making connections

Over the past week everything around me has just been crazy. First of all my modem went bad last Wednesday and I didn't have time to call about it until two days later. Even then it was Sunday before anyone could come out and look at it. Of course they told me that a technician would be at my house between 8:30am and 6:00pm. Why do they do that? Do they think I have nothing better to do on my weekend than sitting around waiting on the cable guy? So I made the best of the time at home to do laundry and other cleaning. Once the new modem was hooked up (and working) I felt so much better. Reconnected. Well, partially.

For the last two weeks or so I've been having some trouble with my cell phone. Sometimes it doesn't receive phone calls. I usually discover this when I try to make a call and it won't dial out. I turn my phone off for a few minutes and then once I've turned it back on I begin getting all my messages and missed calls from whenever it stopped working. During my calls, at some point I begin to only hear every other word of the person I'm talking to. Sometimes this is followed by a moment or two of static and then after a bit, it stops and everything is fine. When I called AT&T/Cingular they informed me that my phone and SIM card was outdated and probably not reading any updates being sent out. I have only had my phone for three years but I guess that is old in today's wireless world. Their suggestion to me... buy a new phone. I'm not convinced that this is the only course of action I can take but we'll see.

On the brighter side, I have a wedding that I'm photographing this Saturday. I'm really excited and a little nervous. This will be the first one that I've done by myself. If all goes well I might end up with a new side job. Yay!

the good, bad, and the smokey

A friend of my aunt's has her own business that she operates out of the back of the store. She used to be the furniture buyer for Fashion Shop Home Store. Now she is self employed doing pretty much the same thing only on a more personal level for individual customers. By going this route, she has to do a lot of marketing to build up a clientele base so she's in and out all the time.

Okay, getting to the point here. Yesterday, she was in and on her way out when she noticed behind the parking lot there was a bunch of smoke coming up above the trees. Panic set in because her daughter has a house in the neighborhood behind the shop. Without a moments hesitation, she took off across the parking lot to see where it was originating from. Sure enough, it was coming from her daughter's house (who is in Florida at the moment with her kids) We were all concerned since not much was visible through the trees, so we headed over to the house. When we got there, the fire department was already there and had everything under control.

Apparently the husband, who did not go to Florida, had come home to fix himself some lunch. While he was in the house somehow his truck caught on fire in the driveway. He heard a pop when one of the tires blew off but didn't know where the noise came from. Luckily, a neighbor had noticed the fire and knocked on the door to get him out. It wasn't long before the other tires popped and then the gas tank exploded.

So what is the good in all this? Well, most importantly no one was hurt. Second of all since the fire was contained so quickly, nothing spread to the house or garage so the pets were safe too.

Bad? There was a little damage from the heat on the garage door and to the tree near the driveway. Oh, and of course the truck was in bad shape. Therefore, smokey sort of explains itself. So far there's no word on what caused the fire.

On to something much lighter...my mom told me that she is going to spend a few days with her friends in Michigan. One of the ladies has a condo in Mackinaw so they're going to have a girls outing up there. They will see the bridge and I think they are going to visit Mackinac Island which they all should really enjoy. Mom has never been to Michigan so she is really going to love all the lighthouses around the coast.

Russell is from Michigan and his parents still live there. The first time we drove up to visit them, they took me on a tour of the thumb. It was great! We stopped at all these little ports along the eastern side of the state and I took lots of pictures.

let there be light! please?

Usually Mondays are not my favorite day. Today was not necessarily a good day but it was quite interesting. When I got to work this morning, I disarmed the alarm and went into the office to set my things down. When I went to make my rounds of turning on all the lights, they weren't coming on. I flipped them a couple of times just to make sure...nothing.

The street where the store is located in Middletown, has many little shops that run up and down both sides. There has been an ongoing project to add some street parking and make nice sidewalks lined with bricks. One end of the street is already complete and it really does look great, however, now they have begun work on our end of the road. Now we have to maneuver around all the construction vehicles that have part of the parking lot blocked.

My first thought when the lights didn't come on was that the workers hit something while digging and knocked our power out. So I called my aunt to let her know the situation and then called LG&E (Louisville Gas & Electric) to report the outage. The girl I spoke to on the phone informed me that it was not because of any construction but in fact a billing issue. (I later learned that my aunt had not paid the electric bill for two months.) So the majority of my morning was spent making calls between LG&E and my aunt. She wanted me to make a payment over the phone and gave me her debit number to do so. They asked for the account number and wouldn't you know there wasn't a statement to be found. I did find the file folder for the utility bills but it was empty, of course! I called my aunt to get the account number and then called the company back and they told me the number was invalid because that account is closed and so on. When I told her the latest, she said she would handle it when she got in.

At around 2pm, she called them to straighten things out. At 7pm, when I left, there was still no electricity. I'm curious to see if they will be on in the morning but I'm crossing my fingers just in case.

whodunnit

By tomorrow, I should be back to my normal routine. The house sitting I was doing for my friend went very smooth except for the last day. I had decided to take Ally with me to play with Gracie. They got along great but Tommy(the cat) did not like Ally at all. Every time she would walk through the room, he would growl and hiss at her. She couldn't have cared less because she just kept ignoring him. I think Tommy isn't used to having a big dog around and he didn't know what to make of it. Tommy and Gracie are just fine together, in fact, I caught him cleaning Gracie's face for her.

So today I've been trying to catch up on all the housework I let slide during the week. This included a little sewing project. Allow me to present "Exhibit A":
If you will note the dark areas in the photo are where the sheet has been torn by a sharp object. It is believed that the suspect(Ally), is in possession of the weapon(her claws). She was alone in the apartment when the slashing occurred and has yet to provide an alibi. (I'm having a lot of fun with this, can you tell?) As some of you may remember, Ally has some anger management issues. She has been granted forgiveness due to good behavior recently but still remains on probation. Ally has been restricted from the bed and her activity is closely monitored. Her only chance at winning over the jury(Russell and I), is to work those big brown eyes like nobody's business. And of course to never tear up the sheets again. We'll have to see if the current one is salvageable.

stars and stripes

First off, Happy 4th of July to all. It's a little late in the day now but better late than never. I will actually be heading outdoors soon to watch the fireworks, so this will be short tonight. In all truth it hasn't been the best of days and I really wish I was feeling more festive. My relationship feels like it's sinking faster than I can revive it. Things have been a little stressful lately and I'm trying really hard not to let it get me down.

On a different note, I began house sitting for some friends of mine last night. They will be back on saturday so I'm taking care of the dog(Gracie), and the cat(Tommy). I stayed the night here last night -here being their house- and when I laid down to go to sleep, everything was so quiet it was almost weird. Then I realized there was no stomping going on from the tenants above me. Just one of the many differences between house and apartment living.