What a long day...

spent all day getting the old house cleaned up so we can get our security deposit back. Went well...but I had to put some sod in the backyard. Sod is messy...will have to hide the Expedition from Stacey until I can clean all the dirt out of the back of it...

Only thing left over there is the Mustang, which won't start (shocking). I hope the batter is just not taking a charge...getting enough amps... but I don't really know. It won't turn over...just clicks when you turn the key. Dang it...

Anyway, I've now got some time to got through boxes here... I've got to get that old laptop out so Eric can start pirating..er um..."mapping" people's wireless connections. It's amazing when you're moving how something you had your hands on just 4 days ago can vanish in a pile of boxes...

Well, I've got a new idea...instead of synopsing EVERYTHING that happens in my day, I'll just sum it up in keywords, and let your imagination go from there

KEY WORDS/PHRASES FOR TODAY:
Early... "why isn't my fence done"... J-mo is back... diaper rash (ewww)... need more bands... "holy crap, that's a lot of debt" (observed after reading another blog)... "do they have to start hammering so early?"... I'm tired of chicken fingers... "Start, dang you...start!!!!!

anyhoo...

Another Monday a.m.

Alabama has restored my belief that watching football can be a waste of time. How in the fahrvhergnugen can you lose a 21 point lead?????? After an hour rain delay, double overtime, and a 21-point lead in the 3rd quarter...i expected more. At least the Titans won Sunday...and Tennessee won in overtime...so somebody I care about won. Okay, Auburn beat some beauty college football team in Kentucky, too :-)

Other than that, the weekend went okay. Saturday...more unpacking/moving. Went to the men's breakfast. Brian, John K., Dave, Jack, Dale D., Andy, and Donny were there. Food was GOOD! I enjoy eating a good breakfast once a month. Heck, I enjoy eating breakfast ONCE a month at all.

After b'fast...Brian came over to the new house and I helped him with a video project he's working on. Spent part of the rest of the afternoon installing my new DVD burner and generally getting my PC and Stacey's PC set back up with all their peripherals, etc.

Dave drove to B'ham and got Jordan a rat...er...I mean a dog -- a chihuaha puppy. Actually, it's kind of cute. They showed it to Kailyn, and kept saying "dog," trying to get Kailyn to repeat the word. Kailyn just looked very confused...after all, to her a "dog" is an animal that is taller than her, weighing anywhere from 40 to 80 lbs. (in reference to our huskies and our beast of a golden retriever).

Sunday...holy cow...if it could go wrong Sunday morning, it did. First, laptop A had audio problems. So Dave, goes home to pick up laptop B and a desktop. Laptop B's audio driver's chose not to work, and Dave forgot a keyboard and mouse for the desktop.

On top of this, Jeremy's alarm clock did not go off, so he didn't make it to church until around 10:10, and I'd already spoken to Jonathan Sparkman about subbing if Jeremy didn't show up.

So, with no practice, a song change, a forgivably late percussionist, and a drummer who's never played with us before, we started the worship service on time. In the end, everything went okay musically. I'm very grateful Jeremy made it and I'm grateful that Jonathan S. stepped in to help us out. Now, if we could only work out the technical PC glitches/crashes. Linux, anyone?

Whatever the case, everything turned out fine in the end. Duh...God has a way of making that happen in spite technical "demons."

Jonathan called from Indy Sunday afternoon. He talked about getting the chance to drive a couple of "fast" BMW's around an autocross course. I'm glad for him, and I'm sure he'll be talking to everyone about the fact he got to drive a couple of fast Bimmers for days...er...years to come. WOOT!

Spent Sunday afternoon assembling a dog kennel and working on outdoor lighting... Sunday night, Stacey, Kailyn, and I went to O'Charley's. Yum - Chipotle BBQ salmon is pretty good.

Today? More fun-filled unpacking, cleaning up old house. At least the fence company is supposed to start on my fence today.

Peace out...

Another fun-filled Friday night in Burnsville...

I'm talking on IM with Dave...listening to Stacey as she plays the pinball game built in to Windows XP...WOOT!

Can it get more fun? well, to be honest..i'm glad to just be taking a break from the rigors of the move and cleaning up the old house (before it all starts again tomorrow)

WOOHOO! Cable TV and internet are finally hooked up at the new homestizzle. It's nice to not HAVE to go to the old house just to check e-mail, update my newly established blog, or browse the internet for...um...pictures...um... (just kidding).

Pam told us the good news last night at band practice that she's having a baby...we even called J-mo at Indy to let him in on the news. It was funny to hear the one sided conversation:

Pam: (to J-mo) "I'm pregnant!" (pause while J-mo says something) "No, I'm pretty sure it's Jack's." That was too funny.

Anyway, the baby will probably come out with a gotee if it's a boy. whatever the case, I'm sure we can have some Photoshop fun adding a gotee to with their first baby pics...LOL.

Band practice was different..been a long time since we went percussion-less. Still, it was good to hear Joel trying to play a lot of our songs...doing quite well, actually, since he'd never heard them before. It's good to see some fresh "enthusiasm."

Also, have our first band booked for the Crosspoint Halloween Battle of the Bands...WOOHOO! This thing may happen after all...

it's good to read that Eric's getting some extra $$ and also putting the finishing touches on his "new" bathroom. Eric's a very "cheerful" person when he's not having to do lots of extra work and when he's reducing more debt. :-)

Anyway, I've got to assemble STacey's PC. I tried putting my new DVD burner in my PC this morning, but OOOPS! -- when trying to cut one of the ties off of my IDE cable, I cut right through the cable. D'oh! Fortunately, I had an extra one laying around.

Peace out...

The old house is starting to feel "nekkid." All the furniture gone...it's hard to believe we only lived there about a year...feels much longer than that. As I type, they're hooking up our phones at the new house. WOOHOO! That's a good thing, because T-mobile's wireless coverage is "lacking" in that area. A wide open space in the middle of nowhere...and I expect cell phone service? Yes, dang it...yes!

Band practice is tonight...WOOT! Feels to me like it's still Tuesday or something...the week's gone by so freakin' fast. Still going back and forth on whether I want to do this thing unplugged (acoustic-like) or full-on band. Guess we'll try a couple of things tonight and decide. Joel Bates, a friend of Lara's, has started coming to band practice, which is a great thing. He seems very enthusiastic about participating.

Eric sent me some helpful toilet cleaning advice...now you could drink out of the toilets...if you were a dog...or a cat...um...no.

btw Eric...it's MeDal of Honor, not MeTal of Honor...I thought it was just a one-time typo a week or so back, but no. Okay, the spelling police have spoken...

On a random "side" note... John Key's been letting me use his trailer to move a lot of my stuff, and that man is a god-send. Without it I don't think we could've gotten much done without spending lots of $$$$.

blah blah...blah blah...

Same old stuff...still moving...won't bore with details...just now on top of screaming baby, bad trucks, i've got terrible "dust" allergies kicking in...or pollen...i dunno...

My cousin Amy had her firstborn daughter this morning a month early. Emily Rose, weighing at 5 lbs. 8 oz. Amy being a mom is hard for me to visualize. She's a permanent 14 in my mind...i haven't seen her in years now. (I think she's like 25 or something now).

Any advice on how to clean toilets?? Stacey be asking. Send comments to kcbsmp@yahoo.com.

The madness never ends... still moving...and moving..and moving...

Stacey's had to work, and Kailyn's like working with a siren blaring in the background...driving me mad.

Still...i can see progress, and the light at the end of the tunnel does not look like an oncoming train.

Thought for the day: Why do things have sentimental value? Why do we keep so many things as souvenirs...stupid things...like odd pieces of furniture or crappy CD's? Is it always a good thing to hang on to -- not just the past -- but THINGS of the past?

After going through all my stuff, I realize i've got a lot of sentimental "crap" around here...everything from old, worn out Pi-Kapp t-shirts to old Atari systems. And when I come across those things, I get all "sentimental" myself...but, ironicially, I never think about those things unless I'm doing something like moving or cleaning...so why do I keep it? I must remind myself that "mental" is part of the phrase "sentimental." So, I guess I'm mental...

(and obviously so tired as to be brain dead enough to digress about this topic...yikes)

crap!!! Lara has strep throat...and she was around kailyn a lot this weekend... dang it, that's all i need on top of existing stress...a risk of Kailyn getting her first incidence of strep throat.... NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

Moving: Day 5. Rain and moving do not mix, so all I've been doing today is packing boxes. That makes for a relatively uneventful day. This past weekend was pretty stressful. Jack came over Sunday morning and helped me load up a truck... wait, let me tell you about the truck. The guy at U-haul called it a 50-mile truck, meaning they never let it rent for more than 50 mile intervals. Yikes. It was old, the parking brake did NOT work (great when you're parked on a slight incline...LOL), and it would run for a full minute AFTER you shut it off...unless you popped the clutch and caused the whole truck to lurch. On top of that, the driver's seat was completely bottomed out...it's very hard to drive a 24' 5-speed piece of junk truck when your knees are as high as your shoulders.... The guy at U-haul said that if someone really inspected the truck, they'd never let it be rented...all I could think was, "But you willingly rented it to me...." LOL

Well, Jack helped in the a.m., and Ben and his wife drove up from Birmingham to help in the p.m. we got most of the heavy stuff moved, but now I'm in the very tedious phase of getting all the small stuff packed up.

Church went well Sunday..it was good to see Eddie and Missy again somewhere other than Wal-mart.

Well, back to packin' (make a joyful noise...)

ah...now I'm a blogger...at last. Now I can post all the rants about things no one really cares about...but they read anyway. I love helping others excel in counter-productivity.