Tomorrow is S-day

Well, 10 days of fun have come to an end. My big tampon finger will be unveiled tomorrow and the stitches come out. The strange thing is that I'm not nervous at all about the stitches coming out, it's what my finger actually looks like. I can't remember a whole lot before it was wrapped up other than seeing that the stitches were done with bright blue thread. It still feels wonky underneath all the gauze, and when I accidentally tap it or knock it into something it feels pretty sensitive. I don't even think I'll feel comfortable using it for a while.

The weekend has been fairly productive, Trevor has been working on the laminate floor in the basement yesterday and today. We went to a friend's housewarming shindig for a bit then to Trevor's sister's house for dinner. Being in other people's cleaner and larger houses made me want to move. Hmmm, so much for basement commitment! I think that might pass a little once things are cleaned up around here.

November 30th sure is coming up fast though. We still have a lot of things to do (bathroom, doors, moulding, low-voltage wiring, storage room shelving, laundry room cabinet doors...). I don't know if we're going to make it at this point, but maybe that's the person with only one functional thumb talking. Those here with two might be a bit more positive!

Printer jam

My coworker has taken to sleeping in my printer. She's not so great at multitasking and answering the phone though.

Separated at birth...

I got a present!

A chainmail glove. Bring on the sharp knives!!
I've even got grippy tape for the fingertips. (Not that I'll be able to cut things for a while. Maybe I should just stick to those plastic children's scissors that can't even cut paper.)

Things that you can't do with a gimped thumb:

1. Type well. At all.

2. Put on pants. (It takes a lot of bum-shimmy-ing.)

3. Tie your shoes.

4. Shower -- that extra hand helps...a lot.

5. Shave your underarms (As Trevor said, "Why can't you just go amazon on one side for a while?' LOL)

6. Put deodorant on -- well, one armpit is easy.

7. Floss. (I think I've found a solution with one of those hummingbird Oral B things.)

8. Change a toilet paper roll.

9. Put a seatbelt on.

10. Put a bra on (Trevor doesn't mind helping with that one AT ALL...lol. Although in his words it was, 'I'm only used to taking these things off!')

11. Ponytails. Trevor learned on that one too. (even though I thought I might be sporting a boppy side pony at one point)

12. Cleaning. Anything like cleaning a shower, washing dishes, that sort of thing. Darn. lol

So I'm just one big gimp at the moment. It still hurts like mad once the painkillers wear off (first thing in the morning I'm not a happy camper). Oh, for those who don't know, I managed to do this to myself cutting a matboard for a picture frame with a blade (boxcutter of sorts) and ruler. Add to that a slip, and you've got yourself a messy situation. I'll omit all the gory stuff, but it was bad enough for me to be really, really worried about losing part of my thumb.

Mentally I'm having a hard time forgetting about it. When I sit and space out for a bit it all comes back again in my head and the pit of my stomach drops out. *shiver* I think it will get better with some time. Today Trevor was putting in the linoleum in the basement and he had to use a blade like I did for cutting...I got the heeby-jeebies looking at it. I'm going to have one major fear of those things for a lonnnnng while.

Oh, and I'm not looking forward to seeing what's under all this gauze. Not one bit. *calm blue ocean, calm blue ocean*

Guess who's not doing much flooring this weekend?

2.5 hours in the hospital and 5 stitches later.

Painting is almost done.

Almost! There's just two areas left to trim and it's done. ALL DONE! We're ahead of schedule thanks to some help with the painting. From now on, just painting a room in the house will be nothing to me. After the priming, ceiling painting and then wall painting, I will be glad to just paint something on the wall rather than doing all the crazy prep work.

But, we're starting flooring tonight! We're measuring and cutting a template out for the linoleum in the laundry room and storage room. And then it will be on to tackling the laminate floor in the rest of the basement. Trevor's taking Monday off from work, so we should have a good chunk done by then. (Hoping...)

Painting (and a revelation)

I am taking time out of my normal work day (what is 'normal' anyways?) to get some painting done in the basement. *whew* It's been a lot of work so far. I officially hate ceilings, and especially the motion sickness I seem to get while having my head cranked back watching a roller zoom up and down. Wait...just up.

I need to trim around the ceiling (or maybe that will be a Trevor job...right?). ;) We'll see. It's been really satisfying seeing all the colours go up, not to mention seeing if the colours were good choices or not. That 'turtle dove' one has really thrown me for a loop in the bathroom. It looks almost green, but not. I kind of scrunch my face up at it for now and just hope that once all the fixtures and tiling is in that it will look more 'right'. The blue-y colour ('lime light'!) in my office and main hallways is looking delish. DEE-lish! LOL The celery colours in the media room are quite nice as well.

We went to Home Depot last night to pick up a small country's worth of lightbulbs, and ended up picking up the wrong ones. So 17 lightbulbs need to be exchanged to the right ones (those had short necks, we need long neck bulbs). And, AND...the heavens opened up on Trevor in the lighting aisle where the dimmer switches are...THEY HAVE DIMMERS ON REMOTE CONTROL. Yes, you read right, a little remote so you can sit all comfy and not have to dim the lights when you're ready to watch a movie. Fancy schmancy, and of course we had to get it.

Tag, I am it.

1) Name the person, with link, who tagged you.
2) Complete the questionnaire without changing the questions.
3) Tag other people. This tag is a questionnaire to be answered on the topic "What does blogging mean to me?"
Whoops, I have already failed the test. ;) Cynthia tagged me. Is it frozen tag?

QUESTION 1: Are you happy/satisfied with your blog, with its content and look?
Sure. I like the simplicity and the little hits of orange here and there. Content-wise, well it's only an outlet for my ranting and daily goings-ons, so sure I like that too.

QUESTION 2: Does your family know about your blog?
My family knows about it. Trevor's family, no. I prefer it that way -- just an outlet for my fam to peek in the window and laugh at me. Or with me. Or not.

QUESTION 3: Do you feel embarrassed to let your friends know about your blog or do you just consider it I private thing?
For my close friends, no. For everyone I've ever run into, I would prefer they take me for face to face value rather than what I write about.

QUESTION 4: Did your blog cause positive change in your thoughts?
Did I have negative thoughts beforehand? I don't like this question.

QUESTION 5: Do you only open the blogs of those who comment to your blog or do you love to go and discover more by yourself?
I'm an equal opportunity blogger. I always check in on those who comment (the terrible two, you know who you are, lol!). Of course I look at other random blogs as well.

QUESTION 6: What does your visitor counter mean to you? Do you care about put it in your blog?
Sometimes I'm blown away by the number of people who come to my blog and read it. Who knew I was so entertaining?
And that last part of the question isn't even worded correctly. So here's my badly worded response: Me not understand. Me not know.

QUESTION 7: Did you try to imagine your fellow bloggers and give them real pictures?
In the whole world or those who just comment??? Silly question. Okay, I imagine them all as little robots, typing away making that *boop bee boop boop* noise. Is that good enough?

QUESTION 8: Do you think there is a real benefit to blogging?
A-ha...! A benefit to me or others? For me, yes, of course. I get an online diary of things I've done and random thoughts. How neat is that? And for others, of course. Anyone who reads my blog is automatically more intelligent and attractive.

QUESTION 9: Do you think that bloggers society is isolated from the real world or interacts with events?
Ugh, another lame question. When do we get to the juicy stuff? Blogging is what it is, leave it at that.

QUESTION 10: Does criticism annoy you or do you feel it's a normal thing?
Criticism, bring it on! If someone feels the need to criticize my blog, then they obviously don't have enough to do in the day.

QUESTION 11: Do you fear some political blogs and avoid them?
Fear? Not the best word. Like I'm shaking in my boots because someone wants to talk all big about politics. Whatever. Next question!

QUESTION 12: Did you get shocked by the arrest of some bloggers?
Never. What's shocking anymore?

QUESTION 13: Did you think what would happen to your blog after you died?
Well, unless I can blog from the clouds it's not happening. You would have to check with the blogger.com people to see what happens to blogs that just sit and gather dust. I think it would probably meet the big delete key, just like I did.

QUESTION 14: What do you like to hear? What's the song you might like to put in a link, in your blog?
What do I like to hear? Come on now, that's a lame question. I like to hear lots of things: silence, wind (not the bum kind, the outdoors type), fires crackling, birds chirping, waves crashing... The song I'd put as a link in my blog: maybe something mellow but kind of boppy, like Zero 7.

Tag You're It! Here are my three tags of choice. . .
Ummm, I have none. If I were to send these questions out to people of my choosing they'd be way better than these!!!

September 16, A.D. (After Drywall)

Well it's been a long weekend priming and painting, and painting...and painting. We made a really good start on it and we're planning on having all of the painting done by the end of the week so we can start on floors (yippee!). Everywhere in the house there's a little cloud of drywall dust that follows us around and covers anything that stands still long enough. There will be one BIG cleaning purge once this basement is done. Look out!

Here's the 'just primed' photos of the basement. I'll leave out the photos of the actual painted walls until we get some flooring in (sha-bam! impact!).
The laundry room:My office!The bathroom (toilet to come!):The media room (aka, Trevorlossus, the Trevorplex, Cineplex Trevortron, etc. You get the idea.):

Four years ago today

We got married!
(This is the most accurate picture of the two of us. I would have scanned in some wedding photos, but my scanner is in a different room and not hooked up. And even if I did want to hook it up, there's no room.)

It was one of the most fun days I've ever had. Not too nerve-wracking and a lot of good memories. Now if only I could rewind and do the honeymoon all over again (who couldn't use a two week getaway to Orlando and an Eastern Caribbean cruise??!).

*snorffff* *cough* *cough*

Well I'm officially sick with a cold. It's pretty crappy considering that this is one of the nicest weeks in September so far, and we're still not working in the basement yet. Wait, that could be a good thing, more time to rest up. The drywall will be done tomorrow (as I hear the drywaller working on something outside around the side of the house). Trevor is all pumped up about starting to prime, and I'm going to catch up with that enthusiasm just as soon as I can breathe through my nose again.

I was looking through some photos of when we were at the insulation stage yesterday. Wow, have we come a long way. Here I am being all retrospective and it's only the halfway point! (okay, maybe a little further than that)

That was so three days ago...

Here's the cake that actually TURNED out. Despite a few strange icing recipes (is it supposed to be the consistency of oatmeal?) I finally found one that worked and worked well. And it did taste as good as it looked (raspberry and white chocolate...mmmmm).

We had a semi-slow weekend, birthday dinner on Saturday (we made the BEST rotisserie chickens on the bbq, must note to do that again), and I went out to Metrotown with Cynthia on Sunday. I think Trevor and I are both still trying to get out of the routine of seeing each other for 24 hours everyday like we used to. It can be very strange because we were with each other like that for two and a half years -- and we didn't rip each other's heads off, it worked quite well. When the weekends come around now we both just have the feeling of wanting to bunk down and just have time to ourselves, which I think we'll do this weekend.

Even though we don't see each other all the time now, we still manage to share each others GERMS. Trevor had a cold last week, and I managed to catch it just in time for an important presentation with a new client today. I made sure to drug up, but still found myself feeling woozy and tired on the drive downtown (wait, maybe that just happens normally). Things went really well in the meeting (exact words to Trevor on the drive home: 'I killed!!!'), despite feeling -- and probably looking -- all hot, sweaty and clammy. No, no, no, not nerves, LOL. I think I hate that upper lip sweat you get the most when you're sick.

My mountain of kleenexes are calling...

Wish me luck...

I'm making another attempt to make a cake. Those who know will recall the memorable other attempts: 'The Slider', 'The Melter' and the 'Brain Cake'. LOL The last cake I made was a Barefoot Contessa chocolate cake that turned out really well and reaffirmed my faith in cake baking/assembly.

The one I'm baking today is a white chocolate and raspberry cake. (It's the F.I.L.'s birthday dinner at our house tomorrow evening and I REFUSE to eat another crappy lardy cake from Costco. BLEGH. So it's really more for me. ahahaha.) So far so good. I've had to make a few substitutions -- well one -- I forgot to get buttermilk at the store so I figure some sour cream and a little touch of milk should do the trick. Oh, and I also didn't read the part about THREE cake pans and I've only done two, might have to increase the baking time there.

But for some reason it's smelling like bread baking right now. I should go and check that I haven't put the bread I bought too close to the oven... Pictures to come!!!

Ode to drywall, and a rant

As I type, the drywall is having it's first heavy coat of mud applied, and all I can think is 'it's not me doing it!!!'. We've managed to have a relatively normal (if you call living in a storage locker normal) week. We're putting bets on the drywall being ready for priming next weekend. I'll be sure to post some photos of the progress before then.

What's really irritating to me is the new Home Depot ad on tv showing a guy and his family and how they finished their basement and owe it all to Home Depot (and with the help of 'Muskie' an employee). Oh and it's so easy, and we couldn't have done it without all the help and confidence that Home Depot gave us. Well that's all BS, seriously. Home Depot doesn't do it for you, and the confidence you get is by having your credit card ring up as being 'approved' when you're paying for more of your supplies. And don't get Trevor started on the guy who's trying to screw plastic to a stud ('you would never do that! what a retard!'). I wonder how many months that ad will run and mock us...wait, we're the ones who have subsidized that ad to begin with...

Is it Monday? No...

I've had the feeling like it's been Monday for most of the day so far. Kind of dragging a bit to get going this morning, but I went to the store to pick up a few groceries before lunch and I feel a little more human now. (Not to mention, how can you NOT be perked up by seeing all those lovelyyyy children with backpacks and walking to and from school! ahahahah! I love it!)

It felt very strange to not be working in the basement over the weekend. There were a few times that Trevor started to look twitchy, like 'give me something to do!' and we went out instead. We hit Ikea on Saturday morning instead of Friday night (combination of bad traffic and a headache; this does not equal quality Ikea time). That was a bad idea, everyone and their college students were there trolling the aisles and picking up supplies (and cutting in check-out line ups), and Trevor was twitchy there too, but in more of a 'get me out of here' sort of way. We did, however, hit the Cactus Club for lunch and I partook in a most delish bellini*, what more could you ask for before noon on a Saturday? I also had key lime pie there for the first time EVER (I know, I know) and it was to DIE for! Saturday evening was spent with friends, and having dinner at Kobe's downtown then on to a show at Yuk Yuk's (where one of the bitter chicks went a bit loco at some guy in the audience).

* The last time I partook in a Cactus Club bellini around noon I was feeling quite 'good' and insisted to Trevor that we needed to wash the car. 15 quarters, a drive in do-it-yourself car wash and one sweaty husband later (my job was pumping quarters in and telling him to scrub faster, the time was going to run out), we still had a crappy half-washed car.

Sunday was a bit of a blur (maybe from the late night?). We had a bbq over at the in-law's. Monday was a nice slow day. We wanted to wander around Fort Langley, but a bunch of shops we wanted to wander into were closed (including that really cool toy store) so we decided on the fly to drive up to West Van and wander around the Whole Foods there. That whole store is just deluxe and never fails to impress us, Langley could sure use something like that. (Oh and I did see their crazy muffins in the bakery but wasn't able to FedEx them over -- sorry Dana, Mom!). We bought some chicken sausages (apple and herb, lemon thyme) and I'm roasting them up tonight with some nice potatoes, yams, onions and carrots. mmmmmm! Fall dinner anyone?

Oh, and I'm officially addicted to that 'Sarah's House' show. Damn her and her money and good ideas! (And the nicest laundry room I've ever seen...grrr.) Perhaps when I watch the new season of Top Chef tonight I'll forget allll about it.