I lost my Silhouettes in the ocean because I was dumb enough to go into the ocean with them. See, I'd neglected to bring my Chesterfields (which I still possessed, pending the arrival of my new shades) but wasn't keen on wearing my $20 pair of contacts into the water for fear of losing them, so instead I wore my expensive pair of Silhouettes in. (I didn't know the exact cost at that point because I hadn't paid attention to that detail.) Yes, despite my obvious history of losing far sturdier and heavier glasses in the ocean, I once again paraded out in my light fluffy, nearly invisible Silhouettes intent on watery fun. After all, I had no intention of getting my head wet, right?
Mere moments after my nephew Kolby asked why I'd worn my glasses into the ocean, I was smashed about the head by a very slight wave, felt the glasses fall forward and they were gone. I have great reflexes, but they were gone before I could even fumble for them. I dove under water to search for them, but quickly discovered that the major trouble in seeing nearly invisible, rimless glasses under water is that it's very difficult due to them being nearly invisible and rimless. Also, it's hard to see anything clearly WITHOUT YOUR GLASSES!
Embarrassed, dejected, and humiliated at my own hand, I stalked out of the water and, soon after, stalked from the beach. The typical reaction our family had upon hearing what I'd done was to say, "AGAIN?!"
I put in my contacts and drowned my sorrows in Yuengling.
Jump ahead to our return home. On the answering machine was a message from Liz alerting me to the fact that my sunglasses had still not arrived because the company had pushed back the release date to mid July.
Well I'll fix them, I thought. I'll just cancel the damned order and have Liz fire me up some new Silhouettes as my second pair. And this I did. In person. To Liz herself. I hoped that my very presence would serve as a dare to say no or provide any more hassle.
Liz seemed okay with canceling the original sunglasses order and applying the money I'd already paid there to the new order of some Silhouettes. Then she told me the difference I would need to cover, which was to the tune of $260. I nearly shat.
"Wait. How much did the Silhouettes originally cost?" I asked, for until that moment, I only thought I knew a ballpark.
She consulted her notes, then decided that even though they'd had a price increase recently she would generously go ahead and give them to me at the original price I'd paid for the first pair, so I'd now owe $230.
"That's nice," I said, "but how much did they cost?"
"With lenses and frames and before insurance, it was $390" she said.
This time I nearly threw up. I was so stunned I barely caught Liz telling me she was going to give me a special 15 percent discount on the frames. Before I left, I asked if I could buy another pair of the Air Optix Aquas, as mine are past their official expiration date by a month.
"Did you need a trial pair or did you want to buy a box?" Liz asked. I asked how much a box was. Turned out $70 per eye with a two box minimum, making a six month supply.
"Gimme a trial pair," I said.
"We no longer carry trial pairs in those," Liz corrected.
"But you sold me a trial pair when I bought the ones I'm wearing right now," I said, my s.
"We've since... made new policies," she said.
"Then nevermind," I said.
When I was retelling this to my wife at lunch, she pointed out an obvious flaw which was that Liz's offer of 15 percent off should have been 50 percent off, as per the rules of the original special.
I blinked. "Wait. Yeah. They are." Or did I mishear "fifty" as "fifteen"? It's a common error. I called Liz back and learned that she had indeed said fifteen.
"But isn't my second pair supposed to be half off?" I said.
"Well, that's what the special is, but you have to buy a pair of glasses at normal price before you can get the second pair half off."
I felt my sickeningly sweet exterior slipping at the edges. "But I did buy a pair of glasses at normal price," I pointed out. They're washed up in Wilmington, granted, but I did buy them.
"Um... yes," she said cautiously. "But in a case where you're upgrading to a more expensive frame," she began again.
"I have already purchased the exact same pair of glasses at full price," I said, still very sweet.
Liz became kind of flustered at this point and said she didn't have the authority to make any decisions, but could consult with the doctor and call me back.
Adopting an even sweeter tone of voice, I said, "And would you please inform the doctor of the two months I've been waiting for my original second pair of glasses?"
Yes, Liz agreed, she would. I later received a message from her saying that she had decided to go ahead and give me the second pair at half off. After my credit was applied I would only owe $97.
I felt like I'd won a small victory, but for the fact that it will now take two weeks for them to arrive, with likely interference by the July 4th holiday and I'm scheduled to leave town for a week by July 3. At this point, I plan to set foot in Liz's place of business only one more time and then never EVER again. I may even tell her that.
(TO BE CONTINUED...)
Friday, July 3, 2009
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
SpecsWar `09 Part II
(My apologies for the lateness of this entry. We took the niece to D.C. starting last Saturday and I forgot to set this thing to automatic posting.)
Okay, so my frames didn't actually explode so much as come apart in multiple places very quickly. First one of the double mounting bolts of the left temple broke, causing the lens to pivot on the remaining bolt. I super-glued that one. Then, on the very day I had scheduled my most recent eye exam, two months back, the nose-bar snapped, as did my glue job on the temple, causing everything to fall apart. As I said, it was a nice coincidence that I was already having my eyes checked, but it meant either being blind for two weeks or that I'd need to get some contacts to tide me over.
It had been nearly ten years since I'd last worn contacts, having lost my final pair of Acuvues to the ocean the summer after losing my glasses to it. (Are you sensing a pattern, yet?) Fortunately the local Borderland optometrist I'd chosen said they could roll with this new request easily and that great strides had been made in contacts for people with astigmatism in the last decade. They hooked me up with a trial pair of Air Optix Aquas, then the optical technician--let's call her Liz--helped me pick out some more rimless frames. The only brand they carried was Silhouette, which were a bit pricier than I liked, but I figured the insurance would take care of most of it. (Wrong.) And because the Silhouette frames didn't come with clip on shades, as my previous brand of rimless frames did (or, rather, you could buy some as extras, but they were nearly as expensive as a pair of frames themselves), I decided to take advantage of a buy one get one half off sale they were having and order some prescription sunglasses to boot. The only ones I really thought looked decent in the store, though, were some Chesterfields, and then only just barely. In retrospect, I shouldn't have bothered ordering frames I wasn't 100 percent satisfied with, but especially these. The Chesterfields have a big clunky CHESTERFIELD logo embedded in both temples and I must not have noticed it right off because I pretty much hate logos on clothing and glasses as a rule. As it turns out, though, my saving grace was found with those very logo-embossed temples.
Remember the bit about how I always tell optical technicians to order the longest temples possible? Well, true to form, I'd shown Liz how the temples in the Chesterfields were woefully too short and noted that she would need to order the longest they had for my pair. She said she wasn't sure they carried ones that were longer, but would call them up to ask and then phone me if there were any problems. She said if I didn't hear from her, expect them to be correct and in hand within a week.
A week later, Liz called to say my Chesterfields had arrived. Can you guess how short the temples were? Oh, very, I assure you. It was exactly as if Liz had taken the display frames I'd told her were too short and just put lenses in them anyway. (Which is what she'd done.) But I didn't realize this until I'd returned home with them, because there was no point in wearing them home as I'd driven over wearing my contacts. I phoned Liz up and had to leave a message regarding the temples of inadequate length. She must have checked the notes in my file at some point and saw her own notation to order longer ones, for she was very accommodating when next we spoke. Turned out Chesterfield didn't make longer temples, which we would have known had she called them like she said.
I came in to pick out new frames and found some nice ones before long. They were some display frames Liz had just received and she said I could have them in a week. Meanwhile my Silhouettes came in and were wonderful to behold and with temples of the correct length.
Two weeks later, I phoned to ask about my promised sunglasses. Liz explained that the frames and lenses had arrived but that a screw was stuck in the frames and she couldn't release them to me in that condition so she'd reordered the frames. She should have them by the end of the week.
The following Monday I phoned again. Still delayed, she'd let me know.
Another week passed and I phoned again. Again, we were looking at some delays. I'd be the first to hear any news.
So, after a full month of waiting had gone by I was pissed off. Actually, I was pissed off long before that, but I was nearly willing to alert Liz to my level of pissed-offedness. Until that point I had been sickeningly sweet to her in all our interactions. I played phone tag with Liz for a day before she called back. When she did it was to say that my frames were not in, they hadn't technically even been released to the public and wouldn't be until June 16. I could either wait, pick out some new ones or get a refund. At this point, barely two weeks away from June 16, I decided I'd invested too much time to give up, so I opted to wait.
On June 16 I received no word from Liz. That evening, we left for the beach, during which I lost my Silhouettes in the drink.
(TO BE CONTINUED...)
Okay, so my frames didn't actually explode so much as come apart in multiple places very quickly. First one of the double mounting bolts of the left temple broke, causing the lens to pivot on the remaining bolt. I super-glued that one. Then, on the very day I had scheduled my most recent eye exam, two months back, the nose-bar snapped, as did my glue job on the temple, causing everything to fall apart. As I said, it was a nice coincidence that I was already having my eyes checked, but it meant either being blind for two weeks or that I'd need to get some contacts to tide me over.
It had been nearly ten years since I'd last worn contacts, having lost my final pair of Acuvues to the ocean the summer after losing my glasses to it. (Are you sensing a pattern, yet?) Fortunately the local Borderland optometrist I'd chosen said they could roll with this new request easily and that great strides had been made in contacts for people with astigmatism in the last decade. They hooked me up with a trial pair of Air Optix Aquas, then the optical technician--let's call her Liz--helped me pick out some more rimless frames. The only brand they carried was Silhouette, which were a bit pricier than I liked, but I figured the insurance would take care of most of it. (Wrong.) And because the Silhouette frames didn't come with clip on shades, as my previous brand of rimless frames did (or, rather, you could buy some as extras, but they were nearly as expensive as a pair of frames themselves), I decided to take advantage of a buy one get one half off sale they were having and order some prescription sunglasses to boot. The only ones I really thought looked decent in the store, though, were some Chesterfields, and then only just barely. In retrospect, I shouldn't have bothered ordering frames I wasn't 100 percent satisfied with, but especially these. The Chesterfields have a big clunky CHESTERFIELD logo embedded in both temples and I must not have noticed it right off because I pretty much hate logos on clothing and glasses as a rule. As it turns out, though, my saving grace was found with those very logo-embossed temples.
Remember the bit about how I always tell optical technicians to order the longest temples possible? Well, true to form, I'd shown Liz how the temples in the Chesterfields were woefully too short and noted that she would need to order the longest they had for my pair. She said she wasn't sure they carried ones that were longer, but would call them up to ask and then phone me if there were any problems. She said if I didn't hear from her, expect them to be correct and in hand within a week.
A week later, Liz called to say my Chesterfields had arrived. Can you guess how short the temples were? Oh, very, I assure you. It was exactly as if Liz had taken the display frames I'd told her were too short and just put lenses in them anyway. (Which is what she'd done.) But I didn't realize this until I'd returned home with them, because there was no point in wearing them home as I'd driven over wearing my contacts. I phoned Liz up and had to leave a message regarding the temples of inadequate length. She must have checked the notes in my file at some point and saw her own notation to order longer ones, for she was very accommodating when next we spoke. Turned out Chesterfield didn't make longer temples, which we would have known had she called them like she said.
I came in to pick out new frames and found some nice ones before long. They were some display frames Liz had just received and she said I could have them in a week. Meanwhile my Silhouettes came in and were wonderful to behold and with temples of the correct length.
Two weeks later, I phoned to ask about my promised sunglasses. Liz explained that the frames and lenses had arrived but that a screw was stuck in the frames and she couldn't release them to me in that condition so she'd reordered the frames. She should have them by the end of the week.
The following Monday I phoned again. Still delayed, she'd let me know.
Another week passed and I phoned again. Again, we were looking at some delays. I'd be the first to hear any news.
So, after a full month of waiting had gone by I was pissed off. Actually, I was pissed off long before that, but I was nearly willing to alert Liz to my level of pissed-offedness. Until that point I had been sickeningly sweet to her in all our interactions. I played phone tag with Liz for a day before she called back. When she did it was to say that my frames were not in, they hadn't technically even been released to the public and wouldn't be until June 16. I could either wait, pick out some new ones or get a refund. At this point, barely two weeks away from June 16, I decided I'd invested too much time to give up, so I opted to wait.
On June 16 I received no word from Liz. That evening, we left for the beach, during which I lost my Silhouettes in the drink.
(TO BE CONTINUED...)
Thursday, June 25, 2009
SpecsWar `09 Part I
I've worn glasses for my vision since around the 9th grade. In the time I've had to wear them, I can count on one finger the number of times I've both ordered glasses and received them within a reasonable period of time. Now, I realize I am not alone in this, as there is a standard waiting period of at least a week for most orders. In my case, however, it's usually two weeks, though sometimes longer. There are also often accompanying complications with new glasses, such as the fact that my ears are slightly further back on my head than the average person, necessitating the longest temples money can buy. Most decent optical technicians figure this out on their own and order accordingly, but due to the ones who are not so observant, I make it a point to tell them in advance. On one occasion my warnings went unheeded resulting in glasses arriving equipped with temples that would scarcely fit over the ears of an eight-year-old. And on that point, I am not exaggerating.
"Well, do you want to go ahead and wear them until the new temples arrive?" they asked. I then attempted to do so just to demonstrate to them how absurd it was to even suggest it. They had to send them back and cost me another week's worth of waiting.
So it takes me a long time to get my glasses. Well, except for that one time...
It was around ten years ago when I lost my glasses in the ocean while vacationing with my then girlfriend (now wife) at Holden Beach. At the time my glasses were wire frame and had temples that ended in old-fashioned wire cables, the kind that hook around the ear and prevent them from slipping off. I was operating, falsely, under the impression that the cables also made them wave-proof. Soon enough, they were ripped from my noggin by a rogue wave and were never seen by me again. It was pretty humiliating, what with my newly met future brother and sister-in-law in attendance (the parents of the very niece we're enjoying a visit from this week), but I chalked it up to a lesson learned. I resolved forever more never to set foot in the ocean wearing specs unless they were secured to my head with one of those rubber floaty things designed to prevent them from sinking away should they become dislodged.
Being a Friday, the local optometrist in Supply was still open, but only until 3p, so I had my then girlfriend (now wife) drive me over for an emergency consultation and--I hoped--some specs. Considering my practically still-dripping swim trunks, it was pretty obvious why I was there when I walked through the door, squinting. The staff looked up at me and said the polite equivalent of, "Lost yer glasses in the drink, eh?"
Even though it had been something on the order of three years since my last eye exam, the doc at Beach Opti agreed to go ahead and sell me some glasses based on my prescription from the last exam, which they had to phone to get. Better still, he said if I was able to find some frames in the store they could have me ready to go in a couple of hours provided I promised to go have my eyes examined immediately upon my return home. I found frames and true to his word the doc handed me a new pair of glasses in record time. (My promise to have my eyes examined took another couple of years to get around to, but for the record my eyes had not changed one whit in the interim, which means not one whit from five years earlier.)
Jump ahead to 2005 or so. I finally decide it's time to get new frames and ditch the beach-emergency, gun-metal-colored frames for some sleek rimless ones. I then got my eyes examined and headed to the Wal-Mart optical center to pick out some frames. I expected a two week wait, but they informed me it would actually take a month because they had to be sent away to a lab for assembly. I didn't want to wait a month, but I really liked the frames so I agreed. Finally, a month and a day later, they arrived and I rushed down to pick them up only to find that some genius at the lab royally effed up the mounting of the nose bar to the point where it was not mounted flat across between the lenses. The staff at the Wal-Mart optical center argued with me that this was not actually the case and that such rimless glasses often appear crooked to the naked eye. They actually said that. Then I laid the glasses flat across the surface of their counter and pointed out to them how no parallel lines were formed between the counter and the nose bar. They had no ground to stand on after that, other than to say it was the lab's fault and not theirs. They offered to send them in to be redone, but I'd have to wait another month. I opted for a refund, instead.
I eventually found rimless frames at a more reputable optical center and stuck with those until two months back when my most recent pair exploded.
(TO BE CONTINUED...)
"Well, do you want to go ahead and wear them until the new temples arrive?" they asked. I then attempted to do so just to demonstrate to them how absurd it was to even suggest it. They had to send them back and cost me another week's worth of waiting.
So it takes me a long time to get my glasses. Well, except for that one time...
It was around ten years ago when I lost my glasses in the ocean while vacationing with my then girlfriend (now wife) at Holden Beach. At the time my glasses were wire frame and had temples that ended in old-fashioned wire cables, the kind that hook around the ear and prevent them from slipping off. I was operating, falsely, under the impression that the cables also made them wave-proof. Soon enough, they were ripped from my noggin by a rogue wave and were never seen by me again. It was pretty humiliating, what with my newly met future brother and sister-in-law in attendance (the parents of the very niece we're enjoying a visit from this week), but I chalked it up to a lesson learned. I resolved forever more never to set foot in the ocean wearing specs unless they were secured to my head with one of those rubber floaty things designed to prevent them from sinking away should they become dislodged.
Being a Friday, the local optometrist in Supply was still open, but only until 3p, so I had my then girlfriend (now wife) drive me over for an emergency consultation and--I hoped--some specs. Considering my practically still-dripping swim trunks, it was pretty obvious why I was there when I walked through the door, squinting. The staff looked up at me and said the polite equivalent of, "Lost yer glasses in the drink, eh?"
Even though it had been something on the order of three years since my last eye exam, the doc at Beach Opti agreed to go ahead and sell me some glasses based on my prescription from the last exam, which they had to phone to get. Better still, he said if I was able to find some frames in the store they could have me ready to go in a couple of hours provided I promised to go have my eyes examined immediately upon my return home. I found frames and true to his word the doc handed me a new pair of glasses in record time. (My promise to have my eyes examined took another couple of years to get around to, but for the record my eyes had not changed one whit in the interim, which means not one whit from five years earlier.)
Jump ahead to 2005 or so. I finally decide it's time to get new frames and ditch the beach-emergency, gun-metal-colored frames for some sleek rimless ones. I then got my eyes examined and headed to the Wal-Mart optical center to pick out some frames. I expected a two week wait, but they informed me it would actually take a month because they had to be sent away to a lab for assembly. I didn't want to wait a month, but I really liked the frames so I agreed. Finally, a month and a day later, they arrived and I rushed down to pick them up only to find that some genius at the lab royally effed up the mounting of the nose bar to the point where it was not mounted flat across between the lenses. The staff at the Wal-Mart optical center argued with me that this was not actually the case and that such rimless glasses often appear crooked to the naked eye. They actually said that. Then I laid the glasses flat across the surface of their counter and pointed out to them how no parallel lines were formed between the counter and the nose bar. They had no ground to stand on after that, other than to say it was the lab's fault and not theirs. They offered to send them in to be redone, but I'd have to wait another month. I opted for a refund, instead.
I eventually found rimless frames at a more reputable optical center and stuck with those until two months back when my most recent pair exploded.
(TO BE CONTINUED...)
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Niecewatch Day 3
Niecewatch Days 1 and 2 went fairly smoothly. We've had very few behavior issues (certainly none during my watch) and have actually had a good time. We've done local museum tours, trips to the gym to swim in the lap pool, lunches at Biscuit World, shopping trips to the mall, etc.
This morning after Kayley awoke, I gave her a breakfast of healthy Kashi Autumn Harvest cereal and then went out to turn my compost heap. I was nearly finished when I heard the *DING* of our microwave and wondered what she would be heating up. When I returned to the house I saw that she had just finished eating the last bits of the chocolate pie my moms-in-law sent. However, because Ma couldn't send it in one of her pie pans, she sent it with us in a lidded storage container--you know, the kind made of enamel-coated metal.
"Uh, did you just microwave that bowl?" I asked.
"Yes," she said. "But it didn't explode," she quickly added.
I then had to give her the very stern lecture on how you should NEVER put metal into a microwave, even if you really don't want to have to hunt up another safer dish to put your pie in because you don't want to miss even a second of Zoey 101. As she offered the bit about exploding, on her own, I have to assume she knew damn well better than to put metal in a microwave. So I added that she should never EVER put metal in ANY microwave, not just ours.
It can only get better, today, right?
This morning after Kayley awoke, I gave her a breakfast of healthy Kashi Autumn Harvest cereal and then went out to turn my compost heap. I was nearly finished when I heard the *DING* of our microwave and wondered what she would be heating up. When I returned to the house I saw that she had just finished eating the last bits of the chocolate pie my moms-in-law sent. However, because Ma couldn't send it in one of her pie pans, she sent it with us in a lidded storage container--you know, the kind made of enamel-coated metal.
"Uh, did you just microwave that bowl?" I asked.
"Yes," she said. "But it didn't explode," she quickly added.
I then had to give her the very stern lecture on how you should NEVER put metal into a microwave, even if you really don't want to have to hunt up another safer dish to put your pie in because you don't want to miss even a second of Zoey 101. As she offered the bit about exploding, on her own, I have to assume she knew damn well better than to put metal in a microwave. So I added that she should never EVER put metal in ANY microwave, not just ours.
It can only get better, today, right?
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Vacations, and coming back there from
Wow.
Been a while since I've posted. I have the perfect excuse, though: vacation.
Yesirree, last week the wife and I drove down to see her family in Holden Beach and there we stayed, gorging ourselves on the flounder that my father-in-law caught and my moms-in-law fried up, basking in the 6 p.m. beach time sun (we no longer have patience for beaches any earlier than about 5p) and occasionally heading out on the ocean and waterway with Pa on his new cabin-boat. It's long been his dream to purchase such a craft and head out to fish whenever he wants and now that dream has come to pass. I didn't catch anything and, instead, lost something very expensive in the form of my new eye glasses which were knocked from my face by a less than rogue wave and may wash up somewhere near Myrtle beach one day. If you find them, lemme know.
This week, we're back in Borderland, but with an added cast member: our 10-year-old niece Kayley, who is staying with us for a couple of weeks. We plan to see the sights around here this week (all two of them) and then head to D.C. next week for some camping and monument/museum touring. It's proven to be a mild adventure, as the wife is back at work this week leaving me to entertain the kid during the day. So far it's not been much of a problem, but the week is still young.
In the meantime, I'm wearing my contact lenses while I wait for yet another pair of glasses to arrive. The story behind my battle with a local optometrist to achieve this, however, is a fun one which I shall shortly tell...
Been a while since I've posted. I have the perfect excuse, though: vacation.
Yesirree, last week the wife and I drove down to see her family in Holden Beach and there we stayed, gorging ourselves on the flounder that my father-in-law caught and my moms-in-law fried up, basking in the 6 p.m. beach time sun (we no longer have patience for beaches any earlier than about 5p) and occasionally heading out on the ocean and waterway with Pa on his new cabin-boat. It's long been his dream to purchase such a craft and head out to fish whenever he wants and now that dream has come to pass. I didn't catch anything and, instead, lost something very expensive in the form of my new eye glasses which were knocked from my face by a less than rogue wave and may wash up somewhere near Myrtle beach one day. If you find them, lemme know.
This week, we're back in Borderland, but with an added cast member: our 10-year-old niece Kayley, who is staying with us for a couple of weeks. We plan to see the sights around here this week (all two of them) and then head to D.C. next week for some camping and monument/museum touring. It's proven to be a mild adventure, as the wife is back at work this week leaving me to entertain the kid during the day. So far it's not been much of a problem, but the week is still young.
In the meantime, I'm wearing my contact lenses while I wait for yet another pair of glasses to arrive. The story behind my battle with a local optometrist to achieve this, however, is a fun one which I shall shortly tell...
Monday, June 8, 2009
Potty Party (Our Baffroom Adventure Part 18)
This past weekend we threw our first major cookout bash here at Chez Juice, inviting friends and coworkers to pop by for a Potty Party. Yes, we threw a party in honor of our newly and finally finished potty.
Okay, so the potty still wasn't precisely finished when we scheduled the party, but one miter-box, saw and some pre-painted white wood trim strips later, not to mention an evening's work, and we finally had the trim set into place. (Note that I didn't say I nailed all of them into place, as the nails I bought don't seem to get along with our walls very well, so I gave up toward the end and just strategically placed the cut trim so as to look like it was affixed to the wall. I'll figure it out later.)
We've not had a party here before and had no idea how many people would show, so we wound up making a tremendous amount of food for it. We had loads of hamburger patties and hotdogs ready to grill, plus chips, hot dog chili and baked beans, but the wife also made potato salad, slaw, a massive fruit platter, bean & corn salad, and a huge banana pudding. In addition, she also cut up chunks of chicken, beef, shrimp, and veggies for kebabs, and even attached little jewels to the skewers so everyone would know whose was whose. Meanwhile, I laid in a stockpile of soft drinks, wine and beer.
Saturday evening people began to arrive and soon we had a whole house full of folks for Sadie to bark at. She was our major concern, because Sadie's something of a wild card when it comes to strangers in her house. She used to be a very friendly dog as a puppy and is still friendly with the people she met at that age, but anyone not on that list gets barked at. For instance, it took her an entire weekend to make friends with my sister during her visit in February. So Sadie barked ferociously at first, but after only a few minutes calmed down a bit and began making friends. Soon everyone was giving her dog taxes from their plates and a couple of guests even played Frisbee with her. (Her version of Frisbee is, "you throw it, I'll go get it and never give it back.")
All in all, we were having a great evening until one of our Tiki torches decided to blow up. The wife had bought new innards, wicks and safety caps for all the torches, but something went amiss with one of them and by the time my attention was called to it flames were spilling down the side of it onto the wicker body of the torch itself. One attendee attempted to put out the flames by pouring beer on it, which we all shouted at him to stop doing. I poured half a bottle of water on it, to no avail. Not wanting to see what would happen when the flames finished burning through the wicker and melted into the nearly full plastic fuel canister, I opted to yank the entire torch up and move it away from the wooden deck and our guests. How to put it out was not as apparent to me, though.
"SWEE, I NEED A TOWEL!" I screamed toward the house, hoping I could smother the flames with one. It then occurred to me that I had just the thing for putting out fires in the garage, whcih was a large bucket filled with rain water. The foolishness of carrying a burning object into my house to put it out didn't strike me at first, so I began running across the lawn toward the rear garage door. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the wife arrive carrying a couple of hand towels and our laundry room runner carpet.
"Here," she said, offering the carpet. Trouble is, I really like the runner carpet and didn't want to see it damaged when I had a perfectly good bucket of water a few feet away.
"No, I got it," I said, still moving for the garage door. As I ducked through the door, I could see the amount of light my torch fire was casting and realized it had grown much larger than when I first started running with it. Probably all the air from running had accelerated the flames. What I didn't know was that it had at last burned through both the wicker and the plastic fuel canister and was likely going to begin raining hot burning oil down on me moments later, had I not shoved the flaming end of the torch into the water. Unfortunately, the act tipping the torch over to do this caused the top of the torch to come loose and the still-burning wick went flying onto the garage floor and rolled to a halt against the wall by one of our big gray plastic shelves.
The wife was outside, calling for me to bring the fire back out.
"I can't!" I called back, while trying to move the wick away from the shelf with the tip of my plastic flip-flop.
"Just bring it back out!" she said again.
"I CAN'T!" I screamed, still toeing at the fire. I did manage to move it away from the plastic and the wall, but it was still burning. Finally, I poured half the bucket of water on it and that put it out.
Only after thinking about my actions later on did I realize the full amount of foolishness contained within them. That could have gone REALLY poorly.
The rest of the evening went very nicely and both we and Sadie had a blast. She was sad to see everyone leave.
Okay, so the potty still wasn't precisely finished when we scheduled the party, but one miter-box, saw and some pre-painted white wood trim strips later, not to mention an evening's work, and we finally had the trim set into place. (Note that I didn't say I nailed all of them into place, as the nails I bought don't seem to get along with our walls very well, so I gave up toward the end and just strategically placed the cut trim so as to look like it was affixed to the wall. I'll figure it out later.)
We've not had a party here before and had no idea how many people would show, so we wound up making a tremendous amount of food for it. We had loads of hamburger patties and hotdogs ready to grill, plus chips, hot dog chili and baked beans, but the wife also made potato salad, slaw, a massive fruit platter, bean & corn salad, and a huge banana pudding. In addition, she also cut up chunks of chicken, beef, shrimp, and veggies for kebabs, and even attached little jewels to the skewers so everyone would know whose was whose. Meanwhile, I laid in a stockpile of soft drinks, wine and beer.
Saturday evening people began to arrive and soon we had a whole house full of folks for Sadie to bark at. She was our major concern, because Sadie's something of a wild card when it comes to strangers in her house. She used to be a very friendly dog as a puppy and is still friendly with the people she met at that age, but anyone not on that list gets barked at. For instance, it took her an entire weekend to make friends with my sister during her visit in February. So Sadie barked ferociously at first, but after only a few minutes calmed down a bit and began making friends. Soon everyone was giving her dog taxes from their plates and a couple of guests even played Frisbee with her. (Her version of Frisbee is, "you throw it, I'll go get it and never give it back.")
All in all, we were having a great evening until one of our Tiki torches decided to blow up. The wife had bought new innards, wicks and safety caps for all the torches, but something went amiss with one of them and by the time my attention was called to it flames were spilling down the side of it onto the wicker body of the torch itself. One attendee attempted to put out the flames by pouring beer on it, which we all shouted at him to stop doing. I poured half a bottle of water on it, to no avail. Not wanting to see what would happen when the flames finished burning through the wicker and melted into the nearly full plastic fuel canister, I opted to yank the entire torch up and move it away from the wooden deck and our guests. How to put it out was not as apparent to me, though.
"SWEE, I NEED A TOWEL!" I screamed toward the house, hoping I could smother the flames with one. It then occurred to me that I had just the thing for putting out fires in the garage, whcih was a large bucket filled with rain water. The foolishness of carrying a burning object into my house to put it out didn't strike me at first, so I began running across the lawn toward the rear garage door. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the wife arrive carrying a couple of hand towels and our laundry room runner carpet.
"Here," she said, offering the carpet. Trouble is, I really like the runner carpet and didn't want to see it damaged when I had a perfectly good bucket of water a few feet away.
"No, I got it," I said, still moving for the garage door. As I ducked through the door, I could see the amount of light my torch fire was casting and realized it had grown much larger than when I first started running with it. Probably all the air from running had accelerated the flames. What I didn't know was that it had at last burned through both the wicker and the plastic fuel canister and was likely going to begin raining hot burning oil down on me moments later, had I not shoved the flaming end of the torch into the water. Unfortunately, the act tipping the torch over to do this caused the top of the torch to come loose and the still-burning wick went flying onto the garage floor and rolled to a halt against the wall by one of our big gray plastic shelves.
The wife was outside, calling for me to bring the fire back out.
"I can't!" I called back, while trying to move the wick away from the shelf with the tip of my plastic flip-flop.
"Just bring it back out!" she said again.
"I CAN'T!" I screamed, still toeing at the fire. I did manage to move it away from the plastic and the wall, but it was still burning. Finally, I poured half the bucket of water on it and that put it out.
Only after thinking about my actions later on did I realize the full amount of foolishness contained within them. That could have gone REALLY poorly.
The rest of the evening went very nicely and both we and Sadie had a blast. She was sad to see everyone leave.
Monday, June 1, 2009
You wanna talk about adventure and excitement then the person you need to talk to is my cousin Earl...
Yesirree, it's been a full weekend of adventure and excitement round Chez Juice. We're wild people, I tell you. Example: We spent nigh on our entire Saturday mulching the flowerbeds. No, I'm serious, we did. Top that, Ashton Kutcher!
Now when you need mulch, the recommended thing to do is to buy it from some guy with a front-loader who sits around in an abandoned lot next to some giant piles of mulch. It's the best way, really. There were a couple of varieties of mulch, but we wanted the super dark black mulch. It was $20 per front-loader scoop, so we handed the man $40 and he scooped us up a big ol' pile of mulch.
Did I mention we don't own a truck nor a flatbed trailer with which to haul mulch? Oh, cause we don't. Instead we'd brought shovels and our plan was to shovel our massive pile of mulch into the back of the wife's Honda Element. Now, the annoying thing was that I'd spent the better part of an hour cleaning out and vacuuming the wife's Honda just the day before, because it had become what we in sweet-hubbie business term "reisty" with filth. We're talking piles of old paper plates from breakfasts on the go; greasy fast-food bags left over from Biscuit World, just waiting for a dog to come along and shred in an attempt to get at the ghosts of bacon past; herds of junk mail and paper piles and stray Kleenexes that somehow failed to be deposited in her gear-shift mounted trash bag; plus a whole winter's worth of dried mud and dirt. And I didn't even have to be asked to clean all this junk out--that's how sweet a hubbie I am, not to mention a wild man, much liken unto the levels of wild contained within one Mr. Steve "Wild Dog" Wampler. The wife had been ever-so-grateful that I'd cleaned her car. She even shed a few tears at the sweetness of it. However, we were still going to fill the back of her Element up with mulch, all the same, and I had to admit it was the only logical way we could haul that amount of mulch back to the house.
In anticipation of the quantity of mulch we'd guessed we'd need to haul, we took the back seats out and covered the floor with both a large sheet of cardboard and then a drop cloth taped to the sides. However, it was such a truly massive pile of mulch that it soon breached the levees we'd set up and spilled into every crack, crevice and compartment of the back seat and then spilled into the front seat all the way up to the parking break. This we hauled home and began distributing into our mulchless flower beds.
By 8p, or so, we had the beds weeded and mulched and everything looked particularly nice. We were even able to save ourselves some hassle in the Element-cleaning department by pulling the drop cloth and most of the remaining mulch out, leaving behind only a reasonable amount that I'll probably go vacuum up, some day. The mulchy stench was still pretty strong in there, though, so we opted to leave all the doors of the car open overnight so so it could air out in the driveway.
At 3 a.m. I was awakened when the door to our bedroom was slammed shut by a gust of wind blowing through the open windows of our house. I could hear rain and wind outside that sounded fairly heavy. I arose and went to close some of the windows so that the rain didn't blow through them. After a minute or so of being up, I saw the wife walking through the hall, as well.
"The car's still open," she said. Only then did I remember that not only were all the doors of her car open, but that the windows were too. I offered to go close it up, but she'd already retrieved an umbrella from the garage and was on her way out. I later learned that she'd woken up around the same time I had, heard the rain, saw me get up and had thought I was sweetly going to close her windows. After I clearly hadn't a minute later, though, she realized I was half-asleep and had not remembered and got up to do it herself. She had unfortunately, not taken her keys and I knew she would not be able to close the power windows without them. I dashed and got mine and walked them out to her in the rain.
In the morning, we saw that our black mulch had been washed clean of its dye and was now just bark-colored mulch, except beneath the overhang of the roof, where it remained black. Still looks a darn sight better than the bare dirt and weeds we'd had before.
Now when you need mulch, the recommended thing to do is to buy it from some guy with a front-loader who sits around in an abandoned lot next to some giant piles of mulch. It's the best way, really. There were a couple of varieties of mulch, but we wanted the super dark black mulch. It was $20 per front-loader scoop, so we handed the man $40 and he scooped us up a big ol' pile of mulch.
Did I mention we don't own a truck nor a flatbed trailer with which to haul mulch? Oh, cause we don't. Instead we'd brought shovels and our plan was to shovel our massive pile of mulch into the back of the wife's Honda Element. Now, the annoying thing was that I'd spent the better part of an hour cleaning out and vacuuming the wife's Honda just the day before, because it had become what we in sweet-hubbie business term "reisty" with filth. We're talking piles of old paper plates from breakfasts on the go; greasy fast-food bags left over from Biscuit World, just waiting for a dog to come along and shred in an attempt to get at the ghosts of bacon past; herds of junk mail and paper piles and stray Kleenexes that somehow failed to be deposited in her gear-shift mounted trash bag; plus a whole winter's worth of dried mud and dirt. And I didn't even have to be asked to clean all this junk out--that's how sweet a hubbie I am, not to mention a wild man, much liken unto the levels of wild contained within one Mr. Steve "Wild Dog" Wampler. The wife had been ever-so-grateful that I'd cleaned her car. She even shed a few tears at the sweetness of it. However, we were still going to fill the back of her Element up with mulch, all the same, and I had to admit it was the only logical way we could haul that amount of mulch back to the house.
In anticipation of the quantity of mulch we'd guessed we'd need to haul, we took the back seats out and covered the floor with both a large sheet of cardboard and then a drop cloth taped to the sides. However, it was such a truly massive pile of mulch that it soon breached the levees we'd set up and spilled into every crack, crevice and compartment of the back seat and then spilled into the front seat all the way up to the parking break. This we hauled home and began distributing into our mulchless flower beds.
By 8p, or so, we had the beds weeded and mulched and everything looked particularly nice. We were even able to save ourselves some hassle in the Element-cleaning department by pulling the drop cloth and most of the remaining mulch out, leaving behind only a reasonable amount that I'll probably go vacuum up, some day. The mulchy stench was still pretty strong in there, though, so we opted to leave all the doors of the car open overnight so so it could air out in the driveway.
At 3 a.m. I was awakened when the door to our bedroom was slammed shut by a gust of wind blowing through the open windows of our house. I could hear rain and wind outside that sounded fairly heavy. I arose and went to close some of the windows so that the rain didn't blow through them. After a minute or so of being up, I saw the wife walking through the hall, as well.
"The car's still open," she said. Only then did I remember that not only were all the doors of her car open, but that the windows were too. I offered to go close it up, but she'd already retrieved an umbrella from the garage and was on her way out. I later learned that she'd woken up around the same time I had, heard the rain, saw me get up and had thought I was sweetly going to close her windows. After I clearly hadn't a minute later, though, she realized I was half-asleep and had not remembered and got up to do it herself. She had unfortunately, not taken her keys and I knew she would not be able to close the power windows without them. I dashed and got mine and walked them out to her in the rain.
In the morning, we saw that our black mulch had been washed clean of its dye and was now just bark-colored mulch, except beneath the overhang of the roof, where it remained black. Still looks a darn sight better than the bare dirt and weeds we'd had before.
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