Anniversary

I hope you all had a great memorial day weekend. Happy anniversary to me and my motorcycle, Saki :)

(2 years and 2 days to be exact)

I shall celebrate by ignoring her.

Opening Doors

Here is our master bath before we moved in:

And here is after we moved in:

Did you spot the difference? Hint: the ugly orange tiles are still there so it's not that, but thanks for the wishful thinking. It's the shower doors. They're gone.

I took them off because they were filthy and hard to clean. And hard to get in and out of. And most of all, did not hide the ugly orange tiles. But now there's the caulking residue left to deal with.

Did I make the right choice?

For the Birds

I'm headed for an east coast visit this year which rocks. The last time I was there was about 3 years ago.

That was when Karma was little (er) and we brought her with us everywhere. We stuffed her in a bag and convinced a bunch of people that she was carry on size. It was actually on the way back from this trip that we failed to convince airline folks this and were forced to buy a crate at the airport and put her in cargo.

Anyway, for most of the trip I left her at my parents house while I went off and did my thing. My parents were also bird sitting for my little cousin while he was out of the country with his parents. Karma loves critters. And that includes birds. But before you jump to conclusions, she did not eat the bird. She did however sit by the cage and stare at it. Like a frozen statue. Anyway, when I came back to pick Karma up, the bird looked like this:


This photo was taken by my parents. They put the bird (named Chocobee) in the freezer so they could figure out what to do next. Their plan was to replace him with an identical one and not tell anyone. I also forgot to mention that my "little" cousin is 18. So I lectured my parents that their plan would foil and how ridiculous it is to attempt.

Who sticks a dead bird in their freezer (actually, don't answer that one - is this behavior genetic?)? Who tries to fool an 18 year old? And did Karma stare this bird to death?

Pit Stop

I love avocados. If you don't, you're insane in the membrane. And I especially love when they are in season and on sale. But what's wrong with this picture?

This specimen was 99% pit.

I was really looking forward to devouring this perfectly ripe, and awesomely green goodness.

Grr.

Clearing Up the Air

I have a dirty secret. Literally. And it involves this:

(my furnace)

I have never changed the air filter in this thing since I've lived here. I have no excuse because I have pets. And eczema.

So that's where this comes in:

I ordered a 6 pack from Amazon. Not that kind of 6 pack. Or that kind either. Although I would be happy with either. Or both!

First take out 1 filter, and put away the rest. Then cut along the top to access the filter, but don't remove the plastic case completely (you'll soon see why).

Then head to your nasty old air filter located under your furnace:

Remove the old air filter*. And brace yourself:

How gah-rows is that? Big time yuck.

This is when you finally remove the plastic sleeve off the new filter, and carefully slide it over the old one:

Mark your new filter with the date you installed it:

Now slide the clean new one where you pulled the gross old one out.

Now toss the old filter and try to forget you let that happen. And then sit back and take a deep breath.

But before you forget the horror, here's one last look at how nasty mine was. *You saw right, it said '30 Day' on the old filter (and indeed it's been a year and half since we've lived here). Are you horrified? Did we beat the world record for air filter procrastination/ignorance?

Have you any similar horrors? Obviously, I won't judge...