Before and After

I don't mean to boast, I really don't...but I'm PROUD of my yard and its progress in one short year. The original owners of my house were "naturalists" as the neighbors put it. That's a nice way to say they didn't believe in using chemicals or even pruning/clipping hedges. Everything was just free to grow. As a result, the yard and landscaping looked like this when I bought my house in July 2008.


I suppose I really should have written this post in July, to commemorate 1 year of owning my house, but that will be a different post. For now, since it's spring and things are blooming and green, I want to focus on changes that have taken place to the exterior of my house since I've bought it. Thanks to help from Mom and Dad (providing a Japanese Maple, and pulling out old hedges), Leslie (being a BIG help with labor, and planting a tree), a co-worker (for using his SUV to pull out a small tree), and Scotts turf builder this is what I have so far this year:



I can explain about the improvements. First of all, we have landscape edging, which I feel provides a nice divide between yard and bed. It's relatively inexpensive for the look it gives, and just takes time to put down. There is red lava rock as a bedding, and under the red lava rock is a weed barrier. Under the week barrier is a mixture of Preen pellet weed killer and liquid round up, mixed for a toxic solution to ward off weeds. Don't judge me. As far as foliage goes, the small items on the ground are a blue star juniper (soft to touch) and a yellow/green juniper srub. These don't spread too large if taken care of. Next, is my favorite. A red lace leaf Japanese maple. It survived the winter and looks amazing. This small tree is gorgeous. I have two large boulders on the ground for a backdrop, and solar lanterns that give off a nice dim light at night...it looks amazing. Then there's the gnome who protects this area, his name is Barnaby. Moving on down now there is some sort of small evergreen tree, this was already here when I bought the house, we just trimmed it. Then there is a small green leaf Japanese maple that my dad brought me from South Carolina. This one is still very young and is staked to be straight. Then there is another evergreen, and on the end of the house is a weeping cherry tree. All of these should not grow much larger, just more robust if trimmed and taken care of. The weeping cherry tree looks excellent in spring, and is a popular corner garnish for houses in my neighborhood.

So, this is what I've been busy spending my days working on this spring, and I still need to finish up (if you can see, more lava rock needs to be put down on the end). Take a look at the grass though. That's a big improvement in just one season. I'm very happy with it and I've had a great time working on it. This is a fun part of home ownership to me!

Also:
- Leslie and I are coming to South Carolina July 2 - 5
- Go see State of Play in theatres
- Happy Mothers Day mom, I love you!

X-Rated Picture, Beware

We're all adults here, so don't get upset at the picture. That's the best description of my condition. Originally all the reading and research I had done told me I didn't have a hernia, because none of the symptoms matched. I then found out about the inguinal hernia, and suprise, that's matches my symptoms and the picture pretty much confirms it. I will know more tomorrow after I have a doctor examine me, but I'm pretty sure this is what my problem is. The bulge shown in the picture isn't always evident, but after physical activity, such as shoveling snow or bowling, for example, the protrusion becomes very evident followed by a pain that's not severe, just irritating.

There was a ton of snow that fell yesterday so now we have about a foot or so on the ground. That makes driving really fun, because the roads still aren't all the way clear.

Tomorrow after my doctor's visit I can update on my condition more thoroughly.

Snow Day

It's 21 degrees outside and it's snowing. I'm on my couch, with the curtains open, under a blanket, warm. This is nice.

No AC

I saw this article on Google about what to do if you don't have AC in your car. I think these are just stupid. You should pay the money to get your AC fixed, or sell your car and buy one with AC - plain and simple. A block of ice on your floorboard? I don't think so.

What to do if you don't have AC in your car

Ello Gov'ner

I took Nana to the airport tonight so she could go back to South Carolina. I very much enjoyed her visit and I think Walter liked having someone home with him during the day.

Last night I got a suprise phone call from Jay asking me about headlight bulbs. He said he wanted to change his burned out headlight bulb himself, but the owner's manual said in one simple step to "remove the radiator reserve tank" so he stopped right there. I thought that was funny.

I'll have to make a trip out to California sometime this fall to visit 2 people I know who live (and will live there): Jay, and Kiki.

I don't know what's going on here, but right now in Novi it's 37 degrees and I think that's way too cold for late April. Last week was a teaser. It was in the high 70's and really sunny. I have no idea what's going on. I do know I'm going to bed right now though, g'night!

Happy Easter; Love Your Friend, Michigan

Instead of lillies, buds, and spring air we got this Friday for the Easter weekend. We had a nice week previously of actually seeing the ground, and the ground was starting to thaw out finally (i.e. it didn't feel like you were walking on a rock while walking on the grass). Then we got this. Luckily Saturday it started to melt but it was strange to see snow on the ground at Easter.

I didn't have to work Friday. A 3 day weekend should happen every weekend, if life were fair. I celebrated by sleeping later than usual, reading, teaching someone from work how to play Smash Brothers, reading more, then going over to Alex's to play more Smash Brothers, then I played 2 more hours with Paul online through Skype using a webcam.

Saturday I took Walt to the dog park. We had missed 2 weeks for whatever reason, but he was happy to go back and play with his dog friends. I also went rock climbing Saturday. I REALLY miss being able to do it for free at Clemson. Now I have to drop $25 every time I go. Friends from work go once or twice a week because they have year memberships (that's like $900). I try to go twice a month. I justify it because it's SUCH good exercise and a mental challenge as well.

I joined a program at work called "In Shape". The whole point is to be on a team, and encourage people to loose weight. Our engineering group formed a small team and I decided I would do it. Basically it's a 6 month long comittment in which you set a weight loss goal, and try to achieve it by the end of 6 months. As a team you're supposed to support each other. It's pretty strict, you have to keep a log of food you eat, and basically monitor calories in vs. calories out. I set my goal for 10 pounds in 6 months which I know I can do. I don't want to loose a tremendous amount of weight, but just firm up some. I lost 10 pounds in college, then another 5 pounds when I moved to Michigan. I attribute it to eating smaller portions, but still being healthy. I ate WAY to much when I lived at home. The portions were larger than I needed and there was always a snack of some sort on hand. So this program officially starts tomorrow.

Dan and I went to Easter service at church today. After that we went to Ruby Tuesday for lunch. I had Easter dinner with another friend from work, Paul, and his family.

I found this picture below online. This is the exact car I want to get in May. It's the same model and the same color I want. That's only about 2 months away now so it's getting closer.

Bulleted List

1) Tonight is a very special night. At 12:00 AM, besides the time change, Smash Brothers Brawl is going to be released. Alex and I are going to the Gamestop around 11:00 for the pre-party and getting our games at midnight. This has been a long time coming. If I were to guess, there probably won't be much posting next week due to me playing that game, but we'll see.

2) Last night Katey and I went to Troy to eat at the California Pizza Kitchen in the Somerset Mall. The Somerset Mall is a really fun place to walk around. It's 3 stories tall and nothing but high end stores. Then we came back to my apartment and watched House. She wanted to watch House, I don't really like those CBS shows but it was ok.

3) I looked at some more houses today in Plymouth, 3 to be exact. What I saw today was much nicer than what I saw when Mom and Dad were here. The prices were lower and the houses were in much better conditions.

4) It snowed again today.

Gotta go!

Good Friday for Somebody

I'm really, really tired tonight. This week has gone by so fast. I started German language training at work Tuesday. It's a blended class with online learning and 2 hours every other week with a German class instructor at work. We're expected to do 90 minutes of class on our own a week, and score >80% on all the exercises. I did well the first class, but German is much harder than Spanish. I have a very hard time pronouncing the German words.

Katey and I went to see U2 3D last night at the Henry Ford Imax. It was pretty good except for Bono's Coexist agenda. I just wanted to see the concert and hear the music and not get into the whole political agenda, but it was still good.

It started to snow tonight. As I was out tonight I thought to myself how nice it was to see the actual ground, but now it's going to be covered up again with snow. It's ok, it was a nice break.

I'm going to bed now, I need my sleep.

Let Me Catch You Up

Wow, half a week since posting. I've been pretty busy lately, so that's my excuse. It's a good one.

Mom and Dad came this weekend to visit. I really enjoyed having them. A strange thing happened with the weather...it was clear and sunny. It was still cold, but you could actually see the sky and the sun. That never happens in the winter here, or, if it does, only for a few minutes.
We took Walter to the dog park, and Saturday afternoon we went to look at some houses in Plymouth, Canton, and Northville with a real estate agent. The houses in Northville were close to $200,000 for something smaller than a trailer. The houses in Plymouth and Canton were nice. I think Plymouth/Canton is where I would like to buy my first house. I found out Plymouth/Canton is the largest school district in the country. Apparantly there are 3 high schools on the same campus, so students actually go to different schools for different classes...a lot like college.

Katey spent the day with us Sunday playing cards and being lazy, which was nice. It was pretty wet out yesterday. Today I woke up at 4:30 to get them off to the airport. Since it was such an odd time after I dropped them off (around 5:30) I just decided to go to work. I went to the gym at work and exercised for about 45 minutes, then took a shower, and actually got to my desk at 7:00. It's nice to go in early on sometimes before everyone.

Tomorrow is Friday, but Really Thursday

I found out yesterday that I can get a really good discount on Subaru's. Today after work Dan and I went to the Subaru dealership and test drove a 2008 Impreza. It was a nice car. It drove so-so, nothing really spectacular. The best part about the car was the all wheel drive. We took it down a neighborhood road with lots of snow and it handled very well. That is one thing about the car I really do like.

I think I will still go with the Civic though since it's cheaper and gets better gas mileage, and Paul doesn't like it so it will be fun to spite him. Sorry Paul.

Tomorrow is Friday for me, even though it's really only Thursday because I have the real Friday off. Mom and Dad are coming Friday morning for a long weekend. It will be nice to have them here. I think it's supposed to snow again on Friday. We already have about 7 inches on the ground right now.

Last night Katey came over and we watched "Little Miss Sunshine" and then "The Office". It was a lot of fun. While she was here it snowed about 3 inches though. I was trying to think when the last time I saw the actual ground was...and I think it's been about 2 weeks?

The Ski Trip - and Monday

Now I can finally write about the ski trip to Canada. It was amazing, and one of the best weekend I've ever had. It was so much fun to rent a huge house for the weekend with 15 of your co-workers and have a good time.

We left work Friday around 3:00 and got to Collingwood, Ontario around 9:00. There was so much snow in Canada it was crazy. There was about 3 feet of snow on the ground at the house we stayed at and the snow banks from plowing the roads were huge. Friday night we had a really interesting party that lasted pretty much all night. I didn't go to sleep Friday night/Saturday morning until 5:30 AM which I never do.

Skiing Saturday was hard because I was exhausted from the night before. My ski pass was good until 10:00 PM but a few of us ended up leaving around 4:30 PM to go back to the house and shower and relax. Saturday night was much more low-key.

We decided to leave Sunday pretty early, around 9:00 AM to get back earlier and because we didn't know what the roads were going to be like. Sunday was literally blizzard conditions. Driving was really hard and there were points where we just had to stop in the middle of the road because we couldn't see the hood of the van we were in. The snow was blowing like crazy and you couldn't see the road or anything. We drove south to Toronto and got on the 401 back to Windsor. The 401 was actually closed in one area because ofa weather so we had to take an emergency detour route around the closed area. All said and done, it took us almost 8 hours to get back because of the weather. We got lucky though, 2 other cars of people we were with actually had to stay in Canada because they closed all the roads they were travelling on and forced them to stay overnight because conditions were so bad. So I am glad we made it back last night.

I'll have to post some of the pictures I took from the weekend, but I'm going to get ready for bed now.

PS...I love my new computer! It's my first blog entry with it and I really love the way the keypad feels. Vista is nice too so far, I like the user interface. So far so good. Did you know today's high was 11 degrees!

I'm a Raggamuffin

I don't have any heat so I'm in my apartment under blankets and in a sweater. The thermostat said 40 degrees in here when I got home. I have no clue what's wrong with the heat, nor do I care, because I pay for others to care. If it were my own house, then I'd care. I'm waiting for maintenance to get here to fix the heat...but it's been about 2 hours now so I'm cold.

Even Walter, who NEVER wants to sit on my lap started to cry and jumped up on my lap, curled up, and went to sleep. He's cold too. The weather got really bad today after lunch. This morning it was a little icy, then at lunch it started to sleet, then the temperature dropped quickly and snow covered the ice. The roads were a mess on the way home so it took me about 45 minutes to drive the 6 miles home. The traffic was bad and intersections were nasty.

Too bad tomorrow can't be a snow day. Oh and Kiki called today. That was a nice treat, I haven't spoken to Keek in a long time (Hi Kiki).

Gambling

Tonight has been my first night at home since...Saturday. I've been out doing things each night. Monday was the movie with Katey, Tuesday I saw Cloverfield with Dan and Tom from work, and last night I went to a Texas Hold 'Em poker game with some people from work. I never knew poker could be so much fun!

It was only my 2nd time playing poker. We played two rounds...the first I didn't so very well, but by the 2nd round I got lucky, or had more skill, I'm not sure which. I like the game though, and I think if I practiced I could be really good. Especially with bluffing. I'm good at lying.

People I work with are inviting me out to do more things with them which is fun. Our work group is pretty close knit outside of work. I can see how that might be a bad thing is something were to go wrong...but it's fun for now. I'm younger than everyone else, but I still have a good time with them. Mostly they're in their late twenties or early thirties.

Aunt Linda took time to send me a nice e-mail today to remind me that in Novi's 10 day forcast, there is only one day where the high is above freezing. Thank you, Linda. I think this snow is going to be on the ground for a long time, this time. The last big snow melted because we had a thaw, but it's going to be cold until March I think.

Tuesday Stuff

Are you wondering if it's still cold? Well, yes, it is. I got this e-mail from my aunt (Hi, Linda) that "oh it's 54 degrees here, and we have the heat on". You're a freak. If it were 54 degrees here I'd have shorts on. Anyway it's still cold.

Last night I went on a "date" with Katey. That's what I'm calling it, because that's what I wanted it to be and I think it was. I think she knows I like her, and if she doesn't she has to be dense. Which is good, because she's a very blunt person so if she didn't want to date now, or in the future she would have said it. I like her a lot though and I told her I'd like to see her more often. She said we could do that. We're going to take Walter to Canine to Five this Saturday since I didn't make it last week.

Tonight I went and saw Cloverfield with two friends from work. It wasn't very good...almost like a Blair Witch Project type movie. The filming made me a little sick to my stomach because the entire movie was filmed in a jittery home-movie type way.

Oh, and I re-joined Facebook. Now, I need to find out when Paul and Lindsey are coming to visit since I stood up to my end of the bargain...

Yes, It Is Still Very Cold

So I didn't really do anything interesting today, and I doubt I will. It's way to cold to do anything, except sit under a blanket and play Super Paper Mario. Todays high is 11 degrees. I went to church, went grocery shopping, then cleaned my apartment (ohhh exciting). Walter was being bratty so I decided to take him for a walk to make him tired. We got outside and he would walk for a little bit, then hold up one of his legs, and cry and sit down. I think the snow/ice was getting packed in his paws and he was crying because it was too cold. So I ended up having to carry him home because he would just cry and lay down.

I think tomorrow's high is 17 degrees?

Frigid

Right now it is 7 degrees Farenheit outside (feels like -10F). Boogers freeze at 4 degrees Farenheit. It is cold; painfully cold. It takes your breath away as you step outside. It's so cold that when I stopped to get gas and I popped the gas door, it wouldn't open because it was frozen shut. I had to pry it open with a car key. It's cold....soooo cold.

It's Dry Here

I'm glad it's Friday. I'm glad the weekend is here, and I'm glad I can sleep in tomorrow. Today was a good day at work. We found out our merit increases (i.e. raises) so I was very happy with that. It's always nice to find out you'll make more money. But with more money comes on more expectations/responsibility so it's a trade off.

I bought a humidifier for my apartment because the air is VERY dry here. When I blow my nose, blood is there and Walter is constantly drinking water and chewing on his back legs. The vet found no skin problems, I think his skin is dry and irritated. My skin also is also very dry so I know his must be. Hopefully this will help.

I'm supposed to help a guy I work with move tomorrow. I'm watching his cat right now. Her name is Harley and I've been watching her for the past week. She's a sweet cat, but likes to wake me up in the morning by rubbing her head against mine. It's cute, but not at 6:30 in the morning.

Goodnight.

63 Degrees in January in Michigan - Holy Guacamole

Today was simply amazing. It was overcast and wet, but 63 degrees! The snow melted, the grass underneath was a very vibrant green, and it felt like an April day. It's only early January though. Global warming does have it's perks.

Speaking of global warming...when did it get to be such a political issue? It also seems if you don't believe in it (rather, believe Al Gore's theory), then you're being stubborn or ignoring the facts. I remember in elementary and middle school that global warming was considered a "theory" and now it's somehow magically accepted as truth. When was that conclusion reached?

I believe the Earth is warming. I also believe the Earth goes through temperature cycles that we as humans cannot fully fathom because the cycles fluctuate and change over hundreds, or thousands, of years. I don't think we can take a look at a 50 year window and conclude that the Earth is warming nonstop, and we're doomed. 50 years is like a grain of salt in all of time. I also don't think humans are 100% responsible for climate change. We are probably a contributor, but there are natural variations that outweigh what humans do.

That's not an excuse to by a Hummer or big Suburban though! I'm just saying...

Thawing

Walter is adjusting nicely to his new home. The first few days you could tell he was still learning. He wasn't eating as much, and acted like this apartment wasn't his. Now he's walking around like he knows the place, and he has learned outside pretty well. He also goes in his crate by himself when he gets tired. He's being a very good boy. Katey came over last night and she said he is very smart and well behaved. I'm proud of him.

Today warmed up to 43 degrees, which feels very nice. The snow is melting and tomorrow is supposed to be 57 degrees! I assume it will be down to be arctic like conditions soon though.

At church today they were talking about some of their goals for 2008 and what they had done in 2007. I never used to think back on the previous year, what I had done, and what I had learned, but I did this past year. I think I posted about it. 2007 was very interesting and probably the most changing year in my life.

I think I'm taking Walter to Terissa's house today so he can play with Teenie Weenie and PJ. I'll have to take some pictures if I go.

2007 and Stuff

It was a little depressing coming back here yesterday, to be honest. It was depressing because there was 11 inches of snow on the ground, and the holidays are over, and I had to leave my family. I had a really good time in South Carolina and it was nice getting to spend time with everyone. So after driving all day, it was just depressing to come back and have to go back to work...with all this snow.

I also realized after reading Kiki's blog how great 2007 was and how fortunate I was. In 2007 a lot of good things happened:

- I lived in a really great apartment with 2 really fun people, and got a taste of paying rent/bills/taking trash out
- I graduated from college with an engineering degree
- I got a really interesting job doing what I've always wanted to do
- I moved to another state
- I traveled to Japan
- I got a dog
- I am doing ok on my own, keeping a budget & managing money
- I got a positive year-end review at work
- I made new friends here in Michigan, but have kept my "old" friends (oldies but goodies)
- I turned 24 years old, on December 24th...what is that called?

I remember in 11th grade I told my chemistry teacher my goal was to "design something on a car, and then see that car on the road, and be able to say you designed that". By 2009 when the 2010 Subaru Legacy's and Outback's come out, I'll be able to say that.

I loved being with family, and I really enjoyed going back to Newspring (I enjoyed that more than I expected). I hope 2008 is just as great of a year.

As they say in Harcombe Dining Hall in the scrolling marquee "The break is over, it's time to get back to work". That's always so welcoming, I mean hateful.