I'm Back!

Just a quick post to let everyone know that I am indeed still alive. What a relief. Had a great vacation last week, and will spew forth another (longer) post tomorrow. Got to get back to work! 'Later.

Did I Move to Miami?

Another day, another post. And again, I have nothing much to say. But I have a wonderful gift in that I can turn nothing into an astoundingly long conversation. Or blog entry, as the case may be.

Well, yesterday I took the afternoon off of work. It was wonderful. I had to go to the BMV (the actual reason I took the afternoon off) to get my new car registered and properly plated. I thought I would be there forever when I saw the crowd in the waiting area, but I was only there for about 45 minutes. That left plenty of time to go shopping, where my husband and I may have picked something up for Bill and Tiffany. I will not say where we went or what we got, though, so don't even ask! I also found a great sale at Kohls, where I bought a pair of capris, a pair of skorts and 2 summery (is that a word?) shirts. This may be mere childsplay to some women, but for me it was quite an adventure. I love new clothes but hate to pay for them, so I'm not much of a shopper. I have clothes in my closet and dresser from high school and, yes, I still where some of them. Not the pants, though. Not quite that lucky.

Another thing I would like to address: Why is it so blasted hot? Usually around this part of the country it doesn't get good and hot until July. And sometimes not even then. But it has hit 90 for three straight days, I believe. And tomorrow it's supposed to be 87. Not that I am complaining exactly. I would so rather it be hot than cold. I can stand outside in 70 degree weather and shiver, so imagine what I'm like in the winter when a "warm" day is when it gets above freezing. If I was single and orphaned I might consider moving to Florida (or somewhere equally warm). I would miss the snow, though. There's nothing better than snow during the Christmas season.

And for my final rambling paragraph of the day, I would just like to say that I'm very much looking forward to the vacation that hubby and I will be leaving for in 3 days. A cabin in the mountains may not be a luxury resort on the beach, but it ranks a close second. Especially since there's a hot tub on the deck. We will be trying extra hard for that baby next week, I guarantee you that! And with that lovely mental image, I will turn my attention elsewhere. I wouldn't want to go and offer TMI again. I have a bad habit of doing that. Poor Matty.

Could Use Legal (Spiffy) and Plumbing (Anyone?) Advice

So, I'm getting really tired of the managment of our apartment complex. We've lived here for about 13 months, and enjoy it. It's relatively quiet, kept up pretty well, etc. However, we've had an ongoing problem with the neighbors downstairs complaining about water leaking down from our bathroom into theirs. Everytime the maintenance guys would come up to see what the problem was, they would just end up re-grouting (I think that's how you spell it, but I'm no handyman) parts of the bathtub tiles. They also replaced our water faucet. Well, that didn't fix the problem, so management decided that we must be splashing a bunch of water out of the tub during our showers and had the maintenance guys install shower guards. Now, my husband and I remained pretty silent through all of this, even though we know for a fact that we are not splashing out of the tub. We are 2 grown people who have figured out how to properly utilize a shower curtain. But now we have started to get pretty upset about the whole thing, because quite a bit of the vinyl flooring in our bathroom has started to turn a rather ugly grayish green, mostly between the toilet and the tub and in front of the sink. Mopping does not clean it, so we can only assume that there is mold growing under the vinyl. And then yesterday, all hell broke loose. When I came home from work, the bathroom floor was a mess. There were actually puddles of brownish water on the floor. Our bathmat was wet, as was the carpet outside of the bathroom. And the toilet, sink, tub, etc. were all acting like the water had been shut off (emitting brown water and spurting at first when we turned them on). We called the front office but it was too late for them to send anyone, so I just mopped the floor. But we made sure to take pictures first! Now I am sure that this water that was on the floor came out of the toilet tank. The towel that we have draped over the top of it was wet. But now the apartment management (who still insists that the whole problem is a result of us splashing out of the tub) says that the water was indeed shut off for a few hours on Friday, and that's probably the cause of the mess. Well, I don't know about any of you, but I've had my water shut off before and it did not cause the toilet tank to explode. There is obviously a bigger problem in our bathroom than they want to face, but today my husband told them that if they didn't send out a plumber (a real plumber, not just their inept maintenance men) then we would be sending a letter to the city about our mold and plumbing problems. Do we sound crazy to you, or do you too think that we are being given the run-around? All I know is, I'm ready to march down to the office and kick somebody's lying ass. And for those of you who know more about this than I, is there anything else we should be doing other than taking pictures and threatening to contact the city? And could there be another problem other than the toilet is screwed up? Just wondering...

Other than that, things are going well. It's Saturday, which is great. It's supposed to be 85 here today, and 90 tomorrow. That's a little warm even for me (one of those people who is always chilly), but at least our air conditioner works. For now. By the way Spiffy, I visited your wedding site. Very impressive! Looking forward to seeing you, Bill, Matt, and everyone else there.

The Gods of Travel Hate Me

I'm back! Who missed me? Come on, don't be shy. There must be someone.

Anyway, so California is a nice place, I've decided. Well, at least the very small part of it that I got to see is nice. The weather was just about perfect. I took a bunch of pictures of palm trees because, let's face it, Indiana girls like me just don't get to see palm trees that often. I wish I had gotten to do more touristy type stuff, but I was there to work not play. Although the last evening I was there, I did take a shuttle to Downtown Disney to do a little shopping. And I had dinner at a Rainforest Cafe. I've always wanted to eat in one of those, but never had gotten around to it. I sat through 2 thunderstorms and a bunch of monkey noise, and have decided that that place is kick-awesome.

I did have a rather bad experience on the way home from California that I would like to share. I got to LAX about an hour and a half before my plane was supposed to leave. Once I got to the gate, I noticed a bunch of people standing in a line at the counter. Why? Because they had overbooked the flight and decided to change planes. So, we all (and when I say all, I mean all 200 of us) had to stand in line to get our new boarding passes with different seat assignments. But, amazingly enough, they got us all boarded only a little behind schedule. So we start to taxi, and then we stop. And we don't move for like, 10 minutes. And then we hear the captain start to say something about the auxillary power valve not shutting like it's supposed to, and how we're going to have to go back to the gate so the mechanics can manually close it. Then we start taxiing back to the gate when we stop again. The problem had fixed itself! We finally took off, about an hour later than we were supposed to. To make this part of the story shorter, I'll just say that we landed at O'Hare at 3:30pm, and my connecting flight left at 3:45pm. After making a mad dash through the airport, I found that my plane had not taken off, but the doors were closed and I was not allowed to board. They also couldn't get me on another plane until 9:35pm. Grrr. I called my husband, who told me about a shuttle that left at 5:15pm that would get me home by 8:00pm. So, I paid $33.00 and got on the shuttle. Well, wouldn't you know it, right about at the Illinois/Indiana state line, a truck lost a load of steel all over the highway. So the busdriver took us to our stops via the city streets. I finally got home at about 9:30pm - 5 minutes before my flight would have left! So at least I didn't get on the shuttle for nothing. All I know is, I've had it with airports for a while. And shuttles. I'm just driving myself everywhere I need to go from now on. And maybe I'll get a pilot's license too. Hmm...

Anyway, that's enough rambling for now. Everybody enjoy the rest of the week! I'll try to do the same, although it's very hard to be back at work after a week away. At least I only have to get through next week and then...vacation! I can't wait.