Getting friendly with the local wildlife

(Update: This actually happened a few weeks ago but MacGyver didn't want me to broadcast that he was gone.  I am so flattered he thinks I have so many readers...  He's back now.  So all you crazy hooligans looking to take advantage of our mailbox will have to answer to him now.)

I had a non-work related run-in with Tillamook's finest last night at my house.  About which I made the following post on Facebook:

One of my coworkers mentioned that this sort of thing only happens to me, and that these things probably occur in my life so I can blog about them.  I will agree with her on both of these counts.  Plus, I'm having a bit of writer's block about the wedding and need a break from writing about it.  Let me explain.

MacGyver left for California a few weeks ago to work on some property a friend of my Dad's is buying.  That means the dogs and I are batchin' it up in Cowtown for awhile.  Translation: we've been eating sticks and twigs for dinner and the TV has only been turned on twice.  And one of those was for the State of the Union Address.  By the way, did anyone else see that snarky look Michelle Obama gave her husband after he made that awful joke about spilled milk?  That's love right there.  When your husband is the President of the United States of America and you're secure enough in yourself and your marriage that you roll your eyes at him while he's giving the State of the Union Address.  That's love.

Anyway, I have a very overactive imagination when I'm home alone.  So does Mojo, by the way.  He likes to come flying out of a dead sleep at 3:00am howling his holy head off like a SWAT team is busting into our bedroom, when there is nothing there.  I just wish the velociraptors that live in our basement would show themselves once when MacGyver was home so he wouldn't think I'm such a sissy.

When MacGyver is gone, I lock all the little extra, superfluous locks in the house that in reality wouldn't stop my dogs from coming or going if they had a mind to, and I set up little boogie man (read: velociraptor) traps all over the place so I'll know if someone is coming to eat me.  I put the garbage can on the back porch, and leave the dishwasher door down so that it blocks the back door from opening.  I also leave all the outside lights on.  MacGyver is going to have a fit when he reads this.  The way I see it, it's like that feeling of security we get from blankets at night.  I saw this the other day and it made me smile:

Last night about 8:00pm, the doorbell rang.  Now, we don't get many visitors.  We're not social people, you see.  The neighbor is usually the only one who ever comes over, and that's only to talk to MacGyver.  He knows MacGyver is gone, so WHO THE HELL IS RINGING MY DOORBELL AT 8:00 AT NIGHT!!!

I actually figured it had to be the neighbor since I'm not sure anyone else knows where we live.  Except the mail man.  And he comes in the morning.

But no, it was the cops!  The cops showing up on your doorstep at 8:00 at night is never good, no matter which way you look at it.  If they're looking for you, you're screwed.  I was so flustered by the doorbell ringing and seeing that a police officer was standing on my porch, that I didn't think to lock my dogs up, so they were going ballistic around my ankles.  Probably getting ready to eat them some velociraptors for dinner.  Yum.

I opened the door only to realize neither of us could hear anything because of my 14 pound vicious attack dogs, so I closed the door in his face and ran to lock them up.  Not one of my brighter moments, I realize now, but he only looked mildly startled.

He had a very thick looking summons in his hands, along with several other documents.  He asked me if my name happened to be a particular name of someone he was looking for.  When I explained that no, that wasn't me, and furthermore I'd never heard of her, he asked if she lived with me.  (I just told you I'd never heard of her, dude, duh.  Pay attention!).  I said no, and he showed me the documents with her name on them, and our address!  I explained that we'd been at this address since 2006.  He kind of chuckled and said, "well, someone is getting away with something pretty big here!"  Then he was on his way.

I was super creeped out by some crazy lady using our address, and when I told MacGyver about it he was all like, "lock all the doors and turn on all the outside lights."  And I was all like, "way ahead of you buddy...".  Who's the sissy now, hmm?

A few of my friends and I had a good chuckle about it on Facebook for a few hours and I wet to bed and forgot about it.  The velociraptors stayed in the basement too, God bless them.

But then when I got to work this morning another coworker who had seen my post asked me about what happened.  When I finished telling her that I thought it was weird that I don't remember seeing any mail for her come through, she aptly pointed out that this woman could be sifting through our mail during the day before we get to it at night and pulling her mail out!  BECAUSE I DIDN'T HAVE ENOUGH TO WORRY ABOUT WITH THE VELOCIRAPTORS.


Tonight, when I got home from work and got my mail (none of it for her), I resolved to do something about my little mail prowler.  I wrote this note and taped it to the inside of our mailbox:

I'll keep you posted.

No, this house is not abandoned.

The paint on our house was a little worse for wear when we bought it. After three and a half years of rain, neglect, and winds that would make folks in Florida want to call their insurance providers, our house has started to look not unlike a crack house.




MacGyver and I have talked about painting it for awhile. Well, three and a half years, actually. We're good at talking.

But after I came home to my new front yard I started realizing how bad the house really looked. MacGyver mentioned how great it would be if the house could be painted by the time my grandmother visits at the end of the month.

On Saturday, about 2pm, MacGyver said, "what do you want to do today". I said, "let's paint the house!" And he said, "okay!". Actually it didn't go down quite like that, but this version is better so we'll go with this one.

I'm going to regret saying this on here, especially after my little tirade before, but we ended up going to The-Hardware-Store-That-Shall-Not-Be-Named to get paint. For reasons I shall also not go into here. And in defense of that particular store, it was an uneventful visit. With no extra trips back required.

MacGyver pressure washed the house until 10:30 that night. Thankfully our new neighbors (delightful folks!) were moving in at that time so they weren't bothered by their crazy new neighbors who apparently like to pressure wash their house in the middle of the night. The next morning we masked off the windows (well, most of them anyway) and MacGyver got to spraying. My parents lent us their paint sprayer a really, really long time ago. And we just sort of never gave it back. Oops.

Hmm...awkward...

Anyhoo...

I picked out the color I thought was the color I wanted: a dark, charcoal gray. But as it turns out, I picked a shade darker of the same stupid color the house was already painted. It seriously reminds me of Civil War uniforms. You know, a nice, happy color. Overcast blue. Blue-gray. Civil War Blue. Tut tut, it looks like Crayola forgot to take his Prozac this morning. It's depressing. And I hate it.

However, I have been informed that hating the color you picked out yourself is evidently NOT a reason to repaint the house. Even if it looks stupid. And seriously depressed.

So I'm working on LOVING the color of our house! Perhaps I'll pierce the eaves and give it a tattoo on the lower part of the back porch. Then we'll have the goth house. And we'll be cool. 'Cause it's cool to be angry and depressed.

Okay I'm done, I promise. Despite that the color is not my favorite (by a long shot), it does look sooooooo much cleaner! It looks fresh! You know, like the goth kid who finally washed her hair for the first time in three months. And the happy front yard takes off some of that Marilyn Manson edge.






At least until I convince MacGyver to repaint it.

Painting the roses...gray?

I wonder what the queen of hearts would say about this.

Cue the lights and violins

I came home from work on Friday to this! MacGyver came home from working all night, stayed up all day and re-did our front yard HGTV style. He wanted to have it all done by the time I got home to surprise me! This? This right here is why I love this man.

Raindrops and Whiskers

I had to do an exercise in a training recently where we had to list some of our "favorite things". It took a great deal of strength not to channel my inner Julie Andrews and jump up onto the tables singing, "Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens..." I know the whole soundtrack by heart. What? Don't judge.

I sat and listened to some other people listing off things I too enjoy, like that deep belly laugh little kids do when they've just cracked themselves up, a hot cup of coffee and a good book, the Internet!, funny movies, anything with glitter and rhinestones (that one was on my list, obviously), and then it was my turn. I piped up with: INDOOR PLUMBING.

It's probably a good thing I didn't start dancing around and singing like the scandalous nun in Sound of Music. I don't think indoor plumbing was on Fraulein Maria's list of favorite things, and in a room full of mental health people, you start talking crazy and people raise their eyebrows. Then I had to explain myself.

About a month ago, MacGyver texted me at work and says, "our basement flooded". And I can go around and around with him about why he would possibly send me a TEXT MESSAGE saying that, but there really is no easy way to tell someone the basement flooded. We're looking into texting etiquette classes.

So I call him, completely hysterical, only to find out that I'm about 6 hours behind the rest of the world.

ME: WTF do you mean the basement flooded?!
MACGYVER: I don't know how else to say it. There was water, and it was all over the basement.
ME: Well what happened?
MACGYVER: I don't know
ME: What do you mean, you don't know?!
MACGYVER: It's gone now
ME: Gone? What do you mean gone? Just now?
MACGYVER: No, it went away after awhile

You can see how this conversation continued. Apparently MacGyver took a shower and noticed it after he went to the basement to do some laundry. I should mention here that MacGyver is a princess in the shower. I don't think I've ever known him to take a shower lasting less than 25 minutes. So when I say MacGyver took a shower, I mean he SHOWERED. And evidently all the water from his princess shower ended up in our basement. And then went away. There is a hole in our floor where water drains into from our washing machine. I know what you're thinking. And yes, IT RUBS THE LOTION ON THE SKIN. Are you happy now?

So we did what any respectable homeowner would do, and applied the "Car Noise" technique. You know the one, Turn-Up-The-Radio-And-Make-The-Bad-Noise-Go-Away. We shrugged it off, and promptly forgot about it.

You can guess what happened then. A few days later it happened again. Only this time it was worse, and it wasn't just water. Uh huh. Yep, there was poo in our basement. MacGyver quickly discovered that our main drain was clogged. Which meant anything that went down any drain in our house, ended up on the basement floor!

MacGyver spend the next 2 days snaking out the drain. First with a 25 foot snake, then a 50 footer, and finally a 100 foot snake. Mind you, we're at day 3 of no plumbing. That means no indoor plumbing. MacGyver was a champ though, and he used our Shop Vac to suction the water out of the drain enough for me to take a monkey bath in the shower and wash my hair so I could go to work. Our entire house smelled like an outhouse on an 80 degree afternoon.

As this little saga progressed, we were getting input from everyone who was a plumber, or knew a plumber, or watched a thing on plumbing on the Discovery Channel one time. And each person we talked to had a worse scenario than the last. By the time I talked to MacGyver that afternoon, I had been convinced that the roots of the huge tree in the backyard had worked their way under the house, collapsed a pipe, and they were going to have to bulldoze the house to fix the problem. And it was going to cost me upwards of $10,000 and a pound of flesh. You'll have to forgive me. I hadn't had a proper shower in 3 days. And MacGyver spent three days covered in poo. We were under a lot of stress.

At about 3pm on Thursday, day 3, MacGyver threw in the towel and I called Roto-Rooter. AND I GOT A VOICEMAIL. I felt like I had called 911 and was told to leave a message with my emergency. Did he not understand that there was POO! In our BASEMENT!!! So leave a message, I did. And I was careful to make sure he knew about the poo. It was traumatizing.

The message said they closed at 5pm. And at 5pm, he still hadn't called back. So I called the 1-800 number thinking maybe that would get me somewhere, and was informed that when you live in the sticks, they'll charge you your left foot and first born to come out from Portland. We decided it had been 3 days, what was one more? And mercifully I had Friday off. MacGyver, however, had to go to work. So I woke up at the crack of dawn and waited by the phone with the intention of calling Mr. Rooter at 8:00 on the nose. And then Hangup-Redialing until he answered the phone. No more leaving messages about poo.

But I didn't have to. He called me at 7:50 and cheerfully informed me that he'd be happy to come out in about an hour and take a little look-see into our plumbing problem.

He brought out what appeared to be a glorified pressure washer and blasted the crap (sorry I couldn't help myself) out of the pipe! He said MacGyver had been snaking right through the clog. Because of course he had. 3 days spent poking around in poo for nothing. Perhaps we ought to take up dairy farming after all.

And when it was all over, less than an hour later, he charged me $85! That's it! That's how much my cleanliness, mental health, and a new cap for the drain cost. God bless the Roto-Rooter guy. I wanted to hug him, and tell him I was forever indebted to him, and perhaps could I build some sort of worshiping shrine to pay him homage? But I didn't. I think he could tell though. He probably drove to the courthouse right from our house and got a restraining order.

For the record, I did try to get some pictures, but MacGyver got angry that I was taking pictures of him covered in poo, while he was trying to get rid of the poo in the basement, that was also covered in poo. I tried to explain that this was for the blog, and that inquiring minds would want to know about this. His response to that would be edited out of most syndicated programming, so I won't post it here. I don't understand him sometimes.

Fed up.

I swore when we had our most recent bad experience with a particular home improvement store that I would not speak the name of that particular store.  I have since changed my mind.
Are you ready?  LOWE'S!  See that?  I even included a link for you to go to their site just in case there was any confusion about which home improvement store LOWE'S! is.  Yes, all references to the home improvement store formerly known as Lowe's at our house have been changed to, LOWE'S! And no, LOWE'S!, I would NOT like to build something together.  Unless it is a very tall bridge from which I can fling you and all the horses you rode in on.  Actually, no, the horses can stay.

Let's back up a bit and I'll explain this little rant.

When we purchased this house we knew the heating sources were bad at best.  There are three big baseboard heaters downstairs in the main living and dining area, only two of which work; however, those were our "for company only" heating sources.  It costs us about $30-$40 a pop when we turn those suckers on!  Much too expensive for us to use daily.  We'd been looking around and toying with various heating ideas, but those are expensive too.  Like a thousand dollars or more.  And I'm a cheap-ass.

We also sort of figured that we ain't no stinkin' sissies and we'd just sort of tough it out through the especially cold weeks with space heaters and lots of blankets.  Uh huh.

Fast forward to December.  It had been a particularly cold week here in Tillamook, with temperatures averaging in the teens.  We didn't have any flooding this year, and I think Mother nature was feeling rather upstaged by El Nino.  This was her way of letting us all know she needed some attention.  Personally, I think Mother Nature could sue a little therapy to learn how to express her feelings in a more appropriate manner.

MacGyver and I had gone in to town and poked around at the various heating contraptions during those cold weeks, dreaming of a house in which we didn't have to peer around the fog made by our breath when we spoke to each other.  We compared heat output, cost of fuel, wood versus pellets versus ripping our house apart and installing ducting for a heat pump.  But the conversation always comes back to the one topic that is a perpetual thorn is MacGyver' side: I'm a cheap-ass.  And we left empty-handed.

I came home from work a few days later (and this is where I really wish I had taken a picture) to find MacGyver sitting in his chair, buried underneath every blanket we own.  Sticking up out of that mound of blankets were two small schnauzer noses, and he had a space heater sitting in his lap.  On high.  People, I swear to you that moment immediately ranked into the top ten most ridiculous things of all time.  Right up there with the Snuggie for dogs.

And that's when I said, "That's it!  Get your coat we're going to Lowe's!".  We purchased a beautiful pellet stove, complete with the little kit thing that you put through the wall so you don't blow smoke throughout your house or light the house on fire.  It took four guys and a forklift to get it into the car.  A FORKLIFT.  And just to clarify, we do not own a forklift.  So while I am watching this little charade of forklifting our new pellet stove into the car, I give MacGyver the one eyebrow raised look that asks, "How in the world is this thing going to get out of the car, through two doorways, through the kitchen and into the living room, sans forklift?!".  He just nodded and said "it's okay, I got this".  Uh huh.  It weighs 17 metric tons, but he's "got this".

It was late by the time we got back to Tillamook, and I was scheduled to leave at some ungodly hour of the morning for a conference in Salem the next day, so the pellet stove stayed in the car overnight.  I left the next morning for one of the most excruciatingly boring conferences I have ever been to, and while checking my phone every 12 seconds to see if it was 5:00 yet, I got this picture:

Because MacGyver is actually MacGyver come to life.  This, folks, is our back porch.  And what you see here is a 2x4 spanning the distance between the back porch and the Exploder.  He shimmied the pellet stove across the 2x4 and into the house.  If you have ever wondered how much weight a 2x4 can hold, now you know.  Roughly 17 metric tons.

Now, for many, this would be the part where the story winds down into a happy ending full of warmth and lots of happy fire.   I cannot tell you how much I wish that were the case.  Or how excited I was to come home to a WARM house for the first time EVER.  Except that didn't happen.

When I got home the next evening I found one very cranky MacGyver and the pellet stove in various pieces all over the living room.  I was informed that the thing didn't work.  Well, it worked, but only for a few minutes at a time, and then it would jam.  Needless to say I was unimpressed with the whole situation.

So I called Lowe's (which was well on it's way at this point to becoming, LOWE'S!), and I screamed and yelled and threatened that it would be OFF WITH THEIR HEADS! if they didn't come paint my roses red and bring the Jabberwocky over to heat my house.  And in that moment, Lowe's became, LOWE'S!

Okay actually I didn't, but I did get them to agree to exchange the pellet stove.  We just needed to bring it back.  Which, of course, is 65 miles away.  Because that sounded like fun.  So I got to witness the above pictured process in reverse, and back to LOWE'S! we went.

They exchanged our stove and gave us a 10% discount, which was agreeably better than me having to order all the playing cards to chop off their heads.  We brought stove number 2 home and MacGyver had installed in what I'm sure was record timing.

Cue the lights, orchestra and choir:

This seems to be the new favorite spot in the house!

My mother had a brilliant idea should we ever be forced to shop at LOWE'S! again: make our purchase, drive around the block, return said purchase and exchange it for a new one.  This way we can get all of that business out of the way without having to drive all the way to Tillamook and back.  Genius!

Of Mice and Customer Service

Because sometimes even the most well-intended plans fall apart.


A most miraculous thing happened at our house. We saved a little money. Holy crap!! I know!! I told you it was a miracle. So we started to take stock of some things that were dead, or headed that way, because Heaven forbid we should have money sitting around for too long.

On the top of the list were the windows in our bedroom. You can read more about that adventure here. We had been reminiscing about winters past, and decided this year we would not suffer through another winter feeling the rain and wind blast through our bedroom. We have replaced all of the windows in our upstairs except our bedroom. Windows are fairly inexpensive in the grand scheme of remodeling so we thought that would be a good next project.

The night we had agreed on the windows I was making dinner and noticed that it was taking FOREVER for our oven to heat up, and it just didn't seem to be heating up as hot as it should have been. I stuck a thermometer in there, and sure enough, "375" apparently means "310-ish" in our Oven-Land. Which was fabulous. Because ovens are not as cheap as windows. Especially when one is replacing one's appliances with stainless steel. And we're trying to save money.

We realized last night that we have been matching our kitchen appliances to our dishwasher that we bought a few years ago. It makes me think of that Kohler commercial where that woman meets with her architect in a fancy office and in a very dramatic fashion pulls a faucet out of her purse and says, "Design a house around this." Apparently that's precisely what we're doing. We're designing a house around our dishwasher. That's not weird, right?

One Friday while I'm at work MacGyver tells me he is headed to Portland for some errands and he was going to pick up windows for our bedroom. He said he was going to look at ovens and if he found a good one for a decent price he might pick it up. Even though I REALLY wanted a shiny new stove, I figured that I had fly's chance in a frog pond of actually getting one. Because we're SAVING OUR MONEY, remember?

So I come home from work and there is a brand spanking new stove sitting in the middle of my kitchen floor!!! He had hoped to have it all set up and installed by the time I got home. So there is the stove, and there is MacGyver. Super pissed. I can tell the difference between irritated and I'm-going-to-tear-the-face-off-anyone-who-looks-at-me-sideways, and he was pissed. Okay maybe not quite that mad. But he was pretty mad.

So I ask him what could possibly be wrong with him, since he just bought the most beautiful appliance I have ever seen since our new refrigerator!! He says nothing, and points to the stove. Now no one has ever accused me of being the most observant person in the world, but I really couldn't see the problem. It looked fine. Did I mention BEAUTIFUL? I told him I didn't get it, and he jabbed his finger at the sides of the stove where the knobs are. The back part that sits on top that has the oven display and everything? It has been horribly bent. It looks like the Incredible Hulk, or maybe Hulk Hogan, take your pick, has taken it and bent it forward so that the metal holding it onto the stove are buckled. More likely, it was dropped en route to the store. Now that it was pointed out to me, I understood his fury. We live in Tillamook. The store (which will remain unnamed for fear of future defamation lawsuits) is in Hillsboro. An hour away.

We agreed that I would call and speak to them about remedying this situation. So I called and spoke to Bob (name changed - refer to above feared defamation lawsuit). Bob assured me that he would exchange the oven no problem. We just had to bring it back to the store. Oh wait, no he doesn't have any more left in stock. Of course not. He would happily give us the floor model - that EVERYONE HAS TOUCHED. Would there be a discount? Oh, no of course not, it's not damaged. Nevermind this store sold a broken product that you drove it 62 miles home, and have to bring it 62 miles back. Fine. Whatever.

We drove back to the store and found Bob. He found us a manager to arrange the switch. The manager turns to these two stoners standing around probably contemplating how many bags of Cheetos their paychecks could collectively purchase, and tells them to go get a dolly to pick up the broken range and bring the new one out. We go to customer service and make the trade on paper. And then we wait. And wait. And wait. For 25 minutes. At which time Stoner 1 and Stoner 2 come out with a freezer. FOR ANOTHER CUSTOMER.

I should take this opportunity to point out that this freezer has a HUGE gash in the bottom of it. When the customer points this out, Stoner 2 says, "oh it's fine it's just a scratch." No discount for him either. I'm thinking this particular store should change their motto to "we sell busted stuff for regular prices!!"

When the store manager sees that we are STILL waiting, he asks Stoner 1 what they have been doing. Stoner 1 replies, "getting the freezer...ohhhh I didn't know what you wanted me to do with the stove", as he looks at us. Yeah, great buddy. Go smoke another bowl.

We've now been at the store for almost an hour. Stoner 1 tells us he's going to come help us as soon as he's done with the freezer. Whatever. We go out to the car and wait. Next thing we know, Stoner 2 strolls out of the store without his little apron thing. ON BREAK. He glances up and says, "Uhhh oh he'll be out in just a sec." Are you kidding me?

A few minutes later Stoner 1 comes out with Bob and switches out the stove. 248 miles, 5 hours and an extreme amount of tantrum throwing later, we have a new oven range!



It is wonderful. Our food cooks evenly! When it says it's heating up to 375, it's as truthful as a Boy Scout!! And the best part?

It matches the dishwasher.

An open letter to the traffic on our street:

Specifically those who choose to remove the mufflers from your vehicles. I'm talking to you.

You're very proud of the noise you generate. I can tell, because you step on the gas every time you pass our house. This causes our walls to shake, and our windows to rattle, giving the overall impression that our house is about to implode upon itself. It is not an enjoyable experience.

Actually, as I'm writing this, I realize that I should like to extend this letter to emergency response vehicles as well. I won't argue that your use of sirens is necessary. Though I find it very interesting that you have an uncanny knack for blasting your sirens past our house, and then TURNING THEM OFF two houses down. Because apparently it is very important for us to hear that you are on your way to an emergency. Really, it's just weird.

Storms make the situation worse. I realize that the noise coming from your vehicles doesn't necessarily get louder during a storm, but couple that with rain gushing in through old, poorly fitted aluminum windows, and wind threatening to huff and puff and blow our house down, it really does seem worse.

Yes, un-muffled exhaust-laden vehicles, you have proven to be worthy adversaries these last few years. But we have finally won a round with you. Oh yes.

Please allow me to introduce new addition installed into the front of our house, and the inside of our bedroom: NEW WINDOWS!



That's right boys and girls. Brand new, double paned, vinyl shiny goodness from Jeld-Wen. TWO OF THEM!! Do you know what this means? In case you've skimmed the rest of the letter to get to the pictures, I'll tell you. It means that when I am laying in bed at 11:00 at night trying to sleep, and one of you Speedracers goes blasting down our street in all your un-muffled glory, I CAN'T HEAR YOU. Nope. Not anymore. And when those sirens are screaming past our house on their way to an emergency, I DON'T HAVE TO KNOW ABOUT IT!!!

It also means that I will not have to layer my windowsill with paper towels during the winter to soak up all the water that leaks through. And I won't have to watch our windows bend and bow in the wind when it is stormy.

Score one point for our team. Actually, there are two new windows so I think that allows us two points. TWO POINTS for our team!

Plus, we can have the air conditioner in our room now!! It used to be in the spare room across the hall with a strategic series of fans and open doors to cool off our bedroom. Because we're sensitive flowers and do not enjoy the heat. Yes, I'm well aware of how ghetto it may make the front of our house look. And no, I don't care. But thank you for that opinion.

In conclusion, to all the loud, un-muffled, siren-equipped vehicles in Tillamook, if you should so desire to stage a parade past our house at 1:00 in the morning, I say BRING IT!!! Because I won't hear you.

XOXO


P.S.

A special thanks to my father for coming out to our house when he had hoped to be out fishing to help MacGyver install those windows, and even taking one for the team when one of the old windows decided to explode on him. By the way Dad, Snoopy Band-aids are definitely your style! :) Because let's face it, I talk a good talk, but I'm pretty useless when it comes to helping with a lot of this stuff! :) Thanks again!!!

There's no turning back now.

As if we would have ever considered that!

I worked a half day today and then went to Portland. My dermatologist was able to fit me in a week early. I had a bit of freckle removed. For those of you who care, it went smashingly.

Whilst I was gone, MacGyver was home making quick work of tearing the rest of the garage down!



See? All gone!! And we met one of our neighbors who (as we discovered today) has lived in the house for about 50 years. Nothing like waiting 2 1/2 years to meet the neighbors. He is a super nice guy too. Almost makes up for his dog who likes to wander over and poo in our yard. He came over to chat while we were outside. Probably wondering what the hell we've been doing the last few days! We're making quite a mess back there.

Now comes the icky clean up work. I've been given strict instructions by the doc not to lift more than 5 pounds for a week. Pity too. I could be out there helping...

Panorama

I created a panoramic photo-collage-type image using Windows Live. Brilliant download, by the way.



This is my way of making a tribute to this mammoth tree I have both learned to love and loathe.

And this, boys and girls, is how we do it

I came home from work today and found MacGyver working on truckload number three of garage debris. Looks like I made it in time for the exciting parts!

I like the way the tree looks looking up through the roof of the garage.




MacGyver busted out the sawzall to cut the sides of the garage so the front could come off.

This next part is the truly exhilarating bit. I took a video for full effect.



Pretty awesome, huh? Yeah, I thought so too.



Yeah, still cool.



MacGyver is cutting back the sides little by little so the whole thing doesn't implode on itself. (Yes, Bryan, that's the definition of implode.)



Now the garage is a much smaller, narrower version of its former self. More to come! If we're lucky the garage will be down by tomorrow night!

Back at it

After El Stinko blew up last week, demo on the garage was temporarily postponed. We were not so easily thwarted. El Stinko was back up and running yesterday and Garage Removal 2009 was back on track.

By the time I came home for lunch, MacGyver had already been to the dump once and was working on removing the rest of the roof



I think this is a nice shot of the bigger picture here. MacGyver perched precariously on what is left of the roof of the (very unsafe) garage, with the reason we're tearing it down looming over the top of him.



I didn't take a video of this part, but this picture was taken while MacGyver was demonstrating how many feet he could sway the whole structure back and forth, while sitting on top of it. He thought it was hilarious. I just kept thinking, "you do not have Aflac!!!"



This is a nice view from inside what is left of the basement. As evil as that tree is, I'll admit it is beautiful. And I'm going to miss it.

For emphasis

This is a video I took a few years ago during a windstorm.

I assure you it's much more dramatic than it appears in the video.

Demolition Day...sort of

Today MacGyver planned to dismantle the garage/lean-to/health hazard/outbuilding that actually decreased the value of our home during the last appraisal.

He spent about 2 hours busting out the roof of the garage and loaded up El Stinko (our old '72 Dodge Truck) to go to the dump. Apparently El Stinko had other plans and decided to blow up at precisely that moment.

Okay "blow up" might be a bit of an exaggeration, but it won't start. Which means no dump run. Which means the garage is not coming down. Which means the tree can't come down. And if the tree doesn't come down, there will most certainly be some sort of coup de etat launched by our Walnut Tree, which is unceremoniously trying to take us out. So you see, it is absolutely imperative that this tree comes down. Like yesterday.

Here is a picture of the demolition so far.

Here is a photo of El Stinko, currently comatose in the middle of the driveway.

The Beginning

This will be the first of many (not too many, I hope) posts about our impending backyard transformation.

Those of you who have been to our house (or have been within a sixty five mile radius of Tillamook) have seen the absolutely enormous Black Walnut tree growing in our absolutely not enormous backyard.

Here are a few pictures of this voluminous deciduous.







And one more, compliments of Google Maps.



I should preface the following with this disclaimer: I heart this tree. It was one of my favorite attributes to this house when we were looking at buying it. It's just too big. It needs to be in the middle of a giant field somewhere with wildflowers all around and squirrels taking up residence. If I could make that happen I truly would.

That having been said, this is no ordinary walnut tree. This particular tree undergoes an interesting metamorphosis every year around the end of fall, and becomes a giant, walnut-missile launching machine. These walnuts are extremely hazardous! They leave dents in the cars where they land. I'm not even going to begin to describe the agony that is caused by getting nailed on the head with one of these suckers. Seriously, the government should look into this for future warfare weaponry. They could classify it as Green Weapons of Mass Destruction. They could probably get a nice tax write off for it.

The other issue, besides the lethal walnut-chucking behavior of this tree, is that it is extremely windy in Tillamook. A few years ago we had a windstorm that broke the wind-o-meter at 124mph. This type of gusty wind breaks the branches of the tree (branches, mind you, that span over four properties on our block, and hang over the wires that deliver cable and power to all those properties, threatening nightmarish conditions every time a breeze passes through.) One year, a fallen branch took out the passenger side of MacGyver's car. Another time I came out to walk the dogs and found a 10 foot branch resting on the back of my car. Miraculously it missed it enough not to cause any damage.

I'm starting to think this tree wants to kill us.

After getting some helpful information from my parents, and doing some of our own research we discovered black walnut trees are coveted for the beautiful wood they produce. I'm all about recycling and planting trees, even serial killer ones. So I'd rather the wood was used for something useful rather than being burned or going to a landfill. We started calling around asking tree cutting people if anyone wanted to come take a look at our murderous beast.

We found a great company, JX3Hardwoods, right here in town that harvests high quality hardwood trees and makes wonderful things out of the wood. Here's the best part: are you ready? They are going to pay us to remove our tree. So they're removing our tree, taking the wood away, and paying us to do it. Yes, this is for real. No, we didn't tell them the tree is secretly plotting our demise as we speak.

Due to our ever booming economy, things have moved rather slowly (we made the original agreement in October); however, I'm happy to report that this potential assassin of a walnut tree will fire it's last missile sometime in July (fingers, toes, and eyes crossed anyway).

And to all you Tree-Hugging Hippies out there, yes, we plan to plant a new tree in its place. Something smaller. That does not bear round, smallish, concrete ammunition and require the property's occupants to carry extra health insurance. Maybe a nice soft lilac bush. Or a marshmallow plant...

An Open Letter to Termites

Dear Termites,

Please go away.

Wikipedia informs me that you are a social creatures that work closely together to sustain your colonies. You are considered eusocial (according to the ever-knowing Wikipedia), indicating that you have a system of dividing up labor responsibilities amongst yourselves, you have overlapping generations, and cooperative care of your young. I see we have some things in common, humans and termites. Yes, Termites, I have done my homework.

I could embrace our similarities and forge an unprecedented relationship with your insect family. Offer squatting rights, if you will. But I am not going to do that. Why, you ask? Namely, because I don't want to. I find your slimy, albino, leggy bodies vile and disgusting, and your behavior absolutely inexcusable. You're eating our house. And I need you to stop. Today.

Your occupancy has created a bit of an issue with the integrity of the posterior of our house. The door doesn't close properly anymore, and body-slamming the doors in my house is not a recommended contact sport. It is not even recognized by the IOC.

Eventually, the entire floor had to be ripped out and replaced. You remember that day, I'm sure. That was the day we poked at you with sticks and dug up everything you had worked so hard to build. I am generally a nonviolent person, and am willing to forgive mistakes. I understand a first time offense. Perhaps the initial Insect/Varmint/Pest removal completed before we moved in (compliments of Dan the Bug Man - thank you kind Sir), and two and a half years of residency have not been sufficient enough to indicate we live here now. When we discovered your existence, we asked you to leave, and made what we thought was a fair settlement with your Termite lawyers. Apparently you did not take that seriously.

Now we are declaring war. We are prepared to unleash the worst from every level of Mr. Alighieri's Inferno to eradicate your presence from our property. There are no squatter's rights in Tillamook. I've checked. And we pay taxes. Therefore, consider this to be your eviction notice, effective immediately. We will launch the nukes at dawn.



DISCLAIMER TO THE INTERNET: I understand I may have put a few words in this letter that have most likely flagged me on every government Anti-Terrorist Task Force list. I would like to plainly state my disclaimer that I have no intention of causing harm to anything living or dead on this Earth, apart from the odius insects holding court under my back porch. I do not possess WMDs or have access to unrefined uranium. Please do not tell the termites about this.

Joker's wild

It was just brought to my attention from my friend (thank you, Zack) that the Congress Brand playing card we found in the walls is apparently an old manufacturer of playing cards that used very unique pictures on their faces. I did some Internet sleuthing and found out that a deck in nice condition is worth a little bit of money online. Go figure! I think we'll keep our humble little joker wall-card.

New Bathroom!!!

This is by far the most exciting (and necessary) project we've completed on our house to date. I did a fairly good job of chronicling the processes this time so the pictures are all here. I suppose that's what happens when you don't slack off on the blogging...

Let's start by taking a stroll down memory lane to visit our old bathroom. Here it is folks. All 17 1/2 sq. inches of it. The shower stall was the size of a phone booth (Superman most certainly would have had a time of it trying to do his little changeroo in that confined space!!). The floor was squishy in several places and the toilet rocked back and forth a few inches to each side. Everything was rotting out and needed to be replaced. And we were more than happy to make that happen!!

First step, rip out that old shower stall! Yes, folks, that's where we showered for 2 long years.

The next step always seems to involve an enormous mess.

The plumbing was a bit tricky, but God Bless those nice people at the local hardware store. They set us all up with the right tools to do what we needed!!

MacGyver framed in the wall for the new bathtub area.

Then the new subfloor was installed!

First of the sheet rock goes up!

The bathtub does not belong on the bed...

It goes in the bathroom!!

Break time...

Tiling begins!!

Now for the upper part of the bathtub enclosure.

Last piece!!

Cue the violins and chorus...........

All done with the bathtub!!

and here is the spout...

Before this, our only bathroom fan was when the wind blew. Now we have a real one!! Our new ceiling fan!!

Texturing, texturing, texturing...

Finally some paint!

Painted walls by the tile.

Our new can light fixtures!

Now for a new toilet the only requires one flush and doesn't double as a theme park ride!!

Out with the old...

(gross...)

Installing the new subfloor. We pulled out the old linoleum and found such severe atrocities I chose not to document them. Suffice to say things were much worse than we had anticipated and all of the bad things are now long gone!!

In with the new!!!

Tiling of the floor begins!! It is the same slate as the bathtub surround.

Just a few more...

Ready for grout!

Sooooo pretty!!!

A few pictures of the finished product!

I created a panoramic view of the bathtub/shower area using Windows Live.

I like that the bathtub enclosure goes above our heads like a bat cave! :) I love our new bathroom.