Category: Uncategorized

And business seems to be slowly picking up. At this point my own impatience is my greatest enemy.

Renovation projects are still on hold, but since it’s getting cold outside and dark early, that’s no problem. I do wish I’d managed to get a load of topsoil in to put on our front yard, but it would’ve been a commitment to completing that task by now (since there’s nowhere to put that much dirt except in our driveway, which prevents us from using our turnaround). Regardless, there will be time in the spring.

I can see the light at the end of the drywall tunnel, and frankly, it needs a good dusting.

We’ve finished putting up walls and ceilings, and other than a bit of painting still to do, we’re done with the structural work for the two offices. We still need to frame in a door for christina’s office, as well as finish enclosing one closet, but those are non-critical items that can take some time if they need to.

I have a few items I’d like to do over the next year, but as with all things they are money dependent. I’d love to re-do our downstairs bathroom (including moving a wall, rerouting plumbing, electrical, and adding a new doorway). I’d like to put in new floors downstairs, move the outside faucet, move the laundry room around, re-insulate the back corner of the house, rebuild the workshop, close in under the deck, replace our existing electrical panel and get a secondary electrical panel in place for the workshop.

Lots of ideas, though they’re going to have to wait until business picks up.

Ty headed to the states to go live with his dad.. it’s going to be an interesting time for him, but it’s what he wanted, and we could not dissuade him, so *fingers crossed* it all works out.

It’s been strange not having him around, but not bad at all. We’ve been busy nearly non-stop since he left. Something about not having to worry about being too loud, or too silly, means we’re working into the nights more often, and damn if it isn’t fun.

I need to remember to write more here.

TTFN.

It’s february, and we’ve just finished re-drywalling the lower offices.  Christina now has an office of her own downstairs, and I’m moved into the back office, which suits me fine.

Drywall’s hard on you as it turns out, all of my knuckles started splitting, what a pain.

This is probably going to be *it* for major renovations until I put a bit more money away.. believe me, i can live with that!

Good god.  I’m not so good at getting this stuff out it seems.  I’ve been busy though, in my own defense, and I’ve been spending more time doing than talking about.

Downstairs is .. well, it’s pretty bare.  We’ve pulled most of the drywall down, and cleaned up .. soon it’ll be time to start putting up new walls and running electrical, but we’re not there yet.

I had to say goodbye to a friend recently, and it was neither easy nor fun.  These things aren’t supposed to be though, and I’m not yet so cavalier that I don’t feel it when i hurt people.

I’ll come back later, and post more.

Maybe.

nn

Man, I’m going to grow up to be a curmudgeon.  I guess it’s good to have a goal though.

nn

It’s not like most people notice though, without a facebook status change.  Yay for the mild, postal-service style reactions (minus shotgun of course), which keeps people guessing… except for my lady, who knows me better than i do.

nn

Money is slow coming now, and I’ve gotta say that now it is starting to bug me.  More than anything I hate it when people don’t pay on time!  I mean seriously, I get the work done as required, and on time, and then it’s somehow cool for them to ignore their obligations until it suits them?  I don’t think so!

nn

Thankfully, i’ve got this mild-mannered exterior, which doesn’t really show how bloody pissed off I get when my invoice goes overdue, and my bills mount because I’m counting on someone else.  It’s a good thing too, ’cause I likely wouldn’t get repeat business.

nn

I’m hoping this dry spell passes soon though, I was getting used to kicking ass and taking names.

nn

I’m in pause on my renovations, partly ’cause i’m tired, more because I’ve run out of cash i’m willing to spend on house parts.  I can see this is going to be one of those things you just end up pouring cash into, and indeed, we’ve wishlisted probably 35k worth of improvements.  I of course would love to just pull that out of my hat, and get contractors doing all the work, but it’s going to take a bit of patience on my part, and likely a few years to get it all done.

nn

I’m also apparently not one to suffer fools anymore.  I’ve gone off on a few so far, and have poured gas on some bridges, and burned others down to the waterline.  Not the actions of a younger me, but hey, i’m NOT the younger me anymore 🙂

nn

I’m going to drop off now, and come back to this another month.  Bah!

n

#blogposts

nn

So i’ve finally taken the time to install a blogging tool.

nn

Hopefully this will mean more posts soon. 🙂

n

#blogposts

nn

My back is on the mend, and today’s the first day in a week that I can sit without an icepack firmly pressed against it.  I’ve had a nice drink, and it’s relaxed me, without resulting in a collapse onto the floor.

nn

My other jobs are paying again, which is a real relief, going from three paychecks to one was a really scary thought.  I’ve been kicking ass pretty much wherever I go, and I’m happy to say life sure isn’t boring!

nn

I’m sure I could go on, but I really don’t need to.  I’m re-reading some Simon Green, and I’m off to read book 2 before i sleep.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

n

#blogposts

nn

I’ve collected this nasty cold.  I woke up about a half an hour ago to an amazingly painful sinus headache.  I haven’t had one of these in years, and I’m thankful for that!!

nn

Lying back down turned into a total fail, as it turns out you have to be sitting up for everything to start moving, so up I got, and here I am.

nn

Christmas was wonderful.  We opened up presents early (of course), and Ty seemed pretty happy with the stuff he got.  Christina got a LOT of chocolate, I hadn’t realized how much I’d bought for her, but at least she’s got lots of options when it comes to sweets.

nn

She made an amazing meal, which we sat and ate together, and there was much hugging to be had.

nn

It was one of the best christmas days I’ve had.

n

Blogged with Flock

#blogposts

nn

It’s 2 days before Christmas, and everything seems to be working out.

nn

I’m basically caught up on work, and I’ve managed to document everything I could think of, so that will help with knowledge transfer when I make the move to Flock. I don’t have any illusions that I’ve covered everything off, but hey, that’s what a cell phone’s for right?

nn

I’m still laughing about aarongreengrass.com, it was tempting to put it as a subdomain under thisnameistoolong.com… that would’ve made it aarongreengrass.thisnameistoolong.com, which would have been accurate, but far too silly.

nn

*laughs*

nn

That really would have been a bit too long. We fixed my wife’s exercise bike last night, it’s amazing how poorly constructed these things can be. We just bought it recently, but it was clunking at irregular intervals. As it finally turned out, it was a combination of a few bearings FALLING OUT of the housing, and the drive belt being misaligned.

nn

We didn’t get it totally perfect, but now it’s quiet like it should be, so it’s something to be happy about.

nn

I’m working tomorrow morning, so it’ll be another early morning, but I’m stopping early too, to come home for family time.

nn

All in all, it’s going to be glorious.

n

Blogged with Flock

#blogposts

nn

We’ll have to see how this turns out. It’s my intention to write here…. sometimes things work out, sometimes not.

nn

I’ve pulled in all my LJ entries, since some of them are actually worth keeping 🙂

nn

This is the fourth or fifth time I’ve migrated diary entries, but I am glad when I do. I don’t often go back and re-read the stuff I’ve written, but it happens, and I think “Wow, you know, that was actually pretty well written”. It’s worth hanging on to moments like that, and as I’ve said before, it makes a good line in the sand, to mark my progress.

nn

This is the first time I’ve used WordPress, it’s pretty good so far, though it’s true, not all plugins are created equal.

nn

I’ve set up two new domains for myself, this one at http://www.aarongreengrass.com, and another at http://www.thisnameistoolong.com

nn

I chose the second one because I was thinking about my email address (agreengrass@) and dreading putting it on some long and convoluted domain name. I was having a real problem finding anything short that I could truly be happy with, and I just knew what ever I picked would be too long.

nn

Funny how the mind works eh?

nn

Anyway, it’s time to sleep.

n

#blogposts