clamhead’s Neighborhood

Lightly but it was my stupid fault. No visible damage to either car. All fine till driver mentions he might 'find engine damage' by light of day. Just what I don't need. I KNEW going to DerW for a hot dog was a bad idea. But I was having an odd craving and couldn't think of anywhere else that has dogs.

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Buy this stuff!!

The grapevine (and, now, finding her blog post) told me that IG was appropriate impressed with Folex carpet cleaner. It's seriously miraculous stuff - a gabillion-trillion times better than anything else on the market but a relatively unknown product. Spray, blot, stain = GONE.

And I just saw, on their website, that it's good for clothing stains too. Why didn't that occur to me on my own? Doh!!

Moving on....

Awhile ago, I found that Folex comes in gallon jugs and can be used in carpet cleaning machines. So I bought a jug and set it in my house for weeks on end. Then, during my extended illness, I pulled out the carpet cleaner that I bought let's say... SIX YEARS... ago and assembled it. But that made me exhausted so, I put it back in the garage to ignore.

Two weeks ago, when the weather was just right, I pulled out the machine, loaded the soap thingie with Folex, and tried cleaning just the hallway... to mixed success. But I realized the soap dispenser had barely dispensed any of the miracle cleaner. No wonder my success was mild, I'd basically "cleaned" with just warm water (making the amount of filth that came out extra scary)!! And the carpets had a LOT of cat fur so that gunked up the works a lot.

Today I got another wild hair (wisely, I had not returned the machine to the garage), mixed the Folex directly into the water reservoir and tried again. WOW!! Some spots just instantly disappeared. One swipe and GONE. That was fantastic! Other spots disappeared after being allowed to sit for awhile. Others (the spots where I sit all the time) only lightened up, appearing to be perma-stains, but were still improved (since I have light gold carpet, I can bleach them).

I'd show pics but the carpet still looks pretty bad (8+ years of gold carpet, black cats, me being a slob and a general disbelief in cleaning... you do the math). You'd only know it looks MASSIVELY better if you'd seen it, in person, before today's cleaning. Plus, it's still damp and I know the Folex will keep working till it dries.

Of course having misc piles of shit up off the floor is helping too. Too bad most of them will be put back because, much like Richard Gere, they've "got nowhere else to go!!"

I only got through 2/3 of the house before running out of motivation and Folex. I still need to do the dining room and move furniture and repeat the living room. And I supposed the bedroom too (the only time the carpet under the bed has been cleaned was when Adrian took out the bed to paint the room) - esp the East side, where the cord wouldn't reach (and there's cat barf that needs to be cleaned up anyway)(gawd, these cats are getting to me!!).

I may y or 4 more jugs of Folex and use it straight up, no water, next time. I'm not sure. I'm also not sure why I hate vacuuming but tolerate using the carpet cleaner... they sound and feel almost identical, and the vacuum doesn't leave the carpet wet, so why do I slightly enjoy using the cleaner but want to ax murder anyone who turns on a vacuum?

And that's basically how I spent my weekend. Sat was spent almost entirely asleep. The longest I was awake was to get some dinner (chicken pho) and pick up med refills (oh, lordy, when did my Darvo scrip go from 30 pills to 60?? the bottle is too big for my cabinet). Then I took 2 xanax (I've been having insane levels of anxiety), passed out around 10p, moved to my bed at 12:30a, and slept till 1pm today. Screwed up my plans for the day but, hot damn, I feel better! (got all the kinks out of my body)

I forgot to share my happy news... I WON A $50 AMAZON GIFT CARD ON FRIDAY!! Random draw from a facebook contest run by BlackFriday.info, which posts all the day-after-thanksgiving ads as they're created - so you can plan your shopping/spending early (or, if you're like me, start craving all sorts of stuff you don't really need). That was an awesome start to the weekend!! It was offset by working till 1am, and some really shitty meetings throughout the day, but hey...I WON $50!!

Should I go out for a drink tonight? I think Puka Bar might be calling me.

I had been kicking myself for not trying to extend my stay in the Emerald City through the weekend, but I guess things have a way of working out for the best whether we realize it or not.  M-----l headed west the day after I came home, and he and Homebody spent the morning watching my team play his team.  I could have been there watching with them.  It's best that I wasn't.  There are worse fan bases in sports, but no fans are worse than Bengal fans when it comes to keeping a little bit of success in proper perspective.  I still remember vividly the bitching and moaning on the part of Bengal fans when the Steelers shredded them (and Carson Palmer's knee) on the way to Super Bowl XL.  You'd have thought the league promised them a championship or something, the way they cried about "being robbed."  And I have no doubt that everyone in southwest Ohio believes after today that they are owed a Super Bowl victory.  After two flukey losses, I kind of hope we face the Bungles a third time in the playoffs.  I look forward to seeing them (and, hopefully, Carson Palmer's knee) shredded by the Steelers once again on their - the Steelers' - way to a seventh Lombardi Trophy.

Who dey?  Dey ain't nuthin', that's who dey.

and I only had to hang up on tech support in India once (a record for me!).

turns out that all i needed was my IP address. i eventually figured out how to hit the modem to see it (gee - just like hitting the router, but you have to be plugged in to the modem).

for future reference, the key to everything is
192.168.1.1

of course, if I can't get into the internet, I'll never be able to find that. So I used my label maker to put all the vital info on the router itself.

I hope I have at least another 2 years before I go through this again.

It looks like a perfect day! Starting out at 50 degrees and sunny! November has turned out to be just lovely!
I'm off to physical therapy...can't wait til this is done. It's not difficult or painful or anything...just an hour three times a week that is rather inconvenient and intrusive. But, all for a good cause....Mobile Toes R Us!

I am having Mom, Dad, sis and three kids, brother and nephew, over tomorrow for Mom's birthday dinner.

So after PT it's to the grocery store. Then a quick clean up of the house. Hopefully I'll see sis and kids tonight...depends on how long it takes them to get here from Chicago!

Ok...time to get a move on! Y'all have a nice weekend!

Handmade cards to e-cards, caroling to MP3s… How has technology changed your holiday traditions?
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It hasn't.

At St. James's Gate, originally uploaded by Carl Belles.

This is the closest I've gotten to the place Guinness is born.