RETIRED WARRANT

Saving Water

The weekend is over and while I got a lot done there were still some things I would have liked to get finished but never got to.

No problem though, I will get to them. The one thing I did get finished with that I am very happy with is organizing my bills and statements. I have been meaning to get to it for a long time, but I just let the stack get higher and higher. Finally the stack got so high I had enough and decided to do something about it. Now the box where my incoming mail goes is empty and also all the checks for next month are written and ready to mail.

I was happy to see Tony Gwynn and Cal Ripken Jr. inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame over the weekend. These guys were remarkable and I love the fact that they each played their entire careers with one team.

Gwynn was known as Mr. Padre having grown up in the San Diego area and having played his entire career with the Padres, though he could have made a lot more money playing for another team. Ripken played his entire career with the Baltimore Orioles and broke Lou Gehrig’s record for consecutive games played. In this time of steroids and performance enhancing drugs these guys were both clean and both good ambassadors of the game. Mark McGwire should have made it this year but the steroid accusations will probably keep him from being selected for a while.

San Diego has really been hopping with Comiccon and the west coast tryouts for American Idol going on. I heard on the news there is no a single hotel room to be had here. That should give the economy a boost.

I guess also there is some bad news, because of the drought we are in they are trying to limit residents to 20 gallons of water a day. I don’t know how they are going to work that but I will tell the kids to try and save water and all.

Well almost time to get to work. I guess I had better get this closed and get in there and teach.

Busy weekend

I didn’t blog over the weekend as I just didn’t seem to get around to it, though I did get a whole ton of stuff done over the weekend. I guess we’re getting too busy with Unification Wars game, and I am sorry for lack of blogging.

Anyway over the weekend we made the commissary run, I ironed all my work clothes and we did a bunch of cleaning. It might not sound like much but with the ironing I was catching up on my own laziness. I have been doing laundry each weekend and then instead of ironing the clothes right away I have been hanging them upstairs in the closet.

I would pick out clothes that were not wrinkled from the ones there, but over time my available choices started getting smaller and smaller.

So this weekend when David did his laundry and threw my stuff in a laundry basket it was all terribly wrinkled so I broke out the iron and while pressing them I went ahead and got the stuff out of the closet and pressed it too. Now I think I can go about three maybe four weeks without doing laundry, but I don’t think that would be a very good idea.

This weekend something funny happened. On the way to the commissary I stopped off to pick up the mail and there was an express mail envelope in my post office box. The label was all faded out and unreadable, someone had removed the top copy. Anyway I opened it up to see what it was and it was a marriage license from Wisconsin. Since it obviously wasn’t for me I went back into the post office and talked to the lady at the counter. As we were talking it all of a sudden dawned on me, it was for one of my students.

Mail delivery to students is a little slow here on the base and so when someone is going to get something sent via express mail or a courier service we get it sent to one of the staff members houses. They get it quicker that was. Anyway I had forgotten that one of the students used my address for the express mail. This morning just to make sure I didn’t forget about it again I put it on the front seat of the car. He was happy to get it when he came in this morning.

Laila and family are going to see the new Harry Potter movie today while I am at work. It is evening over there and I guess they have really wanted to see it. I am not a big fan of the Harry Potter series, I guess I might be too old.

This morning getting to work was an adventure and I almost was late even though I left on time. There was a big wreck on Interstate 5 in the northbound lanes about two miles south of the naval station. Since everyone listens to the traffic report on the radio and TV they all took Interstate 805 causing it to backup.

It made the 805 a nightmare and also all the streets leading to it as everyone had the same idea on how to get to work. To make matters worse, somehow I wound up behind a cement truck when I got off the freeway and every stop sign and red light was a long wait as they are slow getting up to speed.

The gate was no problem and I zipped right through there, but then a ship’s crew was doing their Physical Readiness Test on the street we are located on, so I got stuck behind all the slow runners. I did make it on time but someone did take my normal parking spot.

Well it is time to get to work for the day.

A short vacation from blogging

Sorry for not blogging over the weekend but I had a really busy weekend and never got around to even logging onto the blog. This weekend was the weekend to get caught up on a few things around the house and also finally sort through tons of junk mail to see what was important and what is not.

When I got home from my last trip I went through all the mail and got all the bills out of the stack and paid them, but I had tons of credit card offers, catalogs, and various other junk that I never took the time to sort through.

I finally got to it since time to figure out the taxes is here and I wanted to get all that paperwork found and sorted out. Now I just have to get it organized into a nice little packet and then figure out the best way to file them.

Also Saturday was grocery day and after staying up too late on Friday I kind of slept in on Saturday getting a little bit of a slow start to the day. I also did laundry on Saturday and we worked on cleaning up the kitchen and all.

I stayed up again too late on Saturday night but did get up in time for church. I didn’t bring the bulletin so I won’t post links to the scriptures but the mass was one the one where the lady was going to be stoned for adultery and Jesus said “Let those without sin cast the first stone.” The priest then kind of made the gospel go along the lines of trying to solve a few things that have been going on at our parish. There are several committees that have been fighting for power and as a result it has been causing a lot of conflict.

He basically related everything to the hand. The hand has five fingers of various sizes and none are the same. Some you use differently depending on what you are trying to pick up or grab. If you lose one by it being lost or injured you will not be able to do certain things. It kind of goes along with anything you do in life or family. Everyone has their position and it takes the group or unit to get things done. A weak person, committee, teammate, or family member drags the entire unit down.

He even put it directly towards our Filipino members, our church is mainly Filipino, and said that they have the ability to take a smoothly running organization and by struggling to be the most important and recognized person cause the organization to splinter. He then went on t talk about how if your neighbor buys a car, that the next neighbor will go out and get a better car to show they are more well off. He said we should live within our means and not worry about what others have and own.

He even made a joke about the Gospel saying, “Those without sin cast the first stone” and whack a stone sails by his head and he says “ok, mom”.

Anyway after church the kids wanted to come home and that was when I decided to go through all the paperwork stuff. It took a while but I got through the stack and I made it smaller, though I still have to go through a stack of stuff to get all the tax stuff ready which I will do today or tomorrow.

I was still playing Unification Wars, but was kind of just running back and forth monitoring what was going on every few minutes or so, rather than sitting continually behind the screen. I also got my clothes ironed for the week and all, I had forgotten about some clothes in the dryer, so I had to iron stuff.

Later Laila woke up and then I went ahead and concentrated more on the game and all the chats on the screen. We have various chats set up for the various federations we are allied with and so I have several chat windows up simultaneously. It is good because we can share ideas and make new friends. We can also find out about people and get opinions on things.

Also we have our own federation IRC chat where we work with team members. It is really good because once someone gets kicked out or quits they can be banned. There has been a lot of stuff going on in the federation and our sister federation. Our federation is full and our sister federation has open slots. They have been inviting people into their federation so we can get a look at them and last night one of the most arrogant people I have ever seen in the chat came in and all he did was tell us how this wasn’t good enough, and pretty much slammed us on our choice of ships and all.

Laila jumped on him quick as did Sgt Joe. The guy told us our OP was not good and so Sgt Joe went ahead and listed his battles and results including where he has beat this guy. Anyway, the guy got booted and I hope that others like him will not keep appearing in the federations. It goes along with the hand thing, everyone has a role to play, and that guy was destructive.

We have a couple more like that in our federation, but I think that they might be leaving soon. If they don’t I fear that they will drive some of our players away. To me image is important and I carry the flag of my federation with pride. To me the allies of our allies are also folks to be looked after and not attacked as well as personal allies of our federation mates. We have a few wild cannons that attack and then look at who they hit. They have been hitting allies and friends of allies, and that is not right and has no place in warfare.

There are plenty of NPC’s and people that would like you help them into protection to get your planet count up. I see no benefit in hitting someone’s main system and taking away all their planets unless they are doing it to you or others. Then I feel you are justified in doing it.

If you just attack to prove you can do it then you are nothing more like the folks that are causing all the problems by blowing themselves up in market places and all. It serves no purpose other than to make enemies.

Anyway, now that I have that off my chest, Laila is now starting to have the same problem she had with PLDT happening with her Bayantel. Recently her bandwidth has dropped way down and though their customer service is great the guy checking her lines was able to point directly back to the servers. They too have oversold their bandwidth, but no that she does have a ticket and has had her lines checked hopefully they will get her taken care of.

I stayed up way too late last night trying to get my time reset. It is not cool having to stay up until 1 AM and then trying to get up at 5:15 AM. Maybe if I were a little younger, so I am going to try and move up a little and go out earlier in the evening.

Also Laila as she always does has now learned another section of the game that will produce planets without having to fight for them. She now makes and uses her own artifacts and she is going to teach me how tonight. So now I will start doing that in addition to fighting. But now it will be more like protecting them.

Well time to get ready to get some work done. Have a great day and a great week.

Coffee Maker and Keyboard problems

Well this morning I had a slight personal disaster.

After staying up late last night resetting myself in the game I went to bed. This morning I got up a little early for a Saturday because Laila was going to have her damage protection expire and we both feel more comfortable when we supply outpost for each other.

Anyway I got up, came downstairs, and then proceeded to make coffee but my coffee maker was broke. The pump that pumps the water was broken, so I went ahead and boiled some water and made it manually. Without coffee I am very non-functional in the morning. Anyway it didn’t taste quite right but at least it was coffee.

After that we got Laila through her morning moves and I discovered another slight problem, this time with my PC keyboard. The enter key was broken and I think it was just kind of worn out from use. Also lately one of the shift keys has been messing up so I added a keyboard to my list of stuff to get.

Laila stayed up pretty late for her side helping a new player get his system restructured and leveled up and then we said our prayers and she went to bed. After that I fell asleep at my keyboard for a little while when posting op for someone. Actually I did that twice. Finally I just went ahead and signed off.

I then took a quick shower and took off on a Walmart run. I got a new coffee maker and the keyboard then came home to get everything set up.

I should be doing my laundry but that can wait until tomorrow. I have managed to waste away most of the day and Laila should be getting up soon. I think I will just watch TV until she wakes up for the night because I am feeling a bit lazy today.

Anyway I guess that is about it for today. Have a great weekend everyone.

Broken water pipe

Well the house got me again. This morning after getting up I did the regular morning routine and was all set to have a great day. I was leaving with plenty of time to spare and though I have a slight cold I was in a great mood and looking forward to going in and giving the class a test then starting the receiver area.

As I was getting into the car I heard a sound like running water coming from the side of the house so I looked over to see what was up. I thought either the kids or maybe the neighbor had left the water running. Instead what I saw was water running off the top of my garage, and it was quite a bit. I have one of those old solar water heaters installed originally as a backup to provide extra hot water. It has been broken for years and the company that installed it went out of business a long time ago. So basically it is useless, however the pipes to my regular water heater go through it. Anyway, it seems with the cold temperatures we have had one of the pipes ruptured overnight. I shut off what I thought were the valves and then called home as soon as I thought the kids would be up so I could get them to turn off the water to the house. I told them to turn on the water when they need to, and then I will cap it off when I get home.

So now I am waiting for my class to get done so I can run home and get it fixed. I am hoping I can do it myself and not have to call a plumber. I guess I will have to determine that when I get home. I just want to make sure I don’t mess up the brand new water heater that was installed a couple of months back.

Now I am just wondering what is going to be next as something big seems to happen about every three months. I also wonder what that is going to do to my water bill for this month, as this was leaking a whole lot more than the water heater when it decided to start leaking.

It is pretty ironic that here Laila is always having problems with having no water, while I am having problems with leaks and all. I guess I should just look at unloading the house onto the market, but there is no way I am ready to do that yet.

At least I know what I will be doing for the afternoon.

Anyway, that is today’s topic. Hopefully this will not be too hard or costly.

Update:

I got to take some time off today and ran home early to take care of the water pipe problem. I got really lucky, as all I had to do was rerun the cold water inlet to the hot water tank, bypassing the solar water heater thing.

I thought it was going to be some big problem but all it took was a pipe wrench and about $22 dollars for a new water inlet pipe and some fittings.

So I got lucky there. About the only thing is now I am all wet and dirty so I will have to go take a shower and clean myself up.

For once I got lucky around this money pit. Big Smile

No water

Wow, today I got to have a new experience.

We slept in until 7 AM this morning, and when we got up, there was no running water. That kind of made taking a shower a little impossible, but then I got to experience the primitive way of taking a bath. As Laila calls it the “Arroyo’s future plans for the Filipinos.”

Before Arroyo there were no additional 12% (VAT) taxes on everything, there was running water, and government officials critical of the government did not disappear, or turn up mysteriously dead as they do now.

Anyway since we did not have running water we got to take a shower by tabo. Laila has a drum of water that she stores in her bathroom. She also stores water in the laundry and the kitchen areas. When we have a day like today where there is no water we took a quick bath with a little ½ gallon size pail with a handle called a tabo. It was cold but at least, we had a bath with a minimum of water being used.

After that we then said our prayers and then went to cook breakfast. Earlier in the week, Laila cooked what she called a Monte Cristo sandwich for breakfast. It kind of resembled French Toast and so I have had French Toast on my mind since then. Yesterday, when we were at SM grocery, I bought some cinnamon and vanilla and this morning I made French Toast while Laila made hot dogs and Pancit Canton. For the Americans, reading the blog Filipino’s treat hot dogs like we treat sausages. This morning, however, I had a couple of mishaps.

Laila has a gas operated stove but it is quite a bit different than I am used to in the States. It is a counter top model that has some oversized burners on it. A few times in the past I have had some close calls when the pans were too small for the burners and slipped or tipped.

This morning her good Teflon frying pan tipped while I was making the French Toast and I tried to catch it as it slid. When I grabbed at the pan I got burnt, the pan hit the floor making a big mess, and the handle broke off her good frying pan. We cleaned up the mess and I told her I would get her a new pan. Of course she said don’t worry about it as most of her pans have broken handles. I guess this sort of thing happens all the time.

Anyhow, thanks God no one among us had a serious burn in our legs. Right after that, I continued cooking the French Toast and decided to add some more butter to the pan. Sure enough, splat, I dropped the butter all over the floor.

I finished the French Toast with no further incidents, and we went ahead and started getting the Pancit Canton ready. She mixed sliced cabbage with Lucky Me instant pancit noodles. Against her better judgment, she had me stir the noodles while she continued to set the table and all. Luckily, I did not dump that pot so the rest of the morning as far as accidents go, was over.

I almost forgot, sometime about 4 or 5 in the morning Laila’s cell phone went off and started ringing. It says, “An American found guilty of raping a Filipino woman is being turned over to US Custody..” blah blah blah. Quite a few months ago a marine lance corporal and a few buddies were accused of rape in Olongapo City, near the old Subic Bay Naval Base. The marine was tried in the press as well as the court, and he was found guilty. As is usually the case the US Government rather than have this person rot away in a foreign prison, was trying to take custody of the marine and imprison him in the US embassy while awaiting appeal and if he loses the appeal the US Government would like him to serve his prison sentence in the US Prison system.

If the guy is guilty, I see no harm in keeping him in the US Federal Prison System where at least the fellow prisoners abusing him are at least Americans. Also I see no problem with the US embassy holding him while awaiting appeal. I would like to see this tried in the court and not in the press though. Olongapo City was notorious back in the 70’s and 80’s for being a place where American Servicemen were shaken down by less savory characters. I never had any bad experiences but I have seen many people charged falsely of rape, assault, or breach of promise. From what I have seen of this case there are a lot of questions to be asked of both sides. I don’t really know all the details and all, but I know Laila sided with the girl, on this one. Of course this would not be the first time we disagreed on something nor will it be the last.

Anyway, I guess we will see what happens in the future. I do know that is has affected some things politically like the war games jointly held with American and Filipino forces has been cancelled for next year as a result of this case.

Sometimes you have to wonder about the Philippine Government. Earlier this week I saw where the Government of the Philippines started to demand that the workers from the Philippines working in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, UAE, and other places increase the minimum wage paid. The said countries responded by hiring more people from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and other countries that supply domestic workers.

The Government of the Philippines is also a little upset at the US over the marine deal and says that the United States is in danger of losing the strategic value of the Philippines.

Hey Gloria and other officials of the Philippines. This is not World War II any more. When Subic closed down because the Philippines Government demanded too much the US moved it’s assets to Guam, Singapore, and Japan. Guess what, it still has had no effect on readiness. When the US Military comes to the Philippines now, it is to help you as we can train anywhere now.

Puerto Rico is learning the same thing right now when they demanded the Navy abandon a bombing range. The US Navy moved on, can still hold the same training elsewhere, but when the Navy left so did the big money being paid for the use of the range. Now the Puerto Ricans in the area are screaming, because unemployment is up, income is down. Sound familiar, Philippine Government? Back in the late 80’s just before Mount Pinatubo erupted the Philippine Government decided that it would go ahead and either get a whole lot more money for its US bases or turn the base areas into a commercial port catering to the Japanese, and their shipping industry.

Talks fell through with the Japanese and Mount Pinatubo erupted sealing the fate of America’s involvement with the Philippines. The bases were ruined and it was more cost effective to move to Guam, Singapore and elsewhere in Asia. What was funny is that the many of the same shipyard workers working in the Philippines were now working in Singapore and Guam at the shipyards there.

The only thing that changed was that the Philippine Government lost what Laila would say is its share. The Philippines people are very hard working and when given a chance normally excel in what they do. The problem as I see it is that their corrupt government in wanting to line their own pockets and is preventing opportunities from being presented to the Philippine people.

Business will always seek to get its products and projects done by the lowest priced manufacturer or company. There are many third world companies competing with the Philippines for business. Malaysia, Indonesia, Mexico, and India as well as many other countries are competing for jobs in the same industries. The Philippines Government has decided that for the good of the country they will charge more, and then whine and cry when that new call center springs up in New Delhi or that new assembly plant is built in Penang. They just don’t get it, and their people don’t seem to get it. The people keep electing the same people that have held them back for years or the famous people who do not have a clue as to how to manage anything. In fact, without folks to manage their money where would some of these sports figures and actors be?

Anyway, I would like to see the Government of the Philippines start cooperating with the rest of the world. The Islands have a lot to offer, if their Government would quit sabotaging everything out of greed and corruption.

I read a letter to the editor earlier this week about the Subic rape case, written by a so called American. Sorry, to me this person may somehow have gotten American Citizenship, but he sure missed the boat as far as the way things go in America. He was saying that this marine would have been prosecuted and tucked away in jail really quick and that the prison system would never let this guy go.

Only about one in five rape cases are successfully prosecuted in the United States and a court case in the United States will usually take over a year or so to complete. If the guy were to be convicted there is an excellent chance that the case would be overturned by appeal, or the sentence reduced. Also if the guy did keep his sentence and actually go to prison then after getting time off for good behavior and all how much time would be actually served?

All that is happening by having this guy turned over to the US is making sure that he gets a guy named Bubba for a cellmate and boyfriend rather than a Filipino cellmate for a boyfriend. He will have to serve the full sentence and all.

Anyway enough on all of that, I got off on a tangent again.

This morning while we were eating breakfast the buzzer rang letting us know we had visitors. Laila and I went out on the balcony and it was a bunch of kids who wrongly buzzed her unit, three of them in wheelchairs begging for money. Laila referred to it as the new Arroyo health care system.

Laila is very much against the way the Arroyo Presidency has gone too far, and while we don’t always agree with the reasons, things are the way they are, the causes, or things like that we both are smart enough to realize that if changes are not made then there is no future for the Filipino people.

The middle class in the Philippines is an endangered species. Since no one has much in the way of income, the income tax is not taking in enough to support the politicians in the style they are use to experiencing so they have the sales tax. Since people can’t afford to buy anything that is also not keeping the elite up to the style they are accustomed to, so in comes the VAT tax of 12% on top of everything else.

Since that is not keeping the people down enough lets go ahead and cut their water but then we will also charge them more for the water we are not giving them. Oh and lets jack up the price of gas, electricity, phones services, and all other necessary services.

Right now people in Laila’s middle class neighborhood are having to move away because the tax and raise prices realization has led them to the point where if they hope to survive they have to move to a cheaper area.

As they move out they either hire caretakers, who live in their homes with no water, electricity and other services just to prevent squatters from moving in. Squatters move into the abandoned places and basically live there free of charge until run off.

I have been visiting the Philippines off and on since 1976 when as a young Petty Officer Third Class I pulled into Subic Bay on the USS White Plains (AFS-4). Over the years I say it change toward the better, the ouster of the Marcos regime, saw it get better under Cory Aquino, and now I am seeing it tank again under Arroyo.

I am passionate beyond all other things in my life to get Laila out of here and to the United States where things are also going down the tubes, but not to this extent. Also at least, there, I can move to a place with a nice cost of living and continue working.

Well I guess that is about it for today. I have blogged far too much today, but when I get a chance to just wildly blog my opinion, I sometimes go on a rampage. Anyway, time to get to helping Jun Jun with his project so have a great day everyone.

New DVR

Sorry about not blogging yesterday.

I was really busy at work and after getting off late I decided to stop off at the Navy Exchange Mini Mart to pick up a few things. I was going down 8th Street and just as I was getting to Paradise Valley Road traffic came to a standstill due to a red mini-van that had rolled over. There were two ambulances and 2 fire trucks along with a whole lot of National City Police cars.

I finally got to the mini mart and then headed for home after a brief stop at the post office to get my mail. I then went home and checked out the water heater installation. It cost me an additional $405 to get the installation up to the California and San Diego earthquake codes.

Anyway then Laila came online a bit early and we started chatting and getting set up for the Internet TV watching when all of a sudden my Internet connection became unstable and kept dumping me offline.

I checked out the phone lines and wrapped them a little tighter when I got home today. I have another DSL Modem but I can’t get the software they sent with it to recognize it. I guess I am doing something wrong, but now that I have finished redoing the phone lines and all it is working great, so I may just have had a bad connection where the lines enter the house.

So now it is Friday and I am thawing out some stuff to make for dinner. My new DVR is awesome and it really improved my picture quality. Now I think I will start reading up on it and see how to use some of the other features.

Have a great weekend everyone.

Water Heater

Yesterday I managed to make arrangements to get the water heater replaced and found out a few things. It costs almost as much to get it installed as it costs for the new water heater. I have to pay for the installation, delivery and disposal, and a building permit. At least it is guaranteed for 12 years so I will not have to worry about that before I sell the house.

I am down to a month left before I will be on my way to Laila’s for the holidays. I can hardly wait and I am very anxious to get on my way. I just hope I can stay busy at work so that time passes quickly.

Today my class will finish up their final performance tests and then we will have the final test for antennas and couplers tomorrow. Then we will start the last area, which I will have to teach twice since we split the class in half. I also have anther instructor evaluation on Thursday morning so that will be fun.

We have been getting a lot of questions e-mailed to us from the fleet about malfunction lights on the WSC-3 so I will be posting another tech tips thing today in a separate post. I always like to try and help out when I can.

I just wish I were a little smarter as far as HTML code goes so I can arrange my posts a little better and categorize them like Laila can do with her blog. I guess I can start working on that and see what happens.

That will take a long time to categorize a few years of entries though.

While we were in lab this morning I was listening to the radio and I guess there are accidents all over town. People just can’t drive in the rain here and we have had some light drizzle this morning. It makes the roads as slick as ice and people try and drive too fast. I am glad I am at work and not out on the roads. I am also glad we got a little rain because it has been so dry here. We did get a little light drizzle Sunday, but that was just because I washed my car on Saturday. Also there was not a lot of traffic since it was a weekend so there were not a lot of accidents. Not the same today when everyone is n the roads going to work, school, and all.

Anyway, I guess that is about it for today since I will be writing the other entry for the day.

Taking It Easy

Well, Saturday is here and after staying up late watching movies with Laila last night I still managed to get up before 8 and chat with her before getting a few things done around the house and then going to Sid’s Carpet Barn to buy the carpet for next weeks bedroom. That will leave me with just David’s room, which we will do while he is in boot camp.

Now I am doing the laundry and getting a few other things done. I am also hoping that Tuesday comes and goes fast because it seems the politicians have suddenly managed to get a hold of a ton of money to plaster all the TV and Radio stations with ads, and some of them are getting pretty vicious.

Anyway it will all be over on Tuesday and all these ads will disappear for a while until the next election. Well I am going to keep my post small today. I promised Laila I would take it easy today, and I do have to check on the laundry so I will do that and then relax for a while before she wakes up.

Finally I am getting stuff caught up

Well Saturday is here and even though I have been tired all week I actually got a lot done this morning. Last night Laila and I stayed up until 1:30 AM my side, mainly because I wanted her to plan some activities for the next visit.

I want her and I to get away, just the two of us for a couple of days. It will give us time to sit down and plan for our future. Also I want to get her away from the PC and take a break from my PC too. We will have the laptop for e-mail but we will not be playing any games.

This morning I got up at 7AM but the Santa Ana we have been having makes the mornings cold and the days hot, so after kicking off the covers and feeling that cold air, I pulled them right back on again and stayed in bed for an extra hour.

Laila and I then did our morning routine, thanking God for getting us together and saying prayers for our families and others that have affected our lives, and then I sent her off to bed so Judy, Carlos, and I could go carpet shopping and furniture shopping.

We went to Sid’s Carpet Barn again and I met with the same sales person I met last time. She picked out a nice shade of lavender that matches the color that they painted the walls in, then we took off for Jerome’s and got her a nice 6 piece bedroom set. They had the posture pedic mattresses on sale so we bought a queen size and box spring and made arrangements to have it delivered Wednesday or Thursday, after the carpet is installed.

After that was a quick stop at wal-mart to get some curtains for my room and a shampoo caddy for my bathroom. I also got a new shower head, one of those ones that allows you to move all over the shower.

Now I am charging up the rechargeable drill so I can go put up the curtains and in the meantime Carlos and I are watching Monsterfest on AMC. They are showing “Nightmare on Elm Street”. Laila wouldn’t like it, but then she is asleep and we will watch something else tonight.

So other than the laundry I only have one big chore to get done. And it isn’t really a big chore, but more of an enjoyable task. I uploaded the wedding pictures onto Flickr, but I need to sort them and get rid of the ones that are out of focus, ot camera tests of the floor and stuff.

I promised Randine and her mother that I would get some copies made, so after I get them sorted and all I will order the prints. I feel a bit guilty because I should have done this one already, but I have been really busy since returning home. We took so many pictures just getting them uploaded to Flickr took several hours, but I feel great that they are there because they are permanently backed up.

Well, time to get to work. I want to get everything done before Laila wakes up. Have a great weekend everyone.