Nobody puts baby in the corner...

RIP Patrick Swayze.

This...is...awesome!

Three years...

This month starts my third (and final) bracelet. I chose this charm as it corresponded with our three year LIDiversary, and what is more fitting than a cake with three candles in it? I *had* to get it, didn't I? ;)




We've both been feeling down as we approached our three year LIDiversary and we knew we didn't want to be alone, so we invited some of our very good friends Lisa and Craig and Mark and Michelle over for veggie matzah lasagna, salmon and (what else) cake. Mmmm. (Those that weren't able to come here tonight were dearly missed.)

The day was made all the sweeter when we were able to Skype and talk to Nic, Tim and Zubin, though Zubin really didn't want any of it. ;)

Some of the highlights of the evening were when Sienna told everyone that she's "two point five" years old. How cute is that? Drinking "Golden Flow" orange juice...tasty. Having a wonderful time with wonderful people who feel more like family than friends.

I don't think we could have made it through the last three years of this interminable wait without all of you, both near and far.

The funny thing is, Josh never wanted me to start a blog in the first place. I can't imagine going through this wait without the incredibly strong friendships we've made because of it...or how crazy we'd be without it.

Thanks to Red Sand for tweaking the image so I could put it on our LIDiversary cake.

9/9/09

Just because...

...Josh came home with three dozen roses. *sigh*

Deuce's check-up

If you remember this post, you'll know the problems that we had with Deuce earlier this year.

We took him to the vet on Sunday because he missed the litterbox at some point overnight on Friday. Now that normally wouldn't be a big deal, but since we were told at his last checkup that he had stage one kidney disease, we wanted this checked out. He was eating and acting his normal self, but still it was very unlike him to miss the box. One thing that Deuce has *always* done, even as a kitten, he gets very hyper when he uses his box and tears out of there like a bat out of hell when he's finished. Josh thought that he might have missed the box because he got hyper and jumped out before he was done. :P

When we took him in, the vet did her examination downstairs, since he's always less than thrilled to be there. When she came back, she told us that Deuce was very good during the examination, almost to the point of being cuddly. At this point, I thought for sure he was sick, I mean, he doesn't let them touch him without trying to tear their faces off let his opinion be known.

She told us that they couldn't do the urinalysis on him, apparently he was 'empty', and they also didn't want to collect it in case they nick him...they wouldn't know if he had blood in his urine or if they had nicked him. It makes sense, but we got 'stuck' with the job of collecting it. YAY! ;)

When we got home we Josh had to wash out the litter box, dry it and we were given plastic beads to put at the bottom of the box. Apparently these beads mimic the feel of litter and are supposed to fool the cat. Sorry, but he's smarter than that. I put him in the box, rubbed his paws on the beads and he immediately jumped out. It didn't feel the same to him, plus she didn't give us very many...he's used to a rather full box.

Over the next 24 hours I kept putting him in the box, rubbing his paws on the beads, and again he would jump out several times. He got upset at one point, and just lay down inside his box. Poor kitty. :(

I ended up staying up until 4:00am Monday morning, waiting for Deuce to pee, with no luck. Yes, I know that sounds strange, but the vet told us that we had to collect the sample and run it over to them within an hour of Deuce producing it, or it wouldn't be good. I could go into details about it, but I'm not sure if you really want the history of cat pee. ;)

He *finally* decided to use the box 24 hours later - just as I was going to take a nap. I'm sure he was tired of the crazy lady me constantly putting him in there.

Long story short, we got the results of all his tests Tuesday evening. Apparently all his bloodwork and urinalysis came back 'normal', and now they're questioning if he really has kidney disease after all. He has to go back in six months for a complete blood workup, but for now, he seems to be in great health!

Mini reno

We decided to update our main floor powder room in the past week. It all went smoothly in the end, but OY the problems when we first started out.

As some of you know, I don't drive. Yes, I know I need to get my license. Whatever. We had already arranged to have our plumber come over last Friday (August 21st). The PLAN was that we were going to go out the night before and get the sink and toilet, so that when he came over, it would be a reasonably simple job. Well, something funny happened on the way to the forum.

Last Thursday we were hit with a tornado. Granted, it actually hit 15 minutes away from here, but we weren't going *anywhere* in that weather.

When the plumber called the next morning to say he was on his way, he asked if we got the sink and toilet (with a knowing tone that we didn't). I explained that I didn't drive, so he offered to take me over to Home Depot to get the items in question, rather than cancelling. How awesome is that? Before you ask, no he didn't charge for the hour that we were at the store looking at items.

We bought a toilet and sink which seems fairly ordinary, but the transaction turned out to be anything but(t). Who knew there were so many choices in toilets? We saw one that could flush a bucket of golf balls...it actually said that on the package. Have any of you ever felt the urge to do that?

I didn't think so.

We ended up going with the one that can flush 150 feet of toilet paper, because you just never know when you feel like unfurling an entire roll right into the bowl. *snort*

I'm fairly picky about things, and I found a faucet I really liked but it wasn't in stock. It was a 'special order'. We asked about the faucet, but everyone we asked didn't work in that department. We ended up leaving without the faucet. I decided to take matters into my own hands.

When we got home I went online and looked at the Home Depot website and found the item I wanted, but it was discontinued. I called up their 1-800 number and was told the same thing, but was given the number to American Standard. I called them up and asked where I could purchase it and was told "just go to Home Depot". GRAH!

I explained to the automaton operator that they were no longer selling it and she said "that's news to me!" I explained to her that I didn't really care if it was newsworthy to her or not, I just wanted to find a place to buy it. :)

She gave me three numbers of places to call. I called up store A and they put me on hold for about 10 minutes they came back to me and said that all their sales reps were busy and that I should call back in half an hour so what am I? chopped liver? I called store B and he said he could order it, no problem I told him I'd call him back. I called store C and was told "we don't do small orders, we're a bath refitter, but if it's a common item we might have it." umm, screw you lady...so I went back to store B and ordered it.

The plumber told me he would install what we had purchased and would come back another day when I find a faucet that I liked. Great.

He started unpacking the toilet tank and all was going well, until he unpacked the bowl. It was a different colour. It was packaged as white, but in reality it was bone. When you buy toilets it has a little panel that you can look inside to make sure it's the right colour, but neither of us saw the difference between bone and white in the store. Ugh.

He ended up just installing the sink (without a faucet) and told me to return the toilet and get a faucet. When I had both then he would come back. No problem. It wasn't his fault and it wasn't mine.

VERY long story short, I picked up the new faucet on Wednesday, the plumber came back on Thursday...and without further adieu, I give you this...