More gardening class notes: I skipped my last gardening class because I was pretty busy with work. You might remember I was disappointed with the first class because everything was pretty much over my head, seeing as how I don't actually have a garden yet, and most of the stuff (okay, all of it) was geared towards people who have established gardens and who actually know stuff about, you know, plants. Anyway, I was optimistic, sort of, about the most recent class. And it was pretty much a lot of the same stuff as Class No. 1 (which makes me wonder what they covered in the class I missed - maybe that was the one where they actually taught you how to create a garden?). So I figure I'll ride it out, take some notes about all the different ways to kill insects and pests, and yes, even chippies and squirries, and then I'll buy a book about basic gardening, most likely one of those Dummy how-to books. Or maybe I should bite the bullet and say, "Hey, I don't know what the frig you're talking about, 'cuz I don't have a garden."
Anyway, Jay and I are charting some new territory in our lives. We've been thinking and thinking about exactly where it is we want to end up, so Jay's decided that he wants to go back to grad school, so he gave his two-weeks notice last Tuesday at his job! Weee! It's strange that we're so excited about one of us being unemployed, but I'm super, super happy that he'll get a chance to hunker down, research grad progams, get his portfolio together, and just chill out for a while. It'll be nice to actually have one person be home to take care of some of the stuff we have so much trouble with, like managing how to get one of our cars in the shop or taking Abe to the vet or making phone calls to doctors or dentists or whatever. With two people working full time, it is super, super difficult to get those little things done.
So both of us are SUPER excited! If you see Jay, tell him congrats :)
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Friday, October 06, 2006
Hi! I'm in a good mood!
Well, here I am posting, and I just want to say that it's a beautiful fall day out, I love the sunshine, I love the different colors the trees are turning, and that's about it. Jay and I are hoping to go apple-picking tomorrow if we have time. I have a super-long transcript I've been working on nonstop for a few days, and if I get lots and lots done, we should be able to sneak in a fall outing.
This past weekend was my nephew Mason's first birthday party, and it's so funny how many cameras -- film, digital, or video -- were there. The kid had NO idea what was going on and mostly looked concerned and overwhelmed the whole time. The absolute funniest thing was when he was presented a little red convertible plastic car he can sit in, and he immediately started crawling all around it, checking it out from all angles. He touched the wheels, moved around to the back, got on his belly and looked underneath the car, crawled around to the front, checked out the stick-on headlights, crawled to the side again, got back on his belly and looked under the car -- it was so, so funny. If only he could have kicked the tires... And he went around like that about eight times!
I brought our video camera and got lots (probably way too much) footage of him. Hopefully I'll edit it on the computer one of these days... It's funny to think about the way people document things. I like to take lots of pictures, but most people get fussy and weirded out by people who take pictures all the time. But then those are the same people who are like, "Oh, I'm so glad you got pictures!" And I say, Well, you were pretty pissed at me at the time... loser. Kidding. And especially with the video camera, it's like, When am I going to ever watch this again? But the footage I had from the day after Mason was born was really cool to watch at his birthday party, even though at the time I felt like a jackass for videotaping it. So now I'm more aware of seemingly insignificant events that I'd like to videotape, like when Abe walks on his hind legs for an extended period of time or the like.
And congrats to the Nth degree to Pat and Kate! They got their offer on a house accepted! Weee!!! I just got to tell you guys, there's still lots of emotions to be felt this coming month, so be prepared! If for any reason it doesn't work out, don't get discouraged - but I'm sure everything will go great. We'll be thinking of you guys! Congrats.
This past weekend was my nephew Mason's first birthday party, and it's so funny how many cameras -- film, digital, or video -- were there. The kid had NO idea what was going on and mostly looked concerned and overwhelmed the whole time. The absolute funniest thing was when he was presented a little red convertible plastic car he can sit in, and he immediately started crawling all around it, checking it out from all angles. He touched the wheels, moved around to the back, got on his belly and looked underneath the car, crawled around to the front, checked out the stick-on headlights, crawled to the side again, got back on his belly and looked under the car -- it was so, so funny. If only he could have kicked the tires... And he went around like that about eight times!
I brought our video camera and got lots (probably way too much) footage of him. Hopefully I'll edit it on the computer one of these days... It's funny to think about the way people document things. I like to take lots of pictures, but most people get fussy and weirded out by people who take pictures all the time. But then those are the same people who are like, "Oh, I'm so glad you got pictures!" And I say, Well, you were pretty pissed at me at the time... loser. Kidding. And especially with the video camera, it's like, When am I going to ever watch this again? But the footage I had from the day after Mason was born was really cool to watch at his birthday party, even though at the time I felt like a jackass for videotaping it. So now I'm more aware of seemingly insignificant events that I'd like to videotape, like when Abe walks on his hind legs for an extended period of time or the like.
And congrats to the Nth degree to Pat and Kate! They got their offer on a house accepted! Weee!!! I just got to tell you guys, there's still lots of emotions to be felt this coming month, so be prepared! If for any reason it doesn't work out, don't get discouraged - but I'm sure everything will go great. We'll be thinking of you guys! Congrats.
Heavy stuff
I realize that I haven't been posting much lately. I haven't been posting much because whenever I start to write something, it ends up being all serious and philosophical and stuff, and no one wants to read that crap, do they? So that's why I haven't been posting much.
Oh, what's the philosophical stuff, you say? You wouldn't want to read it 'cuz it's too darn serious! Any funny things or interesting things I think of during the day dissipate by the time I sit down at the computer, and then I start typing posts about 'what's it all mean' and 'i've been thinking long and hard about' and the like. Bo-ring!
So ... I, uh, have no light-hearted post to follow up that intro with. Doh! I guess I could tell you the truth and say that I've been having stressful days at work, and Jay's been having stressful days at work, but c'mon. I don't want this to turn into a pity-fest. (Or do I...?)
Anyway, I'm stuck in a rut, and I don't know if posting will recover. This blog was originally set up to document all the fun house things we were doing, but we've long since stopped doing stuff to the house. Except living in it. And that's not so much fun to post about... Maybe we'll have to do some major demolition or renovation to spark the posts back up. ...?
Oh, what's the philosophical stuff, you say? You wouldn't want to read it 'cuz it's too darn serious! Any funny things or interesting things I think of during the day dissipate by the time I sit down at the computer, and then I start typing posts about 'what's it all mean' and 'i've been thinking long and hard about' and the like. Bo-ring!
So ... I, uh, have no light-hearted post to follow up that intro with. Doh! I guess I could tell you the truth and say that I've been having stressful days at work, and Jay's been having stressful days at work, but c'mon. I don't want this to turn into a pity-fest. (Or do I...?)
Anyway, I'm stuck in a rut, and I don't know if posting will recover. This blog was originally set up to document all the fun house things we were doing, but we've long since stopped doing stuff to the house. Except living in it. And that's not so much fun to post about... Maybe we'll have to do some major demolition or renovation to spark the posts back up. ...?
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
First class
Thanks, Kate, for your comments on my previous post - it made me feel better that I'm not the only person who gets overwhelmed by daily things.
Anyway, on Monday I had my first Basic Gardening and Landscaping class at Assabet Tech. It was three hours long, and will be going on every Monday for the next 6 or so weeks. I get the feeling that it's not quite basic gardening and landscaping, per se, as the teacher began to discuss more intermediate-level gardening, like, oh, I don't know, already having an established garden full of peonies and azaleas (I don't even know if I'm spelling those correctly, and I'm too lazy to look it up) and other such plants, shrubs, and trees. And, you know, I don't have an established garden. I don't even know what the bushes in front of the house are called. Okay, I know what rhododendrens are (again, spelling?), and I know what peonies are, and I know what lilacs are, but only 1/3 of those plants are actually growing on our property. The teacher went over lots of other things that were a little advanced for me, like how to kill moles and chipmunks and different insects, and how to deal with different fungi and diseases on plants. Again I reiterate, Step A for me would be to actually HAVE a garden that moles and chipmunks and different insects and different fungi and diseases could actually attack.
So I was a little discouraged, because everyone else in the class seems to have good base-level knowledge about gardening, whereas I really don't, which is why I signed up for basic gardening and landscaping. I guess I'll just see where it goes, and maybe I'll have to supplement the intermediate knowledge I gain with some basic stuff later on.
Strangely enough, the class is being taught by a guy who's been working at Weston Nurseries for 35 or so years, and I found out recently that my dad knows him. I guess my dad worked at Weston Nurseries way back in the day (way, way back). I asked the teacher if he remembered my dad, and he replied, "Oh, sure. I went to his wedding." I said, "Oh. I... didn't." Because what can you really say to that? He also asked me if my uncle was still dancing. I replied with a laugh, "Umm, I don't know which uncle you're talking about, because my dad has lots of brothers." I for some reason assumed he was talking about some drunken uncle of mine who was dancing like a madman at my parents' wedding (a reasonable assumption given my dad's 11 siblings), which is the reason for my ignorant reply. Oh, no, he was talking about my uncle who is a professional ballet dancer. I felt silly. The teacher knows more about my family than I do.
This weekend my parents are having a party for my nephew's first birthday. Yay, Mason! I have no idea what to get him. I'm thinking some Ford stock. It's bound to go up, right? Right? (?)
Anyway, on Monday I had my first Basic Gardening and Landscaping class at Assabet Tech. It was three hours long, and will be going on every Monday for the next 6 or so weeks. I get the feeling that it's not quite basic gardening and landscaping, per se, as the teacher began to discuss more intermediate-level gardening, like, oh, I don't know, already having an established garden full of peonies and azaleas (I don't even know if I'm spelling those correctly, and I'm too lazy to look it up) and other such plants, shrubs, and trees. And, you know, I don't have an established garden. I don't even know what the bushes in front of the house are called. Okay, I know what rhododendrens are (again, spelling?), and I know what peonies are, and I know what lilacs are, but only 1/3 of those plants are actually growing on our property. The teacher went over lots of other things that were a little advanced for me, like how to kill moles and chipmunks and different insects, and how to deal with different fungi and diseases on plants. Again I reiterate, Step A for me would be to actually HAVE a garden that moles and chipmunks and different insects and different fungi and diseases could actually attack.
So I was a little discouraged, because everyone else in the class seems to have good base-level knowledge about gardening, whereas I really don't, which is why I signed up for basic gardening and landscaping. I guess I'll just see where it goes, and maybe I'll have to supplement the intermediate knowledge I gain with some basic stuff later on.
Strangely enough, the class is being taught by a guy who's been working at Weston Nurseries for 35 or so years, and I found out recently that my dad knows him. I guess my dad worked at Weston Nurseries way back in the day (way, way back). I asked the teacher if he remembered my dad, and he replied, "Oh, sure. I went to his wedding." I said, "Oh. I... didn't." Because what can you really say to that? He also asked me if my uncle was still dancing. I replied with a laugh, "Umm, I don't know which uncle you're talking about, because my dad has lots of brothers." I for some reason assumed he was talking about some drunken uncle of mine who was dancing like a madman at my parents' wedding (a reasonable assumption given my dad's 11 siblings), which is the reason for my ignorant reply. Oh, no, he was talking about my uncle who is a professional ballet dancer. I felt silly. The teacher knows more about my family than I do.
This weekend my parents are having a party for my nephew's first birthday. Yay, Mason! I have no idea what to get him. I'm thinking some Ford stock. It's bound to go up, right? Right? (?)
Sunday, September 24, 2006
Daily struggles of Erin
So, I've been thinking. I don't know about anybody else, but sometimes I just have a tough time navigating daily life. I think to myself, Does anyone else find these things as incredibly confusing and difficult as I do? They're not big things, like marriage or mortgage payments or any other large-scale life issue; they're little things, like the drain on our tub always getting clogged, keeping up with laundry, trying to get car repairs taken care of, keeping old food from piling up in the fridge, etc., etc.
So here's some questions I have for people who have it together:
- how many times a day do I need to do laundry to be at a point where I feel like I'm doing an adequate job with keeping up with it?
- do other people's tubs get clogged as much as ours? do I have a uniquely pipe-clogging-type of hair? do other people use as much Draino as we do?
- do other people have as many lonely, single, matchless socks as we do?
- do other people really keep up with filing important things? really? like, do they really have their tax records from 5 years ago? really?
If I keep going, I'll start asking really weird questions, and you'll probably think bad things about me... but these are the little daily things that get to me most every day, and it's tough to find the happy medium between letting those things run my life and keeping them in check to a reasonable, yet non-obssessive degree.
Anyway, I feel a bit better! I know I haven't posted in a while, mainly because I've been navigating daily life precariously. But y'know, stuff's been happening. Last weekend Jay and I drove up to Vermont to spend the weekend at my bro-in-law's family's 'cottage' (really a four-bedroom, two-story log cabin on a beautiful lake). It was a beautiful weekend at a beautiful place. And today we were on our way to go apple picking, but we saw a sign on 495 that said "Bolton Fair, Sept. 23 and 24," so we decided to take a detour. What a crazy, crazy fair. It was a strange day, anyway, with rain showers here and there scattered between the 80-something-degree heat and strong winds, and then you take that and add on a huge parking lot in a mudfield where the parking attendants (Boy Scouts) keep yelling at you to keep driving or else you'll sink, and strollers that hold 4 screaming kids all around you, and 40-year-old men that get too close to angry cows and keep doing it, and a trapeze artist hanging from ropes in the middle of a field, and you have an ADD nightmare!
But we're back home now, and Jay cleaned the kitchen 'cuz he's sweet, and I did some laundry, and now I'm just going to relax and get ready for another week at work. Phew. Life, huh?
So here's some questions I have for people who have it together:
- how many times a day do I need to do laundry to be at a point where I feel like I'm doing an adequate job with keeping up with it?
- do other people's tubs get clogged as much as ours? do I have a uniquely pipe-clogging-type of hair? do other people use as much Draino as we do?
- do other people have as many lonely, single, matchless socks as we do?
- do other people really keep up with filing important things? really? like, do they really have their tax records from 5 years ago? really?
If I keep going, I'll start asking really weird questions, and you'll probably think bad things about me... but these are the little daily things that get to me most every day, and it's tough to find the happy medium between letting those things run my life and keeping them in check to a reasonable, yet non-obssessive degree.
Anyway, I feel a bit better! I know I haven't posted in a while, mainly because I've been navigating daily life precariously. But y'know, stuff's been happening. Last weekend Jay and I drove up to Vermont to spend the weekend at my bro-in-law's family's 'cottage' (really a four-bedroom, two-story log cabin on a beautiful lake). It was a beautiful weekend at a beautiful place. And today we were on our way to go apple picking, but we saw a sign on 495 that said "Bolton Fair, Sept. 23 and 24," so we decided to take a detour. What a crazy, crazy fair. It was a strange day, anyway, with rain showers here and there scattered between the 80-something-degree heat and strong winds, and then you take that and add on a huge parking lot in a mudfield where the parking attendants (Boy Scouts) keep yelling at you to keep driving or else you'll sink, and strollers that hold 4 screaming kids all around you, and 40-year-old men that get too close to angry cows and keep doing it, and a trapeze artist hanging from ropes in the middle of a field, and you have an ADD nightmare!
But we're back home now, and Jay cleaned the kitchen 'cuz he's sweet, and I did some laundry, and now I'm just going to relax and get ready for another week at work. Phew. Life, huh?
Thursday, September 07, 2006
Life changes, first anniversary, and other stuff...
Yes, it's true I haven't updated this blog in a while. It's not that stuff hasn't been going on, it's just I don't know exactly what to write about. Big life changes for some folks - Pat & Kate have moved to North Carolina, Cuddy has moved to Chicago... and they all left on the same day (Tuesday). Weird.
Pat and Kate moving down south prompted Jay and I to reconsider our life situation a little bit. He has a fantasy of moving down south (but not too far south) sometime between the ages of 35 and 45 and growing a big garden and working at as a college professor at a small community college and taking it real easy and enjoying ourselves. And that sounds nice, don't it? So he's been toying with going back to school, getting a masters, trying not to get sucked into the neverending cycle of corporate life... and I hope that it works out, because life shouldn't be a struggle day to day; you need to enjoy the ride while it's happening. I guess that's why they say stop and smell the roses. But the stopping part's sometimes hard when you're always moving forward day after day...
So in the past few weeks, Cuddy had her last show at ImprovBoston, we had a (lame) party for her, we got Jay a new cellphone because he lost his other one, we went on a little vacation with Jay's parents to New Hampshire and stayed at a motel on the sea shore during a hurricane, and during that vacation we celebrated our first anniversary, Jay had a business trip to Philly that ended up going pretty well, and I missed him while he was gone, but now he's back and it's the weekend!
On Thursday I took the day off and hung out with my pal Laura and her boyfriend Curt. We went to the Brimfield Flea Market. That place is HUGE. So... much... stuff. It makes me so scared to buy anything lest I become a flea market salesperson! We saw lots of really neat stuff, though. I got Jay a map of the highways of Massachusetts that was made the year before the Pike was built, and so it had a dotted line that was a proposed toll road which ended up being the Pike. It was pretty neat. I also got him a color print of the respiratory system. We're geeks.
As I mentioned earlier, Jay and I just celebrated our first anniversary. It came and went, and the top of our wedding cake is still in the freezer. And my wedding dress is still hanging in my closet. (I guess you're supposed to eat some frozen year-old wedding cake on your first anniversary, and I guess you're supposed to either make your wedding dress into curtains or preserve it or something.) We've actually been together for five years (or thereabouts - I guess we officially were together in the fall of 2001), and we've known each other for about 8 years. And I have to say, I don't regret a day of it. Awww! I love Jay more than anything, and I am looking forward to spending the rest of my daily life with him. Awww!!
Anyway, enough mush... perhaps tomorrow we will be revisiting the Alley and meeting up with Matt et al to hang out during Rib'n'Brews. He's right - the Rib'n'Brews Festival really sounds like a great time, but it's always been kind of a bust, so just hanging out in the Alley and eating some hot dogs and drinking some beers sounds much better than fighting crowds to try to get subpar 'authentic' BBQ and leftover beer for $15.
If I ever get my ass in gear, I should post some pics of recent stuff. But opening them in Photoshop and cropping them and saving them and posting them... so many steps for my small brain... If I get ambitious, watch out!
Pat and Kate moving down south prompted Jay and I to reconsider our life situation a little bit. He has a fantasy of moving down south (but not too far south) sometime between the ages of 35 and 45 and growing a big garden and working at as a college professor at a small community college and taking it real easy and enjoying ourselves. And that sounds nice, don't it? So he's been toying with going back to school, getting a masters, trying not to get sucked into the neverending cycle of corporate life... and I hope that it works out, because life shouldn't be a struggle day to day; you need to enjoy the ride while it's happening. I guess that's why they say stop and smell the roses. But the stopping part's sometimes hard when you're always moving forward day after day...
So in the past few weeks, Cuddy had her last show at ImprovBoston, we had a (lame) party for her, we got Jay a new cellphone because he lost his other one, we went on a little vacation with Jay's parents to New Hampshire and stayed at a motel on the sea shore during a hurricane, and during that vacation we celebrated our first anniversary, Jay had a business trip to Philly that ended up going pretty well, and I missed him while he was gone, but now he's back and it's the weekend!
On Thursday I took the day off and hung out with my pal Laura and her boyfriend Curt. We went to the Brimfield Flea Market. That place is HUGE. So... much... stuff. It makes me so scared to buy anything lest I become a flea market salesperson! We saw lots of really neat stuff, though. I got Jay a map of the highways of Massachusetts that was made the year before the Pike was built, and so it had a dotted line that was a proposed toll road which ended up being the Pike. It was pretty neat. I also got him a color print of the respiratory system. We're geeks.
As I mentioned earlier, Jay and I just celebrated our first anniversary. It came and went, and the top of our wedding cake is still in the freezer. And my wedding dress is still hanging in my closet. (I guess you're supposed to eat some frozen year-old wedding cake on your first anniversary, and I guess you're supposed to either make your wedding dress into curtains or preserve it or something.) We've actually been together for five years (or thereabouts - I guess we officially were together in the fall of 2001), and we've known each other for about 8 years. And I have to say, I don't regret a day of it. Awww! I love Jay more than anything, and I am looking forward to spending the rest of my daily life with him. Awww!!
Anyway, enough mush... perhaps tomorrow we will be revisiting the Alley and meeting up with Matt et al to hang out during Rib'n'Brews. He's right - the Rib'n'Brews Festival really sounds like a great time, but it's always been kind of a bust, so just hanging out in the Alley and eating some hot dogs and drinking some beers sounds much better than fighting crowds to try to get subpar 'authentic' BBQ and leftover beer for $15.
If I ever get my ass in gear, I should post some pics of recent stuff. But opening them in Photoshop and cropping them and saving them and posting them... so many steps for my small brain... If I get ambitious, watch out!
Friday, August 25, 2006
Wednesday, August 23, 2006
Stuff and such
We got some firewood delivered today. Pretty exciting, in more ways than one. I ended up posting an ad on Craiglist - I wanted a half cord of firewood for about $100. Most places were selling half cords for around $130, and I was just lookin' for a deal. Some guy responded saying he could help - I called and we set up delivery for 6:00 tonight. Well, 6:00 came and went, and at around 6:45 I had Jay call the guy ('cuz I'm scared of stuff). He said he lost the address. So he said he'd be here in 45 minutes. He showed up an hour later. We had him drive into the backyard to unload it. His headlights were off as he repeatedly tried to back his truck up into the backyard, coming very, very close quite a few times to hitting the fence. He unloaded the firewood, took his money, and booked it (without his headlights on) around the house and through the fence and onto the street. Yeah, I said through the fence. Granted, it a part of an old fence that was falling apart anyway, but come on, dude! Jay thinks he was high. We had a nice laugh. I guess we have a few more pieces of firewood now...
A while back I had lost everything on my PDA after it decided to freeze up. For a long time the program to hotsynch my PDA with the computer wasn't working, which is why I hadn't backed stuff up in months. So last night I decided I needed to figure it out so I wouldn't lose all the new stuff I had put on there. When I plugged my PDA in and performed a hotsynch operation, it actually worked! I didn't have to do anything! So all the old stuff I thought I lost (minus a year's worth) is now back on my PDA. I have Bee back! Bee is my absolute favorite game! It's the stupidest thing in the world, and I love it!
I was just going through some old pictures (you know, the kind that you had to develop) from college and the few years after. I was looking for some good pics of Cuddy, thinking I might make some sort of collage or something for her going-away party. It's weird to look back at old pics - I was so skinny! And hyper! And I dressed in a ridiculous manner! Maybe I'll go through some old videos Friday...
I know that was a random posting of random things, but it's what I was thinking about.
A while back I had lost everything on my PDA after it decided to freeze up. For a long time the program to hotsynch my PDA with the computer wasn't working, which is why I hadn't backed stuff up in months. So last night I decided I needed to figure it out so I wouldn't lose all the new stuff I had put on there. When I plugged my PDA in and performed a hotsynch operation, it actually worked! I didn't have to do anything! So all the old stuff I thought I lost (minus a year's worth) is now back on my PDA. I have Bee back! Bee is my absolute favorite game! It's the stupidest thing in the world, and I love it!
I was just going through some old pictures (you know, the kind that you had to develop) from college and the few years after. I was looking for some good pics of Cuddy, thinking I might make some sort of collage or something for her going-away party. It's weird to look back at old pics - I was so skinny! And hyper! And I dressed in a ridiculous manner! Maybe I'll go through some old videos Friday...
I know that was a random posting of random things, but it's what I was thinking about.
Monday, August 21, 2006
Gonna do some gardenin'
So I'd been talking about it and thinking about it and mulling it over and all that stuff, but I finally decided to actually take a class. Not a for-credit class or anything, just a basic gardening and landscaping class at Assabet Valley Tech's continuing ed program. It starts at the end of September and goes into November, and I'm pretty darn excited! It'd be nice to actually work on the yard and try to make it look nice and know what I'm doing for a change. We'll see how it goes.
I hope everyone can make it to Cuddy's going-away party this Saturday! I'm lookin' forward to it.
I hope everyone can make it to Cuddy's going-away party this Saturday! I'm lookin' forward to it.
Saturday, August 19, 2006
Last weekend we finally found Ashland Town Forest, which we initially read about in Ashland, one of those history-of-a-town-type books with lots of photos. There was a (very poor, old) picture of a cave that people escaping from the Salem witch trials would find shelter in, hence called "Witch's Cave," and it said the cave was in Ashland Town Forest. We didn't know there was such a thing, and we didn't know where it was. We assumed it was the state park. But a few weekends ago, Jay was test driving a Rav4 from Bernardi Toyota and we drove past this sign:
Cool sign!, I thought. And we had found the elusive forest! The walk was very nice - there was only one other person we saw (a very nice old woman that told us to keep the place a secret). Actually, Jay figured out that the forest was the place where he fell out of a tree back in college and started getting attacked by bees. He saw the tree and a flood of memories came back... You'll have to ask him to tell you the story. It's a funny story.
And last weekend we visited Matt up in Lowell, and we got to hang out in the Alley for a while. I took this picture that I like 'cuz it reminds me of an owl:
Today we went for a short kayak trip to Hopkinton State Park. We've been to the park before, but never to kayak. It was nice. There were a lot of other people out on the water in sailboats and kayaks and canoes because I think they rent all that kind of stuff out. We took Abe. Abe does pretty good in the kayak. We paddled over to a little island that was pretty much a huge mountain of dirt with trees on it. It was a very, very steep hill. But Abe walked right up it as he created avalances of dirt and rocks, and he disappeared for a while. We then heard rocks and dirt falling from a cliff next to us, and Abe was perched right at the edge wanting to jump off, so we had to pick him up so he didn't break his neck.
Now I'm on the Internet and I'm going to bite the bullet and order firewood. We like to have fires outside, but we end up having to go in the woods right next to our neighbors and snap branches off trees for wood, and that's just not going to cut it. I don't think they like loud, snapping branches right next to their house at 11:00 at night. But maybe they do, who knows?
Cool sign!, I thought. And we had found the elusive forest! The walk was very nice - there was only one other person we saw (a very nice old woman that told us to keep the place a secret). Actually, Jay figured out that the forest was the place where he fell out of a tree back in college and started getting attacked by bees. He saw the tree and a flood of memories came back... You'll have to ask him to tell you the story. It's a funny story.
And last weekend we visited Matt up in Lowell, and we got to hang out in the Alley for a while. I took this picture that I like 'cuz it reminds me of an owl:
Today we went for a short kayak trip to Hopkinton State Park. We've been to the park before, but never to kayak. It was nice. There were a lot of other people out on the water in sailboats and kayaks and canoes because I think they rent all that kind of stuff out. We took Abe. Abe does pretty good in the kayak. We paddled over to a little island that was pretty much a huge mountain of dirt with trees on it. It was a very, very steep hill. But Abe walked right up it as he created avalances of dirt and rocks, and he disappeared for a while. We then heard rocks and dirt falling from a cliff next to us, and Abe was perched right at the edge wanting to jump off, so we had to pick him up so he didn't break his neck.
Now I'm on the Internet and I'm going to bite the bullet and order firewood. We like to have fires outside, but we end up having to go in the woods right next to our neighbors and snap branches off trees for wood, and that's just not going to cut it. I don't think they like loud, snapping branches right next to their house at 11:00 at night. But maybe they do, who knows?
Tuesday, August 15, 2006
I've conquered my fear!
Is that how you spell conquered? It doesn't look right...
Anyway, I have been trying to actually accomplish things in the past few days rather than mope about how I always want to do stuff and never do it, so the first step was to actually get out of the house, go to the homebrew store, buy ingredients for a batch of beer, take them home, and make the beer. Well, I shopped for the ingredients on Sunday (which meant getting out of the house and following through with buying them - big step!) and didn't have time to brew the beer. This is usually where the story would end. I would usually buy the ingredients and then leave them to sit for months and months and go stale, only because I usually do things on a whim and my whims never pan out fully.
However, I kept the ingredients closeby, and swore to myself that one of these nights, I would brew the damn batch. Tonight was that night, folks. Oh, sure, I didn't get home until around 7pm, but I was freakin' determined. (This batch of beer is specifically for Cuddy's going away party, so I actually needed to brew it at least 10 days before the party.) So I just dove into it. (Not literally - that would be very sticky.) I just started boiling some water in my brewpot, I put the necessary grains into the necessary muslin bag and steeped them while the water boiled, and by then I was committed. The house filled with the long-ago-familiar smell of brewing beer... and it was good.
I planned ahead and sanitized all the necessary equipment to complete the batch (floating thermometer, strainer, airlock, fermenting bucket), I prepared the dry yeast (let it soak in warm, not hot, water for 15 minutes, then stir right before pitching), I added the necessary ingredients into the batch of boiling wort (more hops, more extracts, some Irish moss and gypsum salt), I put 5 lbs of ice and 2 gallons of cold water into the previously sanitized fermenting bucket, and I completed the task.
I didn't even make that much of a mess, like I usually do. Perhaps many months of not brewing allowed my brain to comprehend and organize the various steps involved in brewing a batch of homebrew to meld together and form a cohesive idea of what I need to do in order to brew. Maybe not. But all that matters is that I now have a bucket of beer in the corner of the kitchen that will be ready to keg come Aug. 25th.
Preparing for this batch has made me excited about brewing more. Who knows? Maybe this will be the only batch I brew for a while... but I like to think that's not so. It's not so tough to do. But I guess when it comes time to actually make the contents of the bucket of beer consumable, I might have a different perspective. To bottle, to keg? Oh, the options...
Anyway, I hope everyone can make it to Cuddy's going away party so that they can try my (hopefully) tasty batch of pale ale that I've brewed up. Oh, and to say bye to Cuddy. There's always that motivation. (By the way, if you're coming to the party, bring a friend or eight. The more, the merrier!)
Anyway, I have been trying to actually accomplish things in the past few days rather than mope about how I always want to do stuff and never do it, so the first step was to actually get out of the house, go to the homebrew store, buy ingredients for a batch of beer, take them home, and make the beer. Well, I shopped for the ingredients on Sunday (which meant getting out of the house and following through with buying them - big step!) and didn't have time to brew the beer. This is usually where the story would end. I would usually buy the ingredients and then leave them to sit for months and months and go stale, only because I usually do things on a whim and my whims never pan out fully.
However, I kept the ingredients closeby, and swore to myself that one of these nights, I would brew the damn batch. Tonight was that night, folks. Oh, sure, I didn't get home until around 7pm, but I was freakin' determined. (This batch of beer is specifically for Cuddy's going away party, so I actually needed to brew it at least 10 days before the party.) So I just dove into it. (Not literally - that would be very sticky.) I just started boiling some water in my brewpot, I put the necessary grains into the necessary muslin bag and steeped them while the water boiled, and by then I was committed. The house filled with the long-ago-familiar smell of brewing beer... and it was good.
I planned ahead and sanitized all the necessary equipment to complete the batch (floating thermometer, strainer, airlock, fermenting bucket), I prepared the dry yeast (let it soak in warm, not hot, water for 15 minutes, then stir right before pitching), I added the necessary ingredients into the batch of boiling wort (more hops, more extracts, some Irish moss and gypsum salt), I put 5 lbs of ice and 2 gallons of cold water into the previously sanitized fermenting bucket, and I completed the task.
I didn't even make that much of a mess, like I usually do. Perhaps many months of not brewing allowed my brain to comprehend and organize the various steps involved in brewing a batch of homebrew to meld together and form a cohesive idea of what I need to do in order to brew. Maybe not. But all that matters is that I now have a bucket of beer in the corner of the kitchen that will be ready to keg come Aug. 25th.
Preparing for this batch has made me excited about brewing more. Who knows? Maybe this will be the only batch I brew for a while... but I like to think that's not so. It's not so tough to do. But I guess when it comes time to actually make the contents of the bucket of beer consumable, I might have a different perspective. To bottle, to keg? Oh, the options...
Anyway, I hope everyone can make it to Cuddy's going away party so that they can try my (hopefully) tasty batch of pale ale that I've brewed up. Oh, and to say bye to Cuddy. There's always that motivation. (By the way, if you're coming to the party, bring a friend or eight. The more, the merrier!)
Thursday, August 10, 2006
This and that
So life is pretty much back to normal, what with Jay being fully recovered from his Lyme Disease incident. Thank you all for your well-wishes and such! Jay's first day back at work was today, and he seems in good spirits and energetic. (I'm actually here at work with him - I have to help give him his IV antibiotic at 6pm every day.)
So I haven't posted much about much other than, y'know, that Lyme thing. But in the meantime, we did purchase two very exciting things for our house. We bought two Telechron clocks! Telechron was a company that was founded by Henry Warren, who invented the first electric clock, and the company's home was Ashland. So we've been looking on Ebay for some cool-looking electric clocks made by Telechron. We found one that advertised Telechron clocks, which is kind of postmodern, and we figured Telechron clocks that advertise Telechron clocks have to be pretty rare. Plus it looked cool. That model was actually featured in a scene from Oh, Brother, Where Art Thou? in the background. So we got that... and then soon thereafter, Jay found yet another Telechron that advertised Telechrons! So we got that, too. Our first anniversary is coming up, and it's the clock anniversary, apparently, so hey, we splurged.
Jay's also been thinking about buying a car, either new or used. We go back and forth between wanting a really low-emissions, economical, great-gas-mileage vehicle and wanting a big truck or SUV-type thing that we can lug things around in. We might hold off for a bit until we decide... but we definitely want to get something, as Jay's Mazda 626 blows.
And for all I neglected to email, we're going to have a little get-together to say farewell to Chris Cuddy as she embarks on her journey to Chicago comedy. It shall happen on Sat., August 26th, at our house. Feel free to tell anyone you might know that might be interested. I might even brew beer. (I say that every time and it never happens, so don't get too excited, chump.)
So I haven't posted much about much other than, y'know, that Lyme thing. But in the meantime, we did purchase two very exciting things for our house. We bought two Telechron clocks! Telechron was a company that was founded by Henry Warren, who invented the first electric clock, and the company's home was Ashland. So we've been looking on Ebay for some cool-looking electric clocks made by Telechron. We found one that advertised Telechron clocks, which is kind of postmodern, and we figured Telechron clocks that advertise Telechron clocks have to be pretty rare. Plus it looked cool. That model was actually featured in a scene from Oh, Brother, Where Art Thou? in the background. So we got that... and then soon thereafter, Jay found yet another Telechron that advertised Telechrons! So we got that, too. Our first anniversary is coming up, and it's the clock anniversary, apparently, so hey, we splurged.
Jay's also been thinking about buying a car, either new or used. We go back and forth between wanting a really low-emissions, economical, great-gas-mileage vehicle and wanting a big truck or SUV-type thing that we can lug things around in. We might hold off for a bit until we decide... but we definitely want to get something, as Jay's Mazda 626 blows.
And for all I neglected to email, we're going to have a little get-together to say farewell to Chris Cuddy as she embarks on her journey to Chicago comedy. It shall happen on Sat., August 26th, at our house. Feel free to tell anyone you might know that might be interested. I might even brew beer. (I say that every time and it never happens, so don't get too excited, chump.)
Wednesday, August 02, 2006
Did I forget to tell you?
I guess I forgot to say that Jay's out of the hospital. He got out on Sunday, and he's doing so much better now. Thank you everyone for your thoughts :) Now he has to get antibiotics until Aug. 24th, and hopefully there won't be any complications at all from the Lyme Disease. Okay. Bye!
Saturday, July 29, 2006
Adventures of the week
As you know, Jay's been in the hospital with Lyme Disease, waiting for his heart to recover from the infection. It's been quite a week - lots of funny things have happened, lots of crazy things, and save for the fact that my husband's heart wasn't working, the whole ordeal was rather painless. Jay should be out of the hospital either tomorrow or Monday.
They took out the temporary pacemaker for good today, and his heart seems to be going strong. It apparently still has a first-degree block, but that isn't very serious and should clear up on its own, and is not threatening to his health or life or anything. We kept the wire that rested on his heart to send the electrical impulses that kept his heart beating. The doctor thought Jay was weird for asking if he could keep it as a souvenier, but then when I came back into the room, I asked the same exact thing. So either the doctor's weird for not thinking it, or both Jay and I are weird. Take your pick.
Perhaps I will post some pics soon (yes, I am the geek that took some pics in a hospital. You'll be glad I did in 20 years when you look back on it!). Anyway, it's off to bed - this whole thing should soon be over!
They took out the temporary pacemaker for good today, and his heart seems to be going strong. It apparently still has a first-degree block, but that isn't very serious and should clear up on its own, and is not threatening to his health or life or anything. We kept the wire that rested on his heart to send the electrical impulses that kept his heart beating. The doctor thought Jay was weird for asking if he could keep it as a souvenier, but then when I came back into the room, I asked the same exact thing. So either the doctor's weird for not thinking it, or both Jay and I are weird. Take your pick.
Perhaps I will post some pics soon (yes, I am the geek that took some pics in a hospital. You'll be glad I did in 20 years when you look back on it!). Anyway, it's off to bed - this whole thing should soon be over!
Tuesday, July 25, 2006
Update on my hubby
So the last post was kind of on the meloncholy side, so I'll keep this light. Jay is still in the ICU, and probably will be for the rest of the week, but that's only because they want to monitor his heart for a bit. The Lyme Disease test came back positive, so that's a good thing (even though they pretty much assumed that's what the problem is). He's doing super great -- you wouldn't know anything was wrong with him at all, y'know, except for the pacemaker thing :) And again, he'll make a full recovery with no permanent damage or lasting effects from it.
Sooooo... yeah! I took the last few days off and will take tomorrow off, and his family's been great - his dad does night duty and sleeps during the day, and his mom and I have been staying with him during the day, and Matt's been by a lot, and Bri stopped by, and my parents and my sis & bro-in-law have been by...
I really can't think of a good way to end this post. There's no good closing!
Sooooo... yeah! I took the last few days off and will take tomorrow off, and his family's been great - his dad does night duty and sleeps during the day, and his mom and I have been staying with him during the day, and Matt's been by a lot, and Bri stopped by, and my parents and my sis & bro-in-law have been by...
I really can't think of a good way to end this post. There's no good closing!
News about my hubby
Hello! I just wanted to let everyone know that Jay apparently has Lyme Disease (they think) that manifested itself as some heart irregularities on Sunday. We took him to the ER ('cuz you don't want to mess with your heart!) after he said, "Sweetie, my heart feels funny." His pulse was very, very, very slow and his heart beats sounded very strange and not synched with is pulse. We showed up at the ER and Jay said, "I feel completely fine, but I guess my heart might be acting strange," or something. She took us right in. The initial nurse was confused by his pulse reading. It was about 20 beats per minute! People pass out at that rate! But he was feeling fine. Then the EKG guy showed up and thought the EKG machine was not working. Oh, but it was working - the EKG reading was just really strange. A bunch of cardiologists came in and were looking over his EKG readings. They told him he had a third-degree heart block - I guess that means the top part of his heart wasn't communicating with the bottom part of his heart, and the two parts were just beating on their own without any rhythm. They said, "It's a really good sign that you're still alert and talking to us! We'll just leave it at that!" Which kind of freaked us out.
Long story short, they had to put him on a temporary pacemaker to keep his heart beating normally, which means they put a wire down through a vein in his neck that rests on his heart that shoots out electric signals to tell his heart to beat. So he's still over in the intensive care unit at Framingham Union (or MetroWest Medical Center, whichever you prefer) and will most likely be there for most of the week. He's on antibiotics for the Lyme Disease, and his heart should be getting back to normal within a few days hopefully. There won't be any lasting damage done or anything - it's completely transient.
The Lyme Disease would totally explain why Jay's been feeling so strange for the past month! We attributed it to the strong headache medicine he took a few weeks back which made him feel woozy, then he got a rash, then all his extremities ached in strange ways, and he's been feeling tired and run down lately. But it's great they caught it now and can treat him. I'll keep you posted as to his status in the next few days. Thanks for your thoughts and prayers, everyone!
Long story short, they had to put him on a temporary pacemaker to keep his heart beating normally, which means they put a wire down through a vein in his neck that rests on his heart that shoots out electric signals to tell his heart to beat. So he's still over in the intensive care unit at Framingham Union (or MetroWest Medical Center, whichever you prefer) and will most likely be there for most of the week. He's on antibiotics for the Lyme Disease, and his heart should be getting back to normal within a few days hopefully. There won't be any lasting damage done or anything - it's completely transient.
The Lyme Disease would totally explain why Jay's been feeling so strange for the past month! We attributed it to the strong headache medicine he took a few weeks back which made him feel woozy, then he got a rash, then all his extremities ached in strange ways, and he's been feeling tired and run down lately. But it's great they caught it now and can treat him. I'll keep you posted as to his status in the next few days. Thanks for your thoughts and prayers, everyone!
Sunday, July 09, 2006
So much stuff to do
It's been over a week, I think, since I've posted, and I would have posted something, but we've just been enjoying the outdoors too much last weekend and this that I haven't had the time to sit and edit pictures and write stuff. So here goes:
Last weekend (fourth of July weekend) was lots of fun - we saw a homemade fireworks show at a lake in Framingham, we swam and kayaked with Abe at the state park, we hung out with friends, we saw Superman Returns, we disc golfed...
So I got a good shot in from around two trees and made it right in the basket. I'm not good at disc golfing, but it is a fun outdoor thing, and I was pretty happy when I heard the chains clinking after I chucked it with wild abandon around trees. I actually bought two discs for myself this past weekend - so exciting!
Jay one-upped me (he likes to play one-uppie, apparently) with a great shot this weekend - it was over a mountain and through trees to a basket hanging from under a tree. He doesn't look nearly as excited as I was, but that's Jay's style. Understated.
And we had Cuddy over and went to the carnival right over a the high school parking lot! It was a lame carnival as carnivals go, but hey, I gotta get any carnival action I can get.
Cuddy made Jay an ice cream pie. Deliciousness, and I don't even like desserts all that much.
I like this picture because everyone in it has a silly face.
And today Jay's parents came over and we kayaked and swam again over at the state park, and then we went over to Prezo in Milford, which, I'm convinced, is the best restaurant ever.
I have to get up for work, so I'm going to bed, otherwise I'd write more.
Last weekend (fourth of July weekend) was lots of fun - we saw a homemade fireworks show at a lake in Framingham, we swam and kayaked with Abe at the state park, we hung out with friends, we saw Superman Returns, we disc golfed...
So I got a good shot in from around two trees and made it right in the basket. I'm not good at disc golfing, but it is a fun outdoor thing, and I was pretty happy when I heard the chains clinking after I chucked it with wild abandon around trees. I actually bought two discs for myself this past weekend - so exciting!
Jay one-upped me (he likes to play one-uppie, apparently) with a great shot this weekend - it was over a mountain and through trees to a basket hanging from under a tree. He doesn't look nearly as excited as I was, but that's Jay's style. Understated.
And we had Cuddy over and went to the carnival right over a the high school parking lot! It was a lame carnival as carnivals go, but hey, I gotta get any carnival action I can get.
Cuddy made Jay an ice cream pie. Deliciousness, and I don't even like desserts all that much.
I like this picture because everyone in it has a silly face.
And today Jay's parents came over and we kayaked and swam again over at the state park, and then we went over to Prezo in Milford, which, I'm convinced, is the best restaurant ever.
I have to get up for work, so I'm going to bed, otherwise I'd write more.
Sunday, July 02, 2006
Reviewing old posts
I just spent about 20 minutes revisiting old posts from the infancy of indianspring.blogspot.com. Some made me laugh, some I skipped over, but it's funny because most of the posts in the first two or so months actually had to do with our new house (hence I named it indianspring.blogspot.com). After we stopped doing much work on the house, I started posting about other stuff, which, you know, can be exciting and all. But it was fun to look back on when we moved in and the days before we actually had set a wedding date.
So reading those made me want to post more about what's been going on here at Indian Spring Road. Today Jay did some yard work - he mowed the front lawn and backyard. We were worried about the look of our front lawn because we don't know what we're doing when it comes to having a nice lawn, and the entire springtime consisted of a semi-bare lawn. But recently some new grass started growing. It's a different color green than the rest of the lawn, but hey, it's freakin' grass, so shut your pie-hole, neighbors! (Okay, our neighbors haven't actually said anything about our not-perfect lawn, I'm just paranoid that they've been thinking it.) I tried to use hedge trimmers/clipper/shears things to trim the jungle that's become the shrubs in front of our house. I let them get so out of control that when I trimmed them to what they actually should be trimmed to, there ended up being stumps in the bushes. It'll grow in...
We also took a really nice swim over at the state park. It's definitely the highlight of living here, being so close to Ashland State Park. We just walk on over with our noodles, float around for a while, and walk on home. Some people are scared of swimming in lakes and/or ponds, but man, the water is so refreshing, there's not a lot of people swimming in the places that weren't built as a beach, and it's so closeby!
Tomorrow we're going out to central Mass. to have a BBQ with my fam. My sister and her husband are building a house on the land that they live on now (they've been living in a purple mobile home for a while), so we'll get to see the foundation and beginnings of framing they have so far. And we'll get to see my nephew, who's so adorable. Maybe we'll even get home in time to see some fireworks somewhere!
I hope everyone has a safe fourth!
So reading those made me want to post more about what's been going on here at Indian Spring Road. Today Jay did some yard work - he mowed the front lawn and backyard. We were worried about the look of our front lawn because we don't know what we're doing when it comes to having a nice lawn, and the entire springtime consisted of a semi-bare lawn. But recently some new grass started growing. It's a different color green than the rest of the lawn, but hey, it's freakin' grass, so shut your pie-hole, neighbors! (Okay, our neighbors haven't actually said anything about our not-perfect lawn, I'm just paranoid that they've been thinking it.) I tried to use hedge trimmers/clipper/shears things to trim the jungle that's become the shrubs in front of our house. I let them get so out of control that when I trimmed them to what they actually should be trimmed to, there ended up being stumps in the bushes. It'll grow in...
We also took a really nice swim over at the state park. It's definitely the highlight of living here, being so close to Ashland State Park. We just walk on over with our noodles, float around for a while, and walk on home. Some people are scared of swimming in lakes and/or ponds, but man, the water is so refreshing, there's not a lot of people swimming in the places that weren't built as a beach, and it's so closeby!
Tomorrow we're going out to central Mass. to have a BBQ with my fam. My sister and her husband are building a house on the land that they live on now (they've been living in a purple mobile home for a while), so we'll get to see the foundation and beginnings of framing they have so far. And we'll get to see my nephew, who's so adorable. Maybe we'll even get home in time to see some fireworks somewhere!
I hope everyone has a safe fourth!
Tuesday, June 27, 2006
B-ball Hall of Fame
This past weekend we went to the Basketball Hall of Fame. I will possibly post pictures later, I'm too lazy to right now. It was lots of fun! I'm not nearly as huge a basketball fan as Jay is. Heck, I'm not really much of a basketball fan, at that. But it was cool seeing the history of the sport. I really like all the old stuff they have, like really cool old uniforms and old scoreboards and old basketballs that look like footballs. It's a neat place, if you're at all interested in the sport, and I know Jay really enjoys it.
Then we tried to find a place to grab a bite to eat. We came upon places that I would link to, but I don't want to dirtify your computer. There was a place called "Mardi Gras Gentlemen's Club" whose tagline was "the most beautiful women in the world!" and a place called "Sin City." I don't think I need to say anything else. Needless to say, we went back to eat at the Uno's right next to the Hall of Fame. But hey, if anyone needs a destination for a bachelor party, go to Springfield!
Here's some pics!
me with an old-school Celtics jersey - I think it's made of itchy wool... ouch
Jay tossing the ball into the original basket - a peach basket!
My favorite jersey of all time... the rainbow Nuggets jersey
Jay can jump 9 feet plus! What a man!
I snuck under Bird's arm. Smelly.
Jay loves him.
I tried jumping high, too... could only get to 7 feet... sort of... the kid that kept egging us on helped out immensely.
Then we tried to find a place to grab a bite to eat. We came upon places that I would link to, but I don't want to dirtify your computer. There was a place called "Mardi Gras Gentlemen's Club" whose tagline was "the most beautiful women in the world!" and a place called "Sin City." I don't think I need to say anything else. Needless to say, we went back to eat at the Uno's right next to the Hall of Fame. But hey, if anyone needs a destination for a bachelor party, go to Springfield!
Here's some pics!
me with an old-school Celtics jersey - I think it's made of itchy wool... ouch
Jay tossing the ball into the original basket - a peach basket!
My favorite jersey of all time... the rainbow Nuggets jersey
Jay can jump 9 feet plus! What a man!
I snuck under Bird's arm. Smelly.
Jay loves him.
I tried jumping high, too... could only get to 7 feet... sort of... the kid that kept egging us on helped out immensely.
Saturday, June 24, 2006
Town of Ashland trash talkin'
Well, we now have to pay a lot of money to get rid of our trash. Last year the town started charging us a fee per year for trash pickup. Okay, property taxes aren't paying for it anymore... we can deal. Now they are rolling in a new "You Throw Away You Pay" campaign where you have to buy official Town of Ashland trash bags, and they'll ONLY pick those up, along with paying the flat yearly fee.
Pretty handsome, eh? Here's the prices of the bags:
- 14-gallon bags: $3.75 for five bags
- 33-gallon bags: $6.50 for five bags.
Bucka-wha?? Are you shitting me?? Seventy-five cents per bag for the small ones or a buck thirty per bag for the 33-gallon bags! Plus whatever we pay for the yearly trash fee, which I don't even pay attention to because it kind of makes me angry. I pay, I just don't pay attention.
What makes it worse is that we just bought a 90-bag box of trash bags.
I think we used about 5 so far. So we have 85 big black trash bags. Anyone interested? They should have a trash-bag buyback program like they do in Boston for guns. For every 100 trash bags you get a $50 gift certificate to Target. But don't use it on trash bags.
When I went to buy the brightly-hued bags yesterday, the kid at CVS was getting all pissed. He's like, "These are so ridiculously overpriced! We don't get anything for even selling these things! And now we can't even sell regular trash bags!" I was like, "Dude, I know!"
So last night as I prepared dinner, I would walk to throw something out, I saw the bright orange glaring at me, and I thought, Crap, if I throw this away, that's like throwing away .04 cents. So I put all the veggie scraps in a plastic bag, started using a dish towel instead of paper towels for drying off veggies and stuff, and started searching random packaging for the recycling symbol. I think I spent 4 minutes searching on an empty bag of burrito tortillas for a recycling symbol. I didn't find one. They'll now pick up recycling once a week instead of biweekly. And man, we were never good at staying on top of recycling, but now we have to really try hard.
You know, it's weird, we spend money pretty liberally when we go grocery shopping or when we go out to eat, so it's weird that I'm so anal about scrimping and saving money on trash pickup! It comes down to very little money in the long run, but I guess it really is working because I can't stop thinking about how to start composting and how we'll keep on top of recycling everything! So good job, Ashland, for making me obsessed! High five!
Pretty handsome, eh? Here's the prices of the bags:
- 14-gallon bags: $3.75 for five bags
- 33-gallon bags: $6.50 for five bags.
Bucka-wha?? Are you shitting me?? Seventy-five cents per bag for the small ones or a buck thirty per bag for the 33-gallon bags! Plus whatever we pay for the yearly trash fee, which I don't even pay attention to because it kind of makes me angry. I pay, I just don't pay attention.
What makes it worse is that we just bought a 90-bag box of trash bags.
I think we used about 5 so far. So we have 85 big black trash bags. Anyone interested? They should have a trash-bag buyback program like they do in Boston for guns. For every 100 trash bags you get a $50 gift certificate to Target. But don't use it on trash bags.
When I went to buy the brightly-hued bags yesterday, the kid at CVS was getting all pissed. He's like, "These are so ridiculously overpriced! We don't get anything for even selling these things! And now we can't even sell regular trash bags!" I was like, "Dude, I know!"
So last night as I prepared dinner, I would walk to throw something out, I saw the bright orange glaring at me, and I thought, Crap, if I throw this away, that's like throwing away .04 cents. So I put all the veggie scraps in a plastic bag, started using a dish towel instead of paper towels for drying off veggies and stuff, and started searching random packaging for the recycling symbol. I think I spent 4 minutes searching on an empty bag of burrito tortillas for a recycling symbol. I didn't find one. They'll now pick up recycling once a week instead of biweekly. And man, we were never good at staying on top of recycling, but now we have to really try hard.
You know, it's weird, we spend money pretty liberally when we go grocery shopping or when we go out to eat, so it's weird that I'm so anal about scrimping and saving money on trash pickup! It comes down to very little money in the long run, but I guess it really is working because I can't stop thinking about how to start composting and how we'll keep on top of recycling everything! So good job, Ashland, for making me obsessed! High five!
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