the screaming pages

Just as I was making my way towards the registry to get a temporary license, I got a call from one of the hubby’s co-workers advising that she’d been sent home from the field (injury) and had my license in her hot little hands. All I had to do was make it to the Base to pick it up. Yahoo! Apparently the hubby got all my messages about my missing license, even if he hadn’t responded.

After picking up my license and the car (I don’t let the dogs in the truck – too much fur), I headed back home. Upon arrival, I met up with a water dept. employee who informed me that in 20 minutes, they’d be turning off the water to our street in order to fix an issue with our water main. I had plenty of time to fill jugs, pots and the sink to ensure there would be lots of water for the animals and I to drink.

I also received the paperwork for my pension funds transfer, so that’s in process as I type.

Fenris appears to be healing well and the dogs are off to the vet for a checkup this afternoon.

I think someone better pinch me. I can’t believe it’s a Monday…

Technorati Tags: driver’s license, water, car

Often, when I dress up to go out with the hubby, I don’t carry a purse. Instead, I hand off my driver’s license to him and he keeps in on hand in a pocket in case I need it. A week ago on Friday we attended a black tie dinner. As usual, my license was handed over to the keeper of the ID. This time he placed it in his wallet.

Normally I remember to get the ID back – or he remembers to give it to me. This week I forgot. On a standard week, this wouldn’t be a big deal. Unfortunately for me on Wednesday the hubby drove off to go play in the mud (aka: military exercises at another location) for a month. And where’s my driver’s license? Yeah, it’s in his wallet.

Now, I’ve been taking the LRT downtown most of this week and haven’t been driving, so I didn’t notice that I didn’t have it. Late Friday night, as I was prepping to go out to karaoke with the girls, I discovered I had no driver’s license. ACK! Saturday was a wash and today no registries were open within walking distance. Tomorrow I need to get the dogs to the vet so I’ve had to find a friend who can drive me to a local registry so I can apply for a temporary driver’s license.

I am not amused.

Technorati Tags: driver’s license, ID

I’m not usually a big fan of stain removers. They don’t tend to work as well as advertised and cost far more than they’re worth. This afternoon, I learned that the overpriced package of Shout gel is worth it’s weight in gold – or at least cotton.

During my travels around the world, I’ve picked up shirts and t-shirts from favoured locations, restaurants, etc. Typical tourist stuff. I have one from Memphis that I adore. It always reminds me of great friends, working with FedEx, wandering Beale, great blues, and immediately brings to mind one of my favourite US cities.

This afternoon the hubby decided that rather than waiting in line a the shop for the winter tyres to be changed out in favour of the all season tyres, he’d swap them out himself. Simple enough task. Like Vanna White, my job was to stand around looking pretty and occasionally hand him tools. Unfortunately for my beloved t-shirt, the toolbox he requested was sitting in a pool of long forgotten motor oil. Upon picking the box up, the mustard yellow shirt I was wearing became soaked in the messy oil. I dropped the tool box and made a beeline for the house – threatening horrible revenge on the hubby if he didn’t clean up his oil spill and muttering about planned punishments if the stain didn’t come out of the shirt.

Flash forward to minutes of gooping Shout gel on my shirt, scrubbing, and dropping the shirt into the washing machine in the hopes the stain can be removed. Two sets of scrubbing and runs through the washing machine later and my shirt – while not completely stainless – is significantly improved. I don’t think I’ll be wearing it out in public again, but at least I don’t have to throw it out and can lounge around the house and backyard in it without be embarrassed that someone might catch a glimpse of me.

Technorati Tags: oil, Shout, cleaning products, stain remover, cotton

I’ve been experience some majorly annoying technical difficulties with my keyboard this past week. I don’t know if it had just decided to give up the ghost or if I was typing too fast for it’s poor wireless self, but it was exhibiting some freakish behaviour since Monday.

Whenever I attempted to type more than a few sentences, it would start randomly capitalizing letters, stop displaying letters I had typed, mass produce the same letter over and over again, etc.

I was slowly losing my mind whenever I tried to draft an application cover letter, respond to email, or blog. What would normally only take a few minutes to type turned into a lengthy nightmare of backspacing, deleting, hen pecking (one finger typing) and a lot of cursing.

Despite my best intentions earlier in the week, I hadn’t managed to make it out to a store to buy a new keyboard. This morning all my worries are resolved. I have a nice shiney new keyboard (wired this time) on my desktop and aside from my fingers having to learn where they keys are on this one, I haven’t had to swear at it once today. It appears to be more interested in behaving normally and less interested in following it’s predecessor and acting as a conduit for demonic possession.

All those people waiting for emails from me can finally breathe a sign of relief. I may actually get around to them today. At least, I can’t use my keyboard issues as an excuse for not writing anymore…

Technorati Tags: typing, keyboard

Since there has been a change to the travel itinerary and I won’t be spending as much time in Delhi as planned, I’m revisiting my list to see what I’ve managed to accomplish and what’s I’ll have to save for next time…

Dehli / Gurgaon

1. Agra – Taj Mahal – Been there, done that. WHOOHOO!
2. Travel on the train. – First class all the way. It’s cramped and hot, but at least there are cushions on the benches. Second class had wooden benches, was crammed full, and had odd liquids rolling down the middle of the isle.
3. See monkeys, elephants and snake charmers in Delhi. – One out of three so far. I hope we can make it to Dehli Haat tomorrow to see the snake charmers.
4. Visit Jama Vasjid.
5. Visit Qutb Minar. – we’ll run out of time before I have a chance to see this.
6. Visit Humayun’s Tomb and Nizam-ud-din’s Shrine in Dehli. – same as above unfortunately.

Mumbai

1. Visit the Mani Bhavan in Mumbai or Ghandi National museum in Dehli which chronicle the life of Mahatma Ghandi.
2. Visit Vasai РThis abandoned 16th century Portuguese fort (Fort Bassein or Ba̤aim) is a day trip from Mumbai.
3. Be an extra in a Bollywood movie. Hey, last time I was in India I attended an invitation only MTV/Lycra party, so I may have a shot at reaching this goal as well. One can only dream. Of course, if I can’t manage to become an extra in a movie, I’d at least like to go to the cinema and see a Bollywood film in an Indian theatre.

Bangalore

1. Return to the Bull Temple. I’ve been there and written about my experience before, but my traveling companion hasn’t seen it yet.
2. Shop and explore MG and Brigade roads (Bangalore). I had so much fun there in 2003. Perhaps on the drive I’ll manage to finally get a photo of the outside wall of the Catholic cemetery that had a painted sign stating “please do not pass urine hereâ€? that I used to pass each day on my way from the hotel to work.
3. Visit the Lalbagh Gardens. I spent 7 weeks in Bangalore in 2003 and still can’t believe I never made the trip to see these gardens while I was there previously.
4. If there’s time, make a trip out to Chamundi Hill and Somnathapura (close to Mysore) while visiting Bangalore. I’m only spending 3 or 4 days in Bangalore, so I don’t know how much I’ll manage to see while I’m there. I do have to find time to fit in some work during my trip…

Technorati Tags: India, travel