Current Mood: Beautiful Day

Well, where to begin…..it has been a crazy couple of weeks.

We had a great time down at Curacao, crappy travel and then this week.

We have been trying get our work done, unpack and get the other place taken care of.  We have actually done better at the unpacking then I totally expected.  But at the same time it is hard to work when everything is a mess.  Drives me nuts.

I have the china cabinet left, pictures to hang and the rest of my area of the office….it is a disaster and I can’t stand it.  But this place getting there.  It really does feel like home.  We are even going to unpack my heirloom cookie jars that were my great-grandmother’s, which we packed up in Indiana in 2004 and haven’t unpacked since.  I refuse to unpack them in Florida with those damn hurricanes.

Just so I have a note on the date, we did lose a few items to the move yesterday, broken wise, it was an accident.  =(  They were my ceramic Alaskan clay Eskimos that I made back in ‘87.   I still have my bear and the ribbons from 1st place that I got at the Tanana State Fair in Fairbanks, so that helps.  It just means that we have got to go back to Fairbanks, Alaska so I can get some more clay items.  I remember how long it took me to “sand” the lines from the mode off before they fired them.  It may me think of parts of the process that I forgot about….talk about flash back in your memory.

I have payroll to do this Sunday, so I have a lot of prep to do that I don’t fell like doing..icks.  I really, really need to balance our check books….I’m looking at the mess pile that I have on my table and it sucks.

During all this we watched the DNC and what speeches that we could.  CNN commentaries don’t know when to shut up…so annoying.

All the feature speakers Michelle Obama, Hillary Rodman Clinton & Bill Clinton did great and Barack Obama knocked down every GOP slam.  Al Gore really hit Bush hard!

I really got tired of everyone bitching about Clinton’s on that she didn’t say that he was ready for Commander in Chief.  What do they not understand that she couldn’t do it.  After everything that happened primary, with that being her arguement there was no way.  It would’ve came off as a lie.  She did perfect on what she had to do and that was to address her supporters, especially the women and throw her support behind Obama.  And the arguement for Commander in Chief could’ve only have been delivered by Pres. Clinton, as a former President he makes the strongest arguement.    I’m not happy with some of the things that Senator Clinton said during the primary, but she didn’t do the slander that one of her main advertisers wanted her to do, but there was no doubt in my mind that she would do what she can needed to do for the Dem Party in the end.  The Clintons may still be unhappy and wounded but they will do what is needed for the party and the country, that is who they are.

As a feminist, it really, really pisses me off that former Clinton supporters are being totally ignorant and plan on voting for McCain!  WTF?!?!  Clinton and Obama are almost the same on policies.  And why the hell would you vote for someone who will be able to put Justices on the Court that will restrict a woman’s right to choose?!?!?  That so pisses me off!  NO ONE is going to tell me that I can’t have an abortion if that is something that I decide that I need to do.

Obama wasn’t the sexist!  His campaign wasn’t sexist! It was the f****kin media….like the stupid moron of Chris Matthews.   Hello?!?!?  Can you not tell the difference?!?!  Are you as stupid as Chris Matthews to believe that?!?!  If you do, you are no better the Limbaugh and Matthews and OReily.

And now McCain’s VP pick….that is such a political ploy, that is all it is.  I would so LOVE to see a woman in VP or President, but not her and not with McCain…..the future of the Supreme Court is way, way too important.  That is what bothers me the most, she is truely an Alaskan in who she is and I do really like that part, just because of my love of Alaska, but she is way, way too conservative and anti-choice…..and just a token.  She is the female Dan Quayle.  =(  As a feminist, that is unacceptable to me.

What really scares me is those people, especially former Clinton supporters that will fall for it.  I’m so hoping that when Senator Clinton hits the campaign trail that it will help minimize that damage from McCain’s VP pick.

I know that I sound like broken record (that is a piece a vinyl that music use to come on, for you younguns), but there isn’t a day that goes by that I reflect on that I’m so happy that we moved to this part of the country.   Other then Alaska, I’ve never felt so at home and enjoyed the natural beauty of the area so much.

I need to get a few things done around my area of the office, so I can find things…icks….and then on to bed.

Curacao

Current Mood: Working

Just a quick update.  We finally got the correct wireless/modem from verizon and Torn has all the houses on that connection.   So far it is doing good.  The office cams are the only ones that stayed on when we were on vacation and they were on the verizon dsl.

We have order more usb boosters since we had a few of them die, which is why there is only 2 cams up in the living room.  Once we get those items we will be able to get all 4 cams up down there and focus one on the kitchen area.

So keep your fingers crossed that most of the issues are almost worked out, with no thanks to crappy comcast.

Current Mood: Working

I  finally got the company books done….need to do ours tomorrow and finish up the support tickets for work and get all the private messages answered.

We spent the first half of the day scrubbing the walls at our hold place…yuck.  They actually have walls in the lease……never seen that, most places just repaint.  Luckily Torn saw a mop with a scrubber side, that really, really help.  It cut the time down big time.  We still need to do some touch up paint, but it is much better.  The walls were icky because they didn’t have a good vent for the gas fireplace so there was sout everywhere…if we had known we wouldn’t have used it.  =(

Tomorrow morning we have the cleaners coming, thankfully.  The closer we get to getting done with the old place the better.  Then we can just focus on this place while working….I’m so looking forward to that.  I really want to get this place done.

Right now, I’m going to do some work around the house, just to make me feel as if I’m getting somewhere.

Here is the post that I wrote while traveling home.  I’ve been busy trying to catch up on my work, unpack from the trip and trying to get this place unpacked from the move….I’ll try to do more posting tomorrow.

****22 Aug @ 23:21 Est

We have been having fun here is Curacao.  We are staying at the Breezes Resort.  It is ok, but the way we read their site kids were limited by age, so there won’t be that many…..nope, they are everywhere and all ages.  Not what we expected at all.

We have been snorkeling and the water casing that we brought for the Olympus has been great.  We have got some great pictures.

****24 Aug 18:47 Pst

We are finally on our last leg of our trip, after an hour delay in DFW.  We hope to land in just over 2 hours.  We cannot wait to get home.  The trip back has been much better than the one out.  We got through customs and immigration much quicker than expected.  We thought we would be staying in the restricted area, but some American Airline lady directed us out of it.  =(  So had go to through security again and lost our 3rd bottle of water on this trip.  As much as we travel, this is the 1st time we ever lost water…..annoying.

It has been a few years since we have had a connection in DFW, I will say it is much better then I remember.  Of course, we came in gate D and head over to A…..heaven forbid if our connection is on the same concourse.  But we got there much better then we use to in DFW and then there was an hour delay.

We had fun, even if it wasn’t what we expected.  Too hot and humid and really made us happy that we no longer live in that type of climate.  We visited with all of our friends, did some drinking, went snorkeling a lot and didn’t get any work done.

Our room was in the last and farthest building from the main part of the resort and of course, could not receive any wi-fi in our room and that is after buying the international hotspot cards.  I did log on briefly in Miami…..holy cow, my work email is overwhelmed.  I will be skipping the gym Monday (trainer on vacation), just to catch up on some work.

It was cool to see and hear all the different languages from international travelers.  I haven’t heard that in years.  I just wish I had the ability to speak different languages.  I’ve tried and I suck at it, hell I have problems with English…lol

My brain is a little fried, so I’m having problems on thinking of what to say about the trip….lol  I just got my mind on sleeping in our bed and what I need to get done this week.  There is so much to do that my brain is swimming.

I’ll try and post this when we get home, I’m going to try and get some more sleep….18hrs of traveling on 4hrs of actual sleep…icks.

Current Mood: Angry & Chilling & Exhausted

**22:52 PST Flying from San Fran to Miami

So far this has been the worst travel experience ever….gggrrr…Warning, I am livid and there is a lot of cussing.

First, we got bumped from Alaska Airline to United on our first leg of the trip to San Fran.  Ended up having go Alaska, do our iternry manually and then go to United.  The rest of our flights are on American Airline, we were told that we could get boarding passes for them while in PDX…of course, they have no one manning their ticket counter and no one at their gate…obviously they don’t do much at PDX.  We were also told that they could take care of us at the gate in San Fran.

Since we had to be “added” to United, it made it look as if we just purchased our tickets and that means we get searched.  That was a pain, but the TSA agents there were nice and understanding.

Then on that 2 hour flight we were stuck with a screaming brat right behind us.  Of course, her parents have never told her no before and didn’t think about giving her meds that would calm her down.  Those are people that should not reproduce.

Well, I NEVER want to go through San Fran again!  For one, the departure/arrival screens just have only the airline that it is next to by the gate!!  WTF?!?  I have never seen that.  So we had no idea where the fuck we had to go.  And we only had 30min before boarding…so we are running around and are stuck in nothing but United! 

We finally found AA, no one at the gate….of course, so we had to wait.  Then 15 min before boarding someone gets there and our tickets aren’t correct!!!  We had to RUN and I mean run out of security to the ticket counter, luckily the people in line were very understanding and let us in before them.  The woman at the counter worked hard and got some of taken care of and then we had to run through security again!!

Now, even with all the screw ups everyone has been nice and understanding. American Airline people have been great.  But the TSA in San Fran were asses…at least 3 of them especially a fucking bitch name Tracie #700617.  Because my ticket got flagged to be searched! 

They knew were in a rush and that fucking cunt deliberately slowed down the search, all the time smirking!  You have no idea how pissed off I am.  I really need the gym at this moment and will be researching how to file a complaint against that bitch.  We are stressing about missing our flight and she decides to be a power hungry bitch and if I’m missing anything I will be charging her with theft.  I knew what she was doing, but I didn’t know that the sup was in on it until Torn told me that he saw him smirking to one of the other guys. 

I’m fucking livid!  I will be filing a complaint against the fucking bitch.  I really need a punching bag, hopefully writing it out will help.  But my laptop is pissing me off.  I hate writing from it without an actually keyboard.  Every time I get to typing all of sudden my cursor moves to another line and my typing ends up there.  That is why I HATE typing from the laptop.  It really fucks me up.

Now, lets do a post on the rest of what we’ve been doing.   As you know we’ve moved….and it ended up being a weekend from hell.  Start with the lady not being moved out like she was suppose to have been.  She was suppose to be gone by the 1^st, but didn’t leave until 3pm on the 14^th!  She took the property manager that she had cleaned…that was a lie…so the manager had to rush to get people over there to clean the place and do the carpets.  Which screwed us up, because we wanted to start bringing the little stuff over.  Then we ended up moving in temperatures in the 100s, we both were sick, Torn was really sick and shit keep going wrong.  We are so lucky that we hired 2 guys for loading/unloading but ended up using them for 3 more hours than planned. 

Then Comcast screwed up again, one they didn’t activate our internet and stupid bitch keep telling Torn that it was on our end and we had to download something from Microsoft?!?  What an idiot.  She then had to eat crow when she saw that they screwed up.  Then the room that we are using for an office, they put the wrong part on the connection so when you barely moved the cord you lost cable and internet.  So we got them to come out on a Sunday to fix it.

We were so miserable that we broke down and brought a portable air conditioner.  Of course, that was a nightmare in itself.  There was nothing on our side of Portland that had them and they are seasonal.  All they had was the window ones and for some strange reason all the new houses/apts/townhouses the windows go side to side, not up and down.  It is a pain in the ass for a window air conditioner unless you want to use plywood.  =(  So we ended up buying one across the river in Vancouver, WA the next day.  It worked ok most of the day and then all of the sudden in the middle of the night the cooling part shut off and it was just blowing air.  Of course, it is a weekend and their support was off.   So Torn gets to deal with that when we get back.  =(

Thankfully it has cooled off, to the point that we are cold…weird…dying from the heat 2 days ago and now we are in sweatshirts.

In all of this, we have been trying to unpack get organized, get the rest of our stuff from our old place and then pack and get ready for Curacao.  Then a part on our dryer broke, so had to get an electrion for that…now our motor on the washer isn’t sounding right.  =(  Something that we have to deal with when we get back.  I so hope it can be fixed reasonably.  I really like our washer.

When we get back, we need to get the old place ready to turn over to the landlord.  Once we do that, it will be so much easier on getting our new place put together. 

We also need to get a Japanese screen for our sliding glass doors in our bedroom.  They face the street and the owner never put up blinds for some odd reason.  So we have been changing our clothes off to the side and in the bathroom since the doors face the street.  Luckily there are trees that hang down and offer some privacy, around the whole place since there are no blinds in the house at all.

I will say, for some strange reason I feel more at home there then the other place.  The other place is nice, it really is.  But I feel more comfortable, I don’t know if it is because I just don’t want to move for at least 5 years and have hope that we can do it there..  We have a 1 yr lease, but we are giving it 6 months, if we are happy we are going to renew for 18-30 months (we want 6 more months, because we are not moving in June-Aug again!)  The feel of this townhouse and the area just seems so much more comfortable to me.  We have a downtown area that we can walk to, the police are 2 blocks away (great for crime prevention) the Sandy River and the beginning of the Colombia Gouge is in walking distance, we are right off of 84, so it is an easy shot to Portland and we are 15 min from Multnomah Falls.  It seems to be a great balance, so I have a lot of hope and I don’t know if that is coloring my feelings of feeling like I’m home.

I can’t wait for it to be 2 weeks from now, and then we will be done with the other place and almost done with our new place.

Right now, we brought some drinks on the plane…I’ve never done that before, but really needed it.  The flight attendant was a complete sweetheart and gave me an extra bottle of wine due to us telling how bad of a day we have had.  I will say, so far, the people of American Airline have been great!  Now I’m going to have my second bottle of wine and try to get some sleep.  I’ll post this when we are in Miami killing time.

**06:30 EST : We are now in Miami, our flight doesn’t leave until 10:15.  We are exhausted and none of the shops actually sell hot sandwiches, just cold crap and pastries.  I really want some real food.

Current Mood: Crappy & Hidding from the World & Stressing Out

I sent this to all of our members in our message system, but wanted to make sure that they saw it if they prefer my blog :

Hey Everyone,

I’m extremely, extremely sorry, but because of comcast screwing us up, it has messed up our embeds to our house cams.  We thought we had the embeds working.

We have the cams going, but they need to hit a certain amount of hours before they will show up on the feeds.  =(

I’ve contacted the provider of our feeds and have asked them to remove the requirements, they have given the ok for that.  But with it being the weekend and the only person who can do it being on the East coast….that is now the hold up.

Our houses are showing up on the provider’s site, just not in our members area.

I can’t tell your how horrible I feel…  =(  I was so happy to think that Torn was able to get them going after what comcast did to us and I’m now crushed.

Please forgive me for this screw up.  =(

Once again, I’m extremely sorry about this.

~Toni

I did go to the gym and it was hard as hell.  I was consistently out of breath.  I’m feeling a little better, but still screwy.  Torn is doing much worst then me.  =(  It sucks.  I keep hoping that he’ll start feeling better.

Oh yes, our weather got even worst, instead of highs in the mid 90s it is going to hit 102 for our moving day.  We won’t see relief until Sunday night.  =(  Then the weather will be much better when we leave for our trip.  Why the hell couldn’t it be the other way around?

I got most of our clothes boxed up.  He attacked the kitchen.  I still need to go around and tape up all my storage containers so they don’t fall open when being moved.  I think I got a good head start on some of my prep work for tomorrow.  That is a relief.  Really hoping on not have a pile of it waiting for me tomorrow since it is my payroll day.

I know have a few news articles that I wanted to vent about, but I’m exhausted and need some meds.

Current Mood: Sickly

Today was kind of a waste due to being sick. When I’m sick, I even get twinges of an ear ache and I’ve had that all day….yuck

We decided not to go to the gym and crawl back in bed for a little while.  Then moped around here attempting to get things done.  I had errands to do and have been trying to do work downstairs since the office is now ripped apart.  I can’t wait until this move is over, because this is driving me nuts.

Of course, our timing is excellent…not only are we sick, we are moving on one of the hottest days AGAIN!!  And we will be getting cooler weather when we are visiting Curaco next week.  How screwed up is that?

My abs hurt and I’m hoping it is from my work out Monday and not from coughing all day.  I do plan on going to the gym tomorrow, Torn might not, he is worst then I am.  But the way I figured it, resting didn’t help, maybe sweating it will….who knows….

I’m heading to bed, I feel like crap.

It was hard to get myself motivated.   It doesn’t help that our table between our desks are trashed due to having to take things down due to comcast.  It makes it hard to work.  I didn’t go tanning or walking.  =(

I did get our books & bills done, store orders, got all of our magazine subscriptions changed on the address, post office stuff filled out, more online work and got a few other things done up, such as a verizon dsl account.

We had to deal with a power bump and then it going down for 20min in the middle of me doing all of this…..gggrrr

For packing, I got more of the bathrooms done. Now I need to figure out how I want to attack the office….I’m so not looking forward to that.  I will need to get that done tomorrow after the gym, errands and in between work.

That was day….need to get ready for bed and take some time out for myself.

Current Mood: Accomplished & Exhausted

This post will probably be shorter then my normal on details….I’m exhausted.

We had Torn’s brother, his wife and their 2 boys here for a visit.  We had a great visit, we feel bad that the house is a mess with packing, but they were cool with it.

When they got here Wednesday, we let them decide what they really wanted to do since they drove all day.  They decided to chill out and play games on the xbox360 & wii.  I don’t want to get into the dinner not working out the way we wanted, but we still ended up having a good meal.

Thursday we headed to the Portland Zoo and Children’s Museum.  Wow, that took longer then I thought….I thought we would have time for the Rose & Japanese Gardens that is in the same park.  We had fun and boy did my legs hurt after all the walking, I guess it made up for missing the gym……..grin

Friday, it was off to the Multnomah Falls.  It was gorgeous! Now, I knew it wasn’t far, but was thinking it was a 45-60 min drive…nope, only about 20min!  We are kicking ourselves in the ass for not visiting sooner and looking forward to when school starts so we can visit without as many people there.  And with us moving to right next to 84….it will be even quicker to get there.  We did some walking there and my legs are feeling it.

I hope to get time the next 2 days to post some pictures…..but I’m not promising anything.  We have to pack the rest of the house around all the work that we do….we move this Friday the 15th.

Today started very early with us getting up at 0530 so we can see our family off.  Then we crawled back into bed.  When we woke and start catching up on all the news that we missed the last few days, we found out about Bernie Mac.  =(  I’m trying not to think about it too much, because I just want to cry.  He was a great one.

Then you can see that we got into with Comcast…..gggrrr  No more said there.

We did go and pick up my new bikini that we had made and I’m very happy with and did a few errands.  Otherwise we have been working.  Torn had stated to work on his area of packing and I had a ton of online work to do.  I still have some, but it is much better under control then it was.  I did get a bunch of laundry done.  =)

Now for office work Sunday, I still need to do store orders, our books,  file some receipts, and get my paperwork ready for the post office (address changing).

For Monday, I need to call and make sure that I have water starting on the 15th, see if I can schedule our new trash account and get to the post office.

Over the next 2 days, on packing, I need to attack the bathrooms, get some of our stuff ready for trip, attack the office and our bedroom.

I’m hoping that writing it out here that it will help me mentally prepare and motivate myself.  =)

Alright, I’m heading to bed…..

More Tax Deceptions

McCain released three new ads with multiple false and misleading claims about Obama’s tax proposals.

A TV spot claims Obama once voted for a tax increase “on people making just $42,000 a year.” That’s true for a single taxpayer, who would have seen a tax increase of $15 for the year – if the measure had been enacted. But the ad shows a woman with two children, and as a single mother, she would not have been affected unless she made more than $62,150. The increase that Obama once supported as part of a Democratic budget bill is not part of his current tax plan anyway

**I keep getting forwards with lies like this and it is getting old.  If you think Obama is going to tax the working family, then you need to do some reading