Our first cool front of the fall blew through a couple of days ago. And for the first time in the almost three years we’ve lived in this house, it didn’t bring with it the smell of sewage. There’s a small wastewater treatment plant about two blocks north of us, and it really smells. Due to the stench, the city has been planning for several years to close it. When we moved in, we were told the project was 18 months from completion. The neighbors told us, however, that it had been 18 months from completion for a couple of years already. But the city finally did close the plant a couple of months ago. Big difference!

On Friday, sixteen families in our neighborhood rented a party barge together and had a good time out on Lake Travis. This was my favorite photo from the day:

Don’t gossip about one coworker to another co-worker via instant message!

This afternoon, I wanted to say something less than flattering to coworker #1 about coworker #2, but because #2 was on my mind, I double clicked on his name in my buddy list instead of #1’s, and I sent the snide comment directly to #2. Doh!
Fortunately, my comment wasn’t terribly bad, and coworker #2 is generally good natured and understands that this kind of thing happens, so the damage wasn’t too bad–this time.
Not like the time I wanted to make a comment about my boss and made the same mistake.

This morning, my cousin Shannon in California called. She and her husband are thinking about opening their home to hurricane Katrina refugees. She had found my blog, read my posts about hurricane Katrina and called to ask me if I knew how they could go about finding someone to stay with them.
I have only seen Shannon once in our adult lives–at my grandfather’s funeral–but it was so cool that my blog brought us together, and for such a good cause.

I’m happy to report that I scored 90% on this eighth grade math test. And I only got the one question wrong due to an incorrect calculation, not because I didn’t know how to figure the answer (not that an eighth grade math teacher would care much about the reason).

Sucker, that is…
This morning, I walked the kids to school. Well, Hannah usually walks ahead with her friends and I accompany Samuel. A small crowd of moms and kids was gathered next to the school building as Samuel and I neared. We saw a young cat emerging from the downspout and a mom trying to help it without touching it.
I reached down and scooped up the cat. The woman looked at me and said, “Your daughter was just here. She said that you would pick it up.” I carried the kitten around the school while I dropped Samuel off, took it home and set it up in the spare dog cage. We’ll decide what to do with it this evening.

Sorry I haven’t blogged much lately. Two reasons, one short-term, one longer.
First, the short-term reason: I had knee surgery this past Wednesday.
The longer-term reason: upon my return from vacation a few weeks ago, I made a few resolutions, among them not to surf the web so much. Less time spent wandering the digital back alleys has resulted in fewer things to blog about.

Poor Samuel has lost all four of his upper and bottom front teeth, though the bnew bottom teeth are coming in pretty quickly (Aside: isn’t that the cutest face you’ve ever seen? I’m not biased or anything)

Katie and I have a long history of adapting songs to fit out pets. Two of my favorites: our former cocker spaniel had problems with his anal glands and would frequently drag his ass across the floor (gross, I know). This action became known as the ‘Butt Scootin’ Boogie’. And at one point, we lived in a two-story townhome; when our 20-pound cat would jump down from the furniture to the floor upstairs, we could hear his landing loudly downstairs, at which point we broke out in ‘I fell the earth move under my feet…’