Projects

[DavidS]

Could be worse, jamie. She could want another child.

Or even a load of potted plants that need watering all the time.

[jamiebk]

Could be worse, jamie. She could want another child.

I am WAYYYYYYYY too old for that

[jamiebk]

Could be worse, jamie. She could want another child.

Or even a load of potted plants that need watering all the time.

We have those too...

[Haggis@wk]

the air bubbler makes no noise,

Wife INSISTS on having a 50 gal fish tank in the family room where the TV is. It sounds like Niagra Falls.....I hate it

PS...this is in addition to:

1 dog (she's my baby though)
2 cats
100+ canaries (yep...100)
and, of course, the fish

Fortunately, they are not all in the family room. Now she wants another dog.

Do you breed canaries (well, DUH! 100 canaries, apparently) I mean commercially?

Dogs is good (Selma might disagree) What kind of fish? salt or freshwater? The MRHYN "inheriteted" the boys saltwater tank when we lived in Illinois and hints every now and then she'd like another. I point out we already have one mortgage, and I don't think the bank will give me another to buy SW fish.

[BigJon@Work]

Hah. My buddy doubled the size of his house to accommodate his saltwater tanks and all the related gear. His basement looks like a municipal water treatment plant.

[Selma in Sandy Eggo]

Dogs is good; I simply do not have any at this time. I have a granddog or two; will that do? For me, cats is a necessity and dogs is optional.

Fish, now, is a job. I can just about handle one betta or two goldfishies without brain strain. More than that and you're getting into equipment and tools. I'd rather expend the effort somewhere else.

100 canaries is more than I can comfortably imagine. Really. Makes me all twitterpated.

[jamiebk]

[quote="Haggis@wk]
Do you breed canaries (well, DUH! 100 canaries, apparently) I mean commercially?

What kind of fish? salt or freshwater?[/quote]

################
Canaries are a hobby so we really aren't at the "commercial" stage. She sells a few that get purged out after the show trials. This is "Bonnie":
http://www.springsongaviary.com/

As to the fish...no SW, only garden variety tropicals. It's still a pain in the you know what...

[Haggis@wk]

Nice looking birds

In 1980 I briefly knew Geoff Capes. He was a British cop in the Cambridgeshire Constabulary and he was on the UK Olympics team as a shot putter. He was huge. He was/is a fanatic budgerigar breeder He was also a nice guy. His size intimidated just about any villian he came into contact with but he was so darn polite you tended to forget he could throw you 10 - 20 meters!!

[jamiebk]

That guy is huge....

[piqaboo]

jamie, great website your wife has.
congrats on her successes.

haggis, dat a big guy.

[Schmeelkie]

Pumpkin's kindergarten class is doing a set of lessons on animals - with fish and bugs in the classroom. Now he wants a fish... I came up with the great excuse that we didn't have a good place to put them, and maybe after we moved he could get a fish. I'm thinking goldfish in a bowl, or guppies (although I seem to remember a high mortality rate when I was a kid). I had goldfish and guppies as a kid - never worked up past a ~5 gallon tank. Still less work than a dog, and as I'm allergic to cats, this seems like a good pet, especially a good first pet for (by the summer) an almost 6-year old.

[jamiebk]

Pumpkin's kindergarten class is doing a set of lessons on animals - with fish and bugs in the classroom. Now he wants a fish... I came up with the great excuse that we didn't have a good place to put them, and maybe after we moved he could get a fish. I'm thinking goldfish in a bowl, or guppies (although I seem to remember a high mortality rate when I was a kid). I had goldfish and guppies as a kid - never worked up past a ~5 gallon tank. Still less work than a dog, and as I'm allergic to cats, this seems like a good pet, especially a good first pet for (by the summer) an almost 6-year old.

Try one of those "Betta's". They require very little care and can tolerate "stagnant" water, which is to say that you don't need bubblers, or need to change the water very often. In our case, our cats like to drink it so we are constantly adding new water to the bowl and it stays fresh.http://freshaquarium.about.com/cs/anaba ... /betta.htm

[analog]

Dad kept a small aquarium. i remember scooping up some minnows from a local canal and bringing them home in a paper cup.

Don't know to this day what they were but they promptly devoured Dad's delicate tropicals....

a.

[barfle]

The MRHYN "inheriteted" the boys saltwater tank when we lived in Illinois and hints every now and then she'd like another. I point out we already have one mortgage, and I don't think the bank will give me another to buy SW fish.

Having had a marine aquarium for a few years, I found it to be a most efficient and expensive fish-killing machine. And the fish are expensive, too.

[Schmeelkie]

Hoping to get the house on the market before the end of June, this weekend we stripped wallpaper (in the bathroom, so it was pretty easy - even Pumpkin helped!), cleaned some walls, husband painted some baseboards (silly previous owners painted AFTER putting down carpet, so bottom 1/2 is not same color as top - all through the house!), packed up one entire and 1/2 another bookcase and moved one bookcase into basement, packed up my cookbooks and cleared off shelving in living room (now can actually display some glassware without clutter), cleaned exterior by breezeway door and the door and windows there, some other general cleaning and packed some clothes and blankets to make closets look more spacious. Phew! Also decided to leave the exterior painting to professionals - husband figured it would take several whole days and he still needs to do research this summer. So, during kids movie time this week, I'm going to be packing and moving clothes around so we can remove a dresser from our room and one from Bella's room. And husband will continue with interior painting. We'll see where we are by this time next week. I'll see if I can take Tuesday pm off work and help with painting a bit...

[dai bread]

Been there, done that, Schmeelkie. After shifting 6 months ago I understand perfectly why old people stay in their big old over-sized houses. Not that I regret moving. It was time to go, but it was a huge upset after 36 years in one house.

[Schmeelkie]

Well, got a dresser out of our room, and one out of Bella's room, packed up some too-small clothes of the kids to save space (lots of Pumpkin's were in a messy pile at the bottom of his closet), packed some books from the living room bookcase so it's not jam-packed anymore, scrubbed down walls in kitchen, dining room, hallway, bathroom door and our 'back door' (leads into breezeway), and husband cleaned exterior breezeway door and window frames. I'm hoping that in about a week we'll be ready to put the house on the market! (and I did 4 loads of wash yesterday too!)

Also got a chance to go through the set of listings our realtor set up for us - great to have a link from emails to our personal list. Can delete ones we don't like and designate others as 'possibility' or 'I like it' and put in comments that are saved. Got a list of 51 down to 21. Might be able to do a preliminary check at some open houses next weekend. Husband is pretty set on a colonial/colonial type - trying to see if he'll go for a 'raised ranch' as these tend to have more rooms and SFage for similar price. Will have to go look at a couple.

[Schmeelkie]

We are SOOO close now. Got our bedroom painted last week (parents took kids on Sunday and we did the first coat - husband did second coat Monday, had my dad come over and help with third coat Tuesday) and lots more stuff put away. I planted some impatiens Monday, waiting for another rain-free evening to plant a couple of hostas in the back. Mostly just cleaning now. Driveway was sealed this am! Should hear from realtor today as to when he can come by and take pics for the listing - I'm hoping for tomorrow! Likely won't get a lot of people wanting to look this weekend (4th of July), but you never know. I'm hoping to have time Sunday to go to some open houses... If I didn't have interns to supervise I'd take at least some of tomorrow off (officially have Friday as a holiday, but I don't work anyway - they owe me 4.8 hours..) - may try to sneak out in the afternoon if realtor can't make it tomorrow. I'd have to be here until at least 12:30...
we'll see. Just can't wait to get it sold so I can stop being paranoid about every spill and mess! Had a scare with marker on the hardwood floor the other day - Mr. Clean magic eraser to the rescue! That stuff is great - can't tell you how many hopeless stains have disappeared with that! Now if it would just clean carpet...

[Schmeelkie]

They should be doing taking pics for the listing by now...wondering if husband is going to call and let me know how it went...
we cleaned, cleaned, cleaned....had some fun on the 4th....and cleaned, cleaned, cleaned. I came in an hour late (still working that July 4th holiday time) and finished the living room, Bella's room, one bathroom and the kitchen - leaving my husband a little over an hour to do the dining room, office, Pumpkin's room and maybe the basement (and hose the chalk off the driveway). Now we just have to keep it relatively clean so we don't go into a panic everytime someone comes by to look at the place.

So annoying, keep finding things that we could fix or fix up, but just can't do everything. We could take another 2 months and it could still use work...oh, well. I keep saying that we bought it in the sorry state it was in 5 years ago and it's in much better shape now....Wish us luck!!

[piqaboo]

Good Luck!


Pulled more iceplant this weekend. I'm thinking if we could compact it, we could use it to build a granny flat.