Is It Indian Summer Again?

So, we had one week of cold weather complete with a bit of snow and now we are back to the springlike temps. It's actually that weird temp that it's too cold for a sweater and too warm for a coat so you spend all day removing and adding clothes, never quite comfortable in whatever it is you have on. I've heard from Adam who is still planning on coming home so I guess I'll start arranging things on my end. I'm trying to keep it level since the last two times he was supposed to come it got cancelled. I was looking at the pictures we took, how different everything is now! David and I managed to get half a day of Christmas shopping in yesterday, I'll finish up on Friday and then spend the weekend packing it up. With the warm weather it's hard to get into the spirit of things and of course David has that stinking tradition of putting the tree up on Christmas Eve which I have changed a bit over the years but not much. I HATE THAT - like you don't have enough to do on Christmas Eve and then the person who swears it's his family's tradition refuses to help since apparently his MOTHER traditionally did the whole thing while the rest of them sat on thier butts and watched. This would be how the tree thing got moved a week up since I told him if it was his tradition to knock himself out decorating. La la. And to add to the mix we now have two potential tree-wreckers to keep an eye on - Pearl of course and Vincent who considers it his playground. I'm on call this weekend which is alright - at least it's only every 3 weeks

Eek! How Many More Days??

David finally put up some Christmas lights outside yesterday so we can participate a bit in the nightly lightshow. We cannot compete with our neighbor who at this point has an entire snow people family, full size nativity (with a 5 foot cross), reindeer, sleigh, santas, and has outlined his entire house and yard in lights. It's fun to look at but I'm glad I'm not the one who will be taking that all down. David and I are going shopping today and will hopefully get everything off by this weekend. I haven't heard from Adam whether he'll be coming home or not for sure which is driving me crazy as I do NOT want to take the rest of my vacation in the beginning of January if he's not coming home, that would suck. David has still not been paid by that woman - he's sent her a couple of bills by registered mail so he has gone to plan B. He called a lawyer he'd done work for and asked if he could write a letter to Maureen (someone had told him they do that for a nominal fee). The lawyer replied he would be more than happy to - he had a few small jobs around his house and if David would do them he would not only write the letter, but go to court with David and get his money. It's a pretty good trade - David is kind of between a rock and a hard place because if he takes her to small claims court she can drag this out and he can end up losing more money. So he's happy with bartering services. Charger has been improving weekly with his medications, he can now get up on the bed in the morning and sit with everyone which he hasn't done for months and go outside for hours with David while he clears the lot and not suffer for it later. We are very happy about that! It's amazing what pain relief can do, isn't it?

Damage Control

I have first of all removed the christmas CD from my car that contains the song "Percy The Christmas Poinsetta" as the second I hear it, it gets stuck in my head for weeks. It contains  poetic verses such as "even a plant with no uncle or aunt shouldn't spend Christmas Eve by himself". I have no clue as to how that song exists or the fact that anyone would owe up to writing it. I'm showing the pictures I sent to the adjuster the other day of the "damage" to my car - the only thing that happened as far as I can see is I'm missing a deer whistle. How anyone could sustain injury is beyond me and I've come to the conclusion that my car is sort of like one that people refer to as a "chick magnet". Except mine is an "Asshole magnet" and as you can see, I am still wracked about it. We've been having a quiet weekend, I was watching tv with Jackson last night which I find intriguing as  his viewing choices are sort of erratic. First we watched Histories Mysteries! and learned all sorts of ancient mummy facts. Then we saw an hour of the Exhibits Of The Smithsonian including a history of the benefactor. This was followed by the highbrow movie "Conan The Barbarian" featuring Arnold in his heyday. I wanted to see "Mean Girls" and Jackson quickly claimed he'd seen it already - I said Really? YOU sat and watched Mean Girls? That would be when I discovered Jackson will claim to have seen something in order not to - pretty slick.

Still In The Woods

I got a call from the insurance company today - sigh. I figured since I hadn't  heard anything for the past week  and there was no damage to either car I was out of the woods but alas, that is not so. They just hadn't gotten the paperwork yet. She hasn't talked to the two women in the car I bumped but said when she called one she got the husband who said he'd give her the message when she got "back from therapy"  and had a laundry list so the adjuster said her gut reaction is they will be making claims. I am just disgusted with these people, I really didn't bump them that hard, but I guess a free hand out is a free hand out. It's upsetting that every little accident around here ends like this - David and I have never claimed for something that didn't happen so I guess we expect the rest of the world to be honest. On the upside my wrist is finally feeling better and I'm leaving the splint off for  now. Maybe I should sue Pearl. We still haven't gotten the house decorated, maybe this weekend. The temps are back up in the 50's but are expected to drop down and then possible snow for the weekend. We're having the usual shinanigans going on in the office, I could use a break from that too.

The Deep Freeze

The weather around here is killing me - we broke the record on the weekend with a high of 74 degrees. Then that cold wind blew in and we are stuck in the 20's. I went walking early yesterday and will need to dress better - the trail on the river is very cold. This morning the wind is howling so there will be no walking this morning. I do have a treadmill but have been unable to convince David to install SOMETHING - he doesn't seem to get it's a bit boring to walk on a treadmill in a dark corner of the basement facing the sump pump. Gold's Gym it is NOT. My wrist continues to hurt but is less swollen. I had them give me a velcro splint so I could get it on and off easily for my work but the movement I have to do for infusions is aggrevating it. Yesterday after starting the infusion I borrowed the ice pack from the medication which made the patient laugh as she felt the nurse was in worse shape than she was. I've shown my wrist to Pearl The Ungrateful who doesn't feel she should be made to feel guilty about it. Jackson has been home for the past two days - he's got the flu so he wont be back in school until tomorrow at the earliest. Vincent the cat has been taking great advantage of the situation and not getting out of bed all day - he is such a rat. 

Down On The Farm

Yesterday we finally went out and saw Susan and Roger's farm - it's pretty far (over an hour away) and it's way WAY in the backwoods. The view is spectacular and they have about 150 acres all told, including outbuildings and a pond. They had a couple of benches and the old oak flooring from the funeral home in Mannington they're giving away. David took one bench and is going to measure the back room(the former hot tub room) he's currently working on for the flooring. The whole farm is beautiful, they have a log cabin on it that they're currently rehabbing slowly and at the present, it's used for hunting. We should've brought Pearl, but didn't but they had Buddy with them who was having a grand time bouncing around the place. David will be going back to help them put in a couple of windows upstairs and will get the flooring then. In other news I might have to seek medical attention and Pearl will most likely be doing some time in obedience school. She is still leaping at people when we go walking and yesterday I had the leash wrapped around my wrist and she decided to put a little extra "umph" into her leaping routine. Ouch. Work has been getting increasingly hairier but Susan will be back on Monday and things will go a bit smoother then!

An Update: I did go to the doctor's today and got a nifty black brace for my sprained wrist and a prescripton of naprosyn - I am unable to knit so I'm considering just perhaps lying down and passing away gently into the night. However, since I have to work tomorrow that will not be possible. Damn.

Pearl As An Artform

David must've read my blog and the decorations are down from the attic. Of course the tempeture has gone up again so it will most likely be yet another balmy day. This does not do too much for the Christmas spirit, does it? I finally took the CD out and replaced it - it's hard to get into Jingle Bells when you're wearing sunglasses and the windows are rolled down. Work has gotten quite busy, I'm starting to transistion into the office but am currently wearing two hats which makes things a bit difficult. Today I don't have to start until 11 so Pearl and I will be down by the river being our usual menacing selves. I'm not oncall this weekend and am planning on doing not too much beside cleaning out my car and swamping out the bathrooms. Charger is doing very well these days, since we started him on the rimydyl he's been pretty much painfree - he hasn't yipped or done that awful screaming in a couple of weeks and we've noticed he gets up much easier. I've got to get started on holiday shopping, I think everyone will be getting gift certficates this year - as I get older I think I prefer them myself because you can get twice as much in after holiday shopping sales.