My TV Debut

I got the chance to be in a commercial for Basil Cars, a local dealership, with one of my co-workers Kelly. We have an in at the dealership because the marketing director for Basil is married to our firm administrator. It was an experience and I'm definitely not the acting type. Ray said that our "shoot" was double the time of normal shoots because neither Kelly or I could control our laughter which you will see. The commercial is airing on all local channels for the next month. I doubt you will be seeing me in any other shows anytime soon.

I live with an idiot

I was going through the pictures on my computer because I needed to find a particular one for a friend of mine. I just so happened to stumble across the folder of our friends Maria & Jim's wedding in Delaware. The following video is of James having a "dance off" with a waiter during the rehearsal dinner the night before the wedding. A little background on the location. It's in Delaware (pretty ghetto), in the middle of this industrial plaza, in a pretty upscale brewery/restaurant. Luckily the parents had already gone home for the night. So enjoy!! (you might want to turn off the playlist before you hit start) It's a little dark but you get the jist.

The House Next Door

When we moved into our house last year it took me two weeks to finally figure out that no one lived in the house next door. How could I be confused on whether someone lived next door or not? Because there was a light on inside and a robe hanging in the window upstairs but no one ever came in or out and there were no cars. One day I got up enough courage to walk over onto her deck and peek inside and saw that all of her things were still in the house. How did I figure this out you ask? With my detective skills.... Or, the neighbor on the other side told me that the old woman had died over a year and a half ago. It was all very creepy.

A couple months went by and one day I came home and saw a notice from the water company on her door. It had indicated that she needed to pay her bill or her water would be turned off. I thought I would be a good citizen and call and notify them that she was in fact deceased. What I got was an idiot on the other line that was shocked she was dead and seemed to think that the water had been running inside the house for the past year and a half that ran up a $500 water bill. No, the water hasn't been running all that time, dillhole. Instead of coming and turning the water off they posted another notice that said a lien was placed on the house and the water would be shut off in 10 days. Stupid.

What was even more weird was that the old woman now started to receive mail. Since her mailbox had a rubber band over it because no one was living there, the postman decided I would be the next best recipient. Clearly. I'm pretty nosy so I decided to open the mail. Apparently the word didn't get out that this woman was deceased because people were sending her letters indicating her house had been foreclosed and others claiming they can help her to not lose her house. I decided to be a good citizen once again call. All these people that I called were shocked to here that this woman was deceased. "What? She's dead? For a year and a half? No..." I don't understand how this situation has progressed into what it has become. Idiots. A man came to "winterize" the house and I quizzed him using my detective skills and he spilled out that the bank didn't even know she had been dead that long.

But the reason I brought this up today was the fact that the bank finally sent someone over to clean out her belongings. First the real estate agent took all the stuff she wanted before the movers came... The house foreclosed in the middle of December and just now they are cleaning it out and getting it ready to sell. I will also be informing the new owners, who ever they may be, that the old woman died in that house. I like to torture people. I've decided that you can stop paying your mortgage and water bill and it will take them two years to actually foreclose on your house.

Happy Dyngus Day!

Yesterday was Dyngus Day and me, Kristin and Corinne went out to celebrate at the Hearthstone. For those of you that don't know, Dyngus Day is the annual post-Lent Polish celebration. Even though none of us are Polish we decided it was a good holiday to celebrate. The tradition is for girls to whip boys with pussy willows and for boys to squirt girls with squirt guns. Crazy Polish traditions. But we went out and enjoyed some Polka music, along with some dancing and we whipped people with pussy willows...

Happy St Patrick's Day

In honor of St Patrick's Day I thought I would share with you all some interesting facts. So here we go:

1. St Patrick was not Irish. He was born in Britain and at the age of 16 he was captured by Irish raiders and taken to Ireland as a slave for six years. He escaped, went back to Britain and became a Catholic bishop.

2. Later in his life he went back to Ireland as a missionary. He used the clover (3 leafs) as a teaching tool to symbolize the Trinity.

3. He didn't physically "drive out the snakes" because there were no snakes in Ireland. The snakes symbolize Pelagiusts. They are people who believe that there was no "original sin" committed by Adam and that humanity has full control and responsibility for it's own salvation. Thus St Patrick drove out the Pelagiusts or "serpants".

4. St Patrick's Day is a celebration of his death and we are supposed to feast in his honor.

Here are some pictures of me and James celebrating St Patrick's death...

Update

I just wanted to let everyone know that the car that was stuck during the big storm didn't get out of the middle of the parking lot at the gas station until Wednesday sometime. That was after there was no snow left in the parking lot. But they still had their two orange cones around the car. Dummys.

No Luck

On Saturday we went to the casino in Niagara Falls for Kristin's birthday. It was a good time for the first hour or so because I was winning on 2 cent slots. Then we went to the buffet inside the casino for dinner. It was delicious except for the fact that I've been trying not to over eat. So half way through my second plate I thought I was going to vomit. I powered through and finished but I couldn't even think about dessert which is horrible. Then I started feeling drowsy because I ate so much so I got some coffee which just made my stomach ache worse. Fantastic. So the rest of the night I walked around with a wretched stomach ache and then to top it off I kept playing this Wheel of Fortune game (I do at all the casino's and I never win so I don't know why I keep playing them) and I kept putting more money in there so I could spin the big wheel. Um, no that did not happen because on my last $10 (after losing $70) I noticed that my bonus was "disabled" and I couldn't play the big wheel. This is all because I didn't have a stupid players club card because I'm not a loser and go to the casino every weekend. Ugh. In the end I lost a total of $80 because I have horrible luck, or just no luck at all.

Significant Accumulation

Friday, Saturday and Sunday we were in the middle of a Winter Storm Warning that was bringing "significant accumulation". All week the weathermen have been warning us of this storm. In past few weeks they have been dead wrong about the weather. So I didn't think anything of it. But when it didn't stop snowing for 48 hours, I thought differently. We had record breaking snow both Friday and Saturday. I think Friday was 8.5" and Saturday was 13.5". Needless to say there was a driving ban for the entire city of Buffalo. And as of today at 5pm there is still a car stuck in the parking lot of the gas station around the block.

Handyman my ass

Sunday night me and James were upstairs fixing the toilet after James clogged it and all of a sudden we heard a loud crashing sound coming from our kitchen. We quickly ran downstairs and low and behold one of our cabinets decided it wanted to fall off the wall. Yep, completely off the wall. I think to myself, "Self, how the hell could this have happened?". I think back to the day that we had first looked at the house. The son of the old lady that we bought the house from had just happened to "stop by" while we were there. He informed us that he had re-done the kitchen himself and that he was a "Handyman". Apparently any asshole off the street can call himself a "Handyman". Upon further inspection of the cabinet and the "Handyman's" installation, he did not attach the cabinet to a stud. Instead he screwed a piece of sauder board into the wall (one screw was in a stud, not sure if it was on purpose) and attached the cabinet to that one little piece of sauder board. He even made a little note on the wall that says "NO GOOD" with an arrow pointing to the board. If you are going to re-do a kitchen, I suggest you read up on how to attach the cabinets to the wall. Now my kitchen is in shambles and half of my dishes were broken in the "incident". Here is a picture of the aftermath. That big blank white spot is where my cabinet used to be.

I have skills

So the other day I decided we needed a new desk. Ours was just too small and it was cramped into a corner in the kitchen. We have such a big second bedroom that we needed to fill the area with something so we put the new desk in there. Building the desk was quite the process. I knew it was going to be a difficult journey when the delivery man could barely lift it in the house. Well, he was older than father time and probably shouldn't be lifting anything over 2 pounds, but he got it in the house. Since I'm fairly impatient and James said he wasn't going to be able to work on the desk until Tuesday, I thought I would tackle the desk myself. Boy, was that a mistake. It took me 6 hours to put together. That included opening the box and carrying each individual piece from the living room, up the stairs, and into the bedroom. I may have also been distracted because I had "Friends" DVDs on in the background. I am so proud of myself that I had to share with everyone my accomplishment.