so it's been a productive weekend. I heard that it was going to rain, and all signs pointed to it being the truth, so I decided to stay in. I needed to get some things done, and this seemed like a good weekend to do it.

On Saturday, I woke up after catching some good sleep. I got up, made some coffee, then talked some with my Father. We had a new client coming to see the farm Sunday, so we talked over what we needed done. After that, I started the cleaning process. I turned up the speakers, and cranked some tunes to help me along. My office needed a cleaning badly, so I went and got rid of some empty boxes I had been keeping in there. Once they were gone, the cleaning went much more quickly. In my room, I had computers and hard drives all over the floor, so I put all of the hard drives I had gone through in a spare laundry basket along with with other computer stuff I wasn't using. I was going to put them up in the attic, but I decided that I could just keep them near the attic door, which made them accesible, but out of the way. I also went up into the attic and closed up the windows up there b/c it's starting to get colder, and we don't really need more airflow through the attic. After that, I put all of the stuff up in the attic that needed storage, and was going to bring down the Holiday stuff, but I decided that it was too early. I had spent about two hours doing all of this, and was happy it was done. I realized I had a lot of clothes that needed cleaning, so I started doing some loads of laundry as well. I went upstairs to vacuum, and started my Roomba down on the ground floor to give her some cleaning time. I was passing the bed and realized I was probably do for a sheet change, then remembered I was supposed to do it last week, but had decided to wait until this week. So I stripped the bed, and set out new sheets. I also had a little bit of inspiration, and organized some of the cables floating around my computer, specifically the cord to my external antenna for my router, and the cord for my DeskCam on JerseyCam. While I was at it, I also made more room and secured the cord for the BedCam. Since I had to pass the cord for the BedCam through my computer closet and the wall, I had to make a passthrough on the edge of the door/sheet of wood I use to keep it closed. While taking it off, it occured to me that the piece of string I had been using wasn't cutting it anymore, so I added an actual handle onto it, which looks pretty good, and lets me handle it very securely. By now, it was getting late, so I went to feed the horses, then came back inside. I was going to watch COPS, but since the World Series was on, I decided to check my collection of movies, and felt in the mood to watch "21". While I was doing this, I continued doing laundry and also modified a quick release shoe for one of my tripods. If you're wondering why, don't worry, you'll find out soon enough when I make some more changes to the website. After 21, my movie appetite had not been satisfied, so I turned off the lights and started to watch "Charlie Wilsons War", which was pretty darn good, IMHO. Now it was getting late, so since I had to be up early Sunday morning, I hit the sack.

On Sunday, Even though I had set my alarm, I overslept. I got up and luckily the new clients hadn't shown up. I had no sooner had a pop tart in my mouth when they DID show up. I went out and talked to them till my Dad could make it here. All in all, I think it went pretty good. They were impressed with our place, and it looks like we should get at least 6 more horses over the winter. After they left, I did some more stuff around the house, like wrapping 10lbs of hamburgers, and finally decided to call it quits, which is where I am right now. So if you all don't mind, my head is cloudy, and there is a warm clean bed calling my name upstairs.

Nighters all.

ok, I didn't really go on vacation this weekend. I mostly just stayed around the house. Boring, I know, but hey. At least I got some cleaning done on top of some other things. I managed to fill out all of my rebate forms and get them ready in their envelopes. Now I just need to get the UPCs, and I'll be ready to scan and mail them. One of them is for the new webcam I got, so that I am up to three cams at JerseyCam. The only bad part is that Juliet, my Mac, seems to be very sick. I was having problems with files and her system, and now she seems to be down for the count. I think the problem is a bad battery, so once I pick up a new one, I will try that out and we will see what happens. Since I never really shut her down, I can understand how the battery lasted 9 years, and I'm hoping that being off and not plugged in for a few weeks is the cause of it. Since she is down, Cam 1 is down as well, as the picture isn't the same when I run it through my PC. Hopefully she'll be back up and running soon, as I miss her, and while I'm not a shortage of places to find parts, I've never had any of my macs get so sick they couldn't be repaired. So head on over and check out the new cam, which is for the living room, and tell me what you think.

So on Saturday, I decided to use the veal sausage I got from the store to make a big pot of gravy. I also threw in some yummy pork pieces, but forgot the loin end, so there were no bones to really flavor it. Oh well. It cooked very well, and I was snacking on it all day as it cooked. I even had it for dinner tonight, along with some pasta. I also made some meals for the next three-four weeks, so I'm good in that arena.

After last weeks fiasco with the septic system/ground hog, I finally got some laundry done. For those that don't know, I had a clog in my septic line. This caused the water to back up and there is an ingenious pipe below my porch that will dump any backed up water, rather than it backing all the way up to a sink or toilet. This is a good system. Except when a groundhog.woodchuck decides to build a nest under your front porch. What happened was all the water went into his hole, and since he was right next to the foundation of the house, the water found a easy route, and came in through a hole in the foundation into the basement. So when I went downstairs to get some food last Saturday while doing laundry, I see water just pouring into the basement. This left me in a pickle, since it was late Saturday, and Sunday is $$$$ for a plumber. I came to the conclusion that the problem was the septic tank being full, as I have been asking for the past three years to get it pumped, and it never has. So Sunday I went to Home Depot and purchased some pipes so that I could divert the water away from the hole, and have it head towards the street. It would at least allow me to shower, which was a good thing, and since it is considered "gray water", it's good for the lawn, which sucked up most of the water. Of course, since Mario designed the porch, it was a pain to remove all the lattice work to get under the porch. On a lucky note, after deciding to purchase some Tyvex jumpsuits for my car, in the off chance I needed to do something while wearing nice clothes, they came in very handy while crawling under my porch to attach the pipes. Monday the septic guy came out, and pumped the tank which was only half full. They then ran a snake through the main pipe, and found the clog, which was the main culprit. At least I know that after 6 years, during which the house was occupied by two people for three years, I only managed to half fill our, and I quote the septic guy, "huge" tank.

So this weekend I did some more laundry, and the lines seem to be very clear now. Now for those who may not know, I picked up a little friend two weeks ago. He doesn't have a name, as I haven't thought of one. He is very helpful around the house, and cleans up after me. What is he? He's a Roomba! Here's a picture:
Say what you will about these things, but they are GREAT. The biggest problem I have is the hair, dust, and hay that I bring in from outside. Well, this little guy just goes banging around and finds all the crap, and cleans it up. When he's done, he travels back towards his charging baselin, lines up, and parks himself to re-charge. I mean how cool is that? I decided he was a guy b/c he likes to drive headlong into everything. He does it so much, I sewed him a little bumper guard to prevent any scrapes. The cats hate him, but they will come from upstairs to follow it around, then run+jump away when it comes near them. I think Dummy is starting to realize it won't hurt him, and has let it get closer. Some users report that their pets learn how to turn theirs on, and run around an play with them, so I probably have to look forward to that.

Other than those bombshells, nothing much has been going on. OK, it's near 12:30, and I have to be up in 5 hours. Talk to you all later.

i think it's understandable why I feel how I do about the dentist. Now I don't hate dentists, just the work they do. It started way before I lost my teeth, though, so it's not that. I have just never enjoyed going to the dentist. I think it stems from my past non-habit of brushing my teeth often. Now please don't think I have a gaping maw of rotting teeth. In fact, the only things that have ever removed teeth from my mouth are the medieval tools of the dentist and plastic pool toys thrown by former hot GF's. I had very strong teeth for someone who did not brush much. But anyway.

So today I got up and did my morning thing. It was a bit tough today as I was sore from trimming the fields w/ the RedMax last night after work, and also from smacking my hand with a mallet while constructing the tarp slide for the sawdust pit. It seems whenever I construct a PVC device, I invarably end up hitting my left hand with a hammer. And no, by Hammer I don't mean my penis, I mean a real hammer(if you don't understand that, you must be living in a cave or living in an online world of fantasy. If that applies to you, check here). I then took off to see Dr. Li. I got there 5 minutes late b/c I was stuck behind a funeral procession. I mean, who plans on running into that? So I got there, went in, and expected the worse, as usual. Instead, I was told I'm looking good, and for an adult who drinks coffee, my teeth were not stained. I explained to him I try to keep my teeth a little stained to match my partial. I left there, headed to Wawa for some gas and grub(BTW, their new mint chocolate chip milkshakes are good), then I went home. Since I took the day off, I decided to get some stuff done that I had been putting off. I cleaned out the cabinets of old stuff, or stuff that only had one or two uses left in it. It made a lot of room for my growing shaving den. I then worked on my office for a little bit, organizing everything back to where it should be. Next, I assaulted the slow drain problem I have been having with the washing machine lines. I got a bottle of some nasty cleaner from our plumber, and tried that out. It seems to have worked, but I think my problem is a combination of a few issues, which I should resolve soon, i.e. running some new PVC pipe, eliminating some extraneous angles from the set up, etc... It should be easy, as I am skilled in the art of PVC. Once I cleared the drain, I did some laundry that had been sitting around waiting until I had cleared the drain so i didn't have to watch it drain and stop it if it flooded. I was doing that for the rest of the day until it was all done. I now have a lot of clean boxers, exercise stuff, pants, and dress shirts. YAY! In addition to all of the tasks I completed, I became ambitious and field stripped the vacuum. I washed all the parts, rinsed out the filters, and dried everything out. I also cleaned the pet carrier I found on the road the other day (I think I'm up to 3 hard carriers now), vacuumed both floors of the house and also Huck's rooms. The only room I skimmed over was the cat's office, as it's always full of hair from them lounging in there. The room that looked the worst, but was the easiest to clean was the Kitchen. It's usually done last b/c I follow the up to down, left to right philosophy of cleaning. It applies to rooms, houses, cars, etc... It makes it so much easier to clean. I was really happy to clean the dishes, as I had some sitting in there from Sunday, and I hate when dishes sit in the sink(except if they are soaking). It's so easy to clean them, so there's really few reasons why they aren't done. But I did all of them, then took some vinegar to the counters to get them nice and white. I was pretty much done then, so I finished folding clothes, then decided to relax by paying my bills for the month, and writing this entry.

OK, that's it for now. I'm tired and should get to bed. I'm still sore, so a nice sleep in this cool weather feels so nice. It's been cold enough upstairs lately that I need to use my comforter at night when I sleep.

Nighters----