5/15/09

And so the battle continues...

Background, in 1990 we bought 45 acres to build a house on. The bank wouldn't finance a house on more than 10 acres, so we went to the assessor's office and had 7+ acres partitioned off into a separate parcel for the house.

I received a letter from the assessor's office yesterday and called them this a.m. to find out what it meant. Seems that it's illegal to partition off a parcel for mortgage purposes. What the heck!?! This is the assessor's office, they're the ones who did it, and have been sending me tax statements for the two separate parcels for the last 20 years, and they didn't know it was illegal?!?

So what this is going to do to the refinancing, I'm not sure. At 9:00, I'll call the bank and find out (and hopefully I'll get an answer yet today).

Maybe people who bungee jump do it because they're so overwhelmed with everyday life.

5/12/09

Farewell to a dear companion

She was such a goofball, and loved to play:

And one of my favorite pictures, Lukas and Tynha:

I miss her.

5/12/09

Made an appt. to have Tyhna put down. She can't get up at all now. I was hoping to have the vet make a farm call, but neither of them can until next week. So now we have to try to get her on a blanket and loaded into the back of the van. This is so horrible. There has just been too much pain. I am so tired of it all. And I thought last year was bad. This year has it beat hands down.

5/11/09

Did you know that you can give hydrogen pyroxide to a dog to make it throw up? Just saved a trip to the vet.

5/11/09

Will it never end?!!?

Now my tiller won't start, won't even turn over. I just used it last week!

After chores, I went to the garden to work. Had to come in because the cows were bawling and the horses whinneying so much. They're not used to seeing me down by the barn other than at chores time, so they equate seeing me with food. Well, they already got fed!! Sheesh, so much for the peace and quiet of the countryside!

I'm going to go make some beads. Maybe in a while they'll all go out into the pasture and I can sneak back into the garden.

5/10/09

This has truly been the year from hell.

Friday I started the kiln to anneal a batch of beads, a week and a half's worth of work. I forgot to put the kiln controller's temp probe in the kiln. I wanted to go see Star Trek, so I asked Christian to check on the kiln. I reminded him several times before I left. He checked once. If he had done as I asked, he would have noticed the temperature not moving, and hopefully would have had the sense to turn it off and call me.

When I got home, I asked him if he remembered to watch it, and he looked at it and said it was at 780°. Actually, it was at 78°. I told him to turn it off. Saturday morning when I opened it, it was black on the bottom. All of the beads had melted off the mandrels and onto the kiln floor. And then when I plugged it in, and the elements didn't heat up, I realized the elements had burned out.

I didn't quite cry, yet...

I looked online to find a replacement, and ended up deciding to go down to St. Paul to J. Rings to buy a replacement. I got Lukas up and dressed, since I seem to be the only one who can do that around here. He handed me his remote, and I set it down, and promptly forgot where I set it down. At that point, I really was ready to sit down and cry.

David found it on my computer desk. I don't even remember going in there!

So I met Elaine at J. Rings and bought a kiln with a built in controller so I could never again forget to put the temp probe in. $600 later...

So today, after Lukas and I got home from meeting, I had a quick lunch and went to lay down because I had another headache. Opened the bedroom door, and there's water everywhere. The washing machine was overflowing, and it flowed into my bedroom!!!!

An hour later, Christian and I had it all mopped up. We've done 2 loads since then, and it seems to be working properly. But you can bet the first $500 that I have floating around, I'm buying a new washing machine! As Christian said, it may be 5 or 10 years before that happens, but I sure hope not!

I would love to be so bored with life that I wanted to go bungee jumping.