Skullfuckin'

We've lived in our subdivision going on nine years now. There are houses on either side of us and a couple across the street. We are acquaintances of our neighbors across the street. They are a really nice family and we've had them over for barbecues and whatnot a few times.

The house above us has had three owners since it was built a few months after we moved here. I knew the original home owners through work and it was obvious from the moment they moved in that they wouldn't be there long. When they were foreclosed on they stripped the house of anything of value and disappeared. The second owner rented it out to a pretty nice couple for a year or so and then they moved on. He sold the house after that. I haven't had the chance to get to know the family that bought the house this year but they seem pretty nice as well.

The house just below us was owned for a few years by a really cool family who we became friends with and our children played together. Unfortunately the husband ended up taking him a job with a hell of a commute. He works on the North Slope in Alaska. He works a week and then takes a week off. They decided to move to the midwest to be closer to family as well as halfway to his job. I hated when they moved. The second owner (who still owns it) is a semi-hot chick that we got to know a little bit. She's pretty cool but unfortunately decided to rent the house out last summer to some folks from the area. It's not that they aren't nice people or anything but it seems as if an entire fucking clan is living there. Trucks and cars parked all over the yard, people coming and going all the time. I just get a weird vibe from them. The good news is that this larger-than-life family is in the process of moving out. There's a dumptruck looking trailer sitting out from right now that they are throwing their shit into. They can't seem to pay their rent on time so the chick decided not to renew their rental agreement this year. I can't tell you how happy that makes me.

She's got the house on the market again but if it doesn't sell anytime soon she and her fiance will be moving back out here. They are both pretty cool, and he is in law enforcement as well, which is a nice bonus.

The fact that the large family next door is moving is what prompted me to write about it. I was actually in a much more snarky mood than what I have written, I just decided I didn't feel like being an asshole about it. It also got me to thinking about how we don't really know a lot of people in the neighborhood very well, which is a sad thing. I don't even know the name of the newest group of neighbors and the husband works at the same school as my wife.

Being as how I'm not exactly Mr Friendly I don't guess I'll be rectifying the situation any time soon, it just seems to distress me a little bit.

Found this via @Stevehuff. Yuck.

OMFG. If you are familiar with The Onion then you know exactly what to expect from the video. If not, then you need to go visit.

The energizer bunny by god. That's me some days, or at least it feels like it.

I didn't sleep for shit last night. In bed at midnight, up at 2AM, up again for work at 5:30ish. Although it was officially my day off one of my managers is off as well so I am responsible for staffing and whatnot. Wednesday being payroll day I had to show up at 6:30 and send that stuff to the office and then pressure wash one of the sidewalks at another one of my stores. I managed to finish that stuff up shortly before lunch so went and got a haircut, which looks mighty fine, I might add.

Arrive home at noon, plant a bunch of flowers, vines, a bush or two. Cleaned out the other pond, which was really nasty. Nasty enough so that I couldn't see my hand when I stuck it in to pull out the plants. Got this one huge 3'x3' mass of lily pad roots and miscellaneous garbage that they have grown around. From the bottom it looks like hundreds of snakes or worms all wriggling around. Like I said, fucking nasty. Trimmed back the Wysteria and wove some of the extra in around the wiring which brings us to right now.

I also put in some kind of pond grass that the wife picked up from a friend. Half of it in the pond and the other half just outside as an experiment to see if it will grow. It get's these really cool purple flowers but other than that I have no idea what it is.

Now that I've showered and am starting to fel a little better I think I might print out a burn permit and get rid of a couple of piles of brush that are just sitting there calling my name. I'll have to wait a little while though. The girls have to be picked up from school in a half an hour or so and I need to put a couple of posts up at my other sites anyway.

Hell, the day's only halfway over. I'm sure I can find something else to do as well. I know my seedlings need to be watered but I can do some of them while I'm burning.

I know I've been remiss in posting anything lately, just don't have anything intelligent to say. Heck, I'm hardly blogging at the crime site or anywhere else since I've gotten back from vacation. Anyway, Happy Easter.

I ran across this over at Frizzensparks and just had to repost. Most assuredly not safe for work, but then again you probably aren't at work if you are here...

Oh yeah, I'm back from Disney World. No tramp stamp photos this time but I'll have others to post and the obligatory vacation post probably sometime next week.

I think I missed last week, but here it is...in the extended entry of course.

When Twitter first started up I thought it was a pretty stupid fucking idea. I tried it out and didn't use it very long but then for some reason I picked it back up and while not quite an addict I am 'on' Twitter quite often. My blog posts are broadcast on Twitter as well as other random bullshit. At worst it's a time waster and at best I use it to chat with other folks, not quite in real time but almost.

I came across this video earlier over at PhillyD.tv and it's fucking hilarious. Check it out...

This must be the year to replace appliances. "They" say that the average lifespan of appliances is usually about ten years, give or take. Hell, we've had our washer for fifteen years or so and think the dryer is at least twenty but my kitchen stuff, now that's an entirely different ballgame. I think the kitchen is telling me not to be foolish with my money or something :)

Earlier this year I went ahead and made reservations for the happiest place on earth (whatever). We're taking the girls to Disney for spring break but I talked them all into camping there at Fort Wilderness. It's right in the middle of the resort, closest to the Magic Kingdom. By camping I figure I'm saving about a grand or thereabouts. So the week I made the reservations and paid for the trip (still a couple grand) my fucking stove/oven bit the dust. While I suppose we could could everything on the stove or microwave (because I am cheap as hell when it comes to stuff like that) I do like to occasionally bake as does the wife. So I bought an oven online. It's nothing major. While I looked at several higher end models, we are somewhat limited in space and I will have to replace that section of cabinets for anything nicer and bigger.

Flash forward to February. I've known for quite some time that my PC is dying. In order to combat that I do what all good IT guys do, I NEVER turn the fucker off. My hard drive was going bad and apparently one of my two power supply fans was going bad. I do back up all my stuff online so that wasn't a big issue but when it finally died I went ahead and bought a new laptop, which is really nice to have. Now that I've used it for a while I don't know how I went so long without one.

So this past week I set aside a bunch of money for the trip so that I wouldn't touch anything else. While our accommodations and meals and tickets are all paid for, we always spend a bit of money while there. It just can't be avoided. I'll still be able to do it but I will end up putting it on one of my credit cards instead, which I just hate. I much prefer to only spend cash I have on hand (in my regular checking account). Paying interest on lifestyle debt is just fucking stupid. Guess I'll have to anyway because my refrigerator died just this past week. Doh! We've been in this house almost a decade now so it's time to be replacing stuff but the fucker could have at least waited a few more months.

I didn't get off of work until seven last night and went straight to Home Depot and picked out frig. As with the stove I just stayed in the medium range. I did make a couple of upgrades that we've been wanting though. All black, side by side freezer and refrigerator along with ice and water dispenser on the door. That will damn sure be cool. They are supposed to deliver it sometime on Wednesday. For the time being I have all the freezer stuff in the basement freezer and my refrigerated items in coolers. Kind of a pain in the ass and I ended up throwing out a bunch of food when it first died but it's worked out OK. I wouldn't want to live out of coolers for long though.

After picking out the refrigerator I stopped and picked up some chicken from a fast food place and finally managed to get home a couple of minutes prior to nine last night. That's two days in a row I haven't gotten home from work until after nine. As I was pulling into my driveway the store I was running yesterday called (well, actually one of the employees did) to tell me they were out of something. Fuck. My head was already pounding as it was. I brought the food inside, told them I was going back to work and headed out. I finally managed to get home around ten last night. My head was pounding and I was pretty much a zombie for the rest of the evening.

That hasn't changed today. I am fucking exhausted and ready for my vacation. Four more days...