Fire Pit

Tuesday May 31 - Hubby returned to work while I took Bud into the Vet. I also scheduled Chiro appointment for me at 10:30. Hubby was too busy to meet us in town for lunch. So Lil Bit and I picked up Wendy's cheeseburgers and then met Bud at the Vet's.

The vet had given Bud a mild sedative in order to x-ray his left leg. Turns out he sprained his ankle quite severely. Poor little Bud was quite groggy from his sedative. Loaded him in the car & returned home so he could rest.

Vacuumed house. It started raining. Washed dog beds. Rested.

Monday Memorial Day - Took dogs to wild dog walk. Harry ran everywhere & was exhausted by the time she returned to the truck. Got lattes from Deralee.

Ran to town with FMF. Shopped at Walmart. Picked up Dually at Equipment Rental where kids had dropped it off last night. Washed Bud & Bit at Dog Wash.

 Bud bath

Hubby washed Dually while I drove thru Car Wash with FMF. Ate at Wing Stop on the sidewalk under umbrella. Wonderful sunny day. Hubby got cheeseburgers at Wendy's. Drove home.

Had first fire in pit of the season until cowboy neighbors started up their backhoe to clean up horse shit. Too noisy & smelly. We let fire die down & went inside.

Fire pit

When we were in the house, we discovered Bud was limping on his left front leg. Poor dog.

Owww.. Back.

Friday May 28 - Hubby miraculously has a day off! He scheduled today off for holiday weekend! I am shocked. So we leisurely hung around until he got word to go pick up a Bronco south of CDA

I went about my chores in the morning and while picking up dog poop, I injured my back while bending over! I literally could not breathe. Hubby had to help me around.

I ended up going with him to pick up the Bronco anyway, although in severe pain. We took Bud & Bit in the Dually along with the trailer. Not a comfortable vehicle to ride within.

yet another project...

We stopped to get a couple of horrible nasty lattes in town and hubby returned to get his money back. Then walked the dogs at Riverstone park. Went to get Bronco. It rained while we were there. Hubby realized that it could not be put on trailer as it did not have tires. So he called the tow truck company and we waited until they got there.

After a brief stop at CN Diesel, we got cheeseburgers from Wendy's and went home.


Saturday May 28 - Greg and I picked up lattes from Jen Bunny. Hubby drove Dually while I took FMF with Bud & Bit to CDA to pick up trailer. Drove over to kids' place.

Kelsey and I went to make drinks while guys had to pick up rock in Rathdrum. We also stopped at BX to purchase Lancome for me.

After guys returned with rock, Matt shoveled some out. Kelsey made steaks. My back was hurting so bad that I had to take a bath while they were eating. Hubby drove me home in FMF.

Sunday May 29 - My back still hurts. Can't bend over. I have been dosing myself with Ibuprofen, Aspirin & Naproxen. Not good. Damage to internal organs.

hubby & Harriet

Sat on the deck this morning with dogs.

Ate at The View for breakfast. Never again. My omelette was tiny; hashbrowns were raw; and there were cigarette ashes on the orange.

Fed leftovers to dogs. Then went on "wild dog walk" again.

L to R - Harriet, Bud, Isabelle, Lil Bit & Angus

By this time, my back was hurting again so badly. Came home to sit on heating pad for the rest of the day. Watched TV. Boring sucky holiday weekend.

Rainy Days & Thursdays

It has been unreasonably cold here. And rainy. Today it is raining. A lot. The weeds are almost up to 3 feet! No time to mow them in between the next rain storm.

Latte Training

I had a discussion with Deralee and since I wanted to learn the latte business, she invited me to come down & learn. So it has been train train train lately.

May 23 Monday - Went down from 8:30-1:00 to learn latte. Took notes & made some drinks. Took Bud with me and he stayed patiently in the car.

May 24 Tuesday - Rained today. Could not go down to train. Dogs scared of thunderstorms. Can't leave door open for dogs to go in/out. Cleaned house. Got down to below 50 degrees tonight with rain & cold. Hubby came home exposed to Human Parvovirus because he stopped to get parts at Garwood Wrecking.

May 25 Wednesday - Went to A-town for espresso training from 8:30 - 11:30. Made lots of drinks today. Flustered...and sprayed milk out...made drinks backwards? Trying to learn how to get "rhythm" down. Left is on/Right is off for handle on steamer. Forget to blow steam out afterwards. Forget how many shots to put in each drink. Trying desperately to get the hang of it. Need to learn drinks...then taking orders...then how to collect money. Aaaaah!

Dogs calmed me down when I got home. Had forgotten my iPhone at the latte stand. Had to go back. When I got back home, vacuumed & cleaned house. Did laundry. This work stuff really cuts into my life! LOL.

Bud was a great baby today. Posed nicely.

Bud

As did Bit...

Lil Bit 

When hubby came home tonight, we walked the dogs in the park. It was raining a little, but the park seemed fine. Went on an extremely long walk. All the dogs were tired at the end. Dragging tongue. We drove through the park to look for deer. We saw NONE. Not even one. It was depressing. Where are they all? On the way back on Hwy 54 just out of the park, we saw one lone buck. He was trotting through the cut brush. He looked very majestic. Hope he is OK.

Got ice cream cones at Athol grocery. 

iPhone

May 18 Wednesday - My new iphone got delivered in the afternoon by Fed Ex and I have been busy playing with it ever since.

May 19 Thursday - Cleaned house. Vacuumed. Cleaned out FMF & Dodge of dog hair. Went to Spirit Lake with hubby to get groceries & graduation cards. Ice Cream place downtown was closed. :(  Hubby wanted to get Raffle tickets for vintage 1968 International Fire Department 1-ton Brush Truck. He bought the last raffle tickets they had left. Came home & unpacked groceries.

 Harriet & Isabelle

May 20 Friday - Went to train from 9:30 - 11:30 with Deralee at Espresso Stand. I will be filling in for her when she needs help.

Hubby & I went to deliver Toyota Tacoma to Moscow. 2 hour trip down there. Took Bud & Lil Bit with us. I walked dogs at WalMart that was closed while he did deal with guy. Then we ate at wonderful Italian place - Gambinos! Had lasagne, garlic sticks & spaghetti/meatballs. Yum. Long way to go for a great meal, tho.

 Lasagne & Garlic Twists & Spaghetti

We drove back in dark. Deer everywhere. Had to drive slow to avoid them all. 4 huge elk in the road that hubby had to hit the brakes for-the elk just sauntered off; not even worried about the truck!

Rained off & on throughout the whole trip.Got back home at 1AM. Really tired.

May 21 Saturday - We got lattes in morning. It was raining. Hubby went to work at shop for a while. Delivered another truck to guy in town to fix. Then stopped at Macy's to pick up my Mother's day gift that was pre-ordered & Kelsey's bag with samples. Arby's to get a part to fix for Curt & roast beef burgers for dogs. Then Walmart to pick up cover for iPhone, watermelon & bath salts. Saw Deralee there with Ashley.

It was really raining when we came home. Watched TV & I went to bed early.

May 22 Sunday - Up at 9AM, walked dogs in park by 10AM. Rainy day again. Hot & humid. Gave Jen-Bunny her graduation card.

Nails & Toes / iPhone

May 17 Tuesday I went into town to get my nails & toes done. Deposited life insurance proceeds check at bank. Picked up cheeseburgers for dogs at Wendys. Met hubby for lunch over in Post Falls. Walked Bud & Bit in a skateboard park. Then I came home to girls to give them their cheeseburgers. Idiots are shooting again so Harriet is scared out of her mind.

I vacuumed again because Angus is shedding terribly.

Ordered my new iPhone 32GB in black. Should be here in 2 days.

On May 16 Monday I made homemade baked Mac-N-Cheese for hubby and cleaned the house. Vacuumed & washed clothes & dog bedding.

mac-n-cheese

The area set a record for cold temps this time of year. I think it was about 45 here for a high? With rain. And rain. And cold rain. Icky.

Hubby only worked in shop for about 2 hours and then came home to watch HIMYM season finale with me.

Still taking allergy pills for wasp sting. Hurts.

On May 15 Sunday, got a text from Jen-Bunny that they were going to Montana to do gold-panning. So I raced down to get drinks. They were very nice & made drinks for us before they left! How sweet.

Hubby and I walked dogs at Farragut, it started raining briefly. 

We dropped other dogs off & took FMF into town to go to Costco for dog food & other misc things. Then got gasoline in FMF. Picked up Wendy's cheeseburgers for dogs. Washed FMF at Car Wash. Then took Bud & Bit to dog park in CDA. They played briefly. Lil Bit really does not enjoy the dog park that much. Bud, however, loves to visit EVERYBODY & all the dogs. Has to go over to greet every person & get a head rub! He is such a social dog.

When we got home, we posted the Toyota Tacoma on Craigslist, updated hubby's RMOR blog, and looked up info on internet for events we want to attend this summer.

May 14 Saturday we got lattes in morning, took dogs for brief walk at Farragut, then hubby went to shop to work while I stayed at home with dogs. I kept taking more allergy pills & actually fell asleep for a couple hours. When hubby came home, I took more pills and we both fell asleep in front of TV! LOL!

Eye Hurts

On Thursday, I rested because my eye is still really bad. It just won't heal. Woke up with crusted pus all over it. It feels scratchy & burns.

Hubby came home with the Dodge right after work. We loaded up the dogs, drove to Sandpoint, got parts for hubby and I walked dogs. Then we picked up hamburgers for hubby & dogs at Burger Express. Drove to wild dog walk in deserted subdivision by Priest River. Beautiful area. The water was in draw-down & the beach was exposed. Isabelle jumped down & played in the water as did Bud, Bit & Harry. But Angus was too scared to walk over the rocks. On the walk back to the truck, Bud spied something in the trees & took off. We saw he was trying to "herd" 12 deer than ran out of the woods. Bud came running back - out of breath & completely soaked. He must have run through some low-lying area.

When we got home, it got seriously cold. Ran out of propane. Oh. no.

While paying bills Friday, I came across this.

Still Here
I stood by your bed last night, I came to have a peep.
I could see that you were crying, You found it hard to sleep.
I whined to you softly as you brushed away a tear,
“It’s me, I haven’t left you, I’m well, I’m fine, I’m here.”
I was close to you at breakfast, I watched you pour the tea,You were thinking of the many times, your hands reached down to me.
I was with you at the shops today, Your arms were getting sore.
I longed to take your parcels, I wish I could do more.
I was with you at my grave today, You tend it with such care.
I want to reassure you, that I’m not lying there.
I walked with you towards the house, as you fumbled for your key.
I gently put my paw on you, I smiled and said “it’s me.”
You looked so very tired, and sank into a chair.
I tried so hard to let you know, that I was standing there.
It’s possible for me, to be so near you everyday.
To say to you with certainty, “I never went away.”
You sat there very quietly, then smiled, I think you knew .. in the stillness of that evening, I was very close to you.
The day is over… I smile and watch you yawning and say “goodnight, God bless, I’ll see you in the morning.”
And when the time is right for you to cross the brief divide,
I’ll rush across to greet you and we’ll stand, side by side.
I have so many things to show you, there is so much for you to see.
Be patient, live your journey out … then come home to be with me.
Author unknown

Eye Stye

I have not been blogging or texting any lately because of a Stye in my right eye. It is very painful and I can hardly see out of that eye.

Monday was finally a beautiful day outside. No rain. Lots of sunshine.

However, when I arose this morning, it was storming. More depressing clouds & wet.

Tuesday And Falling Cupcakes

Since I had not made cupcakes for the guys in a LONG time, made preparations to start cupcakes. Obviously the wonderfully warm weather was not cooperating as they fell in the middle! Stupid things.

I vacuumed the house & did laundry. Another boring day.

Hubby said we were going to walk tonight with the dogs, but forgot to bring home the Dodge truck as this week he is on-call & driving the company work vehicle.

Mother's Day Weekend

Sunday - Breakfast at The View; Dog walk at Farragut Park; No Cupcakes in CDA; Brief walk at Tubb's Hill in CDA;

Mother's Day Cleaning

I REALLY need a break. I want to have a few weekends alone with the hubby. The kids are nice, but I need time away from them. LOL.

Cleaned the house again today so that the kids could come over for Mother's Day.

Cold Again Today

On Wednesday, May 4...it was a beautiful day. I believe it got up in the high 50s and the sun was shining most of the day.

Hubby had taken the Dually into work so that he could pick up a truck and I had full advantage of the Dodge. Bud & Bit went with me to get drinks at the latte stand. Deralee was very busy and had 5 cars in line. No talk time. The Dodge was full of dog hair again from Isabelle, so I detailed it...again! Vacuumed, washed windows, and cleaned with Clorox wipes. It smells fresh again because I left the windows open all day. No more wet dog smell!

I also washed dog beds & cleaned the house. Cleaned out the refrigerator, vacuumed the house, and Swiffered. Floors were clean for two seconds...until the dogs got in again. But it smells much better. Just need somebody to come clean my windows.

Thursday, Cinco de Mayo is cold. About 45 degrees out right now with clouds overhead. Dreary. Not much left to do as everything has been done.

Could go out and pick up pinecones, but I think I will leave that to Austin.

Happy Dogs For Happy People

On Monday, I vacuumed & cleaned the FMF just before the rain started again.

Matt had texted us last night that they had finally gotten Osama Bin Laden. So it was all over the internet news & television news all day.

It seems that it took 9 years & 9 months too long to get this bastard.

To me, I was happy that he was dead because he caused so much heartache for so many people. And he will probably rot in hell. But his dead does not indicate that the Iraq/Afghanistan War is over. Far from it. And gas prices are not falling yet.

Hubby had to work late because of High Speed Internet connection problems. He came home around 9PM. Dogs were sad having to wait for daddy to get home.

Tuesday, I cleaned out the refrigerator and did laundry.

Great Birthday Weekend

Today was hubby's b-day! I woke him up with a candle in the cupcake and sang happy birthday to him. It is our family tradition.

I cleaned & vacuumed the whole house. Then swiffered the floors. The house was Clean. Clean. Clean. (for a short while) Then it rained in the afternoon on Friday. Kids came late. They had to stop & do a few errands for me as the helium birthday balloon I got at the grocery store the other day deflated. Sweet kids picked up a whole bunch of balloons! They also brought dog cookies.

There was fresh made cheeseburger macaroni on the stove & homemade crescent rolls. The house smelled delish!

M&K unpacked all their stuff while Beebo tore through the house playing with his friends. I finally had to walk down to the shop & get hubby to come home as he was piddling down there talking again. Ate dinner - famished! Celebrated hubby's birthday. He got some sweet presents from the kids - M went nuts setting up a great off road bag for the Roc Bronc. I had already given him a BBQ set in a case, a set of Thermacare Heat Wraps, & an Auto Detail Kit (for me to use).

Then went to bed for an early wake-up call for the NAPA 4x4 & Off Road Event on Saturday morning.


The guys got up early at 6am. Got vehicles loaded & took off. K&I got ready with the dogs & went to the NAPA Event. Everybody was unloading. Briefly saw Bonnie Graham & Cindy Holman. Then handed the FLIP video cam off to Austin to take video for the day.

KRN and I then went shopping to pick up her supplies for Red, White & Brew. We decided to shop at Old Navy as KRN wanted LOTS of cheap tops. Drove over there on the interstate. When we waiting at a light near Best Buy, a woman opened her truck door & threw up orange vomit! It was disgusting. We were in shock! Both of us suddenly started laughing hysterically! It was bad. We parked in the mall lot to pee, KRN visited a store in the mall. Then on to Old Navy. Walked Bud after shopping a little at Old Navy. There was a circus at the mall & they had two huge red&white striped tents set up.

On the way back to CDA, we stopped at latte stand to get our favorite jet tea strawberry/pina colada. Then on to Costco gasoline, supplies at Costco, multi dog leash at Petco and our final stop at Wal-Mart for bath salts.

Stopped to see if the guys were OK in Rathdrum and they had just finished when we pulled in at 3pm.

Met the guys at home, then unloaded stuff. Everybody got changed for birthday dinner in town. However, when we took the MegaMatt into town Olive Garden had a 40 minute wait & was packed! We decided to go to Ciao Mambo - it was excellent. A little on the greasy side but food was delicious! A table of 8 was set up beside us which made us nervous at first - especially when they came in with little kids that should have been at the babysitter's! But we were amazed to find that the kids were excellently behaved and we were so impressed that we bought the parents' drinks! They thanked us profusely. While we were dining, the prom attendees started coming in so we had a Runway Show with the girls in amazing dresses & the guys dressed in studly tuxes! There was only a slight mishap when the food attendant who seemed to have nothing to do besides waste space at the order counter...brought us out the incorrect food twice! Our waitress came over and corrected the mistake, but I could have waited. It was ridiculous that this dumb girl put food in front of people they had not ordered!

We then decided to go to The Mill to have another beer & play a game. Girls won! We headed home where KRN fell asleep on the couch at 10PM. M had to cancel their get-together with friends in Sandpoint.

Sunday morning we got drinks from Jen-Bunny. Then took dogs for walk at Farragut. Came back home to change then kids packed everything up. Drove with Bud & Lil Bit & Beebo in the FMF to Verizon store (assholes) for kids to get new iPhones.

The Following is a Complaint Letter I submitted to Verizon.

We wanted to upgrade phones to the new iPhone on Sunday May 1, 2011 at the Verizon Wireless Store on 540 West Prairie Avenue #108 Coeur d'Alene, ID 83815.

When we the girl at the entrance asked our name, she wrote it down and said it would be "just a sec". My wife asked if it would be an hour, or a sec. First of all...your customer service should be more accurate...say something like - "thank you for coming to Verizon - the wait will be about 20 minutes." Why would a service rep ever have said "just a sec". This is not an accurate wait. You need to train your representatives better to actually serve the public.  What was the MOST rudest customer service I have ever seen or heard is that the MANAGER of this store pulled the girl aside and told her "Make Them Wait!" in a whisper-however, we overheard this comment. All of us were shocked that somebody; especially the Manager could be this nasty in front of customers!

When we were finally helped, there were no white iPhones in stock as we required. Even though the customer service representative was able to check stock in other stores, and we offered to go pick it up in another store, we were told "You CAN'T do that." That is really NOT customer service. We offered to drive over 25 miles to go get the phone we wanted.

After settling for a phone we did not want, the customer service rep...even after verifying two different phones to transfer service to two different iPhones - one being the 32GB and the other being a 64GB...still managed to transfer the Contacts to the incorrect phones.

The final nail in the coffin to the customer service was that after we left the store, the phones WERE NOT ACTIVATED. We had to call into customer service and go through a step-by-step activation.

After this fiasco, we will not be ever going to this store with its horrific customer service & rude management. Not to mention the stock & wait time is appalling at this Company owned store.

I HATE VERIZON.

We had lunch at Schlotzsky's because the guys were hungry. Their sandwiches were not good. Our salads were old & brown. Ick.

Then our final shopping for the day was at Lowe's to pick up shop lights for hubby. I got an aloe vera plant. KRN & I walked dogs for a short potty stop while guys checked out.

We decided to take dogs to the CDA Dog Park. It was fun. Sunny day and the dogs had fun. Lil Bit wanted me to pick him up and then snapped at a couple dogs. I don't think he was in the mood for the dog park.

Kids left to go home. We went to Wendy's to get cheeseburgers for dogs at home. Then drove home. We were exhausted. Unloaded everything & relaxed for the rest of the night.