I know, it's been forever since I last wrote. To catch you up I am going to paste in an email I sent to Deb with all the fascinating information on what I've been up to. Sorry, Deb, nothing new for you to read. I'll post some pictures from the gathering later.
Let's see what have I been doing? Last week I went to an accounting conference for three days. It was really good and I took lots of computer classes. It was downtown, though and it was exhausting to get from my house to downtown Portland and back. Parking was a big pain in the neck, too. People that drive compact cars should leave the big-car parking spots open for the big cars (say like an Expedition) and park in one of the nineteen open COMPACT ONLY spots. I spent the rest of the week trying to catch up on all the stuff that happened while I was gone. I can only guess what it will be like when I get back from two weeks on the cruise!
Greg & his mom went down to the beach Monday through Thursday last week. They rented a car and a little house and just spend a few days relaxing together.
Thursday I started having problems with my car starting. A fellow Weekender's coordinator had an open house at her house during lunch, and I was over there for a bit. When I came out I couldn't get my car to start. This very kind neighbor came over and tried to help, but he didn't have any luck either. Eventually it started right up, no idea why. I took it over to the Ford dealership in Gresham and left it overnight. It started right up for them, of course. They told me that they couldn't do anything if it wasn't doing the problem and to come get it. I get there, pay, and they go get the car for me and it won't start. At least a technician could look at it. They replaced a fuel pump relay (whatever that is) and everything was good to go. I had no problems for the rest of the weekend.
Saturday I went down to Corvallis for the Haunted Woods Gathering. It was a total blast. We had a ton of people there, lots of food, and about a bazillion letterboxes. My mom & dad went with me, and they enjoyed meeting all us weirdoes.
Sunday we took Carmen & Sophie over to my friend Debbie's house for an introduction to her 5 whippets. The girls will be staying with them while we are on our trip and we wanted to make sure everyone got along okay. They have Smoochie & Melvin, who are Carmen's littermates. They also have two puppies that are about a year old, and another "special needs" whippet. We were there for about two hours and everyone seemed to get along fine. Debbie was worried that Smoochie would be snotty to my girls since she is the house alpha bitch, but she was fine. I was worried that Sophie would be snotty, but she was fine, too. Both Carmen & Sophie grumped at Deja, the male puppy, but he is a boy and not real bright yet. I imagine he gets grumped at a lot by everyone. He's very enthusiastic. Sophie thinks it is her role in life to train puppies, so she'll be happy. They will be just fine there. I'm going to pay Debbie $20 a day for the girls to stay there. A big difference from what daycare wanted ($56 for the two)!'
Yesterday I had problems starting my car again. Sigh. I tried for several hours. Greg even came out and cleaned the battery connections and charged the battery just in case that was the problem. It wasn't. So I called a couple of tow places to see what it would cost to take the car to the Ford dealership in Gresham. I decided I didn't want to pay $75 for the hook up fee plus $3.50 PER MILE all the way to Gresham (about 25 miles), so I found an ad in the yellow pages for an independent repair shop that would tow for free if you had them do the repair work. So I called them, they came & picked up the car and took it away. I didn't end up going to work yesterday because it was 11:30 before they even came to take it over to the shop. They called me back later and said they had no trouble starting it. Sigh. They wanted to keep it overnight also, so I have been without a car today. IT SUCKS!!
Greg brought me in to work this morning. Not only does he have a cold and had to get up before 6:00, but a cop pulled him over on the way in. He can't get the bolts out of the bumper so he can put in the new license plate, so he had it taped to his back window. Eventually the tape stopped being sticky and the plate ended up on the seat. So when the cop pulled us over for not having a license plate I had to scramble around under the seat to find it. I'm guessing he saw two people in an old '74 pickup and thought "Now there's at least one outstanding felony warrant in that car." Ha ha we fooled him! He didn't give us a ticket either.
I called the shop to check on my car about 11:00 and it still was starting just fine. Stupid freaking thing!! I imagine they will call me soon and tell me to come and get it because it works fine. I hate cars.
So that's what I've been up to. 19 days until the cruise! I have a zillion things to do! I don't even have luggage yet!
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