Blurred Vision

Between training class, homework, painting, visiting family, and just pure exhaustion I have been quite the blog slacker.

My bad!

I don't ever mean to slack off this much, but one day turns into 3, which becomes 5 and then before I know it, it's been a week and a half with no blogging!! Holy goodness!

This week, McStudly and I vowed to do absolutely nothing beyond what was absolutely necessary. Needless to say, we've only been doing dishes in the Puhl household. We worked so stinking hard the last couple of weeks that we are pooped! So this week has been relaxing, catching up on our backlog of tv shows (our poor DVR was at 96%, which I didn't think was possible), eating yummy meals at home again (after eating out so much due to our rush), and just enjoying each other's company.

It's been so nice. It's already Thursday and I am SO glad we've spent most of the week relaxing. We didn't get everything done that we wanted to before his mom got into town, but we were close! I know I'll be forgetting something, but here's a quick version of what we did in just 2 weeks:

- prime everything

- paint living room

- paint kitchen

- paint spare bedroom

- catch up on laundry that's WAY overdue

- new faceplates on all outlets and switches (except in the master bedroom)

- fresh paint on window sills and doorways in the kitchen and living room

- switch up a bit of the decor for fall (and to go with the new orange wall)

- dust EVERYthing (also long overdue)

- vacuum everywhere

- BIG bathroom clean downstairs

- TOTAL bathroom wipe-down upstairs (again - long overdue, but our toilet is kept clean, I'm not that gross!)

- dressers de-cluttered

- kitchen table de-cluttered (it collected quite the random mix while we were getting all of this work down around the house)

And, as is with any Puhl House remodelling project, we ran into a few setbacks along the way (thankfully, there was no need to call the Home Owners Insurance this time around):

- primer was spilled on the carpet (have I mentioned how clumsy I am?!). We had to stop everything we were doing to clean that junk up... scrub. Rent a rug doctor from the local grocery store (thank goodness someone had thought of that) and steam the rest of that mess outta there. Luckily, we acted fast and furious and you can't tell ANYthing was spilled, now - SCORE!

- Austin, our McPup, was spending one of our paint days over at my parents' house with Luke, their Labrador, frolicking through the backyard care free. Well, apparently something either bit him or somehow infected him, because he came home with a bump on his side. We checked him for ticks, and found nothing. Then, a week later, the hair feel off on that spot. Eek! Then it seemed like it was getting a little bigger. I took him to the vets immediately and they thought it may be something as simple as ringworm and gave me some ointment to put on his boo boo twice daily. It seems to be helping a little, and I think the hair is finally starting to grow back, BUT the samples they took turned out negative for ringworm. Who knows what it was! He never really reacted to us touching it or anything, but I'm glad he's finally getting better. My poor little puppy!

- I bought some white touch-up paint for the ceiling and trim and such. Well, I didn't pay a ton of attention and accidentally bought sating finish, instead of flat. Needless to say, the ceiling now has a few shiny spots. It's a little weird, but it's only temporary. I finally bought some flat paint and we'll be fixing that oopsie pretty soon. Nice, huh?!

- I bought the wrong size blinds for our windows. :-( My bad. Luckily Lowes is awesome and I just returned them for the right ones, but it was still a bummer, for sure!

- We didn't even think to check for the studs in the wall when putting up the curtain rods. Let's just say it ended up not happening, and we now have 4 new holes to patch and paint over. Awesome, right? yeah... we didn't think so either. And we're way tired of our nosy neighbor looking into our house through our deck door. Creeper!!

We still have a little bit of work to do, like painting the trim and window sills in the spare bedroom, and replacing all of the outlets and switches (we ended up just putting the faceplates on the old ugly ones to save time last week). And the blinds and curtains need to be hung, too, so we'll have to get that taken care of sometime, too, I guess.

Basically, a TON has been done, but there'e still a lot left to do. I will leave you, today with pictures of our yucky old green kitchen. It looks like green threw up in there because it was EVERYwhere! Way too much green, and not the nice pretty green, either. Check it:

My Food Baby

See? Whatd I tell you?

Pretty ridiculous... And quite a bit painful, at times.

PS: This is not as bad as it can get... "the incident" was a bad day, so imagine it even bigger, if you can.

Normal...

This is about how I typically look on any given day, give-or-take. Stay tuned for the 'food baby' reveal...

April Showers

I almost don't even know where to begin. If I seem a little spotty, please forgive me. My mind is in about 5 gazillion places, right now.

*sigh


So as many of you know, we've been doing some home-remodelling lately. We've hit bump after bump in the road, but things were finally progressing. So imagine, if you will, that we've finally taken about 5 steps forward. Well... now think 8 steps back.


My Husband has been living the "Manly Man" dream in wanting to do things himself. I'm not allowed to do them, but it's not due to any fact other than he just wants to be able to do it. Fine. Whatever. I've got PLENTY of other things to do around the house...


Yesterday, McStudly had plans to install the new light into our bathroom. That's fine, but I couldn't keep myself from worrying - so I called.

Honey, I know you're going to laugh at me, but I just have to say it - please don't forget to turn the breaker off before you install the new light.

*sarcastic silence*

"Babe. Seriously. I'm not stupid."

Okay - that's fine. I just had to say it. Laugh at me if you want, but I feel better.

(end of conversation)



Well, apparently it shouldn't have been... in installing the new light, he ran into a bit of a snag and had to make a home-depot run in order to take care of it. While at the Home Depot, he decided to go ahead and purchase a new shut-off valve for the water supply to our new toilet, since the old one was, well, old and needed to be replaced anyways.

Upon arriving home, he decides to switch jobs and install the new shut-off valve instead. (Some of you probably see what's coming. Unfortunately, I didn't know what he was doing, or I would've said... well... you'll figure it out)

He starts taking off the old valve and SQQWOOOOSSHHSHHHSHHSHHSHHHHHSHHSHHSHHHHHHHH (that's my squirting water impression, for those of you not following).


Apparently, Mr. Manly Man himself forgot to SHUT OFF THE WATER!!! He thought that shutting it off on the shut-off valve... the one he was replacing... would shut all of the water off to that pipe. ???


Natural reaction - he sticks his finger in the pipe. I don't blame him. I would've done the same thing... oh wait... no. No I wouldn't have.


ANYwho - he has his finger in the pipe and calls... My Dad. Mr. fix-it-yourself. Probably the best choice, really. So he finally figures out that he has to take his finger out and go shut off the main water... but he doesn't know where it is.


He runs down to the utility closet... then down to the basement and finds three water lines. Shuts ALL 3 of them off. (again - probably the best choice, at this point) But, by this time it had been probably around 5 minutes since "the incident" started. So you know what that means...


Water - EVERYWHERE!!



So I happen to call, and he answers the phone like this:

"I feel so stupid."

Why? What happened?

"I can't believe I didn't that..."

What? You did what? WHAT HAPPENED??

"Ugh - I feel SO stupid!"

Would you PLEASE tell me what happened?!


As he starts to relive what happened, I BUST out laughing... what else can you do? But then he tells me how bad it is.



As you can imagine, 5 minutes is a LOOONG time to have water BURSTING out of an open pipe. It was ALL over the place... literally.


Bathroom - covered in water





(with the new shut-off valve finally in place)


Bedroom - carpet totally wet and soggy at the door and along the entire wall that meets up with the bathroom



Hallway - carpet completely wet and soggy outside of the bathroom door




*sigh* I wish that was where it ended.


Moving downstairs:

Dining room - water rushing down through the new chandelier, through the fire-sprinkler, ALL over the dining room table, ALL over the carpet





Utilities closet - it's raining men in there

(Sorry - it's a bad pic, I know)


Living Room - let's just say you can see all of the seams of the dry-wall on the ceiling. AND where any screw-holes may have once existed.







(the chandelier and one of the sprinkler heads)


(the cieling where the dining room meets the kitchen)


(the floor next to the utilities closet)



Now, McStudly WAS quick to not only turn off all of the water, but also flip the Main Breaker to the entire house. Than the Lord... I didn't need him getting electrocuted on top of all that had already happened (which was my first concern when he answered the phone the way he did and sounding all delirious).



Our HomeOwner's Insurance will be earning it's keep in the near future, that's for sure. Unfortunately, there's no way it'll be done by... TOMORROW, when his grandparents fly in!! But at least they're not staying with us until Monday evening. We'll have a few more days for clean-up and getting the house livable, again.



I'm just glad it was nice outside. A neighbor's kid ran the dog while we cleaned up and when we checked to make sure we wouldn't get electrocuted, we cut the power back on so I could cook some dinner.

On the plus side - the new light is almost installed int he bathroom, and the new toilet (and shut-off valve!) has been installed. I also got a lot of re-organizing and re-arranging in the spare bedroom while McStudly, a Neighbor Man, and Papa Bear worked.






Oh yeah - AND it looks like I no longer need to mop the bathroom floor!! :-P

Let This Be A Lesson

So the energy company in our area is called BGE (Baltimore Gas & Electric).

And FYI - BGE is whack!! *newsflash!* Seriously, though... they're this monopoly of a company and no one can do anything about their price hikes. It's totally INSANE!!

So after 3+ straight months of being charged over $400 each month for electric (now remember - we live in a 2 bedroom townhome, people... NOT Barbie's dream house, okay?!), I did some investigating.

We had done almost EVERYTHING we could, without spending an arm and a leg for windows and doors (though that's next on our list!), to try and reduce our costs. We even had BGE install our FREE (count 'em... $0) programmable thermostat and setting it way low - freezing through the nights, and cuddling at dinner to stay warm.

But nothing - our bill was INSANE!! It made no sense!


Ahh... but it did. I started looking over our bills and saw that they were pulling our payments out of their butts estimating our payments. So naturally, the thought occurred to me that they maybe... possibly... were over-estimating JUST a bit.



Well, let's just say that "just a bit" was to our energy bill over-estimation about as much as the Osbournes are to a "normal" group of people. Yeah - it's THAT ridic! ...I'm just sayin'...



So this month, we literally left our gate (which does tend to get stuck, at times) WIDE frigging open, cleaned up every POSSIBLE ounce of dog poo, and moved every stinking imagineable thing OUT of the way in our 12' x 12' hugeness of a backyard (yeah... it's almost the size of our bedroom, people... massive indeed!) to make a nice clean path for the Meter-Reader Man-person.

And as a result, BGE has now granted as a credit to the grand! amount of *drumroll please* $835 and some change!!

Yes - you read that correctly. We've been charged over $800 dollars way TOO MUCH in the past few months. How insane is that?! And the best part - our "actual/normal" reading for this past month would have only ACTUALLY been about $98. A WHOPPING $98!!


So please - for the sake of the economy, for the sake of your sanity, and for the sake of all electric company's customer service representatives across the nation, go check your bills. If they're "estimating" your payment as well, put an end to it.




You'll thank me for this someday.

Stella

Here she is. I picked her up in Annapolis last night - ain't she a beaut? She's simple. Nothing too fancy - just does what she's made to do... make music.

So, I guess you could say we have some things in common, so far. :-)

I haven't really gotten to know her all that well, yet, but that will come. I'm super excited to learn how to play, and can't WAIT to get started!

But, alas... I have to wait. *sigh* She's WAY out of tune, at the moment. I can't really blame her, though - she hasn't been played in about 2 years, so... I'd probably be a bit out of tune, too.

Okay - I think I'm starting to sound a bit odd, here. Forgive me. I just wanted to introduce you two since you'll be hearing a lot more about her in the coming blogs, I'm sure.

Now that you've met, I'll be on my way for the day. If I get bored, I'll probably be back. But until then, Happy Thursday - I hope you have a blasty-blast!

Asta Shasta!

So I heard...

back from "those people", and guess who's getting a guitar tonight?!


ME!! Yep that's right - I'm leaving work to go meet them in Annapolis to pay and pick it up. SOOOO excited!! *EEK*





Toodles! :-D

PS: Anyone got some old accessories I can have for cheap or... I dunno... say, free?!

Memory Lane

Years ago, I used to go to an annual Youth conference called "Premier Winterfest" with our Church Youth Group. It was a blast! It was a Friday through Sunday morning kind of thing and you stayed in a Hotel along the beach in Ocean City (in February, though...) and went to services and had a BLAST! It was SO much fun that even after I graduated High School, I stayed working in the Youth as a leader, and would go as a chaperone. Yeah - it was that awesome.

Most of you have probably heard of such events, if you haven't attended one yourself. Every year it was different, but somehow the theme involved being "Hungry": "Hungry for God", "Hungry for More", "Still Hungry", "Starving for Jesus", "Dying of Starvation", "Seizing for Spiritual Food"... (okay, so I made those last 3 or 4 up, but that's what we were all starting to think!)

Well, along with awesome speakers and amazing worship, we always had a concert on Saturday afternoon. One particular year, Tait came. That's right - Micheal Tait, in all of his former-DC Talk glory - along with his band, came to OUR youth event! It was fabulous.

The best part? It went something like this:

*dusting off an old memory*

Micheal Tait began his set by coming out to "Electric Avenue". You know... that really funky old song? Yeah - it was rockin' good times. (I sound like I'm being sarcastic, but I'm not - it really was good!) Then he sang another two songs that some of us knew, but not all of us... and then finally he decided he wanted to pull some people up on stage to sing with him.

FREEZE!! *taking in the memory....* UNFREEZE!!

Anywho - I start jumping. My volleyball skills, that somehow were never really present when I actually played volleyball, kicked in and you'd think I was spiking balls into the face of the 2008 Summer Olympics. (I found out later that my sister, and possible a few other people, were actually assisting in my "air"... but I didn't know this at the time)

Long story short - I GOT PICKED!!!! It was FABULOUS!!! Seriously, though. I got to run UP onto the stage and SING with MICHEAL TAIT!!! Check it out:

They start playing "Blessed Be Your Name" and he picks some guy out of the audience. The picture above his him introducing me. (I know it looks like we're fighting over one microphone, but he's actually holding a cordless in his hand) Then they began playing the music, and I was supposed to sing the first verse. I ROCKED it!! And other than trying to harmonize with MT, when he wasn't singing, like I thought he was going to, it turned out AWESOME!! Then comes the second verse. He goes over and introduces Dingbat... (Oh - I'm sorry. I forgot his name) and then tells him to sing the second verse. *Insert goofy look here* He didn't know it! So MT said something along the lines of "Take it, Sarah!" And I sang the second verse, too. Then we harmonized over the chorus and bridge. It was a ROCKIN' good time!!

*sigh* What a good memory. That was my 15 Minutes of Fame - even if it did only actually last about 5. ;-)

What was yours? Have you had it, yet?

FEELING Crazy

So on a MUCH less serious note...

I've been kind've a blog-drag, lately. But when your closest friend is going through something life-changing, it's hard to think about much else. So, I'm sorry for dragging you down with us. I'll try to spread that stuff out a little further, from now on. Deal?

Deal.


Okay - now that that's settled... on to WAY less serious things...


We are now less than a month away from my 23rd (whoa!) birthday! :-D And I LOVE birthdays!!! And 10 days after Mine is McStudly's birthday. Yippee Skippee!!! January is a good month... minus the freaking COLD weather that it comes with! *sigh* We can't have everything, can we?!


So what are you getting me? Please see wish list here: http://tinyurl.com/5d2ftf

I'm always updating it, so... just for jollies!


Actually - you really don't have to buy me anything (not that you were planning on it, anyways! ha ha), but just for fun, right?




So how long until your birthday, and how many candles will you be blowing out?

Oats and Canola Oil

Last night was the Fusion Christmas party. It was a good time.

Well... it was at least "interesting". That I can honestly say...


No really, it was fun. But I have to say that my least favorite part probably would have to be sponge bathing in the church bathroom while soaking my unmentionables in the sink next to me.


Let's recap.


Apparently, in order to show your "love" for your small group leader (notice I used caps... I felt loved, but I have a hard time believe that the other two leaders felt loved with the way their small groups went near-homicidal on them), you have to completely cover them in... well... seemingly anything that the youth pastor could grab from the church's pantry.

We played a game called the "Christmas 12 Days of Doom". If I could remember all of the actual items, and in order, I'm sure it would be SO much more fun... but alas, I was a bit distracted as I was being lathered in Maple Syrup.


What I can remember:

- We were told to come on stage as they brought in the tarps (Tarps? Never a good sign at a youth event!)

- Then, we were each assigned our very on kiddy-pool. Here I was thinking 'Hey, maybe they're going to re-enact a beach getaway for us, since it's so stinking butt-cold outside! How thoughtful... I really DO feel loved!' ... so I got cozy.

- In came the table... on the table sat 3 bins, but the three bins were covered by a big black cloth. (again - this is not usually a good sign)

- They started singing... and it all started with a box of Betty Crocker Cake Mix. Why were they name specific? I think it was to ensure that we knew they weren't going cheap and just dumping the Richfood brand of cake mix over our heads... oh no! They went WORLD class, splurged, and bought the name brand stuff. Because, after all, they loved us.

- Then came the two "things" canola oil (so shoot me I don't know what carton-thingies are called). Were they going to bake me in a 350 degree oven at the end? Well, there's no way to know. But I started-a-mixin' just in case. I was NOT going to be the leader that tasted the worst. If I was going out - I was going out tasty, my friends!

- and out came the whipped cream. At this point, I was BEGGING and PLEADING my girls not to put this gunk on my hair... "I'll bring you SOO much candy next week! SOO much candy! What do you want?! I'll totally bring it for you..." Yes, it was low. Don't judge me. You know you would've done the same thing. And unfortunately for the guys (the other two leader that were sentenced selected for the "activity") weren't with it enough to try... plus they didn't have NEARLY as much hair as I did... it only seemed fair.

- As I'm sitting and happily eating the mixture that has thus far been poured over my shoulders and a little bit down my shirt... loving the whipped cream... out comes the nastiest piece of the puzzle. From this point forward, I looked like I was the closest trash can to the tilt-a-whirl after a ride mis-hap caused everyone aboard to get a tad bit nauseous. What was this awful mess of an "ingredient"? Pork & beans. I know... totally gross, right? *mini-gag*

- After this point, it's all quite a bit fuzzy. I remember ketchup (which made the whole thing look more like a murder scene than a youth group "love" fest).

- I know somewhere in there were bags of popcorn. I tried to catch it in my mouth, but ended up gagging on a kernel and then spitting it all back out onto myself. I'm thinking I just made it worse on myself... but at least it was tasty?!

- Applesauce! I was smart enough to not put my hands into the "mixture" since the whipped cream, so I caught a few things of applesauce and had a bit of a snack. Hey - a girl's gotta eat, right?!

- Maple Syrup. I hear it takes DAYS to get this funk out of your hair. I'm SO glad I had some awesome girls doing this ... whatever it was to me. They were very gentle. *sigh*

- Oats. Alone? Probably not too shabby. But mixed with all of the above ingredients? Including Maple Syrup? Yeah... it got REALLY "icky" here... so I start making some oatmeal cookies for the friendly girls of mine. I'm not so sure why they didn't want them. I guess they were full from all of the free cookies and hot cocoa we handed out before service.

- Speaking of which... hot cocoa (powder only) was in there somewhere, too. Not so sure where... but it was there... and again - this mixture was just so nasty! Have I mentioned that I was SITTING in this gross-ness?

- Cornmeal. I think this was added earlier on, but it was FAR from the worst of the food items I had to swim in last night!

- and finally (and I mean finally!), they added the dozen eggs. In reality this wasn't as bad as it sounds. They slid RIGHT off of me (I actually had this awkward little puddle of eggs inside my indian-crossed legs - slightly inappropriate, right? Again - don't judge me). The worst part about this stuff?? It was FREEZING!!! Tell me... why do you feel that you must refrigerate the eggs that you are planning to pour over your leaders? Were you worried about them going bad?! Let's re-evaluate this decision. Ponder on where they were destined to end up... and now let's think again... did they need to be refrigerated? You people are cruel. JUST cruel!


SO there we have it. It was a pretty good time - up until they were finished with us, that is. I was whisked away (almost literally, since they had me lay on a tarp and then drug me to the bathroom) to clean myself up. And folks, this was NO easy task.

Sponge bathing in general doesn't seem like a very pleasant thing to do. Now add the setting of a church bathroom with no locks on the door and NO more than just a few little sinks. Yeah. Nice, right? At least the water was warm last night, because it's usually like liquid ice when you turn the faucet on.

Thankfully one of the other lady leaders stood guard to make sure that the door was not opened for ANY reason WHATsoever! And she did a great job. I stripped down as quickly as possible (which isn't very quick at all when you are covered in maple syrup and ketchup and trying to avoid getting it all in your hair and all over the bathroom floor) and put my unmentionables into the left sink to soak, in hopes of removing the strong smell of nastiness enough to be able to wear them home.

As I stand in the church bathroom buck-friggin-naked and trying to scrub this... pukey mixture off of myself, I realized just how little my clothes spared my body. I found gooey cake-mix caked (pun not originally intended) in places I didn't know it would ever be. I scrubbed and scrubbed, stretched my feet up into the sink to clean the funk off of them, and then finally felt as though I'd gotten as much as I could. Good golly, miss molly, that took forever!


I emerged from my whole in the bathroom to find that not only had service ended, by this time, but I also discovered that apparently in the boy's bathroom, there was a janitor's closet. Yes, folks - the guys had a nice little drain and I do believe a hose as well in order to wash off.


Fannntastic.


Ah well. At least I still had my blinky-Christmas hat. Wait... where IS my blinky Christmas hat?! OH NO!!!


Thankfully, the girl I had given it to entrusting it's safe-keeping had left it with another girl that was hanging around for a bit. It was returned safely to me just after we took our leader's group picture. Whew! That was close!!


So after being practically attacked my a nose-strong dog, last night, having him somehow manage to drag my funktified clothing over onto the carpet, leaving a trail of nasty-goodness behind him, and FINALLY getting to take a REAL shower, I felt clean and normal again.



...well, as relatively normal as I was before this whole thing, anyways... which isn't really saying much.



Good times were had by most. I stop short of saying all, but only due to the fact that I do believe that the middle school boy sitting in front of my was just shy of having a coronary over the fact that they just wouldn't put it in my hair and the high school boys were, from a distance of course, quite nearly as displeased at the "unfair"ness of the situation. Silly boys... if only you KNEW - I do believe you would've left well-enough alone.





And even better times, still, will be had next week by my girls when they embark on their MUCH earned sugary appreciation celebration. I'm sure you'll have some pretty good times, too, once I get my hands on some pictures to post from the incident... I bet you can't HANDLE your excitement!!


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


PS: The only warning I was given of what was to come was an e-mail that said "bring a change of clothes that you can get messy". Am I the only one that thinks that this doesnt' even remotely prepare one for what is coming? I would've brought another pair of unmentionables, at LEAST!! *sigh*

Oh dear me...

At first glance, this would seem like a dirty post... so I'll probably make the title a bit more friendly. But if you're brave enough, do read the backgroun behind the seemingly innapropriate pictures and you'll see that it's not this post that's dirty... it's your mind (you little heathen, you!) :-P

(I got this info from straightdope.com... apparently a website where they answer questions, though you wouldn't think it from the address)

"I am saddened to report that DO NOT HUMP does not have any of the off-color significance that seems to give many of the Teeming Millions their principal reason to go on living. It refers to a common method used to sort freight cars known as "humping," which involves the use of a man-made hill, or hump. A track heads up the hill and branches into numerous parallel tracks on its way down the other side. To make up new trains, a switch engine pushes a string of cars to the top of the hump, where the cars are uncoupled one at a time. Having determined the car's destination, a worker in a nearby tower pushes buttons or throws levers or whatever to get the track switches (you know, those things where one track divides into two) lined up properly. The car is then given a nudge, causing it to roll down the hump and onto the right track.

The advantage of humping is that it's a lot faster than having switch engines shuttle back and forth all day making up trains. The disadvantage is that it's sometimes a little rough on the freight cars and their contents. Occasionally a car derails going down the hill, meaning the crew has to stop working and try to get the wheels back on the rails, which is not much fun, particularly in the middle of winter. What's worse is the possibility that the car may roll down the hill too fast and crash into the car in front of it, jostling or damaging both the cars and what's inside them. Special gimmicks on the rails called "retarders" are supposed to slow things down and prevent this, but they have been known to fail. Accordingly, cars with especially delicate contents are marked DO NOT HUMP, which tells the yard crew to set the car aside for special handling. This applies particularly to the tank cars used to haul hazardous chemicals, many of which have DO NOT HUMP stenciled permanently on their sides. "










So there you have it, folks. Now, go get your minds out of the gutter!!

If Only You Knew...

The Underground Halloween Party this past Sunday evening was a big hit. It turned out to be loads of fun, and almost EVERYONE dressed to impress (some just dressed, and left their impressing spirit at home, I gusss).

Anywho - it was a blast. McStudly took home the prize for "funniest costume", and if you look at the pictures below, you'll probably see why. (I'm sure it helped that he totally worked it on the runway) Go get 'em, baby!


Brace yourselves...

Yep - that'd be us!

Ha ha ha - he's trying to drink his punch, but he's not used to being so big!

Aiyana rockin' her very impressive costume. "You will never be Geisha!" ha ha

The FANtastic judges: Sheena, Mrs Dee, and Pastor Travis

(American Idol ain't got NOTHING on these guys!)

Phantom and Christi (aka:Richard and Amber - fyi, they're newly engaged!!!)

I know it's dark and I look creepy with my shiny eyes, and what-not, but just imagine the Thriller video playing on a projector screen, and myself (along with a cool guy, Josh) dancing along. Oh good times...

Well, that would be that. It was SO much fun, yet QUITE an exhausting day. Good times were had by all, and tonight there's another party - Neewollah, the Youth costume party. Hopefully there will be plenty of pics to follow (AND I've been told that I'm a judge, so we shall see what happens, eh?!).

Asta Pasta!

When did THAT happen?

Umm... can somebody please tell me when Dakota Fanning grew up? What in the WORLD?!

I couldn't find a copy of the picture I wanted - from when she was on Oprah recently, but holy goodness! She's 14?! When did THAT happen? She was just 7 like... last week! And where did those boobs come from? Sorry... I went too far. But what the heck?!

Google her. Look it up. It's unacceptable. She can't grow up. She's supposed to be the cute-little blonde girl that's wise beyond her years.

PS - She's also a cheerleader in high school, now. Huh?!?!

Mr. Health Department

Well, just to update you guys - the guy from the Health Department finally called me back. We had all of a 2 - 3 minute conversation, and as it turns out (put on your shocked face, for me witht his one) I'm not in violation of any Anne Arundel County Health Codes.


Blah Blah Blah


Long story short, our suspicions have been confirmed. She's off the wagon, and I'm sitting very comfortably in compliance with HOA and County rules and regulations.




*sigh




Ain't it good to be proved right, sometimes? Wow... it feeld good.

Now this doesn't mean that I'm in the clear. I'm sure she'll try something else, but at least I've been advised in what to do, should that happen again. I'll plan to keep you in-the-know about my crazy Neighbor Lady and this whoel thing hopefully blows over, but for today... let's just rejoice in knowing that things are ok.







WOOOHOOOO!!!!

NL Update

So... either she read my post and took some valium, or my experiment is working.


The Neighbor Lady (NL) won't so much as look at me (which is fine by me, while this whole thing blows over), much less try and talk to me. She hasn't spoken a word to me, or tossed me a glance since our last encounter.


I did, however, come home to a nice business card sticking in my doorway, yesterday, from a man that works for the Health Department... this should be interesting. But alas, I called and he was "out in the field" until this afternoon. I will definitely update you one where THAT conversation should lead.


But before I even got to my stairs, I was greeted by Grace (our 80-year-old, work-out loving old lady OTHER neighbor that sold me girl scout cookies the other day) and a nice hispanic gentleman that didn't speak much English, both standing and waiting for me. (Grace is a special kind of woman, but she's at least nice about it, for the msot part) She introduced me to Francesco (you can't make this stuff up, people), and informed me that he does odd jobs around the area and would be willing to clean up my back yard, becuase "Janet's really been fussing at you about that, lately."


Me: "It's actually all clean. There's nothing back there."

Grace: "Then what's she been fussing at you about?"

Me: "I don't know..." *shrugs shoulders

Francesco: *puzzled look of non-understanding de eengleesh


[slapping my own hand "not nice, Sarah... that was not nice to say!"] You'll have to excuse me, being alone causes me to talk to myself more... even so far as punishing myself for saying mena things... MOVING on...



ANYwho, I'm still waiting to hear back on what the Health Department has to say about my back yard... and while I wait, I'm still mid-experiment.


My sister helped with the idea, really (Thanks, Ape!), and so far, it's seemed to work. Amazingly enough, when she can't SEE the poop, she can't seem to smell it, either. Hmm... interesting...

I have a little "poop jaw", as I like to call it, and I just grab his little piles, when he's done making them, and move them under my deck, into a corner she can't see. When it piles up enough, I will clean it up, but this is REALLY just to prove that there is NO problem with my backyard, except that she can't STAND to lok over into our backyard and see a pile or 2 or 3 (which there is NO law against, mind you).



I will keep you updated along with the progress of the experiment, but so far, so good. HOWEVER, he did have a little... umm... "gooey" pile this morning (I'll spare you too many of the details), and as any dog owner knows, you may as wel not even TRY to pick it up, if you don't have to, until it's nice and... umm... hardened. So - there's a LARGE possibility that she may say something to me this afternoon, but I've already been advised the call the police, should that happen. I just REALLY REALLY hope it doesn't come to that.


*crossing fingers






I think that's enough of an update, for now. For those of you who are squeamish, I apoligize for the gag reflex I've conjured up in you today. I will try to spare you in the future...







Toodles!

Dog Poop and Valium

McStudly and I just moved into our new home about 3 weeks ago. Actually - I believe it was exactly 3 weeks this past Sunday.

Well, without going into too great of detail with you guys, let's just say we're not getting along well with a certain neighbor of ours.

Other than this lady, everyone in the neighborhood is fantastic - really! They are super nice. Willing to help out with anything, and easy to talk to and just hang out with through the nice weatehr we've had lately.

But this lady... oh my goodness! I am trying my hardest. I really am - but for some reason, she's got it out for us (from the mouth of another neighbor). You see, she's not too happy that Austin leaves his little "piles" in our backyard. Now, before you jump to any conclusions, please keep in mind that I clean the backyard every 2 - 3 days (and by clean I mean pick up and hose down).

Well, when I got home yesterday, she approached me for the third time (3rd in person, but 5th altogether) int eh three weeks we've lived here.

Let me pause for a minute and tell you that everytime she's approached us, we've gone out of our way to clean the yard up right away, even if we'd just done it the day before, because we're trying to avoid a neighbor war. We're also VERY nice and polite with her (I know, right? HUGE surprise!).

Back to the story-

She approached me yesterday all flustered and upset. I did my VERY best to ignore her. I saw her by her car when I got home, so I filled my hands with things (to look preoccupied), went to check the mail, and looked down at the mail the entire time I walked EVER so slowly up to the house, but she stopped me in my tracks by stepping in front of me.

For the most part, the "conversation" went something like this (I use that term loosely, because it was more like a trial):

Neighbor Lady (NL): all huffy and puffy like "I just want you to know that I called ProCom again [our HOA management] and the Health Department about that back yard of yours. I just can't stand it anymore. I had company over this weekend and it was just horrible..."

Me (M): very calm and with hands filled, so unable to portray any body language "Ok. Well, I've talked to the HOA and my lawyer, and they've both advised me that we're not in violation of any regulations, so -" cut-off... and this won't be the last time...

NL: raising her voice, now "YES you ARE in violation. I know that for a FACT! You have had a pile out there ALL day and it's just horrible!"

yes, you read that correctly - A pile...

M: "He went this morning jsut before I left for work and I didn't have time to clean it up, I'm sorr-"

NL: yelling, now, and for the rest of the conversation "That's just NOT acceptable! You have to clean it up just like EVERYBODY else in this neighborhood! We all clean up. I don't let my cat go out there and crap all over the place!"

umm... cats are usually litter-box trained, btu whatever, lady... just... whatever

M: "Well, our backyard is considered private property, and we clean it up whenever we get the chance. I'd app-"

NL: pointing around the court "ALL of this is private property and everyone else cleans up after their dogs! You need to have respect for your neighbors! That dog got you kicked out of your last place, and I'm not going to stand it here! I don't have to live like thi- I will NOT live like this!"

M: "Well, I'm sorry, but we're not violating any regu-"

NL: "YES YOU ARE! And I won't stand for it! he got you kicked out of your last house, and you won't be able to get away with it here, either!"

M: "That was an agreement between us and our Landlord, and-"

NL: "Well, I'm not your landlord!!"

M: "No ma'am you're not, and I'd appreciate it if you'd stop harassing us about this, so that I won't be forced to seek further legal action with this matt-"

NL: "THIS ISN'T HARASSMENT! I'm your NEIGHBOR and you have NO respect for your neighbors!"

M: "I'd appreciate it if you'd stop talking to me like this."

NL: "YOU ARE IN VIOLATION OF HEALTH CODES, AND I WON'T STAND FOR IT!! There are flies EVERYWHERE out there!"

M: "I'm sorry, but we're not violating any regulations according to the HOA and-"

NL: "YES YOU ARE AND I WON'T LIVE LIKE THIS" *queue slamming door

WOW! Yes - it went something like that. Holy goodness!

Well, needless to say, I went inside and BALLED my EYES out to McStudly. I can put my foot down when I have to, but I am trying SO SO hard not to give this lady any leverage against us in anything. And I held in SO much frustration that I just caved in to tears and incoherent-like talked to McStudly about what happened. He told me to go call the HOA and document everything else that had happened, so I did, but the guy was gone for the day, and so was his assistant. I left a message with the front desk, and she marked it as urgent.

So now we're here: I talked with the HOA Assistant to our comunity this morning (unfortunately for her, she's very familiar with the situation, as I've spoken with her about it before) and she advised me that apparently, the lady has called MANY times about the situation, even yelling at THEM over the phone, and they have told her that we are in compliance with all regulations, as well as all bi-laws, and that she needs to leave us alone.

And since I've now asked her twice to leave us alone, the HOA had "advised" us to call the police, should the issue happen again. I couldn't quote the lady, but she pretty much said 'there's nothing further we can do, beyond what we've already done. We've told her that you guys are in compliance, and to leave you alone, and if she doesn't, then can only suggest that you call the police. If it does come to that, please just send us a copy of the police report and we'll keep it on file here, so that we're on the same page as you through all of this. And if it shoudl come to you having to file a peace order, just, again, send us a copy, and we'll keep it on file as well. Just try to keep us informed about whatever is going on, and we're sorry you have to deal with all of this, but it is harassment, and you have every right to call the police. You should not have to put up with that.' Something along those lines.

So here we are. Not only did I clean up the back yard AGAIN last night (I cleaned it up after she approached me - with company over - on Sunday afternoon) after the incident, AND again this morning... hosing it down each time. If she approaches me regarding this today, I may not jsut call the cops, but... hey - does anyone have the number to the Crownsville Mental Insitution?

So, Yeah. I think she needs valium. All in favor - say "Ay!"