It's been a long time since I updated this blog. I never really had any news though! But we've since had some fun - Donica and I went to Hawaii Donica had to go for her work, for 8 days 7 nights. So she already had to get a hotel room and rental car for her - so adding me to the trip was just air fare and what little food I eat. Well, and a couple entrance fees for things we saw. But still, having this trip coincide with her work saved us at least a couple thousand dollars compared to going on our own. 
 
It wasn't 100% vacation obviously, since Donica had to work, but it was still fun. We had every evening after she got off work, and the whole weekend, and a couple hours our last day to ourselves. And I had all that time to myself too. Sadly, most of the days it was overcast and sometimes rainy. I had gone over to keep Donica company, but to take tons of amazing photos while she was at work. That didn't happen because of the weather. Well, that and I could never really get my sleep schedule switched over so I never got up early enough to drive her to work then steal the car from her But we still had a good time. The main difference to my plan was that I'll have more memories of beautiful scenery in my head than in photos! (It's a good thing our eyes can see so much better than cameras ) I just counted: Out of the 1007 photos I took and saved (meaning I deleted some duds in camera before downloading them), only 26 were worth sharing. Not a very good ratio. 
 
Here's what I have: (Click on an image to see the larger view. Click Back in your browser to return to this page.) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Posted by: Scott Adams

@ February 1, 2009 12:41:04 PM PST ( 1 comment | 0 trackbacks )

Hi Everyone, 
 
Sorry I haven't updated in quite a while, I've been busy helping my friend Gabe out with a project. We're working on a bid to install a complete sound/lighting/projection/video system for a brand new Adventist church. It's a really big project for so little time, so we've had to really scramble. Gabe is doing most of the work but I'm helping with research and planning. I'm hoping we get the job since it will mean some real money for me, finally! 
 
Our home is in almost the same condition it was for our party over a week ago. We've both been pretty busy and/or too tired to do much. The most substantial thing was that I finally got blinds installed in our bedroom. We still need to install some in the other bedrooms so our guests don't feel like they can be watched! I did finally get to finish finding where all of the networking and TV cables go from our "media closet" in the master closet - something my geeky self needed I want to go up into the attic to run more cables but the ladder we have isn't quite tall enough. 
 
My brother and a friend of his should arrive at our home in an hour or so. They're heading up to my dad and stepmothers home in Northern Oregon and stopping by our place for the night. So it will be nice to see him for a few hours. My mom is coming down too to see him. She'll be spending Christmas with us - which is a first...Donica and I haven't spent Christmas with my mom ever! So strange since she's the physically closest relative we have! And another nice thing is that Donica is now officially on a Christmas vacation. She has Christmas Eve, Christmas day, and the day after Christmas off, plus the weekend! Yay! No grandiose plans though, we don't quite have the financial means to do anything big. Maybe if we get ambitious we can drive to the snow for a day. Good thing gas is pretty cheap. (I filled up the Murano for $.74 per gallon last week! I had a $1 off per gallon deal with Safeway with all of the gift cards for Home Depot we used to buy a lot of our home improvement stuff from. That was really fun to see the gallons counter going faster than the dollars counter ) 
 
Oh, and Max is basically all better now. His paw is all healed and he's all done with his antibiotics and stuff. He's not even paying any extra attention to his paw. Sadly, he does have an ear infection though and he does everything he can to avoid us treating it - so that's our current challenge. 
 
Since there's not as much going on now I'll probably be updating this blog much less often. I'll try to at least put major updates up but I don't think you really need to hear that "I finally replaced the light switch plate with a larger one to cover the very slight gap" - right? 
 
So, we might be preoccupied the next few days so I'll go ahead and say Merry Christmas to everyone! Good night. 

Posted by: Scott Adams

@ December 23, 2008 7:26:29 PM PST ( 0 comments | 0 trackbacks )

Well, in just over a half hour our first guests should be arriving. Well actually, we already have three friends here from yesterday. They were helping us get ready...very nice indeed. 
 
We have almost everything presentable now. Essentially everything has been painted by my mother, RoboMom, and we're about as decorated as we're going to get this year. So, welcome everyone! 
 
Since I don't have a lot of time I've gone ahead and tried something new - a VIDEO! We'll see if it works. You might need QuickTime if you don't already have it (and you do already have it if you have iTunes installed). And this file is about 112 megabytes, so it might take a while to get it all downloaded! 
 
Click here 

Posted by: Scott Adams

@ December 13, 2008 5:23:47 PM PST ( 0 comments | 0 trackbacks )

December 10, one month has now passed since we closed escrow and got the keys to our new home. Whew! 
 
I spent a while at the old house and made a couple trips back and forth, but I can now say that (as far as the landlady is concerned) we are OUT OF THE OLD HOUSE!!! I left there this evening after giving one key to the new tenant and locked up with my key, then I placed it in a hiding spot and a big grin came uncontrollably across my face - I was OUT of there! 
 
The new tenant is a handyman and will be doing a lot of the repairs that needed to be done, including painting. So my poor paint color match became irrelevant thankfully. I met him while attempting to replace the torn screen in the upstairs sliding door, and then walked through the house with him. But by the time we were done it was nearly dark and I was doing this outside (the power was off too, so inside wouldn't have helped). Luckily, he offered to finish up for me later too if I couldn't see, so I'm attempting to take him up on his offer. But it could also mean that I actually do have to go back one more time. Plus, later tonight I remembered that there is still some mangled iron tubes from our wind-destroyed gazebo thing sitting in a pile on the side of the house. We'll see if he wants it for some reason. But in the end it feels good to essentially be out of there. And our landlady said that she'll give us our full deposit back! Yay! 
 
On my way back home I got a call from my mom saying that she was on her way down to help again. So RoboMom painted even more tonight. She concentrated on doors tonight. She painted the laundry room door, her room door, and the really nasty bathroom door. They all look excellent now. And this is detailed work too, not just slapping paint on. 
 
Donica took some cookies over to our retired neighbors to invite them to our party. They're SO nice. They invited her in and gabbed for probably a half hour, giving Donica the inside scoop on the neighborhood and stuff. They've been here since the homes were built, which was only five years ago. Now we still have to work up the nerve to ask the neighbors on the other side of us. It doesn't help that Donica learned from our nice neighbors that the old owners and these other neighbors didn't exactly get along. Cops were called out at least twice - nothing major, but animosity apparently abounded. 
 
Donica put all of our DVDs into their shelves - no small feat. And she also finished getting one of the fish tanks set up, and topped off with fresh water, much to my ears delight. 
 
I got the TV/entertainment center all setup, for now. And you know, I can't remember what else I did. It must have been minor random stuff, like digging the doors out of the disaster of a garage and bringing them in for my mom. 
 
Really, we were all three pretty dang tired. Luckily, my mom is helping more tomorrow and tomorrow is also Donica's last day of work this week. I think we're going to get it all done, or done enough, for the party. 

Posted by: Scott Adams

@ December 11, 2008 12:59:45 AM PST ( 0 comments | 0 trackbacks )

So, tomorrow is the one month mark since we got our new home! It's gone by both fast and slow. 
 
But that month also means that tomorrow is our last day "in" the old house. So I had to get stuff done in there today, and I'll be there tomorrow too. 
 
Today was a long yet productive day, and it felt good. My mom came down last night so she could paint today, but ended up starting last night. I think it was enough stuff that I can make it an old fashioned accomplishment list! But I didn't keep track well so I'm sure I'm missing things... 
 

 

• Mom painted more of our master bathroom until she ran out of paint. It's all first coated except for a few small spots. 
  
• Donica baked cookies from some dough she bought from a fundraiser (very good cookies). This batch is for our new neighbors, and we're hoping that one of us will get up the nerve to go invite them to our party, and on one side, to introduce ourselves. 
  
• I got the carpet in the old house professionally cleaned 
  
• I did a few things at the old house 
  
   
  
  • Swapped out a couple of our "fancy" light switches for plain ones that were originally there 
    
  • Caulked and tightened the kitchen sink 
    
  • Loaded up Donica's car with most of the remaining stuff (probably just one load left of the bulky outdoor stuff) 
    
   
  
• Mom painted: 
  
   
  
  • More baseboard trim 
    
  • Behind the refrigerator 
    
  • The "butlers pantry" or whatever it is 
    
  • The pantry door 
    
  • The inside of the front door 
    
  • The hallway desk area 
    
  • The whole hallway area that's above tile 
    
  • The entryway 
    
   
  
• Donica transformed her office from a bunch of randomly placed boxes to a pristine, nice and clean office - with a running computer we got partly setup yesterday 
  
• I cut and installed the remaining chair rail. All that is left is the corner pieces to wrap around the rounded corners (which I haven't quite figured out how to do), and some caulking 
  
• I caulked most of the chair rail I put up, filling holes and spots where the uneven wall made a gap 
  
• Donica did yet more laundry 
  
• I got phone and/or network running in Donica's office, my office, the guest room, the hallway desk, the master bedroom, and the living room 
  
• We all cleaned up a bit 
  

 
 
So that's why I'm up at almost 3am writing this. My mom is probably still reading in bed too. Long day. 
 
Luckily, Max has been behaving quite well and has been leaving his paw mostly alone. It looks like it's healing well and doesn't seem to be bothering him much. He gets excited and gallops around a few times a day again. It's really nice to have him essentially back to normal. I need to take him back to the vet for a check on his progress in the next couple of days. 
 
The next few days are going to be quite busy too. I start out the day tomorrow with a dentist visit, so that's nice. It's really crazy to think how much stuff we want to get done by our party, which is less than four days away now. It's going to be a stretch, and it's likely that the whole house won't be done being painted, and boxes will be hidden away in closets and the garage, and it won't be as decorated as we would like - but it will all work out fine. Besides, people will understand if it's not perfect. And if they don't, I just refer them to this blog  

Posted by: Scott Adams

@ December 10, 2008 3:02:54 AM PST ( 0 comments | 0 trackbacks )

Just a quick update tonight, I'm pretty tired an hungry. 
 
Um, Friday Donica got off work early and we went over to the old house with my Mom to do some more emptying out. Then we came back home (new house) and Mom did some trim painting. Donica and I did other random stuff. 
 
Saturday we just did a little bit of random things again. Donica and Mom went to Christmas parties while I stayed home and watched Max. I did a few random things, like putting up blinds in our bathroom, but tweaked my back somehow in the process. So my usefulness was short lived. 
 
Sunday at 5am Donica got up to go be a support driver for four of her work colleagues. They were doing a relay marathon. I haven't heard the full story of it yet though since I left before she got back. I headed over to PUC for the memorial. I only stayed about 2.5 hours, but drove 4.5 to do so. But it was a good service and I'm really glad I was able to go. And thankfully, there was help enough so that my friends and I didn't really have to do anything during the service. 
 
When Donica got back from the marathon she was quite productive. Our sitting room area was over filled with boxes and randomness and she made quite a dent in clearing it up. She also did more laundry and got to a few other things. Then when I got back I ended up going to the old house and grabbing a load in my car. We're probably 99% out of there now. The only remaining stuff is in the back yard and garage. Once that stuff is gone it's just cleaning the carpet and some fixes I have to do. I think we'll be done in time (Wednesday). 
 
After that load I started to setup my desk in my office. It's all reassembled and cleaned, but I've only temporarily setup my main computer and monitor. It's spartan and not the final result I want, but it's sure nice to have a decently fast computer back up! 
 
Max is healing nicely and has been acting himself. His toe where the actual bite, or whatever it was, occurred is much less swollen and looks to be healing well. He still tries to lick it but not frequently. He doesn't seem to be in pain anymore, but we've still got him on pain meds in case (I think it'd still be painful to me, so I'm sure it'd be true for him too). All in all he's nearly back to his usual self. He's alert and was even bounding around last night, but I discourage that so he won't open his wound. Soon though  
 
This week is going to be a tough one. There is still a non-trivial amount to do at the old house (mostly repairs), and our new house is still very strewn with boxes. We have to get it all cleaned up, put up lights, hopefully buy a Christmas tree, maybe paint more, and find more chairs for our growing guest list! Luckily Donica has Friday off and her good friend Mary coming to help decorate. We'll get it all done and the party will be fun, but don't expect a lot of updates to the blog  

Posted by: Scott Adams

@ December 7, 2008 11:34:43 PM PST ( 0 comments | 0 trackbacks )

I know I mentioned it before, but I wanted to remind people that our Christmas party is coming up. Donica has sent out an email invitation to some people but I'm not sure she's done. I'm planning on doing the same, but you know me and my inability to write emails for some reason. She had written something nice describing it all, but here's my abbreviated version: 
 
December 13th, show up and leave whenever you like, preferably between 6-10pm. It's finger food pot luck. And there's a $20 cover charge. (Just kidding!) 
 
I'm finding out that almost nobody has our new address. So if you're planning on coming, or just want our address, email me and I'll let you know. I don't want to post it online for typical reasons. I'm scadams at gmail dot com. 

Posted by: Scott Adams

@ December 5, 2008 12:26:48 AM PST ( 0 comments | 0 trackbacks )