I was cleaning up the storeroom today, and came across some pictures of me in my youth that my mom had sent me months (years?) ago. Do you think I can find one of those vests in adult size?

Our LP kit arrived yesterday, so this morning I converted the new $32 stove and installed it. There were some brief problems finding a 7mm nut driver (what the hell, do we live in Canada or something?), but I managed to find something that would work.

Next we’ll contact Anya’s school to see about getting our old stove over there to replace theirs. Hopefully there are some strong men who will be happy to haul it up the stairs to the kitchen.

As nice as it is to toss everything into the bread machine every few days for a loaf of bread, it just can’t compare to something baked in the oven. Especially now that I’ve gotten the hang of making the mixer do all the hard kneading work…

This is from a recipe in the LA Times, which so far is the only successful rye bread recipe I’ve made. Without caraway seeds this time, though, so Cabol might actually eat some.

Today I went down to the laundry room and discovered a CFL bulb had leaped to its death off the shelf while I was hammering floors down, and there was broken glass EVERYWHERE (mostly from the globe around the bulb, though). Out of curiosity, I wondered what the government had to say about cleaning up CFL bulbs, since they contain mercury (a possible 4mg!).

Don’t use a vacuum or a broom on hard surfaces, try and manage with cardboard and duct tape. Put everything in a sealed bag or canning jar. Clothes came in contact with some glass? Discard. Take the waste to a recycle area. Wipe down your vacuum. Ventilate the area. For FOUR MILLIGRAMS.

Then I remember at the family reunion, the talk amongst the folks of the baby boomer generation talking about playing with mercury. As in rolling it around on their hands and such. Puts things into perspective, doesn’t it?

Well, at least it came out 95% in one piece, which is better than the muffin crumbly bits I brought to work last Thursday for breakfast. Hopefully it tastes as good!

Only 4 or 5 cups of raspberries left to use up. And why is there glaze in my ear?

This week we finally got to pick up poor departed Lil Loaf’s new brother, a VW Jetta Sportwagen TDI:

When we first decided to get the car, we couldn’t find any bare bones ones (Anya really liked the giant sunroof, but unfortunately for her she doesn’t have any money). So we ordered a blue one with the extra back airbags. Time went by. After a few weeks I called the dealer, and it was still backordered, and after it went into production it would be another 6 weeks. Since I was getting quite sick of driving the truck, we asked him to see if he could find a base one in any color but black.

A dark gray one was found, coming in within a week. We went down to First Team Auto, and signed all the paperwork. Gave them a check. Dealt with a really annoying woman who tried to sell us undercoating junk (whom we complained about later, and the president told us we weren’t the first to complain that week). Also got a little frustrated with the hard selling of an extended warranty. The next week rolled around, when it should be in…and we get a call from our salesman telling us that it had been sold out from under us. Surprise!

We were a little annoyed. After all, we had given them money and signed all the paperwork with the VIN on it. We wrote an angry email. The president of First Team called me back, it turns out the dealership in Richmond did not log something properly, so a salesman saw the car and didn’t know it was sold. But to make things better, they loaned us another TDI wagon until another one showed up on the 15th of December. They even delivered it to our house in the boonies.

This past Saturday they called and it got here early, so Tuesday we drove out and swapped it for the new one. Hooray!

Now we just need to think of a new license plate. Cabol doesn’t like DAS LOAF.

Purchased at an auction this weekend. Good thing we know some big, strong, manly men that moved them for me.

Well, I never thought I’d say it, but I agree with Sarah Palin on something.

These damn automated calls from the Republicans every night is getting really, really annoying.