Lots going on, let’s get right into it:
Wedding – I went to a wedding last Saturday (friends of friends).
The big drama was whether the ceremony was going to be held indoors or out. You see, it was raining sporadically throughout the day and the event planners needed to know where to set up. The bride said, “Plan for both” but you knew she wanted it outside. At the last minute, the weather cleared and everything went according to plan. As soon as the reception began (indoors) the rain poured down in buckets. Crisis averted.
Electrical Problems – I walked into my kitchen at some point last week and saw someone standing in my back yard. “Hello?”
I said from my kitchen (window open, of course). There was no response from him. He leaned lazily against my back porch and seemed to be staring into the sky. I walked out my back door and asked, “Can I help you?” He told me that my neighbor had called and said the piece of equipment that hangs over my yard was sparking and that lights were dimming. I told him that I still had electricity and didn’t notice any problems. The piece of equipment in question is a transformer (I think) and is about the size of a large trashcan. The telephone pole it’s attached to is actually grounded in my back-neighbor’s yard but it’s easier to reach from my yard. I don’t know what will become of that.
Renovations – The neighbors that I have always talked about (the father had recently died, they were piling junk on the driveway, etc) have moved out for good. A couple weeks ago one of the sons and some friends of his moved the remaining items out of the house in a couple of over-packed vans. It was a few days after that when a small army of handymen showed up in their trucks and started fixing up things in and around the house. Then a large metal container showed up (about half the size of the driveway) and I could hear things being tossed in as they echoed off the large metal chamber. It’s been a good week-and-a-half and the handyman guys are still over there working.
Moving Neighbors – On the other side of my house, the “other” neighbors have had a ‘for sale’ sign in their yard for 9 months. The same day the power company technician showed up in my backyard, these neighbors were loading things onto a moving van (and also the ones complaining about the electrical problem in the first place).
It seemed fast… one day they’re living there and the next day they’re not. Which leads me to…
New Neighbors – I come home from work one day (wink) and there’s a small U-Haul truck parked in the neighbor’s driveway – the ones that just moved out. I stand there a moment to see if I can see anyone coming or going but there’s no movement. It’s only been a day since the other folks moved out and now someone else is moving in. Every time I wander out, I can tell that cars have moved positions in the driveway, but I have yet to see anybody over there.
[Edit: These new neighbors are late night people. On both Friday and Saturday night they were out on their side porch talking very loudly. So loudly, in fact, I thought they were standing in my back yard. Not sure what to make of this – yet.]
Paying Bills – Now that I have the promise of a paycheck coming, I’ve decided to pay some bills that are due. I happened to look at a couple of them and there are options to pay online (I’ve always just written checks) so I look into it. The first one is a water bill where the amount changes from quarter to quarter. While I can pay it online, it won’t automatically deduct the correct amount each time it needs to be paid. I guess I’m okay with that reasoning so I’ll continue to pay it by check. The other one is for Sanitation. I start the online process giving them normal information: account number, name, address, etc. Then the fun begins. I get to the part where it asks me to create an account name and password. I fill out all the information and click ‘submit’. Okay, there’s something wrong with the password. I check all the requirements and give them another password. Hmm, still no go. I look at the rules for creating a password again – you know, “it must be 8 or more characters long, must include a capital letter and a number…” I’m usually on the other side of this deal but I make sure I’m well within the guidelines, and I am. I create passwords that the CIA would be proud of only to have them rejected by this website which keeps telling me what I already know. I read the statement again, ‘must be this, must not be that’ – Okay, I get it! I’m following the rules and it is coldly rejecting my password. Is there a number to call? No. I sent an e-mail to the only address listed, which dealt with any kind of support. To this day I still haven’t gotten a response.
Office Furniture – The day before I was to start my new job, my sister-in-law calls and asks if I can help pick up some office furniture that has been donated to the school where she works (and her children attend).
She has borrowed a pickup truck and we head out to the location. She got some really nice desks and chairs with some bookcases and other storage containers. There were a lot of computers there that I enquired about but they were already spoken for. At some point my brother showed up and helped move some of the stuff around. So we drove back to the school and ended up parceling things out in a couple different locations – some chairs went to one location, a desk here, another chair there. At some point in the night I tried to lift one of the office chairs out of the back of the pickup and strained my back BUT GOOD. It settled in nicely for my first day of work (those people must have thought I was walking funny on purpose, or something…). Remind me not to do that again.
New Job – As I have been dropping hints throughout this entry, I started my new job on Wednesday. It’s hard to tell what’s what in the ‘honeymoon’ phase of a new job. I’m fairly agreeable and everyone is nice so I can’t tell much at this point. At some time in the future the gloves are going to come off and I’ll see the real deal. Until then I’m reserving judgment. And if those gloves never come off that will be fine with me.
Whew!
Wedding – I went to a wedding last Saturday (friends of friends).
The big drama was whether the ceremony was going to be held indoors or out. You see, it was raining sporadically throughout the day and the event planners needed to know where to set up. The bride said, “Plan for both” but you knew she wanted it outside. At the last minute, the weather cleared and everything went according to plan. As soon as the reception began (indoors) the rain poured down in buckets. Crisis averted.Electrical Problems – I walked into my kitchen at some point last week and saw someone standing in my back yard. “Hello?”
I said from my kitchen (window open, of course). There was no response from him. He leaned lazily against my back porch and seemed to be staring into the sky. I walked out my back door and asked, “Can I help you?” He told me that my neighbor had called and said the piece of equipment that hangs over my yard was sparking and that lights were dimming. I told him that I still had electricity and didn’t notice any problems. The piece of equipment in question is a transformer (I think) and is about the size of a large trashcan. The telephone pole it’s attached to is actually grounded in my back-neighbor’s yard but it’s easier to reach from my yard. I don’t know what will become of that.Renovations – The neighbors that I have always talked about (the father had recently died, they were piling junk on the driveway, etc) have moved out for good. A couple weeks ago one of the sons and some friends of his moved the remaining items out of the house in a couple of over-packed vans. It was a few days after that when a small army of handymen showed up in their trucks and started fixing up things in and around the house. Then a large metal container showed up (about half the size of the driveway) and I could hear things being tossed in as they echoed off the large metal chamber. It’s been a good week-and-a-half and the handyman guys are still over there working.
Moving Neighbors – On the other side of my house, the “other” neighbors have had a ‘for sale’ sign in their yard for 9 months. The same day the power company technician showed up in my backyard, these neighbors were loading things onto a moving van (and also the ones complaining about the electrical problem in the first place).
It seemed fast… one day they’re living there and the next day they’re not. Which leads me to…New Neighbors – I come home from work one day (wink) and there’s a small U-Haul truck parked in the neighbor’s driveway – the ones that just moved out. I stand there a moment to see if I can see anyone coming or going but there’s no movement. It’s only been a day since the other folks moved out and now someone else is moving in. Every time I wander out, I can tell that cars have moved positions in the driveway, but I have yet to see anybody over there.
[Edit: These new neighbors are late night people. On both Friday and Saturday night they were out on their side porch talking very loudly. So loudly, in fact, I thought they were standing in my back yard. Not sure what to make of this – yet.]
Paying Bills – Now that I have the promise of a paycheck coming, I’ve decided to pay some bills that are due. I happened to look at a couple of them and there are options to pay online (I’ve always just written checks) so I look into it. The first one is a water bill where the amount changes from quarter to quarter. While I can pay it online, it won’t automatically deduct the correct amount each time it needs to be paid. I guess I’m okay with that reasoning so I’ll continue to pay it by check. The other one is for Sanitation. I start the online process giving them normal information: account number, name, address, etc. Then the fun begins. I get to the part where it asks me to create an account name and password. I fill out all the information and click ‘submit’. Okay, there’s something wrong with the password. I check all the requirements and give them another password. Hmm, still no go. I look at the rules for creating a password again – you know, “it must be 8 or more characters long, must include a capital letter and a number…” I’m usually on the other side of this deal but I make sure I’m well within the guidelines, and I am. I create passwords that the CIA would be proud of only to have them rejected by this website which keeps telling me what I already know. I read the statement again, ‘must be this, must not be that’ – Okay, I get it! I’m following the rules and it is coldly rejecting my password. Is there a number to call? No. I sent an e-mail to the only address listed, which dealt with any kind of support. To this day I still haven’t gotten a response.
Office Furniture – The day before I was to start my new job, my sister-in-law calls and asks if I can help pick up some office furniture that has been donated to the school where she works (and her children attend).
She has borrowed a pickup truck and we head out to the location. She got some really nice desks and chairs with some bookcases and other storage containers. There were a lot of computers there that I enquired about but they were already spoken for. At some point my brother showed up and helped move some of the stuff around. So we drove back to the school and ended up parceling things out in a couple different locations – some chairs went to one location, a desk here, another chair there. At some point in the night I tried to lift one of the office chairs out of the back of the pickup and strained my back BUT GOOD. It settled in nicely for my first day of work (those people must have thought I was walking funny on purpose, or something…). Remind me not to do that again.New Job – As I have been dropping hints throughout this entry, I started my new job on Wednesday. It’s hard to tell what’s what in the ‘honeymoon’ phase of a new job. I’m fairly agreeable and everyone is nice so I can’t tell much at this point. At some time in the future the gloves are going to come off and I’ll see the real deal. Until then I’m reserving judgment. And if those gloves never come off that will be fine with me.
Whew!