Today was an exhausting day at work.  Part of me is wishing that the guy filling in for my boss on her vacation was my boss.  Things that have been left unaddressed for weeks he’s handled in a few hours.  I’m not sure he wants the mantle of responsibility but he’s certainly doing a good job.

I got home from work with storm clouds looming.  Lately it’s been pouring rain scant minutes after I drive into the yard.  I arrived home to find Drew busy clearing out the garage in preparation for the demolition this weekend.  He’d already moved out the wood and typical garage items – lawnmower, snow-blower  and such – and I found him crawling into the attic storage space when I drove in.  Apparently the secret to being a pack rat is to store everything in the ceiling of your garage and then move when it’s full.  We found boxes with flyers in them from 1986 and more wood and boxes than you can shake a stick at.  Drew hauled it all down and set aside as much as he could for the garbage and recycling.  It was garbage and recycling day today and, true to form, the city of Edmonton garbage removal crew didn’t arrive.  So, instead of a few boxes of cardboard set aside for recycling, we had dozens.  Drew brought the wood over to the neighbours with firepits.  Most of them are now well and truly stocked for the summer.

We toddled over to L and J’s for burgers on the BBQ – all the while keeping an eye on the sky for the pending storm.  Just as we finished eating, the storm broke.  Thunder rolled and lightening crashed.  E, V and K from across the alley arrived just as we were moving into the L and J’s garage to shelter from the storm.  With the garage door rolled up (so we could watch the storm) we babbled for hours talking about cars and men and silliness.

After the storm had broken we toddled out into the alley to say our goodbyes.  As we’re standing in the alley, we watched a peace officer chasing a young man down the alley, calling after him to stop and to “get down on the ground and put you hands behind your head.”  The young man turned around and began taunting him, screaming “you’ll never catch me”.  He darted forward and lunged at the officer.  This gained him a face full of pepper spray (to which he showed no reaction). Apparently, he hadn’t seen what the peace officer and police officers immediately following him had – the wall of people standing across the alley watching it all unfold.  Drew braced for impact.  When the young man turned around, he screamed again that “no one is gonna catch me” short seconds before Drew tackled him.  Drew waited while the peace officer and police officers arrived; turning him over when they wandered into the neighbours back yard.  The alley filled with police cars, paddy wagons and an ambulance.  Statements delivered and witness statement paperwork in hand, we finished the journey across the back alley to the house.

Apparently no one had told the young man this neighbourhood doesn’t tolerate criminals.  It’s taken a long time to clean it up – years before we moved in it was a den of iniquity – and the residents have worked hard to make the neighbourhood safe for families again.

I wonder if any of this will make it into the local paper in the morning?  No media was present and it was just another day at the office for the hard working men and women of the EPS.

When we moved into our new (to us) house we’d planned for some renovations.  First on the list – but not the first we could afford – was a new garage.  I didn’t want to own the ugliest garage in Edmonton and our original (circa 1950’s) monstrosity certainly qualified for the moniker.  Last year we put a new roof on the house.  This year the plan was to replace the garage and blow insulation into the ceiling/roof.  While both plans are still going to go ahead, it’s going to be tight around here for the next few months.  The estimate that our contractor gave us a few months back was what we used to try and save our pennies so we could afford the new garage.  Today we’ve learned that the cost of removing the demo detritus and pouring the concrete is at least 100% higher than the original estimate.  The cost of the garage package has increased as well.  The new plan is to subsist on Kraft dinner for the next few months so we can afford to save enough for the cost of the garage.  We haven’t even addressed the planned addition of insulation to our ceiling/roof.  Originally I wanted to do it over the summer but I think it will need to be pushed back until September to give us additional time to save enough $$ to pay the bill.

What really sucks about all this is that I was supposed to get a promotion and a raise at work seven months ago.  It has yet to materialize.  Sure, when it’s finally processed I will get back-pay.  However, the government will take a big chunk of that amount in taxes so I’ll be lucky if it covers the costs of the new insulation – and that’s assuming that it even materializes by the end of the summer.  I’m getting the feeling that it’ll never be processed before my next contract ends!

Remind me again why I continue to work where I do?

Guess who has finally finished her paper and managed to get about 1/2 way through herpsycho assignment?   I know.  Easy question since we aren’t sending any of the furry kids to school.  Got it in under the wire – something like 5 hours before it was due and am now going out in search of the hubby.  He spent the day getting rained on at the Ellerslie Highland Games and promptly toddled over to the neighbours once he got home.  I think they’re building shelves or tables in L’s garage this weekend.  Seems the project changes every time I turn around.  I just wish we could get our garage demo/build started.  I thought hurry up and wait with the military was bad.  Getting any sort of construction done in Edmonton is slow as molasses these days.

EEP!  My second paper for Environmental Chem is due tomorrow and I’m so out of my league.  I was whining so much about “not getting” the course that my poor friend Robin took it upon herself to find resources that I could review to try and help me understand.  Many were US based and I’ve read (but not really comprehended) some of the others.  Her heart was definitely in the right place.

I’ve spent the morning and most of the afternoon trying to get a better grip on what I need to do. I think I might be starting to understand what I’m supposed to do in this report.

We have a committment this afternoon and I’m getting ready to put the paper aside for a while.  I’ll be back at it again tomorrow.  Since it’s due tomorrow, I better get my butt in gear this evening.

Drew is out pulling out the hedges in the front of the house.  We both dislike them and it’s a difficult process to pull out many feet of ugly, overgrown hedges.  I think it will take him all weekend to complete.  On the bright side, it means he’s occupied and not annoyed that I am once again locked in the basement.