...I can see the end in the horizon.

This has been a hell of a weekend. The carpeting goes down on Tuesday and I got the painting that needed to be done completed. Now, I will say this. I would not be as far as I am without the love and support of my lady telling me I can do it. I would also be much further behind if it were not for my kids. Most people would not let a 10 and 12 year old do any painting like this. But, I have faith in them. And... they were my only helpers. And... they had no choice.

...I got a hell of a lot farther than I thought I would.

So, I had a plan. I thought I was not going to finish at all. But, I got what I wanted to get done for the night already. And EARLY. I can't paint any more here in the house tonight because it all has to dry.

Don't worry, Sally and Susie, I have an open window with a fan pulling air out.

Lou, once the room is done, I will give you a call. I'll actually have one fully completed room in this house. It's the big entrance room. Carpeting goes down on Tuesday, I should have everything painted before then. It's going to look great.

I would not be as far as I am tonight though without the help of my monkeys. They did a lot too, they also paint quite well if you give them good instructions!

...I have more time to be painting!

This is the weekend I normally have my kids. I will still have them, I just don't have to drive to get them. They are being brought to me. 

This is good for a couple of reasons. 1) I get really tired after being in a car for 5 hours. 2) It gives me more AWAKE time with the kids. 3) It's going to give me more time to paint. 

I have a project going on in the house right now that has been a long time coming. About 7 or 8 years ago I ripped out all the carpeting in my house. Since then, it just kind of sat there. Well, no more pets, and my kids are old enough now that I don't worry (too much) about large spills. Carpet is going back down. This will be so nice. 

But, I also decided to paint this room I am putting carpet in. It's going to be pretty awesome actually. The colors that are in there will look good and compliment my furniture. Things will be moved around a bit too. The dining room will be moved near the front of the house and serve as a seating area for gathering. What would be the "dining room" will actually have my couch and TV. The current "den" is where the TV is right now, and that will have my music equipment and computer stuff in there. Sort of like a studio.

It's going to look great. I just have to get my ass in gear now and paint paint paint!

...I get to watch some monkeys today.

My sister's monkeys to be exact. I love these kids. They are hilarious. Why are they funny? Well, for one they are not mine. That means they can do annoying things and I can send them home. 

The other part is that they just get a kick out of me.

Watch the video below for some of their antics.

...sometimes you just have to let it out and rant.

I keep things positive on here, so I made another site to help me with something that annoys me (and from feed back I've seen, other people as well).

Check it out, read up, re-post, or be angry about me doing it.

But, today was better because I found an outlet for my annoyance.

http://wiscomorons.blogspot.com/

...I made a permanent home for the blog.

So, today I made the decision to get an actual domain name for the blog. Previously you were all going to http://todaywasbetterbecause.blogspot.com. That just doesn't quite do it for me.

Starting today, update your bookmarks. The blog is now at http://www.todaywasbetterbecause.com.

The old link will re-direct you for now, but it would be best to actually go to the new link.

Thank you to everyone for reading and following along.

...baby steps.

This weekend was a good one. It's the first time my lady has stayed at the house for the weekend... while the kids were home. It's a big step. One she didn't know if she was ready for. But, if we are going to move forward with our lives together, she can't just go stay somewhere else every other weekend.

It went quite well. My kids get a kick out of her. They respect what she has to say and don't pull the "You're not my mom" crap I have seen other kids pull on adults. My kids respect authority. They also know that they are at my house and that I won't stand for it.

So, this weekend had a lot of things that were different about it and will continue. My kids kind of got the law laid down about the house and how we need to keep it clean. They were shown the chores that they need to do on the weekends they are home and what they can "earn" for doing these chores.

It totally worked.

Right away Saturday morning, they started cleaning without being told. I was floored. Friday night we had told them they should leave a room "better than when they entered it" and I heard my daughter tell my son "no, you have to fold the blankets up before you leave the room!"

The one thing that was great was that I kept the video games to a minimum. They really should be a reward and not the norm when they are here. I get so little time with them. So, I confiscated the GameBoy that they each have and put them away. No "video" games for the weekend. Games were played though. We had a super long game of Sorry! that was quite fun to play. It took forever, but it got all of us talking and playing at the table instead of in front of the TV.

This needs to happen more often. It really sucks that more families don't do this. Eat at the table. Clean together. Reward for good. Play games as a family.

It was a fun weekend.

...I got to hold a four day old baby today.

See this guy, this is William (or Willie as they will be calling him). He's four days old. Quite cool for four days old. He opened his eyes and was looking around at me. He had the hiccups while looking at me and crapped twice (both times NOT while I was holding him) during his trip to the office.

So, congrats to Holly and Billy on their newborn baby.

Holly, I'm sure the older two will be great with him... and Andy seems to like not being the smallest one anymore.

...good things are happening around here (update)

Well, what would it be if I didn't update people on how things were going around the house...

The biggest thing for me is that I see a huge project and I don't know where to start. Then that means I just don't start it. It's work. I already work 40 hours a week. I want to rest.

Well, this shit needed to happen too. I got a lot done over the last couple of weeks. Cat helped with a lot too. She has been a huge motivator along the way in more ways than one.

(And yes, my kids have sheets... they are in the dryer)

Hannah's room

Hannah's room #2

Ro's room 

Ro's room#2

Kitchen 

More Kitchen

The big room

Even more big room

Sanctuary

Ze bathroom

More big room

...I took control of my email again.

That's right - I love me some Gmail

I used to sign up for everything. I was getting offers and deals from everywhere. Then I realized that I really didn't need all that. So, last week, I started unsubscribing from everything.

Since then, I don't get woken up by a 3:54AM message from GuitarCenter telling me about the latest deal, or any of the others that seem to send over and over and over. Apple, you are by far the worst offender. I only need the email once. Two to three times to tell me about the new iNeedthis is enough, thank you very much.

It's great. I don't hear my phone going off all the time any more. It's quiet. I'm not rushing to see what it is. MAYBE I WON A MILLION DOLLARS!

I love having a clean inbox. I have embraced the "Archive" button. Do I need to do anything with this but I need the info for later...archive.

It's so nice having a clean look to the inbox. I don't feel like I'm getting behind anymore.

...I'm teaching people how to add a +1 button to their Blogger site. - Updated!

So, you want to add a +1 button to your Blogger page do you?

It's pretty easy.

Click on the Design tab, then click Edit HTML. Search for the </head> tag.

Paste this in the line after </script> but before </head>
<script src='http://apis.google.com/js.plusone.js' type='text/javascript'/>

Save your template and you are ready to go. You will now have a Google +1 button at the bottom of every post.

UPDATE! Apparently, you can also update and add the +1 button by clicking on the Design tab, then clicking EDIT in the Blog Posts box, uncheck and re-add the "Show Share Buttons" and it will be there as well.

...I found a voice-mail I was unaware I had.

This is waaaaay too funny not to share. I'm pretty sure I'm going to be hurt for this.

I was going through my Google Voice account and found an old voice-mail message that I was unaware of.

...good things are happening around here.

Nine and a half years ago, I moved in to the house I currently live in and own. As odd as it sounds, I can honestly say that it has never been as clean as it is right now. NEVER.

This house has seen quite a bit. Two marriages, four kids, four dogs, a multitude of cats, and various other animals. To say it was chaos around here is an understatement. Now, I will admit this... I am a lazy bastard. And because of such, I do not like to clean. Only one person is really to blame for this house getting to the point that it got to and that was me. I should have got on the kids to make things right around here, I should have got the people who lived here to pitch in more and help me keep the kids in line. All of that is going to change real quick. My kids are not going to like it. I'm not sure how much their mom makes them do around the house, but I am pretty sure it isn't a whole lot. I have to make sure that my kids understand that you get to do the fun things after you do what needs to be done. I have that approach at work so I need to bring it home too. I don't get to play chess at lunch if there are things to do. Why should my kids be downstairs watching TV if their bed isn't made, or if there are dishes to be put away.

I have someone to thank for this. My lady. She made me realize that there really is time for this once you just decide to get it done. That's what I'm doing now. I should have done it a long time ago. Let me tell you this, when you feel depressed, it just grabs a hold of you. You might not know it at the time, but it's something that just makes you want to sit there... do nothing... feel nothing... I'm glad she helped me snap out of it. It took her over a year. Most people would have quite almost instantly. Not her. She stuck with me, believed in me.

For those of you who have been here and don't believe what I'm writing, come over. I'm not ashamed of this house anymore. I still want to get out of it, but I am going to make the best of it while I am here. It's the only think I can do to stay sane... and it might make August 9th that much better for me. I have quite a bit more to get done here. Flooring will get laid down upstairs and downstairs to make it look even nicer around here within a month or so. Painting is going to begin as well. You're not going to recognize this place when it's done people.

...I started reading a book.

I started reading a book that was written by a long time friend of mine. By long time I mean I've known him for 32 years now.

He's got three of them up there now. This is the first one. I'm all about helping the starving artist. So, if you like mysteries, check it out.

It's a digital download only. So, get your Kindle app ready. Fire up your brain and start reading.

...I want to take a vacation.

I want to take a vacation, but how do I go about this. I am short on cash right now, but I would really like to go back down to Tampa.

So, I started figuring shit out.

According to Google Maps...it is 1270+ miles to the Castle, from my house. Driving straight through, that would be about 21-22 hours of driving. SO....

my car gets about 32 miles per gallon... 1270/32 = 39.6ish gallons of gas to get down there. I have a 14 gallon tank... so 39.6/14 = 2.8 tanks of gas to get down there, and lets say that gas is at $4 a gallon just for fun... that's $56 per full fill up... $156 to go TO tampa... and $156 back.

shit. it's still cheaper to fly...

I need to do more math on this.

...I got a few things done around the house.

So today did not go as planned at all. This was the original plan...

Wake up and go to home depot and get myself a new garbage disposal
Install said disposal
Deep clean the kitchen
Deep clean the floors on the first floor.
Go to dinner for my lady's belated birthday dinner with her family.

...here is what actually happened.

woke up and got the new garbage disposal from home depot
started installing said disposal.
heard running water when none should be
found leaking/burst pipe near the basement toilet (yes, I have a toilet in the basement)
removed toilet piping from the line (had to be at least 40 years old) and went to home depot again...
bought 1/2 inch galvanized plug
plugged the line
water is now back on and not leaking everywhere ruining my basement floor!
back upstairs...Start hooking up disposal pipes...
pipe in the wet wall breaks (SON OF A BITCH)
Off to home depot... again.
get parts I think I need....
realize the pipe in the wall is very badly damaged and again... back to home depot...
Got the right parts for sure this time.
Now everything is all hooked up.
Tested, water tight. no leaks...
...had to miss dinner with my love and her family.


I guess the good that came out of this is that it is done. I won't have to worry about it any more. I still want to get the downstairs toilet operational again, but I don't use it all that often, so it's not a rush.