Collection Calls

We currently have only cell phones in our house, no home phone.  I was going to get a home phone, but it was just too much money to pay every month for what little it would get used.  I really only need it for Joanna in case I do not get home before she gets off the bus.

I thought about getting her a cell phone, but nixed that idea.  The "pay as you go" have some interesting fine print about how the $15 you paid for actually expires after 30 days if you do not use it.  Rip Off!  And adding her to our plan was going to cost an extra $29 a month plus the cost of the phone.  As we all know, trying to buy a basic cell phone at Verizon is practically impossible.  They stare at you like "huh? they actually made phones at one time without touch screens and cameras?"

I have magic jack, but my computer needs to be on and that is not the best situation for Joanna in case of an emergency.  So I decided to give Jason the magic jack to take to Afghanistan and get Vonage for the house.  Even though my internet is not unlimited, I like that the computer doesn't need to be on and I can use my portable phone with 4 hand sets I already own.

So I signed up and the receiver should arrive on Wednesday.  I picked a number out of Lexington, SC so some of my friends and family can use their home phone to call me for free and vonage  has a neat feature that sends your voice mail to email. Well, wouldn't you know it,  I check my email today and have several voice mail emails already.  Huh?  I haven't even gotten my receiver yet.  They are all from collection agencies for some woman named Donna!  Dammit!  I don't even have a phone yet and already I am dealing with annoying calls!

Bad wine and snow

Woodchuck (hard cider) is not sold here and Arbor Mist Sangria is REALLY expensive, so I have been trying to find a wine to be my relaxing "me time" drink.  I bought a pinot noir and was really looking forward to trying a glass.  Yeah, it sucked.  So the search continues. 

Jason moved what little bit of our patio furniture we brought with us out to the deck today.  The weather has been beautiful.  So of course it started snowing this evening. 

However, on a good note, we had a wonderful dinner out with friends on Saturday and I finally forced myself to finish the not so good smut book I was reading.  Not a bad weekend at all.

Book Guilt

I have a confession to make:  I started a book several weeks ago and I have not finished it.  There, I said it.  But I still feel terrible.  I started it the night I was waiting for Jason to get home from training in California.

The book is called Dead People.  It isn't a bad book.  But it isn't great either.  I just can't seem to get attached to the characters.  I find my mind wondering while I read it.  But unless a book is just down right painfully suckish, I always finish. There are only 3 books I have never finished.

So here is the problem: Lover Unleashed, the next installment of Black Dagger Brotherhood comes out on the 29th.  I want to re-read the whole series before I get the new one.  But I can't start BDB until I finish Dead People cause, you know, I have book guilt.  Sounds stupid I know, but it's a little hang up of mine (yeah yeah I know I have lots of "little hang ups" but I have slight OCD so just deal!).

So last night I pulled out my nook and decided to get serious about finishing this book. Which is really hard to do since I have Zsadist and Vishous and Brotherhood awesomeness on the brain.  I open my nook and go to "reading now" and ...........nothing. What?!  It's completely frozen.  I fully charged it so I know that isn't the problem.  I restarted it.......nothing. NOOOOOOOO!  I restart it again.  This time my book comes up but it is frozen on a page, can't turn pages, black screen where the touch screen should be!  NOOOO!  Now I am in full on panic mode!  Not my nook!  Anything but my nook!  As I frantically try to figure out what is wrong, I am already running numbers in my head, trying to figure out what I can give up to afford to buy another one.  This is so not what my bank account needs right now.

Finally I got it working.  My heart rate is back to normal and after that scare, I will finish Dead People. Apparently, as my friend informed me, I really am a total spaz!

Fuel Frustration

We moved into the house on Feb. 10 and had a heating fuel delivery on Feb.11.  It cost $944.82.  On March 14 they came out on auto deliver and filled my tank again.  It was $724.93. 

Commence eye twitch and crazy laughter.

Date Night Football

Jason and I went out for a date night last night.  It started out just as dinner.  We tried a steak place we have never been too.  The thing here is you can not judge a place by how it looks.  Many of the places look down right scary or exetremely run down from the outside, but will be really nice on the inside.  The Roundup was really good.  We had chili cheese fries, house made clam chowder and prime rib with steamed vegetables and garlic mashed potatoes.  It was GREAT!  But way too much food!

On the way to dinner, Jason's friend called and asked if we wanted two tickets to the Grizzles semi-pro indoor football game.  We had just been saying we wanted to go to a game sometime, so we jumped at the free tickets.  We headed to the game after dinner and, wow, was it an experience!

We had a blast.  There were officials who had no idea what the rules were, coaches getting mad and throwing stuff, Refs getting in the way and being mowed down by players, fans fighting with opposing players to get the game ball, players fighting with players, players getting ejected from the game, players dislocating shoulders, players body slamming other players instead of normal tackling........AWESOME!!!!  It was like football, hockey, MMA and WWE wrestling all in one.  And the Fairbanks Grizzles won! Oh, and since they scored more than 52 points, everyone got coupons for free Taco Bell Chalupas!  Once the team had 30 points, I think the crowd was cheering more for the chalupas than the team.  We will definitely be going to more games.

Here's the happenings lately...

I really need to get my groove back and start blogging again.  It's been hard since there hasn't really been anything interesting going on. I know it's hard to believe, but there has been very little for me to be sarcastic about.  But here's a little update:

• Break up is beginning, the snow is slowly melting and there are icicles as tall as me hanging from some buildings.
• FBI and US Marshalls invaded our town Thursday and arrested a militia group, all claiming to be sovereign citizens, who had an elaborate plot to kidnap and kill several state troopers and took out a hit on a federal judge.  They had mass amounts of weapons, including grenades and vehicle mounted machine guns, stored around town.
• Chey is still begging to get her nose pierced, and even tried to tell me the law here allows piercing without parental consent at 14.  I quickly informed her that while the law may allow it, MY law is the one that matters and if she comes home with anything pierced there will be hell to pay.  
• We still have not sold the house in SC.  But we have had really stupid people looking at it.  My favorite by far is the guy who complained our 16inch kitchen floor tiles were not square enough.
• We did have an offer on the house last week, but they asked us to come off the price a lot and asked for us to pay all closing costs. We countered and came off the price some and agreed to the closing costs, but they said that was stretching their budget too much.  We are talking about a $3000 difference!  $3000 isn't going to break your monthly budget, we talking about just a few dollars on your monthly mortgage! But hey, they can't budge on $3000 when they had more pressing concerns LIKE A CRUISE they were leaving for the next day!  Morons! 
• Jason has been gun shopping for me.  You can carry a concealed weapon here, and with all the wildlife and sovereign citizens, I think it is time for me to get a gun.  I've been wanting a Sig for quite some time.  Why a Sig? Because that is what the vampires in Black Dagger Brotherhood carry!  Jason wants me to get a Kimber and I have caved and started looking at them and the Springfields.
• I am having major smut withdrawals since I have not been reading at all during Jason's leave.  We have one more week before he goes back to work and I am not sure I can hold out any longer. I confess, I even broke down yesterday and read two short smut stories, but they just made me miss my books even more.

Very busy house

We've been very busy here at the house and it has left me little time to blog.  We had the water heater, whole house water filter, water softener, refrigerator and dishwasher replaced. Jason came home from training on Friday night (2am, during 60 mph winds and white out conditions!) and he has been busy hanging all our treasured art work.  He started back to work on Monday and I am left with no car.  But I seem to have caught the plague or something and can not walk two steps without getting dizzy and coughing up a lung, so I am ok with staying home.  Hopefully my fever, which has been at 103 since last night, will break soon.  Until then, I'm just gonna camp out on the cough, wrapped in tons of blankets, trying to keep the chills from chipping my teeth.