My wife and I fight endlessly so we won't have to admit how much we need each-other. We fear how vulnerable we are to this other person who is as flawed as we ourselves are. We both throw indignities and accusations at the other to create an endless gauntlet of difficulty - hoping that it will be perceived as the confetti of our endless wedding ( Read more... )

So the fencers came today. They tore down what remained of the old fence and began the slow process of drilling post holes. By the end of the day they had all the posts drying in cement, and they were all nice and even. Seeing the back yard open in all directions made me a bit sad we were putting up fence again. The sense of open space would really ( Read more... )

So the war on hotness continues. We're waiting on our water heater to get shipped to Houston for installation. Apparently Houston isn't a large enough city to have a powered duct heater in stock anywhere. Today we learned that the heater was dropped during shipping, and was damaged as a result. A new one is being more rapidly shipped to replace ( Read more... )

Hot water is one of the great innovations of modern living. I personally enjoy it on a regular basis. Most homes create this hot water with a big boiler - usually one which runs on gas. Yesterday our water started getting less hot. Being a long time veteran of gas water heaters I figured we had a situation where the pilot light had blown out. I was ( Read more... )

The Summer is slipping away quickly, but I have begun to over-schedule to defend against the randomly disappearing days. Some weeks go by without registering on my time keeping radar. One morning I notice it's Monday, so I hurry down to start work. I look up, and it's 2pm - and time for a late lunch. I look up again and it's Thursday night. I often ( Read more... )

So it's day three out here in LALA. This is my first long trip, and the only one that's been strictly all work and no play. The funny thing is that this comes at a very difficult time for me emotionally. I am tugged by many strings that stretch across the map and make me feel very isolated out here ( Read more... )

When you buy a house you buy every bad decision that the previous owners have ever made. I started mucking the gutters this weekend, since they weren't draining correctly. Rory helped out, and she pulled a big mass of muck from one drain only to find a syringe. Luckily the needle was already bent back to the point that neither of us got pricked, ( Read more... )

"My father says that almost the whole world is asleep. Everybody you know. Everybody you see. Everybody you talk to. He says that only a few people are awake and they live in a state of constant total amazement." - Joe vs. the Volcano

Do we want such a life?. Many do not. From O Henry's "The Green Door" we see the typical response:

She thrusts ( Read more... )

When the tree people come to visit they might not like me so much anymore. The huge Pecan tree in our fancy new backyard has been dropping branches on us. After one huge branch fell I was inclined to chalk it up to randomness. When another one fell right next to our bedroom I got a little worried. The second branch was HUGE! More than six inch ( Read more... )