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Monthly Archives: January 2007

Blue, blue, blue

No, I don’t really mean my mood. I’m talking about the carpet.

On Sunday night, unbeknownst to us, Violet knocked one of Clinton’s paint markers onto the floor, and Charlie literally ATE it while we slept. He chewed up the entire marker and injested the (not non-toxic!) acrylic wood paint inside of it. When we woke up in the morning, his paws and beard were blue, as was the livingroom and bedrooom carpet, in deep-blue splotches, smears and paw-shaped stains. Clinton flipped out, calling Charlie a “traitor” and telling him he would never look at him the same way again. Charlie, tail between his legs, spent the rest of the day in his kennel looking guilty and just overall pathetic. Later in the day yesterday, Charlie barfed up a bunch of blue goo and bits of plastic.

At 9:30 PM last night, we drove to Cary to rent a “Rug Doctor” from the grocery store. We stuffed the unwieldy machine and two bottles of miracle solution into the trunk of our car and drove back home to begin the whole process. We steamed the stained parts of the carpet over and over and even treated it with super spot remover to soak overnight before beginning again this morning. We must have emptied 15 full tanks of dirty blue water into the toilet between yesterday and today. Yet the carpets remain splotchy and blue.

Unfortunately, the situation seems hopeless. We had to return the machine back to the grocery store tonight and have “thrown in the towel”, so to speak, on our attempts to get the carpets back the way they were. I’m afraid we’ll have to pay for replacing all of the carpets in the unit, which could cost up to $1500. Ouch. So, I guess you could say our moods are blue, blue, blue, too.

To top everything off, tonight we had to give Charlie a bath because we discovered that every time he drank water from his bowl, his blue paws were getting wet and tracking additional blue paint all over the house! Thus, today our evening was spent washing a large smelly, shaggy black dog in the bathtub with Pantene shampoo, hair and blue paint flying across all corners of the bathroom.

The moral is: if you have a chew-happy dog, do not assume that anything on a table or elsewhere is safe. Our advice: Go through each and every item in your whole house, imagining a puppy eating it. If any item is liable to explode and or ooze when bitten, LOCK THAT MOTHER*&$!#@ THING UP! (Item, not the dog.)

Hope you’re having a better week than we are. Peace out.

 
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Posted by on January 30, 2007 in Uncategorized

 

Crystal's new car!

Clinton and I spent three hours at a used car lot yesterday expertly wrangling down the price of this beautiful 2004 Toyota Corolla Luxury Edition. She’s a true gem – 100% clean in and out, one owner, low mileage and best of all: POWER SUNROOF, baby! Obviously, Durham used car salesmen were not prepared for this pair of highly skilled hagglers, trained in the hottest and most humid vegetable markets of the developing world. We even planned and acted out our “good cop, bad cop” roles. We wiped them clean, play by play. Sped off and left “˜em cryin’ in the dust.

 
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Posted by on January 28, 2007 in Uncategorized

 

House inspection

The inspection went very well today. The inspector spent three hours with us explaining the mechanics and construction of our new home. We followed him around all over the place while he did funny things like turning everything on and off and crawling underneath the house. I learned so much that I typed it all up and made a home repair and maintenance calendar for myself. Very good news: overall, the inspection only revealed three tiny things significant enough to ask the sellers to repair. We also took some photos of the backyard and I added them (5 new ones) to our existing set on Flickr. Check them out here!

 
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Posted by on January 15, 2007 in Uncategorized

 

Happy birthday, Dr. King

So far, this has been a great weekend.

On Friday night, Clinton and I were absolutely floored by a free all-ages concert sponsored by the local library in downtown Durham. It was Harry and the Potters, the coolest pair of rockin’ Harry Potter-look-alike musician brothers, ever! I couldn’t believe how great their music was – they were only teenagers, after all! Some of their hit song titles include Voldemort Can’t Stop the Rock and Save Ginny Weasley from the Basilisk. For so many of the young people in the audience, I’m certain that Friday, January 12th, 2007 was the most inspiring day of their lives so far. “Keep rockin’, keep reading, keep loving!” is the band’s motto. MLK would have been proud.

On Saturday morning, I went running with the gang as usual. Only this time we picked a completely different route – one that took us through Duke University’s majestic campus and the unparalleled beauty (IMHO) of Sarah P. Duke Gardens. Afterward we went to Foster’s Market for coffee and breakfast burritos, which we ate outside at their picnic tables. (For those of you who don’t live in the South and may not understand, we’ve had sunny 70+ degree weather all weekend.) Our pace group is working our mileage back up for a 12-mile race at the end of February. Yesterday we did 7.5 miles.

Afterward had quick shower, and then Clinton and I then took Charlie to River Forest State Park in North Durham and walked to our awesome soon-to-be new house from inside the park! I cannot believe how close we are to the Eno River – couldn’t be more than 100 yards of forest separating it from our yard! We will be able to walk to the river after dinner every day to sit and listen to the water tumble over rocks in the otherwise quiet evening stillness of OUR VERY OWN PARK! Wooooohooooo! Charlie is pretty excited about all this too. Yesterday, he got to run off leash and dive into the water, which is his favorite sport. The hiking possibilities from our yard are also endless. I’m looking forward to getting a fishing license as well. Did you know that the Eno River is home to the Roanoke bass (AKA red-eye bass)?!

Today we went to a great MLK service at ERUUF with Carol and Josiah.

Really excited about our house inspection tomorrow afternoon! We’ll take lots of pictures.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

 
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Posted by on January 14, 2007 in Uncategorized

 

Countdown to new house

Click here for minute-by-minute countdown!

 
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Posted by on January 11, 2007 in Uncategorized

 

New wish list of furnishings for new home

Okay, so we don’t have the house yet, technically. But when we do, the following list is what I’ll want to put in it.

 
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Posted by on January 10, 2007 in Uncategorized

 

Photos of the new house

Here’s what the front looks like. Check out more photos here!

 
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Posted by on January 10, 2007 in Uncategorized

 

Holy cow – we're buying a house!

So the sellers’ counteroffer was very reasonable, and we accepted! We’re having the house inspected on Monday 1/15, and then we’re closing on February 20th! Woooohoooo!

 
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Posted by on January 9, 2007 in Uncategorized

 

House-buying adventure, day 3

This evening, we made an offer on that beautiful house. Anna the realtor is faxing it over to the seller’s agent right now, and she says we may even receive a counteroffer (or a positive answer) TONIGHT!

 
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Posted by on January 8, 2007 in Uncategorized

 

House-buying adventure, day 2

Clinton and I found a house we love that is exactly perfect for us and under-budget! It is in a beautiful north Durham neighborhood, backed up (literally) to the Eno Woods State Park. Right off the backyard is a nature trail into the park! Check out this picture of the yard!!!! Three bedrooms, two and a half baths, rocking-chair porch, beautiful deck, trey ceiling in master bedroom, wood laminate floors, fiber cement exterior and much more! We are working tomorrow evening with the realtor to make an offer. Please cross your fingers for us!

 
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Posted by on January 7, 2007 in Uncategorized

 
 
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