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Sandy J. Hartwick

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Good Grief!

November 18, 2020 by Sandy Filed Under: Blog, Cats, Funny stories Leave a Comment

Photo by NeONBRAND on Unsplash

Good Grief!

We all have those days when we wonder why we ever crawled out of the covers. Yesterday was my turn. First thing in the morning, my husband went and put the dog out in her pen. To do this he had to go downstairs, across the basement to her crate, out the sliding glass doors and about thirty feet across the lawn to Bindi’s pen and then reverse it to get back up to the living room. Once there he said, “What’s that?”

I looked down at the carpet at a turd, which looked to be of cat origin. The unpleasant discovery did not end as we found that my husband had stepped in it and was now tracking it on the wool area-rug. In defense of my cat, I had just cleaned all of her cat boxes, she had not been in the house most of the day before and how could we have missed a cat gift in the middle of the living room?

Then the awful idea occurred that perhaps my husband had stepped on this thing outside and brought it all through the house and up the stairs! NO! If you know me, you know that my Howard Hughes type tendencies were popping at this point.

After much CSI investigation, we found no further evidence on the route he had used. Against all odds, we believe he stepped in it outside and because it was on the outside toe of his slipper, miraculously, it did not fall off until he reached the living room. (We know this, because when it was daylight, he found the point of initial contact out on the lawn.) Some of you will say, “At least your Roomba didn’t find it!” An excellent point and you are right, because things can always get worse.

After cleaning up the mess, we hoped our day would get better. My husband had called our internet provider the night before, because we were having terribly low speed and the lady he talked to said, “I remember you, you called about a month ago, we were having a network problem. We still haven’t fixed it.”

I suggested that he call them this morning and ask for a month credit. After being on hold for over half an hour, he finally talked to someone who told him, “We are having a network problem with one of the towers and we will be installing fiber optic cable. You will have problems until December 15.”

Imagine this company charging everyone their regular bill while knowing that their service was going to be substandard and NOT what they are paying for. They did give us a credit for one month, but really!?

Of course we both had a lot of work to do online. I did not get my blog completed yesterday and everything I had to do on the computer took twice as long or longer than it should have.

Finally, we are having our bathroom remodeled and thankfully we are blessed with some extra bathrooms, one of them in the basement. I used the toilet in the basement and flushed the toilet and the handle snapped off in my hand. Really?! The timing just seemed too convenient. I thought of Bruce Almighty–“Smite me! Almighty Smiter!”

I know, all of these problems are tiny. They are all first world problems and I know that means that I don’t have any real problems. I am blessed. But sometimes I forget that and just have to say, “Good grief!” a phrase my third grade teacher said often. I remember  Charlie Brown used it a lot too.

For those of you that are wondering about that phrase, “good grief” was originally a mild oath. It’s “a euphemism for ‘good God,’ ” according to The American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms (2d ed.), by Christine Ammer. https://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2017/07/good-grief.html

 

 

 

 

 

Why Cats Are Better Than Dogs

September 23, 2020 by Sandy Filed Under: Blog Leave a Comment

Why Cats Are Better Than Dogs


I know that some of you already have your hackles up and some are smiling like the Cheshire cat. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone has written a whole book about the subject of feline superiority when compared to the canine.

Tonight I am way behind and thus my blog post will be short. I will list my #1 reason that cats are better than dogs. Drum roll please…I have never seen a cat eat (or roll in) a turd. There you have it. I could list more reasons, but do we have to go much further?

Please no hate mail. I love dogs too, but kitties rule.

 

 

New Roomba and the Secret Under the Bed

September 12, 2020 by Sandy Filed Under: Blog 4 Comments

 

 

 

Crazy Eightball

I highly recommend keeping a journal. Even if you can’t write in it everyday, it makes for some fun reminiscing. The following is from a journal entry dated October 16, 2019.

Old Roomba gave up the ghost and I tried to get along without him. But having a large house and me being not really into housework found me missing my little Buddy. Enter new Roomba, unnamed as yet. Quieter and it seems to pick up a lot more dirt. Got hung up on the treadmill downstairs a couple of times, but so far, so good. I decided that I needed to run some errands in town and locked new Roomba in the master bedroom/bath while I was away.

I came home and opened the master and everything is normal, except new Roomba is stopped by the side of the bed with a long, black petrified-looking thing beside it. OMG. No. IT. CAN’T. BE. It surely looks like an ancient, petrified cat turd. Ugh. It is! HOW? WHY?!

I look under the bed to see if there is more or if I can spot the scene of the crime. No. Now my Howard Hughes germ PHOBIA kicks in, as I imagine the robot whacking the old, shriveled turd this way and that across the rug and everywhere. I can visualize its little brushes flicking bits of cat crap everywhere. Retch!

It took me awhile to figure out what to do. At first I thought maybe I should burn everything and then I thought disinfect everything. I finally vacuumed the rug (with a real vacuum) and mopped the hard surfaces and will disinfect new Roomba (perhaps its name should be Turd Herder). My husband laughed and said he would have thrown the turd away and restarted new Roomba. This brings me to the point that mankind would be better off if we had kept dirt floors…

 

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