Daily Archives: 04/28/2015
Friends – If you get a chance, you *must* check out mom’s food blog Dear Bacon
Dear Bacon, Our parents are so funny. We are brothers born on the same day in the same litter. Our personalities are like twins though – we both have separate ones. Our parents thought it was funny to put is in these contraptions. But don’t worry. I’ll be showing them what I think about this set up shortly. Barks! Signed Sitting Pretty in the Booth of Shame
Dear Sitting Pretty in the Booth of Shame – I have to admit something my friend. Think of the originality that your humans came up with on this set up. It’s outrageously funny. Okay may not so funny from the side you are sitting BUT from the other side of this computer where I’m sitting – it’s hilarious! I say play it for all it’s worth and have some fun. You can always leave something in your humans shoe for payback later 🙂
Dear Bacon – I had surgery and as you can see I had to wear the cone of shame. Shakes dog head and whines. The cone of shame! But look I’m not sad – I’m happy! My master – he’s the best. He made a game out of it and threw in all of my closest friends. See, I even thought about you with Super Piggy in the front. He reminds me of you. What surgery? I know no pain here. Signed Happy Doggy
Dear Happy Doggy – Oh pal! Where were you when the little guy here had surgery. This would have been fantastic for him to wear his cone of shame and have some fun. Your master is tops in my book my friend. I say when he has surgery, you do the same for him!
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Dear Bacon – What? I was tired from working the hood the night before. See I’m on the neighborhood watch. I gotta make sure I protect all of the humans from the bad peeps that come out at night. The local diner takes care of me. I need coffee STAT – and hey why don’t you make it a double and serve it with some eggs and a steak? Signed Neighborhood Watch
Dear Neighborhood Watch – You are the DOG my friend. I like how you take care of your hood and they repay you at the neighborhood diner. I gotta get a gig like that. Where do I sign up? PIGGY POWER!
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Dear Bacon – Using Facetime on these i Phones are the bomb! See my girlfriend and me were talking. We could see each other and it was a blast. Neither one of us wanted to hang up. We both fell asleep like this. Isn’t she adorable? Signed Beef Cake
Dear Beef Cake – hubba hubba. She is a dish my friend. I know exactly what you mean about Facetime and talking to friends not wanted to hang up. My pet rock here Bashful has been doing a LOT of that lately with some of his friends. Modern technology has come so far, hasn’t it? Just remember to block the picture when you go wizzy. No one wants to see that – it doesn’t matter how much in love you are.
Dear Bacon – Please explain something to me. This yellow ball – why do the humans throw it and then expect US to retrieve it back to them? I mean heck if they want to play fetch, shouldn’t “I” be the one throwing it for them to fetch? That would help in their exercising… right? Signed Confused
Dear Confused – You know what friend. You have a wonderful point on fetch. I understand this completely. Humans do say they are playing ‘fetch’. I think we should try it your way. Throw the ball for the humans and let them fetch it. We shall see how long that lasts. If it’s my dad, maybe 2 minutes tops – snorts and rolls with piggy laughter!
REMEMBER friends – Dear Bacon can’t happen without YOU. Please continue to send me your letters and pictures via email. Snorts and thanks!
Renovation – Phase II
Welcome back my friends to Phase II of the great renovation at the Hotel Thompson. Phase II was an ordeal – almost worse than Phase I in my book. In Phase II we had an electrician out. The one thing that the hub unit has always complained about in the living room is that there is *not* enough light. The hub unit has limited vision and when things are dark, it wipes out what vision he does have which is not much but everything counts, right?
So one of the first things I did was to have an electrician go up into the attic and install a ceiling fan. First, it would be great to have some air circulation and second it would have LIGHT. I have to admit, that this is one of my favorite things about the renovation. It was a great addition and you will see the final results on Friday.
Also during this time, I kept going back to the floor we ordered. Something just didn’t sit right with me. I talked it over with the hub and he told me then that if I had doubts, I needed to call the contractor then and there to discuss it before they were installed. We had the contractor come back out on 4/12/2015 to go over more flooring ideas. I’m glad I did because I saw a flooring color that I absolutely fell in love with so we changed it. While the contractor was out, we also asked him to look at our bathroom floor – it really needed to be changed as well. After reviewing the prices with him on the bathroom floor, it was a no brainer to go ahead and have it completed as well. After speaking with the contractor, I knew the right decision had been made and we were set for the flooring.
But then at 6:55PM on Sunday night 4/12/2015, we received a phone call from American Signature Furniture which set me in a turmoil. The lady that called advised that the furniture we ordered was back ordered until JUNE 2, 2015. What?! And better yet, the store called us at five minutes until closing to advise us of this information. And better yet to that, we had upgraded our internet services to fiber optics and did not know that the company had installed a voice mail on our telephone. The date we bought our furniture and expressing that it had to be in by April 16, 2015, they called us a couple of days after that on 4/2/2015 and said that the furniture was back ordered and would be delivered on April 28th. Now talk about nerves and stress. American Signature Furniture was given two telephone numbers to contact – our house number and my cell number. Not one time did they try to call the cell and we just happened to be at home the evening of 4/12/2015 to speak with the lady about being back ordered until June 2.
Of course, I didn’t sleep well this night. I was worried about our furniture! I called the headquarters of American Signature Furniture the next morning 4/13/2015 and advised our situation. They told me specifically that a manager from the store would call me between 10-10:30AM that day. At noon, I had not received any calls. I called the headquarters again and was advised they were still in the works in getting in touch with someone at the store. Finally around 1PM, the same lady that called me the night before called (who was NOT the manager). She advised that the only thing she could do was refund our delivery fee. Shakes head. How stressful huh? I advised her that I wanted to speak to the STORE manager. She told me that he didn’t come in until after 2PM and she would give him the message.
By 3:30PM, no one had called me. The more I thought about the situation, the more I got ticked. Just a heads up, don’t tick off a woman who has purged, cleaned and stuck to a schedule to get things done in three weeks. I left work early, picked up the hub unit and we went to Ashley’s Furniture where I met the nicest manager ever – Angela. I was up front with her on everything – we needed furniture by Friday 4/17/2015, what I wanted and what had happened. Within 20 minutes, I found better furniture that I absolutely LOVED, better attitudes, bigger fireplace and friendlier staff. I highly recommend this store. AND it gave me great pleasure to go to American Signature Furniture and advise them that I wanted a refund of nearly $3,000.00 due to their service… which by the way a manager has yet to ever call me. I call that piss poor customer service.
Phase II included all of the tribulations of furniture and then on 4/15/2015 the painting began. Lord help me if I *ever* see another paint brush my entire life – LOL. I asked the ‘kids’ to invite their fellow anipals over to the Hotel Thompson for a paint party that included food but unfortunately not one single person showed up. Who would have thought that, right? So much for the anipals and kids helping out. Although, Houdini did try and was almost a Smurf when he attacked the blue paint. That’s right. Houdini attacked a blue paint roller. I immediately picked him up and washed him off. And I have to admit that there might be some snout marks on one of the lower walls in the living room. And yes. I left them there 🙂
So you are asking what colors I chose? Well this is one wall and one color. With the hub unit’s vision impairment, he couldn’t help with the painting so it was in my hands – literally. I painted for NINE hours straight. Up/down/on the floor/standing up. After NINE hours, I called a break. We went to dinner, rested for a bit and then I came back and did TWO more hours of painting.
Let me add that usually painting doesn’t bother me. It can be fun for a while. After 11 hours though, it is a nightmare. I have never gotten up/down so much from the ladder and chair working in trim. Heaven forbid – I didn’t know you could hurt in some areas that I hurt. Let alone when we finally crashed that night, I dreamed about painting and was moving my hands in my sleep with the brush.
This is the same wall showing how the paint dried. Pretty huh? This is the darkest color I used. It is on the entry way wall and one wall that goes from the living room into the kitchen.
By the time I finished the last wall, I had fallen off the ladder once. No biggie just a big scratch on my leg. My legs hurt from getting up and down. My arms hurt from going up and down with the brush. I had multiple colors of paint all over me. And who knew you could have bruises on top of bruises. Was it worth it? At the end of Phase II, I was definitely questioning myself if I had bitten off more than I could chew.
Remember to come back tomorrow for Phase III.
Piglove 