Lisa's Blog

Today is our one year house anniversary!

August 27th, 2007 was the day we took possession of our house.

I remember we drove from Ontario with the truck FULL of everything that didn't go with the movers - including 2 dogs, a cat, and my aquarium fish!

I remember a year ago this morning, we got to visit the house that morning for the final walk through. The realtor said we could leave some things there - but just in case something went awry with the deal, we decided to go in to town and wait for the deal to finalize - hopefully by noon.

All day we anxiously awaited a phone call to tell us the key was ready for us to pick it up from the lawyer. And we anxiously waited all day. Every few hours the sun would shift and we would move to another parking lot to keep the dogs cool.

I think it was after 4 o'clock before we got the key!

That night we unloaded everything from the truck. I spilled an entire bag of dog food on the driveway because the bottom was soggy. We had a lawn chair each to relax on in our new kitchen. We cooked some pre-made pizzas from the grocery store. Jeff had to cut up the pizza with his pocket knife - we didn't have any dishes or utensils! The moving truck wasn't expected for another day so we slept on the floor of our empty master bedroom. It was even less comfortable than it sounds!

So now here we are a year later. There are a few boxes still not unpacked (yes they're mine! get off my back!) We are very happy with our house purchase and hope to have many more years in our palace on the hill!

Remember Monty and I walked in the Purina Walk for Dog Guides a couple months back?

I just wanted to report that donations you made, combined with the other walkers from 160 communities across Canada raised $633,000 for the Lions Club Dog Guide Programs!!

High Five!

I don't have to go to work tomorrow! They are ripping out the disgusting gross old carpet so it was decided that it would be too dusty for us to work there.

What a GIFT! Because I could really use a day off away from that place Enough said

I have been exchanging emails with a lady who wrote me that she lost her Golden Retriever to cancer 16 months ago and feels that a part of her died with her dog. She is thinking about getting another dog, but seems so guilty and torn at the thought. I shared my experiences and thoughts with her and that spurred me on to have a good cry.

Next month will mark 3 years since I had to put my best friend Winger to sleep. Surf followed, just two months later. In a way I can't believe it's been 3 years and in other ways it feels like they are like a distant memory.

I think about them every day - usually Monty (their nephew) will trigger a memory through his actions and antics. But I don't cry much anymore. Once in awhile I have to stop recalling a story about one of them because I'll choke up. Looking back, I'm sure I cried every day for that first year. After I marked getting through that first year without them, I realized that if I kept trying to remember every single little thing about them, then I would never be able to shake the grief. I had to let go a little bit. I had to do it to be fair to Monty, I had to do it if I was going to have a future with Jeff, and most importantly, I had to do it for myself.

And now it's almost 3 years later, and every few months I have to scratch open those emotional scars to feel the pain again. I'm not sure if I do it because I feel they deserve some sort of acknowledgement, or if I'm afraid I'm going to forget them completely, or if it is just healthy to cry a couple times a year. Luckily these times often co-insides with Jeff being out of town so he doesn't have to witness the tear festival going on in here. (he's in Sydney this week)

I usually start by reading the memory stories I wrote for each of them after they died. Winger's is here, and Surf's is here. Then I dig right in and load up a few videos I have of them - so I can see them swimming and I can hear them breathing. They were always so happy.

Even reading their memory stories tonight, I realized how many things I've forgotten about them already. I forgot about Winger's love for all food except celery. I can see him right now gobbling celery, giving it a chew, and then flicking it back off his tongue onto the kitchen floor. He hated celery. And I forgot that. But that is okay. It has to be okay.

Thanks to Shawn at Virgin Mobile, my problems are *hopefully* (fingers crossed) fixed. Of course my cell phone is still dead because of it's "swim". So I have spent FAR too many hours trying to figure out what cellphone and what cellphone features I wanted.

I am sticking with Virgin Mobile. Their prices just can not be beat. And they throw in voicemail, call display, 3 way calling, call forwarding, call waiting for free - even on a pre-paid phone.

I kept my old cell phone number so if you had it before, it's still good.

I decided to treat myself a little. No I didn't get a blackberry - don't be silly. I did get the Samsung R610.

It's a mid-range phone, between a basic phone and a full blown smart phone. It slides open to use, so the keys are always protected (no accidental calls!). It has a 1.3 meg camera, nice big colour screen, and has a memory card for saving pics, music, videos, etc.

Virgin Mobile has a mobile web browsing plan, unlimited, for $7/mth. I signed up so I can try it out for a month to see what the mobile web is about. I am thinking about making a mobile version of a couple of my websites, so now I see what it actually looks like. It doesn't have a QWERTY keyboard, and I hate texting on the stupid number pad, but I'm not going full blown into an iPhone or a Blackberry right now. I probably went over kill on this one, but we'll see.

I could have got the phone for free with a 3 year plan, but I don't like signing my future away anymore, but I'll stick with Pay as You Go for now (I mostly just call Jeff at his office or at home).

I've already played with Twitter and Facebook on it. And it has weather so I checked the weather to verify this rain was forecast So far I like this phone. The camera takes a decent picture. I think surfing the web with it eats the battery super fast, but that is probably to be expected.

OH! and I bought a case too with a belt clip to keep it safe! (and DRY!)

I don't know HOW I didn't hear that the Truck and Tractor Pull was starting tonight until a hour before it began! I LOOOOVE tractor pulls!

I rushed home from work and dragged my husband back into town to the fair grounds for the event. The first half of the events were tonight and tomorrow there are even more classes to watch! I think we'll stick with just tonight's show though. There really is a limit to the number of hours one can comfortably sit on old rickety bleachers.

And what a show it was! Not only were there tractor's pulling, there were 4x2 trucks, 4x4 trucks, highway tractor trailer rigs, AND suped up lawnmowers! And it was SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO loud! I couldn't take action shots because I had a finger deeply inserted into each of my ears!

Here are two movies for you to set the scene! Turn on your speakers if you can!

Before:

After!!

Yes, that is a riding mower!

Oops! This driver was disqualified by driving out of bounds, and crashing into the big advertising signs!

I wish I got pictures of the big transport trucks going, but it was dark by then and my camera didn't take anything good. There were a couple of big tractors too - right off the farm. The Case kicked the John Deere's ass, in case you are keeping score

We've been very disappointed in the Canadian Olympic coverage so far.

It's all American!

Why do I want to watch the US volleyball and the US basketball and the swimming!! This insane focus on an American swimmer going for 8 metals has me turning off the tv! In his first race a Canadian finished 5th. He got ZERO focus. They didn't even mention for awhile what place he came in. All we hear was about the American and his life story. They interviewed the American who came in 3rd place instead. Not one word with the Canadian in 5th place.

WHY????????????????????????

We are so focused on metals that we'll focus on a US competitor that ranks higher? As a Canadian I'm very proud of our athletes, and if one finishes 5th I think that is incredible and I want to know about it and that athlete.

I don't want to watch the US women's volleyball because we don't have a team of our own. How about we watch some coverage of sports we DID compete in. Just because we don't finish in the top 3 doesn't make it not worthy of our support! If I want to watch the Olympics with a US focus I'll watch NBC!

Brian, Leanne, and Hadley stayed with us for the weekend.

Yesterday we went to the beach! I have never swam in the ocean... and I didn't this time either! I did wade up to my thighs, but I chickened out from diving right in. Jeff was the only crazy one to do that.

Beach conditions:

Jeff and Brian contemplating the possibility of a swim:

Leanne and Hadley and the almost completely deserted beach, except for a couple other crazy people and two really cold looking lifeguards.

Brian and Hadley looking for treasures:

We packed a lunch for the beach, but there were so many mosquitos out we had a picnic in our car! Here is Hadley blowing me a kiss!

I know you've been dying to know what we bought for ourselves!

Sianora old mailbox with the big holes in the bottom!

No more soggy mail for us!

My Uncle Ed and Aunt Nora stopped by last night! They are here in Nova Scotia for a week while Ed is at a conference for chicken farmers.

What a busy week!

Jeff's parents left on Tuesday morning. Ed and Nora were here on Thursday night, and my brother Brian, his wife Leanne, and daughter Hadley will be here tonight!

Three new blog posts are in the works.

Stay tuned for highlights from:

-The Sherbrooke Village
-The Fortress of Louisbourg
-Our Latest Purchase

In the meantime, I need to finish my work day.
It's damp and dark out - and only 15°C.

I love Virgin Mobile. I have had no complaints in the 3 years I've had my cell. They have good customer service, and a really cheap pay as you go plan.

But now Virgin Mobile Canada is pushing me out.

I had a credit card set up with my account so when I'm getting low on funds, it automatically tops up my account by $15. That credit card expired in July so I called in my new credit card.

The customer service woman was unable able to attach my new credit card to my account. When I gave her my address, she said it doesn't exist in her computer. Pardon me? After a back and forth battle of me repeating my address in different formats and orders, she said she'd have to pass it on to their billing department and they would call me back.

Almost 2 weeks later I dropped my cell phone in the toilet and it doesn't work anymore.

So now I need a new cellphone.

I researched all my options, all the cell phone types and even looked at the packages offered by other cell phone providers, but I jumped right back to Virgin Mobile and selected a phone that was a notch better than my old cell.

I tried to buy it online at Virgin Mobile but it wouldn't accept my credit card. Either of my credit cards.

I called in to Virgin Mobile again and got no where. Virgin Mobile can not charge my credit card because they don't have my street address in their database. If I alter my address to just use one of their streets, then my credit card company refuses the purchase because the address doesn't match my address on their accounts.

Thinking that maybe we were somehow wrong, I looked up the addresses for our postal code on the Canada Post website. Canada Post has one extra entry in their database, and that is the one for our address. Somehow Virgin Mobile does not have this highway in their database, so I bet not one of my neighbours' has Virgin Mobile service either.

The customer service rep promoted my original request to urgent. That was last weekend. I still haven't heard back.

I didn't use my cell phone that often, but it was a comfort thing - knowing I had it if I needed to call Jeff (can't call him from work since it's long distance from a land line), or if I had car problems, or some other emergency. It was nice to have when we traveled too.

My only other option to stay with Virgin Mobile is to find a store carrying their cellphones, and then always topping it up with phone cards. I checked the only store in town that carries Virgin Mobile cell phones and they did not have it.

Are you listening Virgin Mobile Canada? Your customer service reps are great, but I choose not to move to a new address so your database can verify my address.

I'm seriously behind in my photo blogging!

Mom and Grandma Stock visited over a week ago. Jeff and I picked them up in Pictou from the ferry on Friday (after their visit with Joe and Patricia) and took them to the Halifax airport on Monday so they could fly home.

Here are some photos I took while we were waiting for their ferry to arrive:

I told you early about our rummy card playing. And I told you about the whales and seals we saw. But that wasn't enough for Mom. She demanded that she been shown an east coast deer. So we did one better. We were on a gravel road out near Wine Harbour and there was a doe and TWO fawns on the road in front of us! Take that!

On Monday we got early so we could drive to Halifax, and then go a wee bit past Halifax to Peggy's Cove. Mom and I hadn't been there since our family vacation in 1990. Grandma Stock was there in the 90's with her brother and sister-in-law. Jeff was there in 2001. It was a dark rainy day, but the rocks weren't too wet and just a little bit slippery so we still walked on them to get some photos. What a crazy tourist attraction. I guess a rocky shoreline with a lighthouse is some fascinating thing if you aren't used to it - but it isn't much different from the shoreline in many places in Ontario - Killbear Provincial Park north of Parry Sound for example, minus the trees. I like the old fishing buildings in Peggy's Cove more than the shoreline. Here are some photos:

Until I can catch up and post pictures of last weekend, let alone this weekend, here is a photo from Saturday to tide you over ;-)

I was running around this morning at work getting material ready for a presentation I was making to the Librarians.

The phone rang and it was the passport office calling. They were so casual but I immediately thought, uh-oh, what did I do wrong!?! They were just looking for an alternative number for my guarantor who was on vacation and not answering the telephone. They needed to touch base with her hopefully today so I dashed out to my car to get her number.

What a hot and humid day. My clothes were immediately stuck to me. I briskly walk by the workers who are sandblasting the exterior wall of the library on my way to and from the parking lot. I was initially going to call Patricia from my car on my cell, but sandblasting is SO LOUD!

After I fetched the number from my car dashed back inside (with my hands over my ears). That is one of THE loudest sounds on the ear drums!

On my way back to my office and stopped quick to pee. Mission accomplished. I stood up and pulled on my shorts. My skin was all sticky from dashing about outside so I had to give them a good tug.

Plooooop... gurggle... gurggle..

NO!!!! I did NOT want to turn around. I just knew it.

Sure enough.. my cell phone flew out of my shorts pocket and hit the bullseye. As it sank in the toilet bowl it released big air bubbles.

I immediately pulled up my sleeve and dove down....

And pulled out my wet cell phone, dripping with toilet water (and likely pee).

I tried as fast as I could to get the battery out but I wasted precious time trying to turn it off first. I don't know why. I guess one doesn't think straight when they've just plunged their arm, elbow deep into the toilet bowl.

I quietly went back to my desk, layed out some kleenex, and pulled it all apart to dry. I was trying to hide behind my monitor - I really didn't feel like sharing my misfortune right away.

I really do think the cell is toast. I cheated once later today and re-assembled it to see if it would turn on. Nadda.

I eventually confessed to a coworker and he told me about an indicator that is located inside the cell phone that shows if it has ever gotten wet. I went and checked - and there is a big red fuzzy circle that wasn't there before it was wet. I guess this stops cell phone store clerks from troubleshooting other toilet bowl water soaked cell phones

On the bright, drier side, I checked online on Virgin Mobile's website. Since my cell is a basic, pay as you go cell, I can replace it for only $39.

I googled this afternoon to find out what you are supposed to do when you drop your phone in the water. Pulling out the battery immediately is key. Another one of the common suggestions is to put it in a bowl of dried rice, so that will soak up the water.

Let this be a lesson to you all. Keep a bowl of dried rice handy at work!