Jeez Louise

It’s gotten kind of cool here lately, which has me thinking about work again. So for the first time this summer, I checked my work email.

And there was an email from last week saying that they were going to be changing the computer imaging, and if you want to save any of your documents, get in there before this coming Friday and save them to your own personal device.

Nice – I wonder how many other teachers are going to come back in September never having seen this email? I’m going in this afternoon to save my billions of documents to USB key or two and hope that they’re compatible with whatever the new document management software is. Actually they’re telling us that it’s going to make things much, much easier on us, which is always good.

We got a landline this past Fall, after living for years with just a cellphone. I’m really happy about it, but we’ve been through about three sets of phones since then. The first was a corded telephone – and the dogs were curious and bit through the cord (they’ve since stopped the destructive chewing, but it was hilarious the time when I could hear the phone ringing, answered it, and there was nothing on the other end. Like living in one of those horror movies where the bad buys cut the phone cords). Then we decided to use the cordless set that we’d had in Halifax, but the display was broken and after a week of not knowing who was calling (yes, I know, first-world problem!) I got tired of that. Rob didn’t care, he’ll answer the second the thing rings, but I don’t like surprises.

So after all that, and with my tendency to hate spending money unnecessarily, you’d think I’d have taken the time to read some cordless phone reviews before going out and buying our third set. But no, no I didn’t. And the cordless phones we have now are great when it comes to features and display and everything but the battery life? Ridiculous. If you forget to put it on the charger for one day, it’s dead.

I say this because Rob’s parents phoned this morning – and we were having a great old chat… and then the phone died. So we grabbed the other phone (which was actually ON the charger) and called them back – and fifteen minutes later the “I’m going to die!” beep started happening.

I’m thinking of putting them up for sale on eBay as “phones for when you don’t want to talk to anyone” or “mother-in-law avoidance devices”. No reserve. Bid now.

Along with moving into our neighbourhood, my friend C. has also decided to get a dog. And she went out and found one and put a deposit on it. She’s getting a girl, because all her kids are boys and she feels the need for more estrogen in the house. And she has decided to name her Sookie. Sookie is the same breed of dogs as Sprocket and Doozer.

C. is very excited about this dog. Like, VERY excited. The dog is three weeks old, won’t be coming home with her until the end of August, and she’s already gone out and bought every possible accessory for her – crate, collar, blanket, dog bowls… everything.

I thought I would get her a little welcome gift so when we were grocery shopping today I popped out and went to the department store. Where I saw the best thing ever: Snoop Dogg has dog toys. Well, Dogg Toys. There are headphones, microphones, boom boxes… pretty much everything except for little plush Dutch Master cigars (those ARE cigars that Snoop Dogg smokes, yes?). Anyway, I thought that was cool. I ended up buying her a little outfit because C. is all “I never had a little girl to dress up so I am putting this dog in pink princess outfits at every opportunity”.

We’ll see how that works out for her.

Yesterday was kind of a bust. KIND OF. Not too bad though.
See, my friend C. called and asked if I wanted to go to Charlottetown because she needed to go to Pennington’s. I said sure, especially since I had just received an email (yeah, Pennington’s has me on their email list) advertising t-shirts on sale for $5 each (when you’re used to paying at least $20, that’s kind of a big deal). Also kind of a big deal: actually travelling there. There used to be a Pennington’s in my town, but they closed it this past January, so now we need to drive an hour to get there.

Anyway. We got there, and C. went and found what she was looking for. I started looking for the t-shirts. And looking. And looking. I couldn’t find them anywhere. Finally I stopped a saleslady and asked her about it, and she looked completely confused. She told me that she had no idea what I was talking about, but if I wanted, I could buy two t-shirts for $25 on their sale rack.

When I got home I checked the email, and I wasn’t wrong… so that was frustrating. Ah well. Maybe they did have them and they sold out, and this saleslady just wasn’t up on the current sales.

Then C. wanted to stop at a bagel place. She bought her dozen bagels (nearly $12! i buy 12 bagels for $2.99 but that’s just cheap old me) and the cream cheese spread. I was pretty hungry so I was considering getting one for myself when I noticed that there were flies crawling all over the bagels and cream cheese in the display. NO THANK YOU.

The one good thing that happened was that C. is moving (she decided to move to the same area as me) and is all excited because now she can get an air conditioner (where she is now, the windows won’t accommodate an AC unit) and we went to the appliance store, where the guy gave her a fistful of aj madison coupons, so now she has 40% off the appliance of her choice. She’s now wavering between a dishwasher and an air conditioner.

Oh! Two good things: When we got home, I checked the mail and I had received my package from headcovers.com. It’s pretty warm in the summer, and I don’t always like wearing my wig. It’s difficult to find a good-sized headscarf anywhere around here (I like 36 inches – most are about 20), so I ordered three from this website. The last time I ordered from them it took over a month for my package to get here so I had been worried that the summer would be over before my scarves got here but this one arrived in less than a week, which isn’t too shabby.

Then I collapsed on my bed and decided it was probably a good thing that I didn’t buy any t-shirts or bagels. I’d have just gotten cream cheese all over the t-shirts anyway, with my messy eating, and they’d have been ruined.

YAY BIG BROTHER!!!

I don’t watch the US version, because it’s all super-edited and full of actorslashbaristas or whatever. I do watch the UK version, because it’s on every day, you can hear the swearing, and if they show their boobs or weiners or whatever, they show it on TV. And the public votes for who gets evicted.

So far this season:
a guy with no legs and only one eye.
A robot housemate
a chest of drawers that gives them secret missions
a guy who had to wear a mole outfit the entire first week.

and the latest and I think greatest: A really cringeworthy music video. So bad, but so good. If you don’t bother clicking any of the other links, please click that one.

Yeah so… blogging about TV is quite possibly the worst thing a person can do, but… I’m doing it. I think that DJ will appreciate this post, if no one else.

My dentist here recently retired. Which wouldn’t be a problem, if it wasn’t time for my six-month checkup, and if I hadn’t been having some sensitivity in one of my teeth for the past month and a half. Probably because when I was a kid I got one of those big silver fillings in that tooth, and from what I’ve read, they only last twelve years or so. Mine has been in there for oh… 25 years? It MIGHT be time to replace it.

So I’ve been calling around to all the dentists that friends have recommended to me, and none of them are taking new patients. Since our cable comes from the States, I keep seeing commercials for charlotte cosmetic dentists, and, while I’m sure they can do wonderful things with teeth, I’m not really willing to travel to North Carolina. I think I’m down to the last three in the phone book here before I have to start searching out of town and I reeeeeeeally don’t want to wind up having to travel an hour everytime I need to go to the dentist.

In other toothy news – when we took the dogs to the vet the other day, she was doing their checkups and when she was done she said they were in perfect health (12 lbs for Sprocket, 13 for Doozer), and that they had more teeth than most Shih-tzus. Now that we’re out of there I realize that I should have asked whether that means they have extra teeth, or if that just meant that she usually sees hillbilly shih-tzus who are missing teeth. Doozer also has an underbite (um yeah, ya think?) She didn’t seem to think it was a big deal – he doesn’t need dog braces or anything. And yes, dog braces are a real thing. And she said they were adorable.

We already knew that, though.

(okay, so I got a Canon camera… I still like that song).

I am so very excited about the camera I got for my birthday. Only problem is that I’m still a little afraid of it, and that I need some lessons or a tutorial of some kind to help me to take some better pictures. I think it might also have to do with the lens? I only have the one lens, the one that came with it. It doesn’t allow me to zoom in very close to things.

OR, maybe I just suck at photography. But I’m sure enjoying the photo-taking!

Flickr is taking about a year and a half to upload any of my pictures, but here are a few that I’ve taken in the past couple of days.

This morning we took them to get their boosters. Doozer was annoyed that Sprocket didn’t get his temperature taken in the special way that Doozer got done last weekend. Anyway, they were super good at the vet’s, where she said that they were the perfect weight (Sprocket is 12.5 lbs and Doozer 13.4? Something like that) and that they had more teeth than most shih tzus. I was like “Whaaaaaaaaat?” and she said that that isn’t a problem.

This afternoon, they had a grooming appointment so after I dropped Rob off at work, we continued on to the groomer’s. Usually I come home and hang out while they’re having their stuff washed and fluff dried, but since this time they were just having baths and nails done, not a full-on groom, I decided that it wouldn’t be worth it to drive all the way home and all the way back out. Since the groomer’s is near this place, I got an ice cream, helped some tourists who could only speak french, and bought myself some new fake crocs (yay!) for my dog walks. They only had lime green in my size but I am not really all that concerned with fashion at the moment.

Tomorrow I am going with my Dad to Halifax because he has some appointments. We’re leaving at 6 am for his 11 am appointment (it does not take five hours to get there but he doesn’t like to be late and is worried that there will be construction). As soon as his appt. is done with we are turning around and coming home. Big day in the big city!