Hotspur.us

Yep, it’s been 13 years since we tied the knot.

Since picking up garbage on just one day a weekend isn’t enough for us, wvhunter organized a clean up at the WV Raptor Rehabilitation Center‘s new digs. One again the forecast was for disgusting weather – a nasty cold, rainy April day. The good news is that it didn’t rain and as long as we were moving, it wasn’t that cold! The even better news is we didn’t have to work quite as hard today as we had yesterday!

Our merry group got in the back of diezelsmommy’s truck and headed down to the pond. When the pond came into view I wasn’t entirely surprised to see a familiar sight – the same pond I’ve ridden by on the horse (or tried, he did not like water). Well now I know who owns the adjacent property!

After a successful cleanup we headed up for some grub and were treated to a meet & greet three of the WVRRC’s residents.

Annie a 28 year old red tail hawk. Very dignified and stately.

Alice, the cutest little squeeeeee owl in the world. Oh how badly did I was to schnarfle that ball of fluff! At least I was smart enough to know that would end poorly.

And then…after stuffing ourselves quite heartily we got to see Thunder. Who is every bit as impressive as his name implies.

Another great clean up. And a great learning experience. Check out the rest of the photos for more pics of the raptors and of us standing around staring at them!

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So once again Dolphy organized a trash pick up in the Fayette Cong. And once again, despite dire weather forecasts of impending doom in the form of rain/showers/thunder/frogs/hail/locusts, a bunch of us showed up ready to work.

While the rest of us were hard at work unearthing trashbags of fabulous clothes (swimsuits, fairy wings – 3 pair) others stumbled upon what could only be the garments belonging to “a lady of ill repute” and just hoped that the rest of her was not there as well.

We also hit the mother lode of bumpers from a vast array of vehicles and some seriously freaky toys. I’m pretty sure the one doll that was run over by the front loader is alive.

(This penguin, by the way, is not going home to be friends with Ping.)

And speaking of dolls…..thebuddhaman somehow managed to get the cushiest job of the day – driving one of the front loaders. For real.

And just as we finished up and got into our vehicles…the rain started. Too late Mother Nature! Another fun day of picking up trash that should have been disposed of in a proper manner. I think we should now lay in wait with paintball guns for the next person to dump here.  SURPRISE LITTER BUG!!!!

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We’ve been in this house for nearing on 8 full years. And while the first floor was loving renovated and remodeled, the second floor left something to be desired. It was wall to wall carpet (except the ferrets’ room – we tore that out as soon as we moved in – and the bathroom). On the landing there was wall to wall light blue an indeterminable color due to the horribly stains we managed to inflict upon it.  In one bedroom there was a burgundy  pink dark pink rose carpet. It was horrible. I hated it. I knew it was coming out, so when we painted in there and I didn’t cover the carpet. What I did do though, was slop paint everywhere.

I also knew that there was a wood floor under the carpet. I knew this because 1. I had seen the beautiful hart pine in the 2nd floor bathroom when we ripped the old tub up and 2. I had seen (what I would later find to be an inaccurate viewing) wood parquet under the horrible rose carpet. You may wonder why #1 and #2 did not add up to 3. I myself, I did not.

One overly zealous day while Chad was elsewhere I ripped the carpet up. He came home to find the 2nd floor landing filled with carpet and me foaming at the mouth sobbing  cursing. That was not wood parquet under the carpet. No. It was not. It was sticky linoleum tiles made to look like wood parquet. What. The. Heck? Who puts individual sticky nasty linoleum tiles over perfectly good hart pine? WHO?

I came to grips with this horrible realization because at some point, the nasty sticky linoleum tiles were at least cleaner than the carpet.

And then one fine day (again with Chad being elsewhere) I started ripping those things up. I thought it would be easy. I am such a moron hopeful soul.  Apparently the sticky tiles being self adhering was not enough. The enterprising moron who installed them used extra glue. A LOT of extra glue.

I had some help from my friend Kris in working on the removal. And I also discovered that using an old iron really sped things up. She discovered that spilling water on the floor also accelerated the glue removal process.

Eventually it came time to sand and hope for the best. So I rented a big ol’ sander and had at it. I did the dirty work

After two days of sanding and being bored to death by it (not to mention having every muscle in my entire upper body ache) Chad came in to do the finish sanding (I was so over it by then it was ridiculous).

The floor ended up looking better than either of us could ever have hoped. It was protected pretty well by the rose carpet and nasty linoleum squares I suppose.

As if the project had not hung in there long enough, I decided that since the closet had been ripped out, I may as well cedar line it and install a fancy new organizational system.

The room is not quite done,  but it is a heck of a lot better. And I have learned many an important lesson which will serve me well should I ever decide to tackle another of the rooms. After all, there are 2 bedroms and a landing left on the 2nd floor.

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