So we are officially more than 1 week into the flooring project and not doing too bad. The houses is stacked up the ceilings with all manners of things here and there. We just have little space in the condo so while redoing the computer/future kids room we just stacked stuff as high as we could do in the other room. I am starting to feel more like a rat when I walk through the house. At least we are now more than 1/2 way done with the flooring project which is a very good thing. No more moving things from one end of the room to the other several times in the same day.

On the work front, it has been a crazy couple of days now almost a week. The interm director I think it just not right. She knew coming into the office we where already full of stuff to do yet is giving us more to do, crazy. To make matters worse she totally knows nothing of technology which I find odd for a marketing person. We create more traffic on the site and then get penalized for doing it? Ok makes no sense to me I am just waiting for them to hire anyone and by anyone I mean anyone.
current mood : splitting migraine.

Up to our necks in bamboo and not even outside.

That is what it feels like lately, we have started to put down the bamboo flooring on our entire upstairs. What is bad about this is the fact the condo is so small. We would give anything for even a small piece of yard which would make the process so much easier. So the living room now has saw dust all over it from cutting and their are boxes all over the place full of flooring.

On the good side we did a fairly ok job of the hallway, only a couple of little mistakes but hey we are both new to putting wood floors down without any help. Only a little bit of the hallway is left which is a good thing. Of course now the question is what to do next, oh the joys of condo projects 🙂

After many months of waiting, I finally started my nightmare before Christmas tattoo. Any one that knows me knows I have been a Jack and Sally fan from way back. Hell half the time I call Kathy sally and she calls me jack so how could I not get something. Needless to say the Amazing Tracey from luckysoul came though yet again. She had me worried since I only heard from her a couple times before the appointment. I guess I have to get use to some people not living for IM and emailing. She did a few drawings and sketches and one of them was AMAZING, I cannot say enough how great it was and exactly what we had talked about. So many hours later it was done and I was estatic, and when I got home the wife was totally amazed too . . . Always a good sign.

Here is the photo, my skin is still very angry at me so it looks more red than it should.

On related news I saw a poster for Nightmare in 3d a few weeks ago when we where in Florida which was released last year (2006). Well it looks like they are going to re-release it to theaters sweeeet.

The Nightmare Before Christmas 3D (2007), 25th October 2007

Sad stuff, I may have not been current on his books (still on book 7 I think) but it is sad to hear the creator of a very good fantasy world has passed on. 😦

http://slashdot.org/articles/07/09/17/0243230.shtml

Just got back from a nice weekend in New Jersey visiting the sis (for her 30th birthday!) and nephew. I’m sad we could only stay for a little more than a day, time always goes by way too fast when we’re with them and I miss them so much already! Jeremy is getting so big–he is walking around (or should I say “waddling”?) and can say a few words like “Baby”, “Uh-oh”, and “Ball”. He is getting more teeth and smiles and laughs a lot, and he loves to copy what people do! If he sees someone reading, he will grab a piece of paper and start to “read” aloud too. Ahhh, cuteness! I will post some more pics up in a bit.

This summer has been a great one, one that I think we both will remember for a long time.  Just realized the other day we are approaching having seen 50 bands this year. Kinda crazy to think about that but hell of a blast.

Well Fall is quickly approaching which gives one pause to consider summer, but we are attempting to delay fall as long as possible! Getting away for labor day weekend, one of the last attempts before the craziness of the school year starts with my job. Nearing the cusp of fall this summer has been great. We saw tons of great bands, visit friends old and new, and just enjoy each others company. I find it hard to pick one event as the end all of the summer, be it 3 hour walks at the beach in Maine, finding out our friend sally is having twins, the 12 hour road trip or seeing my always favorite Kirsten Hersh and the great Matisyahu.  What I think personally I will remember about this summer is being able to spend quality time with Kathy. Taking a lot of fridays off, it was nice to just have lots of weekend to spend with my wife. One does ever appreciate the time one can spend with someone you truly care about. It makes you realize just how great some people in your life are and how some surprise you daily in just how amazing they are.

We just got back from a nice weekend at the Cape. My Aunt rents out a little cottage by a private beach in South Dennisport, and she was nice enough to let us stay for the weekend.
The beach nearby was small and sea-weed covered, but it was nice to hear the ocean when we opened up the windows to the cottage to sleep at night!

The first night we were there we hung out in Hyannis-about 20 minutes south of Dennisport. We had some sandwiches at a little Italian cafe and then headed over to the Cape Cod melody tent to see yet another concert–this time Susan Tedeschi.

The Cape Cod melody tent is indeed a tent. It’s a relatively small arena so no matter where you sat you felt close to the stage–and the stage rotated!

She put on an absolutely amazing show. Her backup band consisted of a kickass saxophonist, keyboard player, and drummer. She was very sweet and humble about herself in between songs, but boy, that woman can belt it out! The one unfortunate part about the event was we had the misfortune of sitting in front of a VERY loud, very obnoxious drunk couple who talked through the whole show. They kept making comments about how bad Susan’s butt looked in her jeans (which it didn’t look bad! They just couldn’t find anything better to do). And whenever she sang a slower song, they blabbered on about how they couldn’t stand her slower songs. I wanted to turn around and deck them one, but they seemed like the kind of obnoxious people who would just talk louder if you asked them to shut up. So Chris and I moved outside where we could still hear and see Susan, and we enjoyed the rest of the show much better that way. (I hope those 2 drunkards get what they deserve one day!)

Day 2 of our stay we went to visit our good friends Sally and Shaari, who recently moved to Sandwich, MA from Northampton. It was great to visit with them, their new house was gorgeous and we had a nice time chatting and hanging out. We played frisbee with their adorable black lab, Dixie, went out to lunch and relaxed on a beach in town. We also found out the exciting news that they are expecting-gulp-twins!!

The rest of our day was spent playing rummy out on the front porch of the cottage (I totally kicked Chris in the butt with that game!), walking by the shore and eating out (mostly). We had some okay meals–Royal Pizza had decent pizza and Cafe El Dolce had nice sanwiches. The Sundae School had the best ice cream, and Woolfies bakery had nice blueberry iced coffee and cinnamon twists. Sunday morning we ate at the Breakfast Room, which was mediocre. The raspberry french toast I ordered looked like it was covered in pepto bismol–and kind of had that consistency too. Oh well, you can’t win em all…

We saw a lot of cool places to look at for next time we go.
It was only a short stay at the Cape but we had such a good time we’re hoping to go back later in the fall or earlier next summer. Gotta love being by the ocean!

Today is a sad, sad day for the donut empire. Chris and I have just found out that the GREATEST donut shop in Orlando, and in THE WORLD, just closed its doors. Yes, folks, Hotties Donuts is officially closed.

You may be wondering why 2 healthy vegetarians would be so upset over something which seems so opposite their lifestyle. Aren’t donuts the devil? Well, if you come to this conclusion then you must not have tasted the aforementioned donut!

We discovered said donuts on a (long, healthy) walk to a (healthy, vegetarian) Indian restaurant which we loved to eat at in Orlando. We spotted the (fattening, unhealthy) donut shop across the way on our walk back.
We looked inside the window and found that a. Hotties does not, nor has ever used trans fats or animal-derived fats in their baking., and b. There were a lot of unique flavors to try. So we agreed that, since we had walked for over an hour, it wouldn’t hurt us too much to try just one. So we asked for a chocolate donut with peanut butter in the middle. When we sat down and bit into it, we realized what insane things people might do for such goodness.

So we took to walking to Hotties donuts nearly every other day in the Florida, oftentimes forgetting about the Indian restaurant across the way. We tried mint-chocolate donuts, orange-glazed donuts, and Boston creme donuts that would make Dunkin Donuts hang themselves by a noose in defeat.

I am certain grown men have wept when biting into a Hotties Donut. I was certain that I’d have pregnancy cravings of pickles covered in a Hotties cinnamon-glazed. Hotties wasn’t just a donut shop, it was a sensation. It put Krispy Kremes around the world to shame.

Now that I hear of the news I’m not sure what we’ll do. When we take our next trip to Florida, what will be our motivating factor for those scorching, long walks? (You see, Hotties did actually motivate us to walk more, so therefore it essentially was good for us….kinda…) It’s sad that we’ll never bite into a peanut-butter chocolate again. Hotties, we’ll try to carry on without ya, but it’ll be hard….it’ll be hard….

Today I had a patient who just returned from a 2-year military stay in Iraq (“this time it wasn’t my choice to go over there”, he told me). He presented with severe decay and advanced periodontal disease. He was so frustrated with the quality of dental care in the military, and it made me upset to hear it. He still paid his insurance premiums every month, only to receive the absolute bare minimum of care. He got no regular cleanings, and if decay was spotted on a tooth, even if it was a small and easy to restore spot, teeth were just extracted there. He did not want to lose teeth so he refused to have them deal with the decay. So he is now dealing with some major restorative work that could’ve easily been prevented.

I know we talked about healthcare in a previous post. But this outrages me, and it’s frustrating that, in all aspects of healthcare for military personell, this case is not surprising. Not only is there a nationwide healthcare provision deficit, but the lack of healthcare provided for our military-in and of active duty-is simply atrocious. Injured vets are paying out of pocket and/or yet to recieve care for benefits promised to them from the army? When all the troops come home (I should say “if” the troops come home), this problem will only magnify tenfold and increase mistrust in our government (trust and government no longer go hand in hand). I’m not an apple pie and Ford kind of American, but doesn’t this just seem unpatriotic?