Leelanau Whippersnapper

The Northwoods Is No Place For A Pink Flamingo

Got an email from my Realtor tonight telling me that the owners of the house I want to buy have dropped their price another $2000 as of this morning.  It’s killing me because I have to wait until at least June 7 before I can run my credit report again which will then indicate whether or not I can obtain a mortgage.  I’m stressing about it because it’s a great little house that would be perfect for me, in a great location very close to work and no further from the folks than I am right now.  It’s a 2 story (something hard to find up here in the northwoods) Colonial styled but contemporary home on a corner lot in a nice area and it’s just the right size for me and Gavin the Wonder Dog.  It’s been on the market now for 89 days and has not sold yet although at this point I am starting to ask myself why but that might be beside the point.  My Realtor continues to tell me they are very motivated, the short of it is, I want this house but I have about 3 weeks yet before I will know for sure if I can get a mortgage for it and I have made the decision not to pursue anything until I have a guarantee on financing, something I still realize may not be possible at this time.  Stay tuned, you can be sure I’ll be writing about it here if I end up buying a house this summer.

On that note, with this pursuit of home ownership, I have in many ways now officially committed myself to living in this area for at least the next 5 years or more.  This of course makes the parents happy but at the same time they are not necessarily the reason I’ve chosen to stay up here.  Regardless of all the bitching I do about the people around here, I do actually like this part of Michigan.  It has done amazing things for my photography skills and I like the fact that pretty much my entire extended family lives up here even though I don’t get to see them all that often.  I’m not the type of person that just randomly goes out and makes friends with people and knowing that, it’s important to me to have family near me so that I don’t cocoon myself which I would be very prone to doing if I lived in a city where I did not know anyone.  That’s not saying I don’t have friends, but it is saying that I place more emphasis on my immediate and extended family than I do many of the other random people that I know.  I deal with the public 50 hours a week which is more than many people have to deal with people in a month.  It’s nice to be able to go to my folks house and not be forced to make small talk about stupid shit.  I can have quality conversations when I feel like it.  So, even though my boss at work has started pushing me again to promote with Menards and move into store level management, at least for the next 5 years I’ll be working on my management skills here in Traverse City.  I refuse to buy a house and not live in at least long enough to make a little money when I sell it. Lord knows, I’ll need a profit if or when I decide to take that next step at work which I think can happen any time I want it to.  It’s a nice feeling knowing that you have a steady job with very little chance of loosing it unless I fuck up in a big way and I’m just not the type of person to do that anymore.  I’ve become old and careful before my time and it’s paying off.

So tonight is Saturday night and I’m home enjoying a couple of cold beers and a little internet time before I head off again to work tomorrow.  It’s going to be in the upper 80′s for most of this week which means it’s going to be CRAZY busy at work.  Tuesday is my day off and it promises to be the hottest day of the week.  It’s of course the day I am acquiring new furniture from the relatives but oh well, free shit is worth a little sweat.

Anyhow, just a short update, you know in the summer it’s very hard to find time to write or post things.  Most of you reading this follow me on Facebook anyhow and thats about all I have time for right now.  I’ll leave you tonight with a recent picture taken this past week.

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What a busy fucking month!  So for those of you not in the know, I’ve spent the past several weeks actively pursuing buying a house while at the same time putting in over 50 hours a week at work!  Talk about stress.  There is a lot to do and a LOT to think about.  At this point in the game I’ve decided, along with the advice of my Realtor, to put things on hold until June.  I had a few things that I had to clean up on my credit report and at this point it’s a waiting game for my score to reset.  Should happen within a month and then I should be able to get my financing in order.  So, stay tuned.  Sarah and Brian, you might get to lend a hand helping ME move this time.  You owe me one from your stint in Jackson!  Christopher can help too.

In other news, I’ve recently become a HUGE fan of the Musical Sitcom “Glee”!  I have pretty much fallen in love with this show for a couple of reasons.  Primarily, this show pretty much sums up my entire High School career minus some of the glitz and glamor.  In addition to that, they have taken and re-done a whole shit load of some of the most popular songs from my adolescence and then combined them with some pretty spectacular show tunes.  I would not be a qualified gay man if I did not melt over a good show tune and the kids in this show hit the mark every time.  I imagine, had I actually gone through and finished school, this is the sort of choir I’d be directing at this point in my life.  At the very core of the show though it is about a high school Glee club filled with geeks, nerds and a couple of jocks from the football team mashed together to demonstrate the complete drama of high school, and the triumphs of each of the kids as they work through that difficult time in their lives.  I relate especially well to Kurt, a kid struggling with his sexuality (he is openly gay) and a kid not afraid to excel using the upper range of his voice.  In the clip below (sadly there is no video, just audio), he is singing a duet with one of the leads in the show (Rachel) singing the incredibly awesome ”Defying Gravity” from the musical Wicked.  I can’t help but remember my experiences with my good friend and regular duet partner Rachel as we both swam through the cesspool of adolescence together.  It is VERY rare that I get sucked in to shows like this but this one has really hit the mark for me and I’m sure many other choir geeks out there in the world.  I hope they can get a few more seasons out of it before it runs it’s course.  Enjoy.

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Tiz the middle of winter here in the northwoods and every year around this time I start getting board with where I live.  This is a sleepy little town in the middle of winter and even though I live within the city, there is just not much to do.  Even if there was stuff to do though, I don’t know what I’d do.  I guess I just like the thought of knowing there are things around to distract me.  What I’m itching for though is my own house.  I’ve been a renter now about 15 or 16 years and honestly I’m getting sick of paying other people’s house payments.  Granted, where I am now is absolutely perfect, BUT, it’s not mine.  About a year ago I met with a Realtor to see just what I could afford on my income and based on what he told me then I could find a decent little house somewhere around town.  I’m sure that by now I could afford more because my income has gone up and my debts have continued to go down but every time I go to the realty web sites I am reminded that the housing market sucks up here.  Even worse than that, people simply do not have a clue how to attract buyers.  I just don’t understand how people can expect to sell their homes by posting pictures of their cluttered shit hole of a mess house on the Internet.  I mean really folks, I don’t want to see a picture of your half-assed made bed and a floor littered with newspapers and other trash.  Nor do I, as a prospective buyer, want to see a picture of your lousy home improvement jobs that were done horribly and WAY out of code.  You would think that realtor’s who are specializing in HUGE sale transactions would know at least a little something about presentation.  So after looking around a little tonight, I had to end my search when I stumbled upon the picture below.  It screams WELCOME TO THE NORTHWOODS….sucker.

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Well, I’ve got a problem at my condo and I’m not entirely sure how to get it taken care of.  I mentioned before here that I thought there might be some sort of animal living under my house because Gavin had been eating lots of little pellet poop in the yard.  Turns out I had a hole in the side of my condo leading to the crawl space and I suspected at that time, there might be a rabbit living under the house.  To my dismay, I ventured down into the crawl space a couple weeks ago and there are 2 sections under there.  The main part which runs under 90% of the condo was very clean and I could not locate any sign of animal activity.  Unfortunately, the small addition that was put on to this unit has a foundation that fully encloses it and there is no access to this 10×10 area from the main crawl space.  That’s where the animal is and now it’s starting to stink.  I’ve got a couple of options.  I can call the landlord and see if he can tell me how to get into that part of the crawl space (I suspect he has no idea).  I can dig a bigger hole next to the smaller one to see if I can get past the foundation wall but this is problematic because this is a condo, the owner of the condo doesn’t actually own the structure and I’m not sure I want to get in to screwing around with how this place was built in order to solve this problem.  I can call animal control or some pest control company and pay them to come and figure it out or I can just continue to live in what is quickly starting to smell like a barn.  I think I’ll go with the first option and see what the landlord has to say.  Unfortunately, I likely won’t get a response until Monday so I’ll just have to put up with it until then.  In the meantime, if you have any ideas for how to catch a rabbit (although I think it might be dead already and that’s why it smells so bad) I’d love to hear it.

In other news, I continue to amaze myself with my geeky fascination over technology.  Over the years, I’ve built up a rather impressive collection of old computers, cases, parts, hard drives and the like.  You know you can’t just toss that shit into a land fill so I’ve just never bothered to recycle any of it.  Last night, I hauled it all out, pulled out all the good components from the 4 old computers and reassembled them into a new hybrid computer.  My goal?  My big flat screen TV has an option to connect a computer to it and I have this urge to sit in my recliner and be able to surf the web.  Actually, there are all kinds of web sites available now where you can stream TV shows and movies (either free or for a fee) and by connecting this computer to the TV, I can now watch old re-runs of Silver Spoons, Family Ties, and the Golden Girls on Hulu.com on the big screen TV!  Shit, who needs cable any more, I can watch whatever I want for free via the Internet with the right technology.  So this morning I am re-installing an operating system before I head out to the lake for the day and tonight, we’ll see just how well it performs.

Anyhow, I need a life.

I’m going to be 35 freakin years old on Monday.  I’m not entirely sure where the past 10-20 years of my life has gone but I can’t say that anything that’s happened has been all that bad or that I regret any of it.  I’ve always tried to live my life the way I want to live it by my rules and for the most part, I get support from the people who matter for doing so.  I never thought I would end up back in retail, I certainly never thought I would end up living in Traverse City (seeing this place primarily as a vacation spot for most of my life), and I never thought that at this point in my life I’d be single again.  That last part bugs me a little bit but at the same time, I really don’t mind where my life is at right now.  I’ve always been fairly solitary, I do pretty well on my own, and to be completely selfish, I enjoy spending money on myself rather than supporting other people.  I make more money now than at any other point in my life (as it should be), I’m healthy, my parents are healthy, and I can pretty much do whatever I want, whenever I want within the confines of a retail schedule of course.  Looking ahead, just 35 more years until I’m 70 and hopefully (fingers crossed), I’ll be retired and living comfortably by that point.

I thought I’d share this picture with you as I approach my birthday.  They say that being gay is something you are predisposed to at birth and that social conditioning plays a roll but it’s not the only factor.  Do you think this kid is being socially conditioned to be straight or does he just have parents with boundary issues?  I can’t even begin to imagine Hooter’s being an appropriate venue for a 10 year old’s birthday party!   He apparently doesn’t seem to mind.

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What a bitch.  I was fortunate enough to get out of work a couple hours early today so I thought I would take advantage of the fact that I’ve not seen any daylight at my house in the last 2 weeks by cleaning up my yard a little bit.  My yard and garden beds came with the house.  Part of my job as a current renter (and perhaps someday owner) of this condo is to keep up the yard.  That means using a hedge clipper on the 25 different shrubs that I have, some taller than me, and also keeping weeds out of the way.  In general, I am pretty happy with what came with the condo.  I’ve got huge mounds of daisies in a few different colors, shrubs that are exceedingly healthy and have grown so much that I’ve had to cut them all back twice so far this summer, and I am having great success with my upside down tomato plant grower thingie with a plant that is just going nuts.  I’m going to have grape tomatoes coming out of my ears from this plant.  I’ve also got one hideous plant…ground cover actually, that is just the most dreadful thing ever.  Lamb’s ear or Stachys byzantina has got to be the most invasive plant I’ve ever seen.  It does well in full sun and poor soil (which I apparently have plenty of) and takes over EVERYTHING.  It’s killed one of my rose bushes and nearly devoured the other.  It’s a freakin bee hotel and I personally think it smells awful.  It’s managed to pretty much take over the perennial garden beds.  Once they get going for the season they sprout these spikes that are about 20″ tall with little purple flowers.  They could be somewhat attractive if they were not so invasive.  I decided today that I’d had enough and cut off all the spikes so the rest of my plants might have a chance to live this year.  What a mess.  Bees everywhere, velvety like smelly leaves all over the place.  Anyway, I got them cut back and things look a little better now.  Hopefully things will start doing better.  If I stay here, those will be the first thing to go in my yard.  Actually, if I buy this place, I’ll be ripping out everything along that side of the house and re-planting things so they make sense.  Right now I have 3′ daisies in front of ground hugging daisies.  Ass-backward from any perspective and poor planning.  Here are some pictures taken this afternoon.

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I am nearly done now with what has been an exceedingly long week at work.  This week I clocked 72 hours at work which, generally speaking is about twice what any normal person would work at any other type of job.  It bugs me that I can spend all this time an energy training a well rounded and otherwise exceptional team of employees but my company thinks that things will utterly fall apart if at least one manager is not right there all day long.  Talk about putting absolutely no faith in the ability of my employees.  I am quite comfortable leaving any one of them in charge and leaving.  What could possibly go so horribly wrong in the short amount of time I am gone?  Nothing, it’s retail for shits sake.  It is not a nucleur laboratory!  Anyhow, I have a 12 hour day on Sunday and a 6 hour day on Monday.  Assuming my assistant shows up again after her vacation, I should be out of work for a day off by Monday afternoon FINALLY.  Even more, now I get to do the same thing to her.  On Friday I leave work at 1 PM and I will not be returning for 10 days.  I get to take a vacation.

Speaking of vacation, this year I’ve decided to take a road trip.  Facebook has brought me back in touch with folks I’ve not seen or heard from in nearly a decade.  Last year, some of them came to visit me up here in the northwoods.  This year, I’m going to visit them.  I’m going to Grand Rapids for 2 days, then off to Chicago for 2 days, and then to Indianapolis for 3 days.  I’ll return on Saturday.  I’m looking forward to getting out of here for a little while and selfishly, I’m looking forward to ditching the dog for a short time.  I love Gavin dearly but every parent needs a break every now and then don’t ya think?  Aunt Nancy has graciously agreed to take Gavin for a few days at the start of my trip and then mom and dad will get him for the remainder.  Good lord, I hope he behaves himself.  I’m sure he will.  Well, this is a long enough post for today.  Hopefully I’ll get back in to writing here again as my schedule calms down….I’ve said that before.

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I hate people sometimes.  Actually I hate people who make assumptions and judgments about you before you even open your mouth to say something.  In sales, I’ve been trained not to make judgment calls about people based on their demeanor or appearance…or even their tone.  Quite often, the dirtiest, most foul individual on the planet can be your most valued customer who spends the most money.  Apparently those who work at the Cherryland Humane Society have never had training in how to deal with the public.

As you all know, the cats are done.  It was an agonizing decision to make and certainly one that I did not want to make however nothing I have done to correct their problem behaviors has helped and I can no longer afford to continue letting them destroy this house.  Whatever their issue is, it is too costly for me to fix and I must resolve this problem as quickly and efficiently as possible.  In an attempt to do the right thing, I contacted the Cherryland Humane Society in Traverse City today to ask them what my options were for my cats.  The immediate response I got on the phone was intimidating, condescending and really horribly inappropriate.  As has been reported on the news, I understand that these folks have been inundated with pets since the economy went down the toilet.  People can’t afford them, their shelters are overcrowded and there are a LOT more animals today that need homes than there were even just 6 months ago.  That however is not my concern with this post.  I was asked the ages of the cats and becuase I’m an honest person, I informed them that they were 8 and 10 years old.  “Sorry can’t help you” was the response in short bitchy tones.  Apparently the Humane Society is not in the business of helping people whose pets are older than 5 years old.  They refused to consider them at all which tells me a lot about their primary focus (money).  The conversation continued and at this point I felt I was being treated as some sort of criminal for having the audacity to even consider giving up my pets.  Look, the issue is very simple here.  I have 2 cats that must vacate this house immediately.  There are 2 ways for this to happen.  Way #1 involves adoption through an animal shelter or adoption agency like the Humane Society who IS IN THE BUSINESS of treating animals with respect and dignity.  Way #2 involves leaving them in the woods somewhere.  NEITHER of those ways involve the cats STAYING in this home! Now, do you really think as an animal lover and someone who has had pets all his life is going to choose way #2?  I think not but that seems to be the only option anyone is willing to give me.

The humane society has made it perfectly clear that change can not and should not ever occur in a human’s life and circumstances could never possibly change.  They are intent on making what is truly one of the most difficult decisions I’ve had to make in a LONG time that much more difficult and in the process they’ve managed to piss off a potential donor or contributor to their cause.  There are very few non-profits out there that I would ever consider making a random donation to.  I support the Humane Society’s mission but they’ve been removed from my list due to the lack of professionalism exhibited by their employees.  YOU LOSE.

At the end of the conversation, I was given the name of AC Paws which is a pet adoption agency in Traverse City that works out of Pet Smart.  I sent them an email tonight explaining my situation and asking for their help in placing these cats in a new home while clearly stating that they can not stay here.  For now and until I able able to find some sort of support or help in this community, the cats will remain with me while I try to save up enough money to repair the damage they have already caused me both to my house and emotionally.

It’s too bad I am not yet able to afford my own house.  I’m OK with cats fucking up my own house, I’m NOT OK with cats fucking up someone else’s; ESPECIALLY when I can not afford to successfully repair the damage.  I’m off work tomorrow, likely will head out to Leelanau at some point.  I’ve not been in the mood lately for much writing.  I’ve been somewhat emotional I think due to the change in the weather.  I’m just not ready for winter this year..I hate winter to begin with.  I’m sure my mood will change soon.

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I have to admit, I am LOVING the fact that it does not take me all day to do yard work!  10 minutes to mow, 5 minutes to trim and wallah, I’m done!  I’m looking forward to a day off tomorrow.  Jirar is in town and while the details are sketchy (he’s not staying with me but with my former housemate), it appears that we are going to hit the casino tomorrow night.  I’ve only been to the new Turtle Creak Casino once.  They re-built the old casino and replaced it with a huge new one.  I was out driving around one afternoon and decided to go check it out.  I didn’t even gamble that time but for an Indian Casino, I was pretty impressed with the scale and atmosphere they’ve created.  I love to gamble…really I just love to play slots.  Yes, I know slots have HORRIBLE odds of winning however in the nearly 8 years I’ve been going to the 2 casino’s up here I’ve easily pulled about $10,000 out of those stupid machines.  It’s that ADD thing, the constant noise, games, things grabbing my attention in all directions.  I always have to be careful because I can get carried away but I’m actually pretty good at setting limits and walking out when I should.  I think it will be fun.

The situation is not improving with the cats.  The house stinks…it’s 50 degrees and I have all the windows open right now to air it out.  I’m still cleaning up pet poop and the steps I’ve taken to try and fix the problem have not been working.  I’m afraid the end might be near for their existence in this house.  I just can not afford to fuck up a house that I don’t own.  As I was telling Jirar, if this was my own place, I would not even consider getting rid of them.  However, I don’t see how I can keep this up and not land in some pretty deep trouble when it comes time to move out of here.

Work is really slowing down lately.  We are starting to see some Black Friday shit show up at the store.  It won’t be long before they are cramming low margin crap into the store so we can contribute to the mass chaos the day after Thanksgiving.  I am putting my assistant on morning duty this year.  I’ve had to open for the past 3 years and I’m ready for a break from that this year.  She wants to open anyhow so she will not go out and blow all her money shopping that morning.  Works for me since I don’t participate in that early morning bullshit, I can sleep in then come in to work and clean it all up.  It’s a bit of an odd store to be in that day, we are usually pretty slammed in the morning selling all the shit we normally don’t even carry but come noon, it empties out.  Not too many people out there purchasing drill presses and appliances, or paint for that matter.  I’m sure we’ll see pretty good traffic that weekend though.

Well I must go now and make dinner and finish my laundry.  Here’s another picture.

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A bit of a busy week at work for me!  We had our final inventory audit for the fiscal year and if I am nothing else, I am incredibly consistent.  We passed and I get my bonus.  Without saying too much, inventory audits are conducted as an incentive program and designed to help us keep stock levels in check, the shelves full, and the ordering system functioning.  Passing them means I am doing my job correctly.  There is still room for improvement but all said, my department is where it needs to be right now.

I am a little distressed lately about my cats.  When I last wrote about them, I had indicated that they were living here on a trial basis.  Unfortunately, neither KD or Pooh has been able to correct some of the problems they have using the litter box and I simply can not afford mentally or monetarily, to allow their behavior to continue.  KD has begun marking again and I’ve spent the last month picking up Pooh’s poop off the floor.  Neither animal appears to be unhealthy, both of them know how to use their box becuase I’ve watched them both use it to make sure, neither seems to be under any great deal of stress or anxiety.  I’ve spent hours on the web looking for solutions and I’ve found nothing that is helping.  Tomorrow I will set up a 3rd litter box and I am taking down the baby gate that shuts off their room.  I keep them in the back part of the condo when I am not here, I am wondering if Pooh poops on the floor because he can’t get to the box fast enough.  By removing that barrier (which he has to jump over first to get to the box) perhaps this will reduce the problem.

It’s sad because up until last year, both of these cats had been great animals.  Jirar and I never had one ounce of problems with either of them.  Then, with Jirar leaving, a new roommate and the addition of another cat as well as easy access to the outside yard, both of these cats behaviors changed dramatically.  For fear of insulting the spy’s who read this blog, I won’t interject my opinion as to why my cats are now unable to cope with themselves.  I am willing to go 3-4 more weeks maximum trying to change their behavior.  If there are no improvements, I will be taking them to the humane society or I will attempt to find them a new home.  While I treat them like my children, they are in fact NOT children, they are pets.  Not expendable by any means but pets are bread to conform to the needs of humans, not the other way around.  I don’t have unlimited resources to fix the problems they are creating.

Tomorrow is a day off for me.  I think I will go out to the cottage with Gavin and perhaps spend some time on the boat.  It is supposed to be quite nice, it might be one of the last good days for boating this season.  Cheers!

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Wow, it’s getting cool up here in red neck land.  I’m finally enjoying a day off from work and getting ready to head out to the parents house for a day on the lake.  Not that I’ll be swimming but I know Gavin will be.  I decided it was time to mow my lawn this morning.  Took me about 10 minutes with this great little electric lawn mower my landlord left me.  What a contrast.  At my former house, I would have to plan an entire day around doing yard work.  It would take a minimum of 4 hours JUST to mow the lawn, then there was trimming and watering and everything else.  It was exhausting and HOT.  Thank god I no longer have to worry about that.  Even better, once it snows, I don’t even have to worry about plowing.  It’s going to be done for me!  YEH!!!

I had to go to the Secretary of State this morning and renew my drivers license and also change my voter registration.  It never ceases to amaze me how busy that office is and how rude the clerks are.  I guess when you work for the state you have some sort of license to be a shit head.  Oh well, my new license is in the mail and within a couple weeks I’ll have my voter registration back in the mail so I can vote in the election this fall.  Without question it will be for Obama.  At one time in my life I called myself a conservative but I have never voted for a republican.  As I get older, it’s easier to see just how fucked up the world really is, the republican party to me is a party that is terrified of change, espouses hypocritical “family values” (Nice to see that abstinence only education worked wonders with Palen’s daughter…NOT), rules with heavy handed and unnecessary laws, spends uncontrollably, has NO concept what-so-ever of science, and is led by these righteous wing nut theocrats who really believe they are doing the work of Jesus fucking Christ.  Sorry folks, JESUS WAS A LIBERAL.

OK enough politics…it makes me crazy.  Gonna pack up the camera and the dog now and head out to Leelanau.  Maybe another post tonight with some new pictures!

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Tomorrow (Saturday) I get to wake up at 4am due to my inability to be an asshole to my team members.  It’s a holiday weekend.  NOBODY wants to work but you know, we retail slaves are open for business JUST FOR YOU on a holiday so you can stain your fucking deck [incorrectly].  Well since I had nobody else to work, I took the early shift where I will have the pleasure of stocking shelves for 2 hours in the morning before the store opens.  At least I won’t have to stick around once the doors open.  I hate Memorial Day and Labor Day weekends up here.  The lunatics REALLY come out of the woodwork around here.  Had a guy spill a full gallon of stain all over the floor and then literally run away leaving foot prints all the way across the store to the exit doors.  Spills happen folks, don’t embarrass yourself any more by running away, how about if I give you a FUCKING paper towel?  No?  I guess not.  Enough about work.

I’ve received all my bills now for my new place except for my water bill (I suspect that is a quarterly bill here).  Looks like Gas and Electric combined will be under $65 a month.  My cable (which STILL is not working right) and internet will be my most expensive bills.  I’ll take it, I use those two utilities more than any of the other ones.  So, it looks like when I add up ALL my bills (debts, utilities, rent, gas money, food, and random shit) I can live for less than what I was paying just in rent before.  I might even be able to get that retirement account going this year…I need a few months though to make sure I have a reliable percentage I can sacrifice each week.  Just having arrived to a point in my life where I am not living paycheck to paycheck, I’d like to actually enjoy it for a minute.

The pets are adjusting fine to the new condo.  I do have to separate them however when I leave for the day.  It seems that Gavin is just too dam smart for his own good.  2 baby gates and a door he could never slide through has not been enough to keep him out of the cat food.  Fortunately, my condo is set up nicely so that I can separate the cats in the back and dog in the front and everyone has all kinds of room to sleep all day long.  Like the pets, I am really liking it here.  I still have a ton of unpacking and sorting to do but I am taking my time now since everything I really need is in its place, now it’s just the little shit I have to find places for.  Soon it will be time to start thinking about decorating for Christmas (yes, my retail mind thinks Christmas starts in September).  I’m looking forward to seeing what I can do.

OK, well off to bed now so I can actually get out of bed in the morning. Here is a picture of a VERY tired Gavin on the last day of my “residency” in Leelanau.  We just finished playing fetch.

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