Sometimes I wonder about the sagacity of giving Jamie the power of speech. Lately he's been coming out with some doozies. Other times, he's just hilarious.
************************************
Jamie thinks that discipline is funny. This presents all manner of problems, of course. One evening, I scolded him for something (I don't remember what) and he started to laugh at me.
"You're not funny, Jamie," I said sternly.
"Oh, I funny, Mommy," he replied.
Yeah. You're a riot, Alice.
************************************
This morning we were on our way home from the grocery store and Jamie was in the backseat repeating "Hai-ya! Hai-ya! Hai-ya ya ya!" over and over again.
So I said it right back to him.
"Stop that, Mommy, that's annoying," he said.
O RLY!?
************************************
I took Jamie to lunch at Eat n Park (a perennial favorite of my children) and when his milk came to the table he grabbed a straw to put in it. As he was tearing off the wrapper...
*gasp* "A bendy straw?!" he said.
"Yes, a bendy straw," I replied.
"For me?!"
"For you."
"Yesssssss!"
Who knew bendy straws were that exciting?
************************************
When he's not being a smart ass he's being stubborn. I hear "no" and "I don't want to" an awful lot around here. He's got an opinion on just about everything and he's not afraid to voice it. I love this child to distraction and he can be sweet and adorable and loving. I try to remind myself that there will come a day when stubborn self-confidence will serve him well and in the meantime, I just have to civilize his savage side.
As my mother said on the phone today, "You can't strip to a loincloth, paint yourself blue, and attack the neighbors, kid."
Indeed.
Showing posts with label oh hell. Show all posts
Showing posts with label oh hell. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 16, 2012
Sunday, March 27, 2011
A Letter To Spring
Dear Spring,
I miss you. I miss your sunny days, your warming temperatures, your soft breezes, and the delightful way you smell.
You came to visit for a few days. It lasted almost a week. Then, you left us and now it's cold again. Oh, the sun may be out but don't let that fool you. Step outside and you'll freeze something off.
Spring, you loveliest of seasons, it is now the last week of March. You have taunted and teased us with hints of your arrival long enough. Please come to stay. My children want to play outside, ride bikes, play with sidewalk chalk, and chase the dog.
I want to throw open the windows of my house to let in those wonderful breezes. I want children who aren't crazy and cranky from being cooped up inside. I want to clean my garage and try to tame the leaves left over from last fall.
Come back to us, Spring, and when you do, please whack that stupid groundhog upside the head as hard as you can.
I miss you. I miss your sunny days, your warming temperatures, your soft breezes, and the delightful way you smell.
You came to visit for a few days. It lasted almost a week. Then, you left us and now it's cold again. Oh, the sun may be out but don't let that fool you. Step outside and you'll freeze something off.
Spring, you loveliest of seasons, it is now the last week of March. You have taunted and teased us with hints of your arrival long enough. Please come to stay. My children want to play outside, ride bikes, play with sidewalk chalk, and chase the dog.
I want to throw open the windows of my house to let in those wonderful breezes. I want children who aren't crazy and cranky from being cooped up inside. I want to clean my garage and try to tame the leaves left over from last fall.
Come back to us, Spring, and when you do, please whack that stupid groundhog upside the head as hard as you can.
Friday, March 11, 2011
Sunday, March 6, 2011
Really, Pixar?
Scot and I went shopping for mattresses for the kids at Sears over the weekend and while standing at the counter waiting for them to do the approximately 29239048834902 steps to check us out, we were poking around at the display of Cars action toys.
Am I the only one giggling like a 12 year old at this?
Am I the only one giggling like a 12 year old at this?
Just me? Ok, then. I'll just slink back off to the rock under which I live. ;)
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Walls Were Just The Beginning
You know that old adage about how bad things come in threes? Well, it's holding far more true than I would like when it comes to home repairs.
Our house is 35 years old. It is a veritable baby in comparison to our previous home that was 80 years old when we moved out. I assumed that having a younger house meant less silly "oh that's really old and now you're screwed" type of repairs. Here is where I reference the adage about what assuming does.
Anyway, the point is that in the middle of dealing with the beginning, middle, and completion of wall construction, a number of OTHER things went wrong with the house. Money is flowing in a mighty torrent from my bank account to the repairmen of Pittsburgh. (Repairmen of Pittsburgh -- decent band name.)
First, our garbage disposal went haywire. It got stuck in the "on" position. We have one of those nifty professional models that turns on by twisting the drain plug in the sink. No switch on the wall by the sink. Just reach down, twist, and churn away. I'd never seen one before we moved here. Now I know why. That sucker got effed up somehow (I don't know how!) and it got stuck in the on position. I'll let you go ahead and imagine the frantic attempts to shut it off to no avail until I finally cut the power at the breaker box. As luck would have it, the thing is on its own circuit so I didn't lose power to anything else in the process.
I haven't had anyone in to fix it yet but it will probably be around a $250 job to replace the batch feed switch on the silly thing.
Then there was my garage door. I was standing in the library one Saturday afternoon (yes, we have a library - we have too many books and the formal living room became a library) and I heard a huge crashing noise. I ran around for 10 minutes trying to locate the issue until I decided that maybe it had happened outside and I hit the garage door button to check.
The door went up about a foot and a half.
The door opener tried to lift it further, got nowhere with that effort, and sent the door back down again.
Lather, rinse, repeat about 4 times until I satisfied myself it was not a fluke.
So, I went over and while the opener was running, I lifted that damn door all the way up so that I could get my car out. And then I noticed that certain pulleys and wires were hanging willy nilly off the tracks of the door. Ah. Yes, THAT would be the problem.
I called in a repair guy who said I had bad springs. He replaced them both for me for the low, low price of $70 (yahoo!) and also left me with a rather nice little quote for new garage doors. If we can scrape the money together, that's a project for the fall.
So, the door was working well for a few days.
And then it crapped out again. This time, it would start lowering, go about a foot and a half, get caught up somehow and go back up again. Joy. This occurred on the first day of wall construction.
I called the repairman back and he came back out and gave that opener a piece of his mind. Really, he just adjusted the thing to accommodate for new springs and it's working fine now. Even better, he didn't charge me.
Two days later I decided that I had better do some laundry before we went out of town last weekend. (That's another blog post.) I got an error on the first load. We have a front loading high efficiency washer so those codes mean diddly-bo-jack-wop-shit to me. I cleared it out and sent it through another rinse and spin cycle.
That crapped out, too.
Bonus. Now I had a washing machine problem that I needed fixed immediately in order to have clean clothes to pack. I called a local repairman and when I told him what kind of washer I had he ran away. And told me that every other local dude would run, too. Sigh. So I called the next option - a large appliance repair company. They said they'd be able to send a dude out that same day. Hurrah!
I went to the laundry room to remove the wet clothes from the washer. Now, this is the first time I've ever had the washer repaired - we only bought it 3 years ago. So, I didn't really think about the consequences before I opened the door of the FRONT LOADER WASHER THAT WASN'T PROPERLY DRAINING.
Water. Everywhere.
I got it cleaned up the best way I could without, you know, having a working washing machine and waited for the repairman to show up. He showed up, took the thing apart and removed a single bobby pin and some lint. Let me repeat that. A single bobby pin and some lint. Then he put everything back together and charged me $134. For a single bobby pin and some lint.
But, wouldn't you know, that washer works again and I had clean clothes for the trip.
Dear Household Fairy - UNCLE.
Our house is 35 years old. It is a veritable baby in comparison to our previous home that was 80 years old when we moved out. I assumed that having a younger house meant less silly "oh that's really old and now you're screwed" type of repairs. Here is where I reference the adage about what assuming does.
Anyway, the point is that in the middle of dealing with the beginning, middle, and completion of wall construction, a number of OTHER things went wrong with the house. Money is flowing in a mighty torrent from my bank account to the repairmen of Pittsburgh. (Repairmen of Pittsburgh -- decent band name.)
First, our garbage disposal went haywire. It got stuck in the "on" position. We have one of those nifty professional models that turns on by twisting the drain plug in the sink. No switch on the wall by the sink. Just reach down, twist, and churn away. I'd never seen one before we moved here. Now I know why. That sucker got effed up somehow (I don't know how!) and it got stuck in the on position. I'll let you go ahead and imagine the frantic attempts to shut it off to no avail until I finally cut the power at the breaker box. As luck would have it, the thing is on its own circuit so I didn't lose power to anything else in the process.
I haven't had anyone in to fix it yet but it will probably be around a $250 job to replace the batch feed switch on the silly thing.
Then there was my garage door. I was standing in the library one Saturday afternoon (yes, we have a library - we have too many books and the formal living room became a library) and I heard a huge crashing noise. I ran around for 10 minutes trying to locate the issue until I decided that maybe it had happened outside and I hit the garage door button to check.
The door went up about a foot and a half.
The door opener tried to lift it further, got nowhere with that effort, and sent the door back down again.
Lather, rinse, repeat about 4 times until I satisfied myself it was not a fluke.
So, I went over and while the opener was running, I lifted that damn door all the way up so that I could get my car out. And then I noticed that certain pulleys and wires were hanging willy nilly off the tracks of the door. Ah. Yes, THAT would be the problem.
I called in a repair guy who said I had bad springs. He replaced them both for me for the low, low price of $70 (yahoo!) and also left me with a rather nice little quote for new garage doors. If we can scrape the money together, that's a project for the fall.
So, the door was working well for a few days.
And then it crapped out again. This time, it would start lowering, go about a foot and a half, get caught up somehow and go back up again. Joy. This occurred on the first day of wall construction.
I called the repairman back and he came back out and gave that opener a piece of his mind. Really, he just adjusted the thing to accommodate for new springs and it's working fine now. Even better, he didn't charge me.
Two days later I decided that I had better do some laundry before we went out of town last weekend. (That's another blog post.) I got an error on the first load. We have a front loading high efficiency washer so those codes mean diddly-bo-jack-wop-shit to me. I cleared it out and sent it through another rinse and spin cycle.
That crapped out, too.
Bonus. Now I had a washing machine problem that I needed fixed immediately in order to have clean clothes to pack. I called a local repairman and when I told him what kind of washer I had he ran away. And told me that every other local dude would run, too. Sigh. So I called the next option - a large appliance repair company. They said they'd be able to send a dude out that same day. Hurrah!
I went to the laundry room to remove the wet clothes from the washer. Now, this is the first time I've ever had the washer repaired - we only bought it 3 years ago. So, I didn't really think about the consequences before I opened the door of the FRONT LOADER WASHER THAT WASN'T PROPERLY DRAINING.
Water. Everywhere.
I got it cleaned up the best way I could without, you know, having a working washing machine and waited for the repairman to show up. He showed up, took the thing apart and removed a single bobby pin and some lint. Let me repeat that. A single bobby pin and some lint. Then he put everything back together and charged me $134. For a single bobby pin and some lint.
But, wouldn't you know, that washer works again and I had clean clothes for the trip.
Dear Household Fairy - UNCLE.
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
This Is What Two Feet of Snow in 24 Hours Will Do To You
Back in February I posted about the storm damage to our house from Snowmageddon. We finally got a chance to get an insurance adjuster out to the house to look at our damage and tell us how much they'd pay to fix it. Keep in mind that we, like almost every other homeowner, have a $1000 deductible on our policy.
I showed the nice hunky inspector the damage to the flooring in the front hall. He took pictures. He took measurements so that he could estimate replacing the ENTIRE floor - powder room, entrance, and hallway - even though we only have about 2 square feet of real damage.
I then showed him the two water damaged ceiling tiles in the game room from the water seeping in along the floor joist. Again, he took measurements so that the entire drop ceiling could be replaced. By this point I'm thinking that we've left that $1000 deductible in the dust.
Then I took him outside to show him the damage to the mortar on the brick holding up the front porch. Story time! Remember the Icicles of Doom? Well, because they spent so much time dripping on the porch - on top of the mountains of snow already there - we ended up with about 6 inches of solid ice on the porch. That ice made the front stairs and porch a serious hazard and nearly impassable. We had to dump about 150 pounds of salt on the damn porch and stairs to melt it down and make it safe. Did I mention that once we melted off the ice, we had a lot less problem with the damage to the floor in the front hall? So, that ice was a double pain in the butt.
Unfortunately the salt did a number on the mortar. It's crumbling away to sand.
I showed the inspector thinking that we'd be able to get something for this little issue since it was a direct result of the storm problem. Yeah, that was wishful thinking. He was apologetic about it but apparently homeowners insurance doesn't cover mortar, foundation, cracking, spalling, etc, etc. Or, at least ours doesn't cover it. I have no idea what it will cost to fix this little gem of an issue but I have to get it dealt with.
And then next winter, I am avoiding the cheap ass rock salt like it's one of the 10 plagues of Egypt. Calcium Chloride all the way!
Hunky Inspector Dude then grabbed a ladder and hopped up on the roof to make sure we didn't have damage up there (we don't, thank goodness) and then went to write up his estimate. In the end, after they subtracted that $1000 deductible, we got a little over half of what they estimated the total cost would be. Damn sight better than a sharp stick in the eye.
So, the next task is to find someone to deal with the mortar problems as they're more pressing than anything else. We can deal with the other stuff later.
I hated being a renter but when it comes to stuff like this, it would be so nice if it didn't always have to come out of my pocket. This is the part of owning a home that sucks. Just wait until I regale you with tales of The Great Retaining Wall Project of 2010.
I showed the nice hunky inspector the damage to the flooring in the front hall. He took pictures. He took measurements so that he could estimate replacing the ENTIRE floor - powder room, entrance, and hallway - even though we only have about 2 square feet of real damage.
I then showed him the two water damaged ceiling tiles in the game room from the water seeping in along the floor joist. Again, he took measurements so that the entire drop ceiling could be replaced. By this point I'm thinking that we've left that $1000 deductible in the dust.
Then I took him outside to show him the damage to the mortar on the brick holding up the front porch. Story time! Remember the Icicles of Doom? Well, because they spent so much time dripping on the porch - on top of the mountains of snow already there - we ended up with about 6 inches of solid ice on the porch. That ice made the front stairs and porch a serious hazard and nearly impassable. We had to dump about 150 pounds of salt on the damn porch and stairs to melt it down and make it safe. Did I mention that once we melted off the ice, we had a lot less problem with the damage to the floor in the front hall? So, that ice was a double pain in the butt.
Unfortunately the salt did a number on the mortar. It's crumbling away to sand.
I showed the inspector thinking that we'd be able to get something for this little issue since it was a direct result of the storm problem. Yeah, that was wishful thinking. He was apologetic about it but apparently homeowners insurance doesn't cover mortar, foundation, cracking, spalling, etc, etc. Or, at least ours doesn't cover it. I have no idea what it will cost to fix this little gem of an issue but I have to get it dealt with.
And then next winter, I am avoiding the cheap ass rock salt like it's one of the 10 plagues of Egypt. Calcium Chloride all the way!
Hunky Inspector Dude then grabbed a ladder and hopped up on the roof to make sure we didn't have damage up there (we don't, thank goodness) and then went to write up his estimate. In the end, after they subtracted that $1000 deductible, we got a little over half of what they estimated the total cost would be. Damn sight better than a sharp stick in the eye.
So, the next task is to find someone to deal with the mortar problems as they're more pressing than anything else. We can deal with the other stuff later.
I hated being a renter but when it comes to stuff like this, it would be so nice if it didn't always have to come out of my pocket. This is the part of owning a home that sucks. Just wait until I regale you with tales of The Great Retaining Wall Project of 2010.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
File Under: Homeowner Woes
So, about those icicles?
Problems. Big, big problems.
Icicles like that are caused by ice dams. Ice dams mean water can't get to my gutters which in turn means that the water has to go someplace. Usually that means leakage into the house. We are not the only ones in the area experiencing this problem - not by miles - and we probably wouldn't have an issue at all but for the fact that we got 24 inches of snow in 24 hours. Plus an additional 12-15 inches over the course of the following 10 days.
Generally, this problem means water running down your walls. But I got lucky, yes I did. We have been gifted with the slow seep. It appears to be coming in from the front porch somewhere. It is being sucked into the plywood subflooring thus warping the subflooring. In turn it is transferring the damp and the warp to the one and only real hardwood floor we have in the house. We have several planks buckling at this point.
Added to this joy was discovering that two of the tiles in the drop ceiling in our basement game room are water damaged. I can't move one of them because there is a light in the middle of it but I moved the other tile and saw the damp subfloor and the wet floor joist for the foyer flooring by the front door. I watched the water come down the joist and drip, drip, drip, every few seconds.
So, I moved things out of the way and placed a bucket to catch all those little annoying droplets. Unfortunately, this is the only visible water I can actually find. The rest of it is just slowly seeping into the flooring and screwing things up.
We contacted our homeowners insurance and were assured that it is covered by the insurance. But, we've also been told that there is very, very little that can be done (read: nothing) before this all thaws out and dries out. Once that happens we can assess the damage and go from there. We get to sit around for the next several weeks and watch this problem cause more damage the longer it goes on. The most we can do is mitigate the water as much as possible - which isn't much considering the slow seepage problem.
Pardon me while I pause to have a panic attack...
It could certainly be worse. We've been told of other people who have kitchen ceilings literally falling down. We don't have that problem. Yet. But, I have to admit, this is the part of owning a home that I really hate.
Problems. Big, big problems.
Icicles like that are caused by ice dams. Ice dams mean water can't get to my gutters which in turn means that the water has to go someplace. Usually that means leakage into the house. We are not the only ones in the area experiencing this problem - not by miles - and we probably wouldn't have an issue at all but for the fact that we got 24 inches of snow in 24 hours. Plus an additional 12-15 inches over the course of the following 10 days.
Generally, this problem means water running down your walls. But I got lucky, yes I did. We have been gifted with the slow seep. It appears to be coming in from the front porch somewhere. It is being sucked into the plywood subflooring thus warping the subflooring. In turn it is transferring the damp and the warp to the one and only real hardwood floor we have in the house. We have several planks buckling at this point.
Added to this joy was discovering that two of the tiles in the drop ceiling in our basement game room are water damaged. I can't move one of them because there is a light in the middle of it but I moved the other tile and saw the damp subfloor and the wet floor joist for the foyer flooring by the front door. I watched the water come down the joist and drip, drip, drip, every few seconds.
So, I moved things out of the way and placed a bucket to catch all those little annoying droplets. Unfortunately, this is the only visible water I can actually find. The rest of it is just slowly seeping into the flooring and screwing things up.
We contacted our homeowners insurance and were assured that it is covered by the insurance. But, we've also been told that there is very, very little that can be done (read: nothing) before this all thaws out and dries out. Once that happens we can assess the damage and go from there. We get to sit around for the next several weeks and watch this problem cause more damage the longer it goes on. The most we can do is mitigate the water as much as possible - which isn't much considering the slow seepage problem.
Pardon me while I pause to have a panic attack...
It could certainly be worse. We've been told of other people who have kitchen ceilings literally falling down. We don't have that problem. Yet. But, I have to admit, this is the part of owning a home that I really hate.
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