Catch Up

After I posted the Chicken Tortilla Soup recipe yesterday, I went back and looked at the meager postings in my blog and realized I need to close up a few loose ends.  So here you go…

Crappy ISP

They finally came and did what they needed to do.  There was an installation fee that no one told me about (although I was kind of expecting it) until the bill showed up in the mail a few days later.  A few days after that I got another bill from them for monthly service, which did not go up in price.  The stupid part of this equation is that they’re supposed to be auto-billing my credit card for any charges. 

I called them on a Monday and told the answering machine that I would like someone to return my call as soon as possible regarding a billing matter.  A full week after not receiving a call back from them I wrote a little note on the bill reminding them to bill my credit card.  A few days later they finally called back and said that they went ahead and billed my credit card…you know, like they’ve been doing for the past 3 years.

So back to the installation for a minute – when they came they didn’t have a face plate for the jack in the wall and promised to come back “in the next day or two” to take care of it.  It’s been more than a month.  I don’t think I’ll be getting a face plate.

My internet is much faster these days though! 

Baby Blake

My nephew Blake is at home and doing well.  My SIL updates his CaringBridge page once a week.  Prayers are always appreciated.

Grad School

I’m 6 weeks into my first 8 week course – Business Ethics.  It requires a lot of writing, which I don’t actually mind.  It also includes a lot of group work, which I’m having a harder time with.  It seems to be difficult to form a cohesive and committed group in this class.

I’m looking forward to my second course on Organizational Behavior in January.

Medical Update

We have been fairly healthy this fall but the kids keep coming down with weird rashes.  They range from 5-10 non-itchy spots to a body full of itchy spots.  I think William might have chicken pox right now…but I also think he had them in September.  Of course the doc doesn’t want to see them, I’m just told to “watch them”.  Ugh…  So William has been home for the past two days, healthy as a horse, no fevers, but covered with itchy pox-like bumps.

Katey’s eczema is getting worse.  I think she likely has a dairy allergy and if we took her off of all dairy she would clear up.  However, (there’s always a however), we can’t switch to a non-dairy diet at daycare without a written note from the doctor, who doesn’t seem to see things the way I do.  I wish we could find someone who is as interested in finding out what is causing Katey’s problems as they are to treat the symptoms.  It seems like they’re more than happy to prescribe medicine after medicine to stabilize her but won’t necessarily go any deeper to find the cause.  We were told that we shouldn’t do any more allergy testing until she was 4 or 5 years old.  I think I’m going to request more testing to be done after she turns 3.  There has got to be *something* triggering her eczema and allergies!

Why I’m Ticked at my ISP (part 2)

One of my pet peeves is bad customer service, and I think being stood up twice up with no call/email is just about the worst customer service ever.  Yup, you guessed it, Aaron from Crappy ISP never showed up on Friday.

On Saturday morning, I sent Aaron an email asking him to let me know when he might be able to come this week and I’d arrange my schedule to accommodate him.  Previously, I had been emailing him days/times early in the week that I was available for the maintenance.  Apparently my very restrictive “any time Tuesday, Thursday or Friday between 10 am and 3pm” type time frames didn’t work for him so I’ll leave it up to him to decide when he’s available.

In the meantime, I’ve found two other ISPs who claim to have VPN friendly wireless “high-speed” access available in this area.  Unfortunately, the prices per month is roughly twice what I’m paying now.  But, if they provide higher speed access and better customer service, I really wouldn’t have a problem with the additional charge.

Although neither Aaron or anyone else at Crappy ISP realize this, but an entire paradigm shift in our house is dependent on the work they want to do to improve my reception, which is making me more uptight about this than I normally would be. 

• As soon as the antenna is installed and we’re able to get internet access in the office downstairs, we can move the desk and other office type paraphernalia out of the upstairs office.
• Once the upstairs office is no longer an office, we can paint and decorate it to become Katey’s new big girl bedroom.
• Once the big girl bedroom is done, Katey can move out of her toddler bed in the master bedroom and into her brand new room.
• Once Katey is in her own room, it will mark the first time in 7.5 years that we haven’t had a kid in the master bedroom with us.
• Need I say more?

So to say I’m anxious for this upgrade is a bit of an understatement.  True, I will embrace the promised increase in speed and I will love being able to have internet access without having to precariously position the wireless modem on the window ledge of an open window in the heat of summer/dead of winter.  But mostly, having all of the kids in their respective rooms and no longer in our bedroom will be a dream come true!

Maybe if I give Aaron and Crappy ISP the entire sob story they may be more apt to actually show up the next time they say they’ll be here.  Or maybe I should just call one of the other ISPs…

Happy Home Challenge

Several years ago, I became a consultant with a direct sales company called Once Upon a Family.  I truly love the products and the mission of the company but found that I don’t absolutely love doing the home parties.  I’m still a consultant but mostly for personal use and to keep friends and family stocked with the cool products.

I got an email this week announcing the Happy Home Challenge.  Families commit to taking on a family challenge each month October through March and posting their results to the Happy Home site.  Any family who completes all the challenges will receive a Happy Home Hero Kit that contains six great Once Upon a Family products!

Check out this page for all the details. You can join a conference call on October 15, 10 AM PST with Lorle Campos, author of happyhome to kick off the challenge.  Call information: dial 231 644 8000, ext 581866#.

And if you need someone to order the happyhome book from, I just might know someone who can hook you up.

I’m Alive!

Believe me, that is something to cheer about these days! I’m finally on the tail end of a bad strech of something that started with strep throat early this month and progressed into a bronchitis type illness that just will not leave. A shot of penicillin and a 10 day does of a different antibiotic later, I still have a cough but almost feel human again.

Ok, so that takes care of my September absence. I have no excuse for July and August, other than life was predictably chaotic. Now that the kids are settled back in school and I can get back to web surfing….er….working in peace during the day, I might find a minute or two to keep up the blog.

Maybe.

If I can find time between PTO stuff, Cub Scout stuff, Ducks Unlimited stuff (really, don’t ask), purse business stuff, kid stuff, and, oh yeah, my real pay-the-bills job, I might just have time to post.  But I’ve gone and done this crazy thing that’s just might eat up whatever spare time I have left.  I’ll leave you hanging on that one until next week when I should know for sure…

(And by “you” I obviously mean the Google search bot, which seems to be the only thing reading my blog these days.  Gee…could that have anything at all to do with my inability to post with any regularity?  Hmm…)

Blueberry Season Has (Almost) Begun

I checked out the website of my favorite blueberry patch today and was rewarded with seeing that the patch will be open for picking on Monday!  The boys and I have been going blueberry picking for at least 5 years and quite possibly more.  They are amazingly good blueberry pickers, however last year they found the not-quite-hidden-enough patch of blackberries at the blueberry farm and proceeded to eat with abandon until I realized where they were and reigned them in.  I’ll try to keep better tabs on them this year but I’ve already heard them talking about finding that blackberry patch back.

The blueberries are $1.75 per pound when we pick them at the blueberry patch and we usually end up with 10-15 pounds.  We spend a few day gorging on fresh blueberries, a few more days gorging on baked blueberry goodness and then freeze the rest to enjoy for the rest of the year in pancakes, cereal, oatmeal, cakes and any other random blueberry recipe I can find. 

The broken stove is going to be an issue this year.  I’ve been salivating over the though of fresh blueberry buckle for weeks now and will be sorely disappointed if the oven isn’t fixed before the berries have to be frozen. I’ve ordered a replacement heating element and am anxiously awaiting its arrival.  I’m overly optimistic that it will actually work when it’s installed.  Our luck never runs so good, unfortunately.