My son actually found out Friday when they posted the list on the 5th grade hall, but he made Safety Patrol! Yipee! Now he's got even more stuff to do at school besides regular classwork.. he's joined Continental Math League, Challenge Science and when it's available, he'll try out for the Robotics team. Hmm.. at least he's not doing anything outside of school right now. He might feel a little overloaded.
After ranting yesterday about lack of money, I thought it'd be fun today to dream about what I'd do if we won the $325M lottery.
1 - half would be set aside for the taxes.
2 - half of what remained would be set up to let me live on the interest.
3 - my house would be sold as-is and I'd go buy the home of my dreams (which really isn't outrageous and is certainly NOT a mansion).
4 - all bills would be paid off.
5 - hire my dad to manage the accounts.
6 - I'd pay off the mortgage on my parents' condo.
7 - Set up trust funds for the kiddos (probably incl. nieces & nephews in that).
8 - take my daughter on her dream Nickelodeon cruise with the iCarly cast.
9 - travel! I really want to see Scotland, London, Paris, Italy, Australia, etc etc.
10 - home school my kids (so they can travel with me, nothing like field trips for learning)
11 - support the various charities I want to support.
12 - hire a maid to help me keep the house clean.
13 - keep dreaming!
Hubby says he'd retire from his job, too.
You can see some pictures of last year's fair here.
As it turns out, I've been working on the schedule to finish ALL the activity badges, with the aim of getting my older boys their Arrow of Light in the process. Of course, our sister Troop has had mostly dead silence towards me and my den for some time. That's a dual fault, I haven't tried talking to them this past year and they haven't tried talking to me either (tunnel vision, I say, tunnel vision). Den chief? nope, none of those. Unfortunately, another troop tried providing one (or two) to us and those didn't work either. I'm not sure if I scared the boys off or what. So, no real contact with other troops.
That isn't really the big deal, though it might have helped. The 'big deal' is that one of the req's for Arrow of Light is an outdoor activity with a Troop. Sounds simple? Not necessarily. We have our schedule, they have their schedule, and families have their own.
Someone just shoot me now.. I'm sure I'll figure SOMETHING out, right now, though it seems a bit impossible.
House:
The computers have been taken in to be examined. Insurance requires everything to be examined by a 'professional' and then having results submitted. The company didn't think they'd be usable based on my description, but they'll let me know in 2 business days.
AC should be repaired and running by around lunch time Thursday. Certainly by end of day. They're coming out Thursday morning to do the work, so I guess it depends on how fast they work as to how quickly it all happens. Some interesting details there that I'll mention.. 1- my first estimate came from the folks that maintain my systems, it was high according to insurance so they had me get a second estimate. The second was more on the lines of what they were expecting/wanting, so they're cutting me a check for AC based on that one. I let my company know what was going on and they came back with a matching 'bid'. Basically, I'll get the same system, but it's "vanilla" (ie: no branding, basic grill, etc. Manufactured by and in the same factory as the original they wanted to give me) and will do the same job. So, they're coming out Thursday to do the work.
The range is still waiting on a visit by the repair people. While the stove top works, the oven won't because the computer is out. Some time tomorrow the service man should come out and give me a verdict. We have a warranty plan on the range, so it may very well be covered by that instead of having to wait for insurance to cover it. If so, that'll be good. It can be repaired without the wait.
We followed up with having ComfortTemp come out to check the air conditioning. Not only was the fuse melted, but he replaced a capacitor in the unit. As soon as it powered back up, it tripped the switch which means the air unit has a short in it now. So, unit dead. He'll let the office know so that they can come give me an estimate on a new unit.
So, I called State Farm and filed a claim. I was supposed to volunteer at the aquarium today, but canceled my shifts for the week to take care of the issues. As I told my son, at least he gets to go to school where it'll be air conditioned for majority of the day. It'll probably be a few before we can have air here. One of the extra fans I've had in the hall to help air circulation was apparently affected too.. and IT was plugged into my UPS.
Just a general statement, I know I'm trying to fix up my home to sell it, but this was NOT the way I'd planned to go about it.
Yesterday afternoon, sometime around 4p, I walked into the office and heard a very odd noise. About a minute later, I heard a "POP" from the kids' eMac and then it shut down. The odor of burned electronics (ozone, smoke, whatever) started coming from hubby's side of the office and then permeated the room. We shut everything down and started investigating. The surge protector on hubby's monitors was dead, the surge protector on the mac had slightly melted and the mac was dead. We waited a while and then tried one by one to turn things back on. Everything else was working fine. We figured the mac had done the deed and left it at that.
At dinner time, we wandered downstairs to get leftover out of the fridge. Hubby informs me the oven is off. We go check the breakers to reset everything and notice that the ceiling light is out as well. To see what was up, we tried replacing one of the bulbs in the ceiling light. It worked fine, so we replaced both. We pushed out the oven to see if it was on a ground fault outlet to be reset. Unfortunately, the answer was no. It's had outlets for two things, so we plugged a lamp in to check the outlet, it worked. So the issue was with the stove. The units on top are gas, so we tried starting them (electric starter), those worked. Which means the computer for the oven is dead. Hubby still thought the mac had done the job, even though these are all on a different circuit. I would have thought the circuit would have tripped. So, I went looking for the receipt for the oven since we have a service contract on it.
I had the children go around and check everything and found out that the computer in my son's room had been hit (it wasn't on a surge protector) as well as the air filter that runs in his room. Two different outlets. Ugh. Everything else inside at that point was working.
At bed time, I made the comment to hubby that it was hot upstairs. He went downstairs to turn down the air and realized the air fan was running. He had a sinking feeling so he went outside to check the air conditioner, it was NOT running. Grabbing a flashlight, he started to look at all the pieces and it turns out that the box that holds the fuse has partially melted. At that point I called GA Power.
GA Power came out around midnight last night and ran tests. They got on the roof to check connections as well. When he left, he told us that all power levels were normal, including going through the fuse box in the house (he checked each switch). So, the problem was likely a ground wire touching something it shouldn't INSIDE the house.
So, today I'll contact an electrician to come check the house itself. Having had roofers over this week, it's possible they did something somewhere that messed something up. I'm not sure WHAT, but anyway. I'll also contact the air conditioning company to come look at the unit to see about fixing that. Once we figure out what happened, I'll try talking to State Farm and get an insurance claim going. If it turns out the roofers did it, I guess I'll have to talk to them too.
Somebody please just shoot me now..
It's called "Williamsburg Gray". Now to paint the outside of the home (eventually).. meanwhile, on the inside, I've got a sun room floor to fix, a bathroom to finish painting, lots of decluttering to do.. BUT MY ROOF IS DONE!
Today my kids find out who their teacher for the year is. My son starts 5th grade this year, my daughter starts 3rd. They're getting so big it's hard to believe we've come this far. Here's hoping the next school year is a good one and they get teachers they'll really like.
It was PACKED when we went in. I'm glad we didn't go on a rainy day, you wouldn't have been able to move. I'll admit, I'm very spoiled when it comes to Aquariums. I was able to identify a good number of the fish in their exhibits without looking at the labels (so proud of myself). For once I didn't wear my volunteer t-shirt, I did that at the Mote but I don't think with all the people it would have stood out.
I realize none of my photos were of fish, but that's because they didn't come out. Ripley's does have a tunnel with a moving sidewalk where you can see barracuda, sand tiger sharks, sand bar sharks, nurse sharks, grouper, eel and misc other fish. They have a touch pool full of horse shoe crabs. Now, I'm not sure I agree with their policy but apparently you can pick up the crabs and turn them over (out of the water). I didn't let my kids do that as I really don't think it's a good idea. They also had a ray touch pool. They have cow nose, southern sting ray and eagle rays in theirs. It's also harder to access the fish.
At any rate, it took us about an hour to work our way through with the crowds. For the price, it's worth the U-pick-it combo ticket.
Today the roofers come to replace my roof. oh the excitement! They'll have to take off two layers of shingles and we know some of the decking is bad. They're also putting in a ridge vent. Woo Hoo!
Update 1 - layer one gone, working on layer two..
Update 2 - apparently siestas are part of lunch breaks..
Update 3 (3:10p) - replacing decking on upper rear roof
Underlaiment on upper front. Still stripping on lower level..
This was where we accessed the beach from. We were in Tower 3 of Wyndham Ocean Boulevard, so we'd head downstairs and past the pool to the beach. Just lovely.
