A is for Absence...

and apathy. There is a direct correlation between the two. My general apathy has led to an absence of new postings to this blog. So if absence makes the heart grow fonder, what does apathy do to the body? I should probably not stick around to find out.

But in all seriousness, I will make a good faith effort to revitalize the blog...starting this weekend. Laura and I haven't taken any recent pictures but we are now the proud owners of a new TV (upgrade from 14" to 22"), a slightly used sofa, and an armoire that's too big for any nook or cranny.

The house is actually clean for once thanks to Laura and we've pulled out all of the old, moldy fixtures in the upstairs bathroom. I've re-caulked both tubs at this point but was duped by the DAP kitchen and bath caulk. Instead of curing and leaving us with nice clean tub edges, the caulk chose to break down again into paste upon contact with water. A few quick google searches taught us that 1) this is not an uncommon problem with this brand of caulk, and 2) we will have to pull out all of the new caulk and replace it with 100% silicon caulk. This means that I spent perhaps $40 and two days so that I could pay ACE hardware another $15. Sweet.

I have now worked out a system with Wells Fargo bank where they will pull bi-weekly mortgage payments from my bank account directly. This ensures that 1) I will never make a late payment, and 2) interest payments on the mortgage will drastically decrease over the life of the mortgage. Our next goal is to save up enough money each year that we can make an extra payment or two directly to the principal. It's not essential but definitely desireable.

There are loads of other things that Laura and I have talked about for the house, but they escape me at the moment. I'm sure they'll trickle out over the course of the next few weeks. And we haven't yet rented the basement. Hopefully that will happen sometime in the next month or two. For the time being, making the mortgage payments has been a non-issue.

I feel as if this post has been boring, so here's a joke. A bear walks into a bar and sits down. He says to the bartender, "I'll have...a beer." The bartender says, "Why the pause?" The bear looks down at his hands and after a few minutes responds, "What? These? I was born with them."

Get it? Pause...Paws. Hilarious.