Maggots strewn about that crawl

No song title today.  Fact title. Maggots on the floor in our garage this morning.  Not even on anything, just crawling about according to Ry, the master maggot killer.  I killed a few, he got the majority.  Gross.  It actually just adds to all the dumb shit happening to Casa Glow like an ill omen.  

First, a few quick pics from the Second Annual Birthday Massacre Nerf War.   I'll post more as I steal them from facebook, these are some I took on my phone.  

Prepping for battle

Pre game

Post game spoils

Where'd it go?

So, cleaning up the mess the next day we discovered the sink was all plugged up, which sucked because even though we had plastic cups everyone wanted to use a big kid cup and so I had a sink full of dishes to wash.  We draino-ed it.  Then we draino-ed it again.  No dice.  Called my mom and she and Geoff came over and helped ryan snake the drain.  No dice.  Then Geoff came over again with sulfuric acid drain cleaner.  I should have questioned that it came in a plastic sealed bag with the terms "CUIDADO!" written on it in all red caps.  It said WARNING! really big on the other side, so don't fret that it was some weird foreign draino.  It was plumber strength.  I have no idea of the concentration, it probably would have helped later last night.  But I didn't even want to touch the stuff.  It did finish the job the draino started, though.  The job of burning right through the pipes to drain out on the concrete slab in the crawlspace of our house.  Shortly after discovering this awesome fact, we also discovered that when mixed with draino it creates H2S, or for the layman, hydrogen sulfide gas.  Which smells like rotten eggs.  And is an irritant to the mucus membranes. Did I mention it filled the whole house?  We ended up opening all the windows and putting out fans to aerate the house.  Awesome.  Then we dumped a ton of baking soda solution down the drain to neutralize the chemical reaction.  It actually worked as far as I can tell, my house isn't on fire, the smell is gone and there isn't anything else weird happening that I can tell.  Hopefully.  I guess I'll find out when the plumber comes later today. Yup, had to hire a plumber.  Lucky us.  

The second awesome homeowner event to happen this week: I called and found someone, Mad Hatter Chimney Sweeps, to come clean out our fireplace and fix it so it stops acting like an open door in the winter. He came out and cleaned yesterday.  And cleaned and cleaned.  Then told me I needed like $700 more in repairs done to the fireplace.  A new damper, replaced mortar and flue tiles, a new cap.  He said there was a chimney fire in there at some point which ruined some of the internal workings and that it hasn't been maintained even though it's been heavily used.  Awesome.  So, grand total so far for fireplace: $850, probably.  For a fireplace we aren't even gonna use.  But...it needs done.  

So, now I'm waiting for the third thing to go wrong, because things go wrong in threes, right?  Isn't that a statistical fact? I hope it's cheaper the the first two...  I wonder if I initiated something if that would work?  Like if I got the one broken window fixed?  Or the carpeting ripped out of the kids rooms and lamanent put down?  Does that count?  

I guess I'm glad these things happened while I'm still on maternity leave and I don't have to take off of work to be here to wait for the repair guys.  

Also, look forward to a post of the haunted house schedule this year...it's coming soon.  Post suggestions if you have any.  

Summer Nerf Wars....Finally. Betcha thought I forgot!

Asher says "Let's get ready....to RUMBLE!!!!!"

Say hello to my little gun...

Do you think he has enough guns?

Tom watches the skirmish with longing.

Choose your weapon, but choose wisely...

Practicing his war cry.

He can't decide if his beer or sword would be more effective.  It's nice they gave him the time to choose, instead of cutting him down where he stood.

A battle to the death between two fierce warrior women.

Action Shot!

You're always there for music and me

My brother had a pretty awesome Nerf war Bday party last night.  I don't have my normal computer so I don't have any way to put photos on here at all for either of my topics today, expect photos in the next couple of days, hopefully.  That's all I'll say about the party without the pics for now.

So, I come into work today knowing full well that I won't have a wall to my office anymore.  I wasn't expecting the true damage that I walked into, though.  Not at all.  I guess I should have expected my office to be covered in a patina of dust from 100 years of having walls in the office.  Everything was covered in dust, nothing covered or protected.  So, there is that. 

Then, I was told that my sanctuary, which I just finished cleaning and arranged, was supposed to be safe as it was protected by a support wall.  This was not the truth, they ripped a hole in the other wall for no reason.  For no reason at all.  Really, guys?  Really?  Were you getting a little crowbar happy?  In fact, the crow bar is still hanging stuck in the wall.  I'll post the picture when I can. 

Oh, did I mention that they shut off the power to my office, too?  So it's a horrible mess, I don't have any power, it's in unworkable conditions, and I'm still expected to do my job.  Thanks, guys.  Really, I mean it.  Thanks.  Motivation is at an all time low.  I didn't think it could get this low. 

Gah.

To make matters the worst, I planted a tomato plant, Giada the Tomata, in a spare sparse garden bed here and I've been taking care of her, watering her and weeding and tying her up and everything.  And when I left on Thursday she had a nice half ripe tomato on her, the first one.  I expected to have a nice beautiful tomato when I came into work today.  Guess what I found instead?  Someone took it.  My first tomato from her.  I am not against sharing my crops with people here, but no one else helped me grow her so I feel that I should have first rights.  How dare someone steal my first tomato.  It was the final nail in the demotivation coffin today. 

And I'm stressing big time about going to NYC and leaving my little bear.  So that doesn't help with my overall mood.  If Ry was staying home with him I would feel 1000% better.  I wish he wasn't going to Niagara Falls.  I know that is selfish and not nice but I can't feel good about us both being gone.  I'm home with Asher a lot when Ry travels.  I just wish he could reciprocate.  I cannot even begin to tell you how stressed I am about this.  I've been trying not to think about it.  I haven't been succeeding.