The Week That Was

Hello, my blogees. Boy, it's been a while, ain't it?

I've been limping along lately, working at work, working at home, and trying to keep things in Betland together. (No rusted rides, no poisonous concessions, etc.)

But you know, my birthday was Sunday. That would be your Sunday, Feb 26th. I was ready to celebrate and forget about things in "real life" for a while. Hell, if I have to become a bitter old crone, why not celebrate it?

It started on Friday, February 24th. Friday, yes! The weekend was coming, and I had weekend plans! And they started with leaving work Friday, picking up Paw, and heading to Lowe's to pick out my birthday present, the one I specifically asked for from Paw and Granny.

A new storm door.

Yes, how romantic, and what a fun gift. But it's exactly what I wanted, and, well, needed. I have a new storm door at the front of the Pod, but the one at the dennette door, the one I use 99% of the time, is just about shot. And realize, I have a Milo in my life, so a working storm door with a good latch and a good lock is a must.

We went and picked out my door, set it all up for installation, and I was feeling pretty good. I could hang with Stennie that night doing the podcast, then I was to head to Mr M's the next day for dinner and movie. I was happy.

I got up early Saturday morning to take Milo out, and there was a small dusting of snow on the grass. "A mere trifle," I said, and brought Milo back in and lazed around in the Comfy Chair.

A couple of hours later, the phone rang. It was Paw. "Have you not left?" he asked. I said, well, no, and he asked me to look out the window. It was snowing like a mother.

"Oh, shit! Why does God hate me so?" I exclaimed, and of course my dad chastised me for that, but I got him off the phone and started running around, pulling on clothes and stuffing things in the overnight bag, without benefit of shower or anything else except a toothbrushing.

I hit the road, and the bad snow ended pretty quickly, though it did snow on me almost the whole way to B'burg. The wind, though. My Lord, the wind was blowing me this way and that, and I was fighting to keep the car on the road.

But I made it there, and then things were OK. (Well, except for a couple of skirmishes between Mr M and me.) We had a great dinner out with The DeepFatFriar, then went to see our movie. The next morning, I got to laze around and Mr M made me pecan waffles. I so didn't want to go home.

But home it was, because it was a Paw Duty weekend. And you know, it was OK. Me and Paw giggled and joked our way through the whole grocery, then I got home to prepare for the "fun stuff."

See, the Oscars were on Sunday, my birthday (thank you Oscar People), and we have a little TheCompanyIWorkFor codicil that says we get our birthdays off. Since mine was on a Sunday, I announced I wouldn't be at work Monday.

So I was excited to watch the Oscars, stay up late, play Stennie's Oscar Drinking Game, and not have to worry about going to work the next day.

So I got everything in place, hit the internet, watched the Oscars by myself on TV, and with my friends online, and had a blast. When it was done, I went to bed and prepared to snooze while my TV was on, tuned to all the after-parties.

That didn't go so well.

I climbed into bed and turned on the TeeVee, and it was all funny. The picture had lines, and buzzes and pops through the speakers, and I couldn't tell who anyone was. I muttered, "Stupid cable," turned over and fell asleep.

I slept in Monday. Yes, I slept in an astounding 15 minutes. Then Milo barked and I got up and leashed him and went out. When we did, there was a line of traffic in front of my house. Because the trash truck was running, at the building one house south of me.

I had missed Trash Duty Monday by one house.

I called Paw and told him I was bringing a bag of trash to his house. And here, folks, is how old people are. He hemmed and hawed, and basically said he didn't want it. Apparently he has three trash cans, and one more bag of trash there would totally set the earth off its axis, because it might not fit in the cans. I told him I was bringing it anyway, and I did.

Also on Monday, the guy from Lowe's called me and said he'd be there Tuesday to install my new door. Wooooo!

However, Monday contained something else. While the cable in my bedroom was still lining and popping and cracking, I found out the two other TVs in my house got cable just fine. Oh, crap. Not the cable. My 9-year old TV in the bedroom had gone, I said to myself, and schlepped out to the Wally World (Wal-Mart) to get a new one. (I can't be without TV in the bedroom.)

$278 and a lot of lifting later, the nice new TV was in my house. Then my cousin Jacob came down, loved on Milo, we hung out, then went out to dinner. It was great.

When we got back from dinner, she was kind enough to come in and help me put the new TV up. It went fairly smoothly, and we got everything in place. We hooked it up and turned it on. It did the same damn thing the old one did. Pops and cracks and lines. "Hey, I spent $278 for nothing!" I exclaimed.

I knew a call to the Comcast Bastards was in my future.

However, the next day was Tuesday, Storm Door Day! I came home for lunch, and the Lowe's guy arrived shortly after. Milo was a nutcase and whined and ran around everywhere, and I apologized, but he said that was fine.

He took off the old door, I watched him through the side window of the Pod, then I heard, "Ms B? Ms B?" I walked to the opening of the dennette and leaned over the gate (which I couldn't open because Milo was Mr Batshit Crazy), and said, "Yes?"

Then Mr Installer informed me that I seem to have a "non-standard-sized' door. Width can vary, he said, but height is standard. 81 inches. My opening was 82 inches.

I shouldn't have been surprised. Not only was my house built in the 50's, and all fixtures I've had to replace don't match with ones made today, but the dennette was an addition to the house, and apparently whoever addended it didn't care about door size.

I had two choices, I was told. Get a special ordered door at 82 inches for $200 more than we'd already paid, or have Mr Installer work on the door facing and build it down and inch. Which sounded complicated, but I found out today that would cost about $70. Guess which one I chose.

Now, the cable box.

Since a new ($278) TeeVee didn't solve my problem on Monday, I decided while Mr Installer was there I'd take the bedroom cable box and schlep (I seem to be schlepping a lot) it to the living room to hook it up there. By the way, I hate this kind of stuff. I hate playing with hook-ups and wires and connections like the plague. But I did it.

I hooked that box into the living room TV, and it played just fine. And that lead me to what we call The Worst Case Scenario.

That the problem wasn't a TeeVee or cable box, but the cable coming into the bedroom. Which is, might I add, coming into the bedroom behind my (very) full and heavy chest of drawers. (Or Chester Drawers, if you live here.)

I took the box back and hooked it up in the bedroom, and well, it's been spotty. It was working for a while right after the TV started, then went wonky. Last night? It worked perfectly all night long.

The Comcast folk are coming tomorrow morning. I need to move approximately 15,000 things in my bedroom away from that chest to give the guy the best chance he has to get at the cable. AND - if the box is still working perfectly, what do I say?

"That box is a liar! It's bad!" Umm, because that's what Comcast taught it, right?

I don't know.

All I know is that tomorrow is Friday. I like Fridays.

Betland's Olympic Update:
- Never do these anymore, but yesterday we got the news that Davy Jones of the Monkees died. So sad. I feel like another huge chunk of my youth is gone.