Dying appliances.

My fridge is in the last stages of a slow painful death. I can hear the death rattle and see the water pooling around the bottom. We've had it serviced/fixed 3 times (twice they couldn't even find the problem) in the past 18 months. I'd hoped to have it last another year or so but I don't think that's going to happen. It looks like I need a new fridge. That's awesome! Then I discover that the fridge I covet won't fit into the fridge spot in the kitchen. It's 1 inch too wide. Cry. Now I need to find a new one and find one fast. Good thing the fridge decided to die after I spent $300 on perishables at CostCo today. Or I could just ignore it and hope the problem goes away. :D

The nearly perfect day

Yesterday was the nearly perfect day. It was just the two of us all day. Well, 5 of us if you count the pets, but the boy was gone for the weekend. w00t! Woke up, got myself a cup of coffee, sat on the deck drinking coffee while the pup patrolled the yard and did what she had to do. I love sitting on the deck in the fresh air while drinking a cup of coffee. Booze works too. It was in the lower 70's and sunny. Nice weather to start off the day. We took our time getting motivated, eating breakfast, doing some laundry, prepping sausage and peppers for dinner all at a very leisurely pace. The other half did some HAM radio stuff while I played some GTA IV. We took the pup to the dog park for an hour or so. She played with a couple of dogs and chased her ball around. Got home, took a "nap" (nudge nudge wink wink, say no more say no more), took a cool shower. Perfect. Here's where the "nearly" comes into play in the nearly perfect day. It got hot. Too freaking hot for me. It was 86 degrees outside, 82 in the house. I almost turned the AC on it was so freaking hot. I really hate this summer stuff, it's too damn hot! I sucked it up, got myself a cold beer and sat on the deck in the shade. It was bearable but just barely. Grilled some sausage and peppers for an early dinner, had another cold frosty drink, sat on the deck being lazy, lather rinse repeat. It cooled off by the time the sun set that the house was a bearable temp again. Watched some Food Network stuff (damn you Alton Brown for making me hungry again at 8pm!) ate some fresh fruit, cheese and crackers and pepper salami slices. Yummy! Took the pup for another walk played some GTA again and went to sleep. It was the nearly perfect day too bad those don't happen very often.

So, how was your weekend?

Leaving New Jersey

We're pretty much done with NJ. The cost of living is killing us and we didn't buy a house above our means and we don't live an extravagant lifestyle either. We're not up to our eyeballs in debt yet we're just getting by. We have everything we need sure, but very little extra. Our property taxes are going up again. We'll be well over $9K (which is where we're at now) by the end of the summer. There are dozens more things we hate about NJ (other taxes, super corrupt politicians, etc), it's time to leave. But wait, it's not that easy. NJ hits you up with a HUGE extra tax when you sell your house and leave the state, the exit tax if you will. 2% of the selling price of the house. WTF? Now if we could find someone stupid enough to buy our house, we could barely afford to move. Houses aren't moving right now, the market is dead.

Oh, where do I want to move to? I'll get to that in a second My priorities are a bit skewed but here they are:

1) Lower taxes
2) Concealed carry permits (I'd settle for just a carry permit though)
3) MUCH lover humidity and warmer climate
4) Bigger property (2+ acres) without the $600K or more price tag.
5) Not California
6) Less dense population

I don't have to worry about good schools since the boy will be done next year. I need the lower humidity and warmer climate because my arthritis is getting worse by the day. When it's 45-50 degrees and raining I can barely walk or use my hands. It's awful to have that at the ripe old age of 41. So we've narrowed it down to several areas of the southwest. Outside of Santa Fe, NM and the Flagstaff/Sedona areas of AZ. We've found several houses we love but the move is impossible right now. Mostly because we can't sell yet and the other more compelling reason is that the other half can't find any work. After showing him one house I loved (20 minutes outside of Santa Fe) , he started the job hunt. Nothing. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Fuck. Nothing for sys admins/archs anywhere in the Santa Fe/Flagstaff areas.

Maybe in the next 2 years or so things will change. Here's hoping because I need to get the hell out of this place before I go insane.

Puppy Milestones

It's been a big week for Abby. She's now 5 months old and a whopping 11 pounds. She's been in the middle of a teething frenzy which has been making her (and us) miserable. She's been chewing on everything and anything she can get her little teeth around. We're going through chew toys like crazy. Today she got some relief, her lower canines fell out. Joy! The upper ones should fall out any day now. The adult teeth have broken through and the baby teeth are feeling awfully loose. Premolars and molars are next. The incisors were the first to go last week.

I'm also happy to report that at the ripe old age of 5 months, she's appears to be fully house broken. Major JOY! She still sleeps in her crate, but she's no longer shut in. She has free roam of the bedroom at night which makes her a much happier puppy. Now I'm not foolish enough to leave her uncrated if I'm out of the house for 4 or 5 hours, but for short 2 hour trips out of the house she's fine. We're turning many corners right now and Abby is turning into a wonderful dog. It's taken a lot of effort on our part, but it's so worth it to have a happy stable well trained puppy.

Another big deal for her is that she played in the "big dog" section of the dog park today and loved it. Our dog park has two fenced in sections for off leash dogs. 3/4 of an acre for dogs 35 pounds and under and a 1 acre section for dogs of all shapes and sizes. Because she's so small she hasn't been in the big dog side. She wants to be there but until today has been too intimidated to relax and enjoy herself. Today there were no small dogs at all and several big dogs. She pretty much inststed to be in with the big guys today. She was relaxed and confident and had herself a blast running around the big dogs and there were some whoppers today. A pair of Cane Corsos, a Greyhound, Golden, Shepard mix Yellow lab puppy, you get the idea. The Canes are HUGE dogs, well over 100 pounds each or roughly the size of a Bull Mastiff. Abby loves the Canes. They were very tolerant of this snack sized pup prancing around them sniffing and trying to get them to play. And the weather was perfect for it too, 75 with bright sunny skies.

So there you go, real actual content. I'll get to the souffle soon. Really I will :)