this - I almost bought a fridge. Ok ok ok ok ok ok. So we were leaving HD and you know how they have all their closeouts right in the exit there.... and they had an LG, bottom freezer, french door, stainless steel, matte finish - the high performance fridge of my wildest dreams. ON CLOSEOUT! For $1500 something. I was dying. I was drooling. I was caressing. It had those super cool drawers in the fridge part. It had a cube size select ice maker in a pullout drawer in the freezer drawer which pulled out so super smoothly. Did I mention Closeout priced?!

I had to have stood there for at least 10 minutes mulling over it. I wanted to take the plunge - buy the thing. I wanted to so bad!! Mike was no help - he just kept telling me to do whatever I wanted. And I wanted the fridge! But I knew it was wrong... especially with everything else we're trying to accomplish right now. Not to mention the $500 in upstairs finishing materials I had just bought in the last two days. Not only that, but I didn't even know whether it would fit in my kitchen design. Or, even more importantly, if it would fit through the door to the house!

That's what tore it for me. I told myself, "we'll never even be able to squeeze it in." Never mind the fact that I shouldn't be spending money on impulse. But I think about it even now... wonder if it's still there. Just down the street from me right now. I know I made the right decision.

That was my frame of mind when we got back home. We installed the office bi-folds to test fit and that was the end of my half Sunday allotment. Mike was off on the boat and I decided to stay home and relax after that. It was nice.

I have to admit I went upstairs several times while Mike was gone, just to look at the closet doors. They make the room look so much more finished - even without trim. Now we just have to test fit the doors in the bedroom, take 'em off, stain 'em and put 'em back up again with all the trim.... which we need to put a second coat on, hopefully tonight.

Another Inturruption

How often has this happened to you - you're trying like hell to get work done around the house and everyone in the world keeps butting in on you and you can't get a thing done.

Let me tell you about my yesterday, and how absolutely frustrated Mike and I were. First off, we had to do a scrap metal run in the morning, which I knew would hold us up until about noon. And of course we hit traffic and didn't get home till about 12:30. But the second we got home, a guy stopped by to look at our boat, which is for sale on the front lawn. And he held up Mike until about 1:30.

At that time we were pretty hungry, having skipped breakfast, so we had lunch. Then we made our list for home depot and were really eager to get going. We were literally sitting in the truck when another guy stopped by about the boat. Once that guy left, we headed out. But 5 minutes on the way to the depot and a guy called about the boat - wanted to trade us for a truck and wouldn't take no for an answer, no matter how many times Mike said he wanted cash. So he was stuck on the phone with him allll the way to the store.

In the store, Mike got a call from his friend, who wanted to stop by our house. Leaving me to hobble down the aisles while he was yapping away.

We managed to get everything and get out of there. But once we got home, another person stopped by about the boat. Then, once he left and we were working, our neighbor called and wanted to invite us over for dinner. And then that guy with the truck called again, begging for Mike to just "look at it" before he said no.

Mike was so frustrated, he said fine. At this point it was around 6pm. We had cut a bunch of trim pieces and were ready to start staining.

And then the guy with the truck stopped by - Mike had to talk to him for a while, look at this stupid truck, and then finally sent him packing. And then our neighbor stopped by, just as we started staining. Which was ok, because he was just watching us and talking to us.

But then Mike's friend came by - drunk as a skunk and twice as annoying. We finished staining as fast as we could and I retreated back into the house. Mike now had to make a beer run and take care of his friend. And then our neighbor's son came over to hang with the guys. Then they went up to our neighbor's house for dinner. I stayed home - I was tired and annoyed.

It was the most impossible day ever! But at least we got most of the trim cut and first coated. Amazing that we got anything accomplished!

Doors Suck

So I think the bi-fold wood doors are going to run more like $70 a piece. That's not a set - that's a piece. Two closets times two doors equals $280. That's just crazy in my opinion. That's going to bring my "finish the upstairs" total into the $500's range, I'm sure. If not more.

I should just bit the bullet and go for broke. Have to take the plunge sooner or later. No use beating around the bush. What is today but yesterday's tomorrow.

Ok - now that all my sayings are out of the way.... I must admit I haven't told Mike any of my crazy Saturday schemes. And he's only agreed to put up the already stained trim and to cut and stain the window trim.... I don't know if that includes straightening the bedroom windows. But as I see it, it'll be easy for me to weasel my way into more.... I mean, we'll already be at the Home Depot getting window trim - so why not buy the doors, door trim, and the recessed light trim? And if we're already cutting and staining trim - why not cut and stain the door trim and the doors?!

That's evil girl power right there. I know its evil too. The whole Saturday will be gone before he even knows it. But I haven't pulled out the whip for weeks - so nobody out there can say anything. Plus, there is a lot I can do in terms of cutting and measuring to help out. Not like I'm not doing my part.

Are We There Yet?

It's time. Time to get back to work. And boy is that upstairs just screaming to be finished. We were sooo close before collapsing 500 yards from the finish line. So close I bet we could finish the entire thing in a weekend... we should have just a marathon Saturday and try to beat the clock - how fast can we finish the upstairs? Starting gun goes off at 7am - and we've got to be done by midnight.... that would be so cool. Mike probably wouldn't think so though, with me being less than 1/2 as helpful as I could normally be.

But really - to finish finish everything, there's only a few things left:

Install office trim (which has already been cut and stained - it's in the basement and ready to go)
Re-install 2 bedroom windows (they're crooked because of the house lift)
Install window trim on 4 windows (needs to be bought, cut and stained)
Eyeball trim for 2 recessed lights (takes two seconds)
Closet doors & trim for two closets (need to be bought & stained)
Trim & doors for 2 attic holes (need to be bought & stained)
Office railing (bought and installed)
Office ceiling fan

So minus the fact that everything needs to be stained - it's all totally dooable. Wow, I just mis-spelled Dooable. Sweet.

The cost for all this is another story - but I would guess about $300. The eyeballs are $25 each, the closet doors are probably at least $100 a set, so that's $250 there.... Hmmm, maybe more like $400. We have some trim in stock already. We'll see. It's a small price to pay to call the upstairs "done."

100% done. No "except for's." I get all giddy just thinking about it.

That's it - I'm going to try for it. Maybe if we can do just a little bit each day this week it could be done by Sat.....

Whip Crackin' is Backin' Action!

Hello world! I'm back and highly motivated! HIGHLY motivated. No, I'm still not ready to run, skip, jump, or other leg-type-activities. But I am in good spirits. And no, I haven't been drinking spirits... mmmm, spirits.

Back to the subject.

So, last week I devoted myself to a tedious planning task not to be undertaken by the faint of heart... or faint of butt. Because it requires a large amount of time on your butt. Since most of my time as of late has been of the butt-sitting variety - I decided it was high time. So, I got out my pencil (which is hard enough because I despise pencils. Stupid pencils.) and I got out my paper. And I got out my tape measure..... which I then broke. So I got out my other tape measure! And then I got out my laptop and went to work.

I painstakingly measured my kitchen. And then I went to ikea.com. And thus commenced the hours and hours of drawing, erasing, adding, clicking on stuff, drawing some more, calculating, moving, erasing some more, getting another pencil, getting another piece of paper - etc etc. And by the end of the third day, I had created - KITCHEN! And it was good.




Why? Well, it is true that we have a kitchen. I found my cabinets for $200 at a yard sale - full set! More actually, then I ended up using. And I do like them - I like the color and all. But they are old.

And in the very near future - we are going to have to rip them all out anyway to fix the drywall in the kitchen, which got the biggest beating from the whole house-lift-basement. Sooooo, if we have to take them all out anyway - why not put back new ones? And in a coolio configuration designed by me instead of in a hap-hazard make 'em fit or else kind of former configuration? Capeesh?

The design is totally awesome and reflects the fact that I spent waaaay too much time on it. And really, it won't even be too expensive. I already have the countertop - which will still fit as long as we don't break it getting it out. And we already have an awesome granite sink and newish appliances. (Except for the fridge which is totally too expensive for words.)

Under all realistic conditions - none of this madness would even think about starting until after next year. There's too much other stuff to be accomplished. But I'm working on that too....

Down on My Knees - I mean, luck.

I've determined that I'm the luckiest unlucky person ever. Just when I thought things were going so perfectly - I had money for my new laptop, my good friend Justin was coming for a visit, I was going to Europe in Sept... just lucky lucky stuff. Something terrible had to happen.

Last month - I slipped on a wet floor, dislocated my left knee, had to go to the ER, was outta work, and now in physical therapy - all the while hobbling around on crutches, not being able to do anything fun. And that's the short version.

So that's the main reason I haven't blogged in a long time. It's been just a crappy summer. I've had a handful of fun times at friends' houses - but I can't go out to the bars or go to the beach, ride the motorcycle, go camping, take belly dancing classes, work on the house.... or even go for a short jog. I'd be happy with a non-hobbling walk at this point. Forget running. Makes me want to start balling again.

Mike meanwhile has finished the CarBQ. He bought a new boat and a new motorcycle. The boat is nice, the motorcycle is ok - though I don't really like cruisers. Now we've got to sell our old boat and motorcycle. The garage gets smaller by the day, it seems.

Of course, we haven't even been able to finish putting the trim upstairs. Or construct the stairway railing. I'm still content to at least see it most of the way done - but I'm getting sick of my office mess - books and milkcrates of stuff everywhere. But it's useless to put all that on the shelves just to take it all off again to put up the trim.

At this point, it's a struggle to even keep the house clean.

So that's the story ur-body. I miss writing to all of you. I hope all of you are having a great and productive summer.

Where Did She Go?

I've missed blogging, but there's been no new news! Everything's been on hold while Mike is working on this Car-B-Q thing. (Yes, CarBQ. Think BBQ under the hood of a teal toyota tercel.) Then this weekend is Laconia - I don't get to go this year. Next weekend we have a b-day party to go to. Weekend after that my friend Justin will be home from Japan for a visit. Weekend after that is the annual summer party.

So maybe around 7/14 we can get back to work... although my friend DosBequis b-day is on 7/11, so I may be partying that weekend too!

Stay tuned - I promise I'll get more work done soon!

My Undying Love for Grass

Well - the lawn is official. Mike mowed it for the first time last Thursday. And now even the bare spots are starting to fill in since our over-seeding a couple weeks ago. We have massive amounts of weeds - but they're green! So I'm happy.

We finished staining the office trim and the banister landing posts last week too, although we didn't really have time to put them up over the weekend. Hopefully we can get to that this week so I can finish getting the office back in order.

I have to admit - I'm pretty tired. It's been go go go for the last month - with the floors, weekend work, crazy work during the week, bdays, concerts, dance class.... I'm just exhausted. I finally had this Sunday off and I did nada all day. And I mean nada.

For once, I really don't want to do any work on the house. I just don't feel like it. I'm excited just to put out the trash tomorrow morning. And that's probably a good thing because I have to get the deepho paid off again.

It's such a strange feeling to be so lazy.

I know Mike wants to see if he can add the farmer's porch onto our current permit.... but this time I'm leaving that up to him.

Can I Step on It Now?!

Grass is a wonderful thing - and boy is it coming in now. We still have a lot of holes - and now a lot of weeds are coming up. But they're green weeds! When the lawn is high enough to be mowed, we'll put down some week control.
Here's the view from upstairs. You can really see the blank spots from here.

But from the side, it's harder to tell. Hopefully another week or so and the overseed we put on will start to grow. It's almost getting too hot now to seed. But at least our nights are still cool.


Here's the side yard, which actually looks better in person then in this pic. This we didn't hydroseed - it had grass.

A DeepHo Story

All of you know by now that I have mixed feelings about the Home Depot. I've had bad luck there, and I've had good luck there and I've complained about both.

This is a story about why Home Depot is taking over the world. Sad, but true.

Mike and I went to purchase landing posts for our stairs on Saturday. We were on Cape and decided to check out the selection at MidCape Home Center - figuring that they might have something we liked better than Depot in stock.

The dude in the store told us to go to building #9 out back because that's where the stair stuff was. So, we walked, in the drizzling rain, past 8 other buildings to #9.

Once there, we saw they had just one style of post and it was too short. The guy went back to his stock and, by chance, he happened to have some super long ones. We decided to just get them - I mean, we had already come all the way down here and made the guy check for these for god sakes. We felt bad.

He asked if we wanted oak or beech. Our treads are oak so we said oak. And he gave us the three posts and told us to bring them to the gatehouse. Poor Mike had to carry these three heavy 6ft long posts through the drizzly rain all the way past the 8 buildings to the gatehouse.

At the gatehouse, the attendant told us we had to bring them inside. So we brought them inside to the cashier. She looked at the boxes. Put on her glasses. Looked at the barcode. Asked us where we got them from and what they were. We told her. And then she told us that she didn't know what to do with them and to take them to customer service.

Mike again carried the boxes through the store to customer service. The lady there didn't know what to do with them either. She pointed us over to another customer service guy. Lucky for us, he knew what to do.

He started ringing up the posts and then asked us if we had wanted oak or beech. We said oak and told him that the guy in building #9 said they were oak. They weren't. They were beech. So customer service man called building #9 man to find out if they had any oak. They didn't have any, we'd have to order it.

Mike asked the price difference. It was $79 per post for beech and it would be $90 per post for oak. I thought that was outrageous for either, but having just been through allll that ridiculousness, I told the guy I had to get my project done and I'd take the beech.

And we were finally able to pay and get the hell outta there. Immediately I commented to Mike about how much of a pain that all was and how obvious it became that Home Depot would take over the world at this rate.

We went home, dropped off the posts, and headed to the Depot because we had to rent a hardwood floor stapler.

By chance, I said, "Let's look at their stair stuff."

Oh my god. They had everything. They had a variety of landing posts, banisters, trim pieces, balusters, and more. They had the exact same style as midcape - oak - the right size (actually a variety of sizes) and it was $50 a post. (Actually $49 a post.)

$50 a post! And it was there, I could pick it out myself, I could bring it up front and pay for it easily.

So for the same amount we spent at midcape - we got all three posts, long oak boards, landing post trim pieces, an iron baluster for test length, jig saw blades.... I can't even remember all the stuff we got.

Mike's going to return those other posts tomorrow. Can you believe that? I'm all for supporting the local businesses - and I hate the fact that the whole world is a Home Depot/Walmart/CVS plaza - but OH MY GOD!

Sleeping in My Room

Do you know how awesome it feels to sleep in your own room after living out of your guest room for over 2 months? You must - you're all housebloggers.

I think it was the most restful sleep I've had in a long time. But that could also be because I was exhausted!

Let me rewind a little.

Having to work last Sunday - I decided early on last week that Saturday was do-or-die-day for the wood floors upstairs. I was determined to sleep in my own room again. The problem - the banister... or lack thereof.

The banister landing posts has to be recessed and attached to the floor joists - not just the hard wood, so we knew we had to get them before anything could be accomplished. Now, if you haven't had a stair experience - I'd highly recommend it. Stairs are complicated, confusing, mathematical, expensive, and usually, very necessary. Ours are even more so because they lead into an upstairs room with a railing that theoretically should tie into the stair banister. And we have an unusually tall last step. (at the top that is)

Ok - so we were completely in the dark about how to work the banister. Over rail, between post, wood, iron, lose it into the ceiling, lose some tread space, tie it into the upstairs railing, how to tie in the railing with the hardwood floor...

We were confused enough about how to make it work - never mind making it look good. That was a complete enigma.

So Friday Mike went over to TJ's house (carpenter/contractor extrodinaire) to ask his advice. Together they came up with a plan, and Saturday Mike and I set about putting it into action.

THE PLAN

Step1: We drove over to TJ's early in the AM with some of our hardwood pieces for him to cut and router. Cutting off the tongue & groove portion would leave us with a smooth edge to edge the stair hole with.

Step2: We picked up landing posts. We decided to go with a post to post system rather than over rail because it would be easier for us. (Long story about this to follow)

Step3: We picked up some oak boards to trim around the landing posts.

And there's more to this plan, but that's all we could afford to get at the time because we had to rent the hardwood stapler again too.

With all these errands, we couldn't start flooring until around 3 or 4pm. So, naturally, we were up till midnight flooring. And I had to get up at 5am for my shoot. Lovely. But it wasn't so bad - our neighbor's son came over and helped out. It went pretty quick once we got started. And here are the results:

Here's where the railing will be. With two oak landing posts, the oak board surrounding them, and next to the board, you can see a piece of wood flooring that goes in the opposite direction to the rest of the floor. That's so the tongues of the horizontal boards snap in and hold tight.

Here's the other side of the room. We stained the baseboard trim last night and haven't put it up yet.

Awe behold the beauty.

Having just barely finished the floor on Saturday night, we were in no condition to move furniture. And Sunday, I was exhausted from work.

Last night I didn't even think it was going to happen! Mike and I cut and stained the baseboard trim and the landing posts. And after that, I was ready to quit for the night. But as we were bringing laundry upstairs, Mike just decided that we should sleep in the bedroom that night. And we started moving stuff!

Around 11, we had all the office stuff back in the office - although not arranged. We just threw it all in there. And we had the bed and nightstands in the bedroom. Messy as everything still was, I was so happy to see it in place.

Trudging Thru the Mud

Here I am reporting live from the scene of yet another exploding logo. And wait... is that big booms & explosion SFX?! Oh my god - isn't that the coolest most awesome thing you've ever seen?!

Yeah right. I need more warm & fuzz in my life right now.

Anyway, so as you can tell, work has totally infiltrated my sanity.... if there was any there to begin with, it's gone now. I should start a second blog - but then our clients might get a hold of it and that would just suck. Because boy would I have a few choice words for a few choice individuals. As in, "NO MORE EXPLOSIONS!"

Back home... yeah, home - what's that? But seriously folks, the grass is coming in nicely. We put down some additional seed plus starter fertilizer to begin filling in the blank spaces.

We also got a cable splitter. Now, here's an issue I'd like to bring up. Those things are dam expensive! Way back when, when we did the wiring, we put cable, phone, and internet in every room... except the bathroom. The bathroom just got cable.

(Could you imagine me blogging from my bathtub?! I could add a web cam and make millions from idiots watching me blog naked live in my bathtub. Unfortunately for all of you, I'm not greedy and shameless enough.)

Back to the story - so we have eight cable cables that need cable hooked up to them. (Yes, I'm a video professional, leave me alone about the ridiculous girly techno babble..) Of course, Comcast doesn't do diddly but give you a two from one adapter and say, "All done!" So Mike and I went to the DeepHo after he gave me my cool new kitchen TV looking for a better splitter with 8 outputs.

And they had one! It was perfect, one in, eight out - amplified and ready to mount on the wall. The price for this little box no bigger than a Dove Ice Cream bar box - $130.

$130!!! Let's take a minute to examine that. That's outrageous. $130 just so I can watch TV in every room. I don't even have a TV in every room, but why spend $60 to have TV in three or four rooms just to spend $60 again later down the line?

I could have had my stairway banister all finished and my office floor done with $130. Which, by the way, needs to be spent/done this Saturday. I can't even tell you how frustrating that is. I've spoken to it before - these little things that end up costing big bucks.

But I bought it anyway. Needed to. I'll have to eventually. The price is never going to go down. (Famous last words.)

Meanwhile a debate has begun on the stairway - should the railing go over the poles or between them? I prefer the over and Mike prefers the in-between. We'll probably go with what he wants this time around. Even though it's f-ing ugly.

I want the metal balusters though - none of this all wood junk. It'll be too woody. I wouldn't mind if Mike would let me paint the wood. But wood on wood on wood is just too much wood.

And now back, to Summerfest2007. KABOOM!

BLING

Mike got me the coolest (yet, most belated) b-day gift evah!

It's a kitchen clock/tv/radio/DVD player/CD player/iPod player! Oooo! Total techno geek stuff right there. We installed it last night and I have high expectations for its future awesomeness.

Feels Like A Year

Remember how I had that mad-crazy last saturday plan? Well, that was foiled. My sister in-law is selling her house and needed Mike's home-improvement expertise on Saturday.

Which, actually worked out perfectly because I really shouldn't be buying more stuffx at the DeepHo until I pay off my bill next week! That's a conundrum isn't it? Paying off a credit card so you can buy more stuff on it and get yourself back in debt.... it's almost philosophical in its retardedness.

So my Saturday was spent on my ass. There was a Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends marathon on and one point - and I enjoyed that waaay too much.

On Sunday I had to shoot in NH and Mike was the one on his butt all day... probably watching the Power Block on Spike TV... followed by Man-Type movies.... and eating chips 'n cheez.

This week's going to be a complete loss too. Since I'll be shooting in Laconia next Saturday I decided, what the hell? Why don't we just go up there for the weekend and do some riding? Since we won't be up there for bike week. I wish we could camp, but the grass isn't strong and tall enough to drive the big 'ol truck over it to pick up the slide-in, which is at the back of the back yard.

What does all that mean - I've got to hoard more money so I can pay for room and food and fun and gas. *sigh*

It's always something.

Although I did get my plants in the mail! I got three pink flowering shrubberies, one lilac, and a bunch of little ground-cover-type purplie flowering things. (You can tell I'm sooo into gardening, right? Pshaw!) Yeah, I just plant 'em where I'd like 'em and if they live they live and if they die, I don't cry about it because I don't have the patience to deal with taking care of them. I just figure - these plants normally just grow in the wild allll on their own, right? So they should be able to fend for themselves in my yard.

Gardeners of the world are screaming at me and my laziness right now, I'm sure. My neighbor is an awesome gardener/farmer - I have to plant stuff when he's not looking so he doesn't see how many rules of gardening I'm breaking.

The Weekendless May

What a bummer of a week. I should be psyched - the grass is coming up, the office is painted, and it's been beautiful out.

But there's also bad news. I'll be working this Sunday, next Saturday, Sunday the-what-ever's-after-next-Sunday, and the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend. And not just working working - like, out of the state working. I should be psyched about that too - it's a great opportunity and should be lotsa fun. (Can't elaborate any more, however. It's a little bit of a hush-hush operation for now at least.)

But this is the start of Spring!! Normally every weekend is jam-packed with places to go, people to see, and things to do. This Sunday, I'll be missing out on the blessing of the bikes, for example. =(

And Mike and I won't be able to go camping at Nickerson on Memorial Day weekend like last year.

Not to mention the loss of countless hours of work around the house. Saturdays are going to be super stressful. That is, if I don't have to travel on Saturdays. I'll be getting the details today at 1pm. This Saturday, as an example, I have to get up early for a hair appointment. (Shut up, and let me be girly for an hour and a half please!) Meanwhile, Mike's got to haul a load of scrap metal to the junk yard for cash. When we both get home, we have to run to the deepho, rent the stapler, and try like hell to do the office floor by end of the day.

For now, I hope this crazy schedule is only for May. I'm going to cry if it cuts into June and July. I'm already missing Laconia this year because of a stupid dance recital we're shooting 6/16. We always go up last weekend of the week - and I was really looking forward to it being just the two of us this year. Plus I wanted to get a new leather jacket at Weirs Beach.

Anyway - nothing I can do about it. It's just - why can't all this stuff happen in Fall, Winter, or Early Spring?!

Princess $7

Last night I took absolute joy in just standing in the office. It's just something about dim light and warm colors that makes me comfy. (I have dimmers on almost all the ceiling fixtures in the house - from the recessed to the tracks to the pendants.)

About a month ago I found a killer small chandelier at Walmart for $7. Mike wired it in for me last night while I put the pendants back up.

Now this is officially the princess sitting room. It is so royally awesome. The chandelier is perfect. The pendants look killer.

All I need now is the floor and the furniture. Too bad I have to wait until Saturday.