Monday

I got the car washed on Sunday. This morning it got rained on. I am happy about finding a car wash near me and while this time I went for the fancy under carriage cleaning,  they also have a very reasonable normal cleaning that I will take advantage of.  So now my car is clean, but rained on. I'm okay with it though because it was mostly about the under carriage cleaning anyway, I'm pretty sure that whatever was under there from the snow and ice did its damage all ready but I at least kept it from hanging around even longer and doing worse over time. The exterior of the car looks very smart now.

The interior looks like a war zone.

Speaking of the dog, Rocket and I took a very nice walk through the warehouse district this evening, Rocket did some very nice jumping and climbing and working out. When we came home, I had him roll his barrel a little bit.

Before our walk, he tried on his new snow shoes! I think they are fantastic, he thinks they are torture devises and I am the most evil dog person ever. I think next winter and on very, very hot days, he will be happy his his feet are not touching the pavement. Spoiled thing.

Back to the barrel, I do think that maybe having a small sized wooden cable thing would be nice for him to learn to walk on, it would hopefully be wider, heavier and move a little slower? He has a hard time balancing all four legs on the barrel we use now, I think its too tall and too light and it moves too fast. I need something shorter, heavier and slower to teach him on. I know he can do this because he has done it on accident and I think he could do it for real with some work. What I really need to work on is how easily distracted he is! There is no end to the fun things he could so but can't because he gets distracted by everything. He is  much more focused  if I have treats handy but it snot always handy to keep treats around.

Whats the point of teaching him all these fun things if he can't do them in front of an audience? Its too much fun to watch him do what he can do to keep him bottled up in the yard. I have a tiny niece and nephew, they should get to see him do these fun things! I'm the only one who gets to see him perform? A You-Tube Star is in the waiting! Progress must be made.

Warming up to Spring

I did as close to nothing as possible this weekend and I still got jobs accomplished! I slept late but still got the back lawn mowed and checked out an antique store - sadly, too well lit and not enough stuff and no dust to speak of! But they have time to get themselves stocked up and dusty before I got back there.

Friday night, I found my costume for next Halloween, $3 at Kohls, totally worth the investment I think. I also found a new skort to replace my old one that had gotten too big. I don't care what fashion people say about skorts, I love them. Long Live Skorts!

Saturday, I mowed the back yard so now both yards match, I'm going to have to hit the front yard again sometime this week and that's kind of a drag, I wouldn't, but the hipster mowed his and I will not be neighbor shamed by the hipster and his semi-annual mowing!

Doesn't that look nice? I am also going to call my weeds "ground cover", it sounds much nicer and is actually a better word than "weeds" because it is a ground cover. It makes it easier to take care off, makes me feel better about the condition of the yard and is more inclusive. Ground Cover.

I also got tired of playing hide and seek with dog bombs and now I can at least see them to remove them. I'm really looking forward to getting Garden 2015 in the ground and moving but we're a long way from there at present. I have to decide if I want to continue with my current irrigation system or if I want to go with my very good sprinkler that will hit everything and use less hose and be simpler, if waste more water through evaporation and watering everything in its reach regardless. I don't know, I'm going to have to think about it and what I'm planting and where I'm planting it. The drip hoses might be the better route still.

After mowing the ground cover, dog and took a rest and enjoyed the sun. My phone told me it was 42 degrees, but I think it was confused. In its defense, I was wearing multiple layers

Sunbathing  42 degree style.

Sunday, I took dog-dog out in the yard again and I pulled out his  rolling barrel and his hoop and he was still able to work with both! I've been using his jump to keep him loose, but I haven't really worked the hoop in a while and I put the roller up a long time ago. He seems happy to see both and we worked on them for about hour before Rocket got tired and lost interest in performing. He did a great job! He also kept trying to ride the barrel and that was exciting - not entirely possible, because I don't think there is enough surface space on it and its too light, a larger, heavier barrel might work better. I need one of those large cable spools the phone company uses. They are very heavy though and I'm not sure how I would be able to maneuver one around much less get it into my car to show others how talented my dog is ( totally would be!). Something to work on.

Friday Cat Blogging

I am a Maxinista

I finally went shopping for my ice tea and soda! I feel so relieved  that my  hydration needs are covered at last.  I also bought a fabulous 100% wool Brooks Brothers ladies sweater for $30! Not at the same place I bought the soda and ice tea though.

I had hoped to find a Easter appropriate frock at my favorite discounters but the sweater was the only thing that took my bait. I guess I do kind of have the frock thing taken care of all ready but its fun to shop for  Easter frocks. There is something about pastels and florals that is very calming, together they are just about hypnotic.

The sweater I came home with  is much more useful and I will have it and wear it for years and years. Dress styles change but a good sweater is forever.

Its quite nice - no one is going to accuse Brooks Brothers of being hip or on trend or pandering to the youth market, but its lovely and it was on-sale.

Wednesday

I wanted to go shopping afteroushe walked the dog but then I was tired and so I didn't, I actually need to go to the grocery because Lowe's is has my ice tea and orange soda as their weekly specials and if I'm in that neck of the woods, I want to see if I want something to wear to Easter and that is not going to happen if I stay at my house. But we walked and then we came home and I made the mistake of sitting down and didn't go out.

I did get up and empty the dishwasher and  take some stuff out to the recycle but not a lot of mileage there. The dog was sleepy, its hard to get excited about getting up and getting out when the dog is snoring on the couch. I can't run errands over lunch or after work so if I am going to get things done, they re going to get done in the evening. If I can't get motivated to run my errrands when I can run them during the week, they don't get run and  I end up having run around like a crazy person all weekend. Not restful.

Next month, I'm going to buy that fancy lamp I saw at Wayfair. I decided that I'm just going to do it. I saw the Ikea lamp I was leaning towards on Craigslist and in real life, it looks flimsy. It looked like it could be flimsy and the shade too papery on the site but is looks like it is flimsy and the shade is too papery. Just say no to flimsy lamps and paper shades. And yes it will cost more than my couch did, but I also will not spend a lot of time worrying  about  It bursting into flames. I could have cheap and a fire hazard or pricier but sturdy. It works  itself  out. You have to put some value on your state of mind.

Yay for decision making.

when do you  clean your bathroom sink?

- first thing  in the morning when you can't  see and don't  care about  the slow drain

-  right before you go to bed because it seems like a good time to tidy and maybe if I run a lot of  hot water down the drain it will loosen up that drain over night.

Oh my God! Me too! We are so the  same person! Go us.

Okay. I think that if you all ready get up at 0'Dark Thirty in the morning and you can only barely hear your alarm over the pouring rain and thunder, that you should just be able to call it day and go back to sleep.

Graying Out

Dogger spent the day playing in daycare and got featured on their Instagram feed and that was awesome and then we came home and had dinner and young dog and I went on a long walk. It was a great day for Rocket.

Not a great day for me, I can't find my gray shoes! I can't imagine where they went, all the other shoes are all together in shoeland and the gray pair has become separated from the herd. Its worrisome because now I'm beginning to wonder if I even have gray shoes and so here I am searching for something I don't even have - this says all kinds of less than wonderful things about my mental health and those are such great things to be thinking about while you a searching for something you know is here somewhere but what if it really isn't?

I'm going to find them. I know the dog didn't eat them because he hasn't eaten shoes since he was a puppy - or more truthfully, he hasn't been in a situation where he was granted unsupervised time alone with shoes since he was a puppy.

They could be in the downstairs bedroom being camouflaged by everything  I had to shift out of the living room ahead of the painting. I  keep that door closed now because I like being happy.

Found them! They were in a bag under the dining room table! I must have worn them on one of the last snow days and I brought winter boots to slosh back and forth in the snow and them to wear around the office. I kept running across the boots and never thought about why they were front and center and the shoes were not. Yay. Not Crazy.

Sigh.

It was  not a good day in DTR  . It still oddly quite hours later when I had dog downtown for his walk. I do wonder that when the building is finished and all the work is done if there will be any thing that says three men lost their lives to make this place, that people died there. I doubt it, but at the very least, a plaque, something that remembers those men.

I hate to say this but... I got a late start to lunch and I am so glad, if I had left on time I would have been right there it as this was happening. As it was I was there an hour later and it was still awful.

Garden Update 1 2015

Work. Work. Work  Filled the larder, tilled the garden, mowed the lawn, did a lot of laundry and took the dog for long walks. I rewarded myself with a trip to a cafeteria.

I also finally got my tax refund and called the painter and set up when he's going to paint my place. Its not as soon as I would have liked, but its going to get done and that's what I need to concentrate on. I can spend the time tidying up and cleaning the corners and getting the place ready for the painter to do his thing. I don't want to hear about my housekeeping from "Elden"

He's going to be here for a week, painting in the evenings after he gets off work. I see myself walking the dog quickly after work and hitting one of the places downtown before heading home. Hopefully it have warmed up by then and won't be raining. The place is going to look really nice after he's done.

The garden is going to be different this year. I'm going to move the peppers into the garden extension, to get them away from the shade causing tomato plants,  and hopefully, up production. I'm going to be growing container corn again and not growing green beans for the first year in memory. The harvest has been less then awe inspiring the last couple of years so I'm benching them for a season. I'm also not planting potatoes this year, too carby for me now, and I was getting over extended garden-wise. I'm going to get rid of my non-productive berry plants too and replacing them with more more attractive elephant ears and lavender.

I'm going to be putting in a lot of tomatoes and peppers though, and I had good luck with a admittedly, carbtastic corn on the cob, that I am just going to eat because I like them and corn is easy to gift.

Friday Cat Blogging

I am invisible

Yay for Politics

And damn it, I am still 1st Vice Chair. I had been hoping that someone else would want the gig, but sadly,  no one did. We did however make our  quorum and actually went over our quorum at that for the first time in years! It was very exciting.

It would have been more exciting without the endless speeches about how miserable it is for our handful of Democrats in the House and Senate downtown. It doesn't raise our morale at all or make me happier to be a Democrat. On the upside, no one cried into the mic either, so we did see seen some improvement.

 The GOP voters here believe that we should take care of our mentally ill by electing them to office.  They hate the idea of warehousing their  severely mentally ill brethren in icky hospitals or grungy group homes. They want them in the State House! Where the Party can proudly show off how they don't let a little things like galloping, out of control unmedicated mental illness keep them from making laws! The first order of business for the House GOP when they came back into session was to update the state seal to feature a tin foil hat and AK-15 and then  they quickly changed the elitist Latin inscription  to "O'Bummer is a Sekret Muzlimist". The GOP doesn't  feel we need more beds for our mentally ill, we need more districts for them to represent.

I'm not sure what the Democrats did while all this was happening, held hands in the cloak room  and sang We Shall Overcome I imagine.  Too much to ask for them to actually come up with real legislation themselves. Perhaps we should start electing a few of them ourselves. I've met our fringe and they are just as wacky and unreasonable  as the loons the GOP routinely gets elected, I think its something the party should explore. We might get some legislation passed, its worth a try, at we should be willing to do anything to get Democrats elected. We have tried being reasonable and it doesn't work.

Exciting Times

I spent too much time this afternoon being pretty sure that it was already Thursday. It's Wednesday, all day. Tomorrow is not Friday, its just Thursday. I have two more days to get through, I have to say, as the week goes on, the alarm goes off earlier every day.

Thursday  eveningI have my  make up precinct meeting. I am hoping that it threatens snow again so that maybe we can not have this one either. I really don't want to go, even more than the last time when I only thought I really didn't want to go because ti was really cold and raining. But now I know what "not wanting to go" feels like and I really don't want to go.

So I'll be there, I am not going to try for a officer spot because I want to not go to the local conventions this year, I never want to go to the local conventions but as an officer I have to go to them because no one else goes, but now, we have a Chair who does go, so I really don't have to attend these nightmares. Next year I'll try for an officer position because it will be an election year and a lot more fun. This year however, I won't have to give up my Saturdays to go to the boring, non-productive meetings and do nothing, I can put my garden in on my schedule an not go to exciting places like Lillington or Pittsboro or the thriving metropolis of Fayetteville. All of them make Raleigh look like the Seattle in the nineties.

This year three whole Saturdays more than usual, are mine. Today after work I went to the post office and  I bought stamps and later, after dinner, I paid bills. Woooo.

Hurry up and wait

I have to say, there is something oddly thrilling about packing up your clutter, I do miss my snow globes though! In a perfect world my whole collection would be reunited and displayed together in all their glory.

Those boxes behind the couch are the books and DVDs that were on the shelves. Most of them are most likely not going to be coming back into the room. I know it still looks messy, but it s work in progress and we all have different standards. I can't wait for my rebate check to get here so I can unleash the painter and get this job done. I think the room is going to look really slick once fresh paint is on the walls and wood work and the new curtains are up. The carpet is also on the way out, but it has a separate TBA timeline.The torch lamp is also on its way out soonish, to be replaced by an arc lamp, the rando furniture will be a dark burnt orange.

HGTV lies about so many things!

Blergh. But Happy St. Patricks Day!!!

I would have an entry today except that after dinner and a nice walk with dog,  I  checked the larder and decided that a quick trip to Wally was in order. Post shleping around the store and getting more than just dog food and broccoli because reasons, I got in "that" line behind "that" person and what had been a quicky trip to pick up dog food and broccoli turned into an extended visit to hell. By the time I got home  the evening was shot and I was annoyed and so, well, at least Monday is over.

Oh, HAPPY ST. PATRICKS DAY!!!

Busy Bee

I was busy this weekend. I hired not one but two painters. One to paint the living and dining room area and another to paint the hallway and entry way.  I liked both of them but the one guy seemed to be a little more professional, and while he was the higher bid, I think he was the better choice. He will also be working in the evening while I am here and and can supervise.

The other team came in so under budget that it made me wonder about the quality of the paint and the quality of their work. I do think they are the right choice for the smaller job, if they  stay to budget on those and do well with those small spaces and , I will know who I will call for the next job large or small.

Since I am now officially a Job Creator and I think should not have to pay taxes anymore.I think Gov. McCrorey owes me an apology and a sizable check.

I also bought paint, twice. You know the saying Measure Twice, Cut Once? Think:  If They Don't Ask, TELL THEM YOU NEED THIS IN OIL, latex is the go-to and they don't even ask if you need oil! There should also be some saying about : Check To See If The Paint Manufacturer Makes Oil Based Paint and Then Ask If The Big Box Store Has Any Oil Paint In Stock In Gloss. Because they might not and you will end up putting satin on the wood work even if that is not exactly what you wanted and you will have to start the very trying process of finding The Right White all over again and that is maddening.

Because  YOU CAN'T PUT LATEX PAINT OVER OIL PAINT . And if you know you are dealing with oil based paint, Make That The First Thing Out Of Your Mouth At The Paint Section.  You can either prime it out or just put more oil paint over it. Gah.

Anyway. Wrong paint returned, correct paint in hand.

The new paint color. It felt like I looked at 50 Shades of Gray!

 The walls will be : Going Gray

The trim is going to be a slight grayer shade of white because I didn't want there too be too much contrast, enough conrast, but not too much contrast. Its a lot harder to do than I thought it was going to be, there are a lot of colors that are called "white" but aren't "white", almost as many shades of "gray" that are called "gray" but aren't "gray". My first choice turned out to be lavender once it was on the wall.  Looking for paint seemed like it would be a lot more fun than it was.

I also picked a very bright pink, looking for this was fun -  to use on the insides of the book cases and in the entry way and hall way. Instead of a passe Feature Wall I will have very couture Feature Rooms. The random furniture will still be a burnt orange to be named later.

The other work I, or rather, Broskey, did over the weekend, was the job putting the legs on my ottoman!

My contribution to the cause was to stain them walnut. They are taller than I had originally  wanted, but I couldn't get the shape I wanted in the smaller size. I am glad I went with a taller leg.

I am super pleased with the way they turned out! They look great in the room and the legs look as good on the ottoman as I had hoped! and they are a good height for a coffee table/occasional seating.

I also took Rocket to Dog Bar and he impressed a whole new group of dog people with how well he behaves in public, his capacity to get along with other dogs, even loathsome little dogs who lunge at him snarling and snapping, and his awesome good looks and how  incredibly patient he is about  wearing holiday outfits and doing very silly things for me. Best Puppy Ever.

Friday Cat Blogging

Painting by phone numbers

Today my painter cancelled his second appointment with me when he told me he was moving to Charlotte and unless I was ready for the job to get done like, now he was going to have to take a pass. For a man with two very young children and a sickly pregnant wife, I see a rush move to Charlotte as being in no ones best interest. He also told me he was going to work with someone he met while in the ministry and they were going to work with people with drug and alcohol problems. I knew he was either one or the other, a drunk or born again, at least I found out which one was currently in charge before he got the job.

There are two kind of contractors : The Born Again and the Drunk. They can be drunk and born again as well, but usually they aren't drunk the same time they are born again. Your drunk contractor will get saved half way through your job and instead of finishing your job, he will decide that he really needs to be spending his days painting his church instead. His drunk self will done just over half the job and walked away with all your money. Jesus saves.

As I was talking to different painters on the phone and setting up meetings for this weekend, I started to think about the paint choice I made quite a while ago now. What if I don't like it on the walls? What if it was  not what I thought it was? I had never even seen it in real life, just as a swatch in a catalog.

I needed to fix this.

I went back to Home Depot to return my two ottomen test feet and while I was there I got a sample pot of my paint - I really should have done this a long time ago. Its a $3.17 investment in peace of mind or a quick trip back to drawing board land. Better now than later.

I brought it home and put test squares on the walls, every wall in the room gets a different version of the same light and I need to see how its going to look on all the walls.

Answer, it looks good! Its still wet, so its going to be lighter, but so far, so good. Here it is with the curtain fabric

I'm going to need to do that again without the flash and using natural light, but it looks nice. I am a little afraid its going to be too light for the fabric but I'm not sure I would want a darker color on the walls. I'm going to have to be really annoying about the white for the wood work I think. Its going to need to be the exact shade, not too starkly white and contrasty but not too candle light because there can not be any yellow in the white. Its going to have to be the perfect shade of grey-white. The room is going to be dark and I need the punch of white to keep it from being too cave like. The contrast is going to have to be spot on to work.

Progress.

The lies HGTV tells us

Today I spent most of the day looking at various styles of furniture legs, most of which are either awful or awfully expensive and arc lamps that are either gorgeous and very expensive or  gorgeous and extremely expensive. I did find one at Warfair that is the very closest to something I could see myself getting, but even it is just over the $100 threshold, and paying more for a lamp than  I paid for my couch doesn't feel good to me. Even if it is a gorgeous lamp that is still much, much less then I have seen (over and over) every where else - and it has gotten very good reviews, which other cheap arc lamps did not get. This is not working to  talk myself out of this. Its perfect and I love it and I want it. Damn it all.

See? Very Pretty.

I am very concerned about the ottoman feet issue. I was hoping to get this taken care of this weekend but unless I run cross the Perfect Feet in my travels, its not going to happen. I know exactly what I want now but sadly, its not available at the big box home improvement stores - Which makes me feel pretentious, and that makes me mad. I did not set out to be the worlds oldest hipster but I think that is whats happening to me. All I want are the perfect no more than three inch mid-century legs in walnut! Is that too much to ask?

My first world problems are more pressing then your first world problems! I have a paint contractor coming this evening and the clock is ticking! On TV these make overs seem so easy! Budget? what budget?  Details? What details? Issues? What issues? Choices? what choices! HGTV is a deceitful deceiver!.

Bad Legs

I spoke with Broskey, who will be doing the heavy lifting with the ottoman project and he threw a major wrench into my leg plans. By bringing up taste issues and the idea of matching not just the color of the other legs but doing my best to match the style of the legs. The visible legs are so there, that its really important that they work together somehow, this will make the whole look more pleasing and uniform. The pieces are not going to match in anyway, but having some similarities between the different styles will make the look of the room sharper and nicer over all.

Here is where we are now leg-wise

The legs I got this weekend are not going to cut it. They are too small and won't do the job, I should have thought about scale when I picked them. They will go back. I picked up two other styles that I thought would be right, but they aren't either, again, the scale is all wrong.

The very visible couch legs, clearly, the other legs are not going to work.

The invisible chaise legs

Here is what I found when I Googled  "ottoman legs":  Sofa Leg Warehouse . There is actually such a site! I was just kidding around and it popped up. Here is my favorite so far, because its on sale. I would still have to make it a lot darker and if it was a bit taller I would have bought it all ready, but the price makes me think it can work with it as it is.  But I think I have more shopping to do to find the right style, I would also like to not spend a lot of money on this. They need to be thinner, darker and maybe more Eamesian?

Good Reads

Where the bodies are buried, The New Yorker

Forgiveness Isn't Tidy, The Wichita Eagle


Read them, tell me you read them. I would love to talk to someone about them. I read the two above long form stories about the people left over after slaughter. I found both of them to be terrifically enjoyable reads as well as very keeping with Lenten themes of forgiveness and penance and the chance for redemption. Whether you need it or not, whether you deserve it or not and want it or not.

Do we forgive because the offender needs us to do so or do we forgive the offender because we need us to do so? Does it matter for them ultimately? Does God keep track of whether this sinner has been forgiven on earth? or is it only His forgiveness that unlocks the gate? If the offenders victims forgive him and He does not, does this reflect badly on the victims? Is forgiveness something we give because we need to feel better? Because the victims need to move on and the only way to do so is to "let go" of the negative emotions?  Let Go and Let God?

What if that is what the bad guy truly goes to hell for? Making someone else hate?

Is forgiveness given out of the selfish need for healing, real? Does it count? if I forgive you but God sends you straight to hell, why does it matter that I am all right with you? Your act sinned against God and God forgives all who seek it, what if the bad guy never seeks it? What if he or she never accepts the blame or admits the guilt?

In the first piece, the daughter of the BTK murderer speaks what happened to her after the FBI came to her house and told her that her father was BTK and imploded her life and led to a break down.  She can not forgive him for his acts, he did not actually do anything to her directly -  but she tries valiantly to forgive her Father for taking away her Daddy. She is not in a position to forgive him for being a mass murderer, but she certainly is in role where she can be furious with him because her friends questioned whether or not she and her husband should even have children less BTK was a genetic problem! She has to explain to her very young children, that their grandfather, whom they will never meet,  is in "a very long time out".

It is a very good feature.

The second one I read is a bout a very different set of murders and victims and forgiveness or lack of. The story is about two women, the very first woman to be a full on member of the IRA and the widowed mother of ten that she is party to murdering. The dead woman's children had to watch people they knew from their neighborhood come to their home and take their mother at gun point. They next saw her some forty years later when her body was finally discovered on accident. The IRA suspected, wrongly as it was, that she was a spy for the British.

We learn quite a lot about both women. The dead woman was raised a protestant but converted upon her marriage, her oldest son was in jail for suspected IRA involvement when the IRA killed her.The murderer was interviewed multiple times for various university projects and she made herself very available for these interviews and was very open ( to a point)  and proud (to a fault)  about her involvement with the IRA.

We know less about the dead woman, she is silent as the grave. She died young and was killed to maintain that silence, her children had to live with their mothers murderers and learned to be quite. The IRA member was ultimately jailed for her bad acts, went on a famous hunger strike and was eventually released from prison by Margaret Thatcher , who knew a little something about being a bitch in a mans world - eight years into her double life sentence. She married actor Stephen Rea and had two children. I knew he married a a former IRA member and she had served time, but interviews gave the impression that she made sandwiches and rolled bandages and was just part of the ladies auxiliary IRA and was mostly jailed because she was an enabler. The fact she was very guilty of being an actual gun toting, terrorist murderer was not really explored at length. I can see why, if they had made it more plain, that he was married to an unrepentant murderer, people might have stopped seeing his movies.

Years later, marriage over, she finally succumbed to drugs and alcohol and mental illness. She never apologized or admitted guilt for her acts and one of her children had to find her dead body. Her victims children did not forgive her, and have to wait around until the neighbors die to see any kind of closure for their loss. One of the sons will occasionally hail a cab and the driver is one of the people who kidnapped his mother.

Today, both women are dead. I know they don't sound similar in theme but examined women's roles - victim, over empathized in the media, and victimizer - which is not often explored. I don't think I explained my rationale for this at all well, but both moved me and made me think about forgiveness and redemption.

More fun with ottomen

Operation Getting a Leg Up

The legs are I think going to be gloss black to match the fabric, of course, my first thought was orange! but I reminded myself that I am not a tween girl and then I thought How can I make it silver! and then I slapped myself and asked myself what color are the other furniture legs in the room? And I had to say n"I've never noticed" and that was a good answer. Lets not make the legs something we notice. Gloss back it will be. Or brown, I looked at the other legs and they are brown, maybe glass brown is the best idea - boring but in line with everything else and that is an important detail that can bring unity to divergent pieces. Its nice making unlike things look nice together.

Friday Cat Blogging

Aging Out

I learned two things about  Dog-Dog today :

- He does not need me to arrive home promptly at 4:15pm. He can hold on until 5:00pm! This is outstanding news and bodes well for my strongly held desire to be able to eventually stop coming home for lunch every day and, two, I could possibly also reach my secondary goal of running errands after work instead of first having to go home and get him and then run the errands. I am not as certain that he could have held on as long as he did if I had not gone home for lunch. But, it appears at almost three years of age, progress is being made on his toilet training.

- He wears  a size small  mens' tee shirt.

On to other factoids. Wednesday we had a high of 74 degrees, today it rained all day and we went from a high of 64 degrees to a current temperature bouncing around freezing. and by Friday morning they are expecting a wintery mix. On the upside, it is supposed to quickly warm up. Good news for those hearty souls planning a road trip Friday afternoon.

Made a list, did not check it.

It occurred to me that I need to get ready to go out of town and that I am running out of time to get things taken care of. Thursday night I have a precinct meeting and I am duty bound to attend, I will not however be volunteering to be an officer this time around. Its another non-election year and they are boring as hell, I think someone else should have the opportunity to go to the conventions. I'm giving and sharing like that.

So tonight after I got my packing started, I went out to restock my larder and got dogger some food and restocked my yogurt. I went all the way to the store, two stores at that, and didn't get myself new protein bars. I think I talked myself out of it because the ice tea and bread I need are cheaper at Sams and I need to go there Thursday after work, I just wasn't thinking about shopping for people food while I was at Wally.

I went to Lowes Foods because they had two for one diet orange Sunkist and I was helpless to in  the face of it. While I was there I found on sale yogurt and popcorn - I have actual free range popcorn somewhere in my house but I must have hidden it from myself. I don't know where I would hide a bag of popcorn kernels  or why I would hide popcorn from myself in the first place. Its a mystery.

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Making it Pretty

The next project.

Its going to change places with the table next to my chair. I need an out-of-sight storage option in the room and this is as good of one as I am going to find and it is definitely fits the bill. Its a family piece, but its not precise, so its going to get painted because it is also not pretty. It offers a huge amount of storage and I think it can be an interesting canvas. I will be consulting Alphagal because I think this is up her ally design-wise. I would just paint it out and move on but I think there is just so much opportunity here that it would be a waste to do that.  I think it can be really pretty

My only concern is that it is not square and everything else in that room is very, very square and straight and line-y, while the wooden table is roundish, will it fight with the room? I once upon a time thought about introducing roundness into that room but changed my mind when I began to see how many squares and rectangles made up the space and decided it was easier to work with them than against them. I think it makes for a more restful space visually.

The downstairs table and its partner in crime, ugly lamp, are going to move upstairs where I need both a table to replace the above and more lighting . The lamp from the bedroom is going to move into the living room and I'm going to press one of the "crystal" lamps I bought at Good Will into service in the bedroom - their intended home anyway.

The table will be primarily burnt orange, as I think it works better with the red furniture than my pink does. The metal side table will also be the same orange as well.I think its okay to mix textures as they are the same color. Right? I hope so.

New Coffee Table

The ottoman/coffee table I was using  before is exactly three inches taller than the new "table". It will be more comfortable for leg propping as well as traditional coffee table usage  if it were taller. The bottom of the ottomans are made from wood and there are existing footlings all ready there, adding new feet should not be a huge task.

I am going to get the largest piece of velcro I can find and then 1)figure out how to attach the Velcro to the two ottomans, and then attach the two ottomans together to form a table.

Weekend

I didn't so anything living room re-decoration related, I did however, buy the two ottomans from Wallyworld on Thursday ( on sale! $29 each, free delivery!!)  They are scheduled for delivery to Wally on Tuesday! But other than that, I took the weekend off from decorating.

My big accomplishment was changing one of the dogs prescriptions from Sams Club to Wally - Which I thought were the same thing, but are not. Sams Club wanted to charge me  $100 a month for something Wally wants to charge me $20 for!  I had contacted the behaviorist because I can't pay $100 month after month for a script - no matter how well it works, its not going to happen, even if was my med, there are no $100 meds in my life.

So, now the med should come from my local Wally and it should be in the dosage that the doc originally wanted, i.e, One Single Pill,  instead of four pills at a time I am hopeful of this. The four pills also drove the price way, way up.

When I wasn't doing laundry, I did a lot of laundry this week - It turns out that when you have to wear like seven layers of clothing at a time all the time, you end up with seven times the laundry, Upside? I did a lot of stairs, up and down to the basement and then to the attic.

One of my trips out of the house, I went to Big Lots and bought, well, Lots. It was a Friends and Family weekend, 20% off my entire purchase! Tell me you wouldn't jump on  more kitchen garbage bags and a brand new tarp for your roof. So that I not get the reputation of being totally fiscally useful or responsible , I also bought a Traxx!

What is a Traxx? It is a poor mans Fit Bit. It doesn't work as well, its slower and buggy and  I fear that it will not work as well . My first clue came with a card in the packaging from the maker begging buyers to please call them to ask any questions before we get mad that its not a real Fit Bit  and take it back where we got it. I bet they get yelled at a lot because the buyer just can't afford a real one, I imagine they listen to a lot of self loathing drama.

I didn't make cookies, even though I had orrigannly planned on doing that. Instead I watched a lot of Chopped and slept in front of the TV with the dog a lot of the weekend.