Sep 12 2006
I hate being sick. I had a wonderful weekend, but I got a really bad sinus infection on Sunday. I had to take yesterday off work and layed on the couch all day sniffling and sneezing and coughing. Bleh.
Today I’m still a wreck. I’m at work but still feeling awful. My poor nose is about to fall off.
I just feel like complaining. I hate being sick. -ec
Sep 11 2006
I traveled to New York this past weekend for my cousin Arthur and his fiance Meghan’s wedding. The rehearsal dinner was located at my mom’s cabin. My mom, grandma, and I cooked like crazy all day Friday. The dinner was Ramen noodle salad, rolls, stuffed cornish hens, wild rice, stuffed tomatoes, and for dessert chocolate covered strawberries and my mom’s famous New York cheesecake. YUM!
The wedding was on the lookout of the mountaintop that my uncle owns by Antler Lake, NY. The weather was beautiful and so was the wedding.
The reception was at Arthur’s house in Northville, NY. It was quite a drive from the wedding (an hour) but it was well worth the drive. Meghan’s parents brought in tons of fish and cooked all of the food for the reception themselves. It was amazing; homemade stuffed flounder, lobster pasta, clam chowder, and tons more. It was so nice to hang out with family that I haven’t seen in years. All my cousins are getting so big; I feel so old 🙂
Click on the picture below to see pictures of the rehearsal dinner, ceremony and reception:
-ec
Sep 02 2006
I bought a new vehicle today. But I’ll start from the beginning…
I sold the Talon today. A 17 year old and his parents drove from West Virginia (~5 hours) and ‘look’ at the talon. I knew it was as good as sold when I opened the garage door and Matt whispered “Dad….there it is!”. Didn’t get the exact amount I wanted for it, but I felt good selling it for less since I knew this kid was going to love the car. Here’s the car momments before it left my driveway for the last time:
Emily and I went out “looking” to see what kind of SUVs are on the market around here. We drove through and walked around 10+ dealer lots. At our last stop, Champion Dodge, I saw a maroon 98 Durango. Further inspection proved it to be a 20 footer (only looks good from 20 feet away). Dents, dings, scratches, thinned paint and a nail in a tire. Next was a 2001 Ford Explorer Sport. Out of my price range and the armrest was completely broken. Next was a 99 silver pewter metallic Durango. 5.2l V8 (230HP, 300lb/ft torque…but at 6300lbs!!). Looked nice, very little body defects, and has an aftermarket 6 disc cd changer.
We haggled a little. The dealer wanted $9995 which was about $3000 more than I was “allowed” to spend. So we went inside to get the sales guy’s card (it was his first day and he didn’t have any with his name) and while we waited, Emily suggested we just lowball them and offer the $6700 I got for the Talon. The sales guys were a little surprised, but they turned around, huddled and talked, and accepted the offer! Not bad eh?!
Although the Durango only gets 17MPG highway (hence the tree hugger title to this post), I only have to fill it with 87 octane. That saves me 20 to 30 cents per gallon at each fill up, and the talon only got 20-22 MPG anyway (about 200-225mi per tank), if I was lucky.
I’ll get some more pictures tomorrow, but here she is:
Sep 02 2006
Today I went to one of my little brother Philip’s football games. He plays JV for Lloyd High School. The team is really small this year, so all the players stay in most the game. He’s really enjoying football this year, and he’s getting really good at it! He made some great plays & tackles today. He used to be one of the smaller players when he started playing football years ago, now he’s the biggest guy on his team. I sure wouldn’t want to be across from him on the line! Those poor guys were getting pummeled and smashed every play!
Click on the picture below to see some pictures from today’s game.
Sep 02 2006
Our fence was finished Friday. It looks great and Megabyte spends about 5 hours a day out there running around, looking through the pickets and guarding her yard by growling at unsuspecting passerbys.
Many thanks again to our Uncle Ted and Aunt Karen whose gift made it possible for us to get the fence so soon after moving in. 🙂
Click on the picture below to see pictures of the completed fence (and some of Megabyte enjoying her yard).
Aug 30 2006
Well, I called the fence company this morning and they were actually super nice. I talked with Jim (who I’ve talked with numerous times – very nice) and he appologized for his guys installing the wrong fence. He said “you’d think after 25 years they’d know the difference…” I asked about the truck they drove out here yesterday and the description matched. When I told him about the yard he was really upset that his guys would do that, especially since it hadn’t rained in so long, then rained 2 days straight before they came. So, he said for us to get it fixed either by ourselves or a landscaper and they’d deduct that amount from our bill. Nice.
They did a lot of work today. They took off the wrong boards, and installed the entire fence minus 20 feet and 1 gate. I assume they’ll come back tomorrow, then be finished. Megabyte got to run around the yard by herself, sniffing all the wood and standing up on the rail and peeking through the boards. So cute!! Can’t wait until it’s completely finished so she can run around out there unsupervised for a few hours. We can tell she’s really excited! 🙂
Check out more pictures of progress from today by clicking the image below. Thank goodness we’re on the right track with this whole thing again.
Aug 29 2006
Why does it seem that every project we hire someone for turns out wrong or needs correcting?? They started putting up the pickets for our fence today and they are the wrong kind of pickets! *scream*
We ordered what are called \”gothic pickets\” which are like this:
![](\"http://www.williamsfence.com/wood/gothic_picket.gif\")
They installed \”french gothic pickets\” which are like this:
![](\"http://www.williamsfence.com/wood/frenchgothic_picket.gif\")
Plus, on top of getting the wrong fence, our yard was completely torn up by a truck, which we assume was them when they dropped off all the wood. The first time they came to work on the fence they parked on the street in the front of the house and walked around back. Today there were huge tire tracks over the yard between the street and sidewalk and about 4 feet into our yard, most about 6 inch deep ruts.
We took a bunch of pictures of the grass, and I plan on staying here tomorrow morning until they show up to see if their truck matches the tire marks before I call the company. I feel bad because I really like the company, they are super nice and did my mom\’s fence with no trouble…but this is rediculous.
Click here to see pictures of the fence and torn up yard. Grr.
Aug 23 2006
Mills Fence started our fence today! They came out this morning to ask where we wanted our gates, and then started digging! They got about 1/3 of the posts in the ground, cemented. The other 1/3 has the holes dug, but no concrete yet, and they still have to dig holes for the back stretch of fence. So far it looks like they are doing a great job. They didn’t mess up the yard at all. We were really worried about dirt and rocks going all over our new grass, but they did a great job cleaning up because I don’t see any excess dirt or rocks anywhere.
I assume they’ll come back tomorrow and do the rest of the holes and posts, then they have to let the concrete set a few days before putting the pickets on. Stayed tuned for more…Click on the picture below to see progress on the fence.
Aug 20 2006
Paul and I are getting our backyard fence installed Wednesday, so we decided to go to Lowe’s and get wood for stairs so we can actually get to our backyard from inside the house. The stairs turned out really well. Check out pictures of our handiwork:
Aug 17 2006
