A Dog's Purpose

News Round-up

Credit to MissPres for the title here--I love their weekly news and blog round-ups. It has been an interesting week, with everything and not much happening, so that seemed like a good way to go on getting a new post up.

First up, a new teacher arrived in Diomede, Alaska--an island in the Bering Strait--and from which, you really can see Russia. See the video of her fascinating voyage via crab boat here. I am impressed with this young woman and her commitment to teach in an isolated post. I "met" her through my St. Paul, Alaska blog and after having spent time out on that remote and isolated island, I imagine she will have quite the adventures over the coming year.

The fall semester began Monday, and though it was incredibly busy, it was a smooth week as far as most things go. I have a great bunch of students--about half of whom I did not know prior to the class, and others whom I have taught before. Classes are larger than usual and that will be a challenge in the semester. I spent one entire day working on the revision of a manuscript, and with one more devoted day, can have it ready for the final edit. Also in the first week, I had the opportunity to participate in a focus group for our school, attend a workshop on excellence in teaching, and attend the longest faculty meeting of my academic career.

The most difficult thing so far has been the trek all the way across campus to my classroom, and then all the way across to the other side for the second classroom. Yesterday as I returned--it takes a full 15 minutes of laborious walking with the cane, so I am spending a hour just walking to and from my two classes--I came up the handicapped access due to pulling my book cart. I have to prop the cane on my leg and open the door with my left hand. The automatic door swung out and right across the top of my left foot, pinning it to the concrete. I could not move my foot or the door. I was standing there--in pain, I might add :)--wondering how in the world I was going to manage to get out of this predicament. Topped off, the ramp is at the back door, so there is no one there to see me and help out. I finally managed to get the door to move forward enough to scoot my foot back, and vowed revenge. Needless to say, I have a large bruise on the top of my foot this morning.

The good news is it has cooled off a bit here early in the mornings and late evening, and it has actually been possible to sit outside and enjoy watching the birds and the cats. The two kitties have become friends and now eat out of the same bowls and hang out on the same side of the yard. Tux (the black and white kitty) now knows that even though Libby is out in her kennel, barking, that she can't go through the fence. Tux will even sneak up to the crack at the corner of the fence and look at Libby, which of course, drives Libby nuts. The yellow cat (who has yet to have a name fit) is still uncertain, and it will make a mad rush to the gap in the fence to hide in the kudzu any time one of the dogs barks from inside the house or Libby from her kennel. They are less leery of me now, and will sit at the end of the sidewalk when I am outside. Tux will even stay on the bench on the front porch while I fill the food dish, but the second I walk away, he/she makes a run for the yard, just in case.

Finally, yesterday was Randy's birthday. We postponed the celebration until today although we did manage to watch a movie last night while eating take out from Chik Fil A. We don't eat out on Friday nights when school is in session, unless we drive to Water Valley. He is off to buy his present this morning, and then we will work on putting up the walls for the tub surround. Just another glamorous day in the life.

Ta Da! Another small step...

We spent the day in Memphis yesterday, picking out the ceramic tile for the tub surround. It's called Cedar Slate, and is similar to the floor tile. Once we had the tile selected, we searched for paint. It is supposed to be Glazed Pears, though on the wall it looks more like white to us. It had a slightly yellowish hue on the chip--like a pear that has been baked with a brown sugar glaze. So much for the consistency of the chip and/or the computer mixing of the paint hues.
The cabinet and sink vessel are installed, along with the spiffy "City Loft" faucet. Now I can move on to finishing the walls and floor while we wait for the Kerdi system to arrive this week. Tiling starts next weekend...at least, I hope it does.

Rain, finally

After days of humidity so high you could feel moisture dripping out of the air, the rains finally arrived last evening. It cooled things down and allowed me to sit on the porch for a while, watching the rain fall, hearing it plinking against the metal tub covering my chimenea. It's a sound that reminds me of my childhood and the "sleeping porch" with its tin top--a sound that lulls you into a peaceful bliss.

I hear it again this morning, outside my window as the rain splats against the ledge outside Libby's pet door. Coupled with the semi-darkness of the room, it makes me just want to crawl back into bed for a while, and I am tempted--right after I finish this wonderful breakfast. My friend gave me a handful of fresh tomatoes from her garden. Imagine, a tomato that smells like a tomato, and tastes like a tomato. Sliced and seasoned with freshly ground sea salt, it's the perfect accompaniment to eggs and wheat toast.

There is only one tomato left now, and I shall savor it like this day--the last day I have left before officially beginning the new semester tomorrow.

"If it weren't for bad luck, I'd have no luck at all..."

I have got to stop saying "if nothing else goes wrong" because, of course it will. It started off well, except for the part about waking at 4:30 this morning unable to return to sleep for thinking about the bathroom. I did get the primer coat on the wall and the floor and was on my way to work when I got side-tracked with having lunch with J.

Back home from that, I tiled the part of the floor for the sink and put shiny new chrome flanges down. Oops--they extended beyond the feet of the sink cabinet, and the ones on the pipes had to come out. Now, frankly, I am starting to wonder why NOTHING in this house is standard. Studs are supposed to be a standard width apart in walls--not here. There might be 4 of them within 6 inches here. I guess the good news is that is gives lots of support, and more areas in which one could hang a picture or nail baseboard. But why is the water pipe 2 inches from the drain on one side, and 8 inches on the other? What were these people thinking?

After all of this, J and I decided to change the paint color for the walls in the bathroom, which meant slow down on installing the sink. That will give me more time to figure out how to cover the tile around the pipes, since the flange will not now fit.

So, my lovely new sink is still in the living room for the moment. Meanwhile, J prepared dinner tonight.
We don't know what it was called, but it was quite unique and delicious, and contained my favorite butternut squash, carrots, and some interesting spices including oregano from the herb garden. As usual, though, his propensity for dishes with cream based sauces sabotaged me again.

Partial accomplishment!

Sink and partial tile in our bathroom. That is as much as I will do in here until we finish the hall bath. Tiling the small section, taping and bedding the wall, and putting a primer coat of paint on the wall behind the sink took all morning. Because the new sink is smaller than the old one, I also have to extend the baseboard. I guess Will figured since it did not show, it did not matter if it went all the way to the wall. Either that, or like most other things in here, he cut too short anyway and just nailed it up regardless.

I had to replace the bottom 8 inches of sheetrock on one wall in the hall bath, due to the earlier water damage from when we had to rebuild our shower. While the sink was out, it made sense to texture the back wall. The caulking is in place on the floor and it will all dry overnight. In the morning, I will paint the primer coat on the section of floor I can tile for the moment, and primer the back wall. In the afternoon, I will get the tile installed and then we will be ready to put the new sink in place. Slow going, but at least some accomplishments to celebrate.

Back to the bathroom: Enter laughing

Well, of course he did--something else not done correctly to begin with. Even I know you cannot put ceramic tile with mortar on a fiberboard floor without a moisture barrier. But of course, that is the reason we have had to rebuild everything in the bathrooms anyway--his failure to put down moisture barriers and a shower pan/liner when he shoddily built the shower in the first place. So, once we got to the repair by the drain and the tile had to come up, along came the floor with it. We actually kind of expected that, so were not surprised. It primarily just crumbled.

The option for now was replace the part of the floor necessary to put the sink in and get the vinyl tile down on that part of the floor and wait on the rest of it, since it will necessitate replacing the flooring in all of it, along with taking out the toilet. We don't want to do that until we are ready to replace the toilet and do all the tile. After Randy got the new wood floor in place, I painted it with the primer coat needed before applying the vinyl tile.
Next up was to put this side of the wall in. I will tape and bed it tomorrow (of course, another all day job), put the primer coat on the wall, and then put the tile down on this section.
Libby said thanks for cleaning out her kennel. After that hot and unpleasant task, I went down to the road to cut down 2 pine saplings and a cedar tree that have been beginning to block our view of the highway for the past several weeks. Cars come around the curve far faster than the speed limit anyway, and one needs the best possible view to avoid a collision. It was 97, but felt far hotter than that.

Second shower of the day and I am ready for take-out and to kick back with a movie. After all, tomorrow will be busy enough, and then it's back to work on Monday. Where did the summer go?