Alone For the Week

Hubby has been away all week on vacation visiting his Aunt in North Carolina.  It seems lately all we do is drive each other crazy, so I was kind of excited at the idea of having the house to myself for a whole week.  On Saturday, I dropped him off at the airport and headed home to have a fun relaxing day.  Well, the house was quiet, so I turned on the television and started doing a little tidying around the house.  On Sunday, I was still excited about having the house to myself and did more cleaning and some shopping.  Monday, the excitement had started to dwindle.  The dogs weren't great at conversation.  In fact, all they wanted to do was bark at every noise leaving me feeling like a recording from telling them to calm down. 

By Tuesday, I was over being alone.  The dogs had started to look for their daddy and wanted to go outside every 2 seconds convinced that he would be out in the yard.  One of the dogs started sitting in the door to his computer room just waiting for him.  I had no one to talk to and was in general just missing my husband.  On Wednesday, I distracted myself by going shopping for a friend and visiting with her for a while, but that only lasted a short while.  By Wednesday evening, I was tired of distracting myself with cleaning (I mean seriously, how bored do you have to be to resort to cleaning the oven). 

Today, I am starting to get excited again because he is coming home tomorrow.  I suppose I should just face it; we have been together for 26, almost 27 years, so being apart for extended periods of time really stinks. 

I am really glad he had this chance to visit his Aunt.  She is 98 and realistically he probably won't have the chance again.  But, I will be happy to have my partner back home - even if we do drive each other crazy when we are together.

Home Ownership

Sometimes the tests that come with home ownership can make you want to become a renter again.  This past Friday, hubby and I came home about 5pm to find our air conditioner had gone out.  In fact, it had completely frozen up.  Being that it is 5pm and on a Friday, getting someone out was a little tricky.  We do have a home warranty, but they couldn't get anyone out until maybe Sunday.  We have a company that did our annual maintenance on the a/c just 2 weeks before, so I called them.  They were able to come out on Saturday and we discovered our blower motor was dead.    It was finally replaced on Monday, but it was a really long weekend with no a/c.  The highest it got in the house was 90 and we were able to muscle through by opening windows and using lots of fans.  But when things like that happen, I sometimes miss being able to pick up the phone and have the landlord deal with the issue. 

Then I think about my garden and the great neighbors I have and I am glad I have my house.  Pros and cons, I suppose.

Dining Room Set

We purchased a new dining table and chairs this weekend. Previously we had a pub style set, but since I am on the short side, it just wasn't comfortable. The one we purchased is normal height with cushy chairs. We haven't had a comfortable dining set in such a long time that I had forgotten how nice it is to sit and talk while you eat. No television, just conversation and maybe a little music.

Yard of the Month

Our yard was chosen as one of the yards of the 2 yards of the month for our neighborhood. All the credit goes to hubby. Since he did all the work, I guess he gets the gift card too.

Soft Scrub Total Kitchen

This stuff is the absolute best. I forgot to clean our George Fireman grill for about two weeks. I had grilled pork chops with a balsamic glaze and the grill was a caked on mess. Hubby even commented that this may have to be donated to Goodwill because it was such a mess. As I was digging around for something to use, I found a bottle of Soft Scrub Total Kitchen under the sink. I sprayed the foam on and let it sit for about 20 to 30 minutes and it literally wiped clean! I couldn't believe it. I will definitely keep a bottle of this around from now on.

New Borders

They finished the borders around my trees and flower beds this weekend. They look fantastic. I am so glad we had them done.

Armadillo

There is an armadillo that is terrorizing our yard.  He has come by on a few occasions and is digging (rooting around actually) in our flower beds and in our yard.  We have tried several things to make him go away, but he is a sneaky little devil and just finds a new spot.  Last night he was  in our front yard and he made 30-40 new holes.

Drought & Water Restrictions

Living in Texas, you expect the triple digit temperatures, and you even expect that there will be droughts and water restrictons.  What really irks me are those people who refuse to follow the watering restrictions.  In the area where I live, we are at Stage II which means we can only water outside using sprinklers on certains days of the week and only during certain hours (not during the heat of the day).  Since people are not following the restrictions and the water consumption is too high to sustain us through the drought, they are considering going to Stage III which could be no outside watering.  I see some of the people in my neighborhood who water every day and simply don't care. Their reasoning is that "they can afford the bill".  How can we get them to see that it is not about whether you can afford the bill?  I can afford my bill too, but I want to ensure that we have water to sustain us through the drought.  For those people who are only worried about their yard looking pretty, how do we get them to understand? 

Yard Work

Today hubby and I, mostly hubby, did a little work in the back yard.  We have some spots in our back yard where the grass just isn't doing very well.  We think we may have a fungus call brown spot, but we aren't 100% sure.  We are going to take a sample and get it tested.  In the meantime, we are doing some of the others things suggested to take care of it and that should at least make it better.  If we don't have brown spot and it is just the heat, then the things we are going to do won't hurt the grass.  Other than working in the yard, we had a pretty uneventful day.  What did you do today?

Smoke Alarm

Why is it that your smoke alarm battery never goes dead at a convenient time?  Ours seems to always go dead late at night when we are relaxing and getting ready for bed or in the middle of the night when we are sound asleep.  This morning, the smoke alarm starts beeping at 6am.  It jolts me out of bed and sends the dogs in to a barking frenzy.  By the time I get awake enough to figure out what is happening, everything is quiet.  I look over at hubby and he is still sound asleep, so maybe I was just dreaming.  I go back to sleep and about an hour later it happened again.  This time I am not dreaming because it woke hubby too.  I get the ladder so hubby can help me change the batteries (I am too short even with a ladder) and when I look in the box of batteries, we are short one battery.  Since the smoke alarms are all connected, they still beep even is one is low, so I made a mad dash to Walmart to get a battery.  I know they said you should change the batteries once every 6 months or when the time changes, but I have it on my calendar to change them every 3 months now.  No more being jolted out of bed.

Hill Country Home Repair

Yesterday we had a storm door installed on our back door.  A guy from Hill Country Home Repair, contracted through Lowe's, brought the door out and did the install.  He was fantastic.  He arrived right on time and finished the job in exactly the amount of time he stated.  He took the time to adjust the settings on the door so it wouldn't slam shut, just as if he was installing the door at his own house.  The quality of his work was great.  I even saw him sweeping off my back porch when he was done.

I will definitely add this guys name and number to my list of contractors to use in the future.

Harold E. Larsen Lithograph

Hubby and I have had a picture frame with a Casablanca poster hanging in our bedroom for about 20 years.  We found the picture frame when I worked in the apartment industry and it was empty - just the frame and a white backing.  Last week we were in Target and they had a nice wood poster frame on clearance ($6 and was originally $30), so we thought it was time to upgrade the Casablanca poster.  We took the old frame apart and was ready to put the poster in the new frame when hubby mentioned that the white backing paper on the old frame was really thick.  He turned it over to discover it was lithograph with a beautful southwest landscape scene on the other side.  On the picture it has "Presden Gallery, Harold E. Larsen, Sante Fe, New Mexico".  We decided to put Casablanca back in the original frame and the lithograph in the new frame.  It will look really nice hanging in the guest room. 

We hear about people finding cool stuff like that, but it has never happened to us.  Now, I just need to see what I can find out about Harold E. Larsen.

Super Bowl

This year the Super Bowl gathering is at our house.  I am looking forward to it because this is the first time the "gang" has been to our house.  We still have over a month before the game, but I am already doing some planning in advance.  I already have the menu planned out - Papa Murphy's pizza.  Now we just have to get our house the way we want it; primarily, pictures up on the wall.

Pampas Grass

Today we cut back our pampas grass and while working with it, hubby and I decided this would be perfect to use as a security measure.  We have two and each one was about 6 feet tall and at least 4 feet in diameter.  If you were to plant these right outside each of your windows, no burglars would be able to get in for fear of being cut and scratched by this plant.  It would also be great to keep teenagers from sneaking out. 

In Home Energy Monitor

Our electric company asked us if we would participate in a test of their new In Home Energy Monitor. The monitor is a piece of equipment that works in conjunction with our smart meter and shows us how much electricity we are using in real time (well, actually a 3 second delay). It has lots of features, but the one we like the most is the one that tells you how much your electricity is costing you per hour at your current consumption level. It has a back light on the display that changes colors based on your usage. It displays green if you are in the low usage group, amber for the moderate usage group, and red for the high usage group. The idea behind the monitor is if you can see how much you are using, you will adjust your usage. So far we have only had it connected a few days, but it works. If I walk by the room and see the display on red, it makes me think about what all we have running. Sadly, we have not been able to get it to display green yet, but we are trying.

The Fence

Hubby and I are slowly power washing and putting Thompson's Water Seal on our fence. We have already done all of the portions that are visible from the street and today we put the water seal on one side of the fence in the back yard. We like to put it on with a roller so it takes a little longer, but looks much nicer. Plus, it is kind of peaceful out there just rolling on the stuff. Hubby told me I could watch, but that is no fair to him and no fun for me. He did the majority of the work, but I help too. Now, my legs and butt are so sore since I did most of the low portions He's 6'3" so the low areas are tough for him. Since I'm only 5'2", those are a little easier for me. Next we have to decide when to do the back portion of the fence. We have to speak to the neighbors first because when we power wash it just stuff in their yard. We go and clean it up, but we want them to know first.

Although I didn't get any of my inside chores done, I feel good that we got that portion done.

Yard

We had our yard aerated a couple of days ago. When hubby called to tell me it was done, I had this mental picture of our yard with hundreds of baby gopher holes all over. Well, it doesn't quiet look like that. You can see the holes in some places, but mostly you see the plugs of dirt that were pulled out of the ground just laying on top. It actually looks like hundreds of little dog turds laying all over the yard. The only bad thing is that in the back yard, it is hard to tell which one are the little pieces of dirt and which ones really are dog turds. That makes picking up the yard a bit more of a challenge. In a few more days, the little clods of dirt should break down and go away, but for now it makes for an interesting time walking in the yard.

Exhausted

I worked pretty much all weekend trying to get somewhat caught up at work. I am hoping I have only 1 or 2 more hard weeks and then I can get back to a normal pace. With my assistant leaving, I have been working really hard to clear up the backlog of work that she was stashing without telling anyone. This weekend, I brought a ton of stuff home and managed to get 2/3 of it done. Yesterday, I got up and worked either doing stuff around the house or on my work stuff from 7:30am to 11:45pm; except for the couple of hours I paused to watch a movie, Death at a Funeral, which was hilarious. This morning, I hit the snooze button more times that I ever have. In fact, I even debated calling in to work late, but then I remembered I needed to tidy the yard for the landscapers and that woke me up. Thank goodness I only have a few meetings/conference calls for today; otherwise, I just might fall asleep while the talk.

Lawn Care Service

We have a fairly large yard, so it takes us almost a full day every week to make our lawn look nice. I am not that good with the weed eater and I struggle with the extension cord on the lawnmower (we have all electric tools), so unfortunately that means that hubby takes on the brunt of all of the work. With hubby not feeling well last week and the temps hitting 108 a couple of days this week, we decided to look in to paying someone to do the mowing and edging for us. ABC Lawn Services came out yesterday and gave us an estimate; the price was right, so we signed a contract. I feel so much better knowing that I am not going to be at work worrying about hubby cutting the lawn in this crazy heat. Instead we can spend our time doing other projects around the house - like putting up pictures or painting the garage or pulling weeds out of the flower beds or a hundred other things on the list. Now on lawn day, all we have to remember to do is pick up the dog toys from the back yard and make sure the yard is free of dog pooh.

Toaster Update

Well, you aren't going to believe this.... I broke another toaster today. We actually had a toaster oven and when I got home from work I decided to try to use it (we have owned it for a little over a month and only used it 2 or 3 times). Katreader said she loved hers and I never really tried doing toast or bagels in ours, so I gace it a try. I plugged it in, put in my Asiago bagel and waited for it to finish. I pulled my bagel out before the time went off because it had gotten as dark as I wanted. Just as I finished pulling the bagel out, I hear a loud pop coming from the toaster oven. Whatever that was scared the crap out of me and also ended up tripping a breaker in the house. Needless to say, my luck with toasters seems to extend to toaster ovens too.

Since it was so new, I called Black & Decker and reported the issue. They are going to be sending me a new one, but in the meantime, I am back to the same toaster dilemma. Tomorrow I am going on a hunt for a T-Fal toaster. They are a little more expensive, but as much as I have spent on toasters lately it will be worth it in the long run.