Mondays are Bad

So today is Monday. I don't like Mondays. I think they are evil. :)

After being out of the office Wed - Fri last week for the conference and then moving all weekend. I don't think it is hard for you all to imagine how behind I am. Not to mention this was my second conference this month!

So I spent the day catching up on emails, helping faculty, dealing with student issues, dealing with instructor issues, and proofing an entire course for College Algebra! Fun for me :) I may have to work tonight....I started at 6:30 am today and it is now 5:30 pm and I am still at it.. I think I will take a break for dinner and then try to do a little more. I must get caught up because I am out of the office on Friday again.

The bright side...only 3 more days of work this week! :)

Hope you all had a great Monday!

The rental

Well, the time is coming, we are going to have to move into the rental :). I took some pictures when I was there yesterday. Let me explain:

This is the front of the small house. There is a screened in porch that you first enter before entering the house.

This is the master bedroom. It came all decorated with the curtains :) The rug is ours that we had in our office here in Longmont

This is the living room. We will add our loveseat and our coffee table but then the room will be full :)

This is the dining room.

These two are pictures of the kitchen....those of you who have been to our house in Longmont know that this is VERY small compared to what I am used to. But I just keep saying...it is for a short while and then I get a great kitchen!

This is the backyard. We are so glad to have a nice place for Stormy and Deogi to play.

So that is the grand tour...it didn't take too long did it? We will keep you posted on the goings on on the ridge. ....

Just a week left

Well this time next week (Monday) we'll no longer own our house in Longmont. It will be a sad day for us cause even with all the little annoyances, we really do like this house and where we are at. I'm hoping we will feel the same about the new house in no time, but that is at least 3 months away at this point.

The house is looking really sparse now and most of the rooms are empty. We have some pictures of the rental on the camera and hopefully later I'll upload them into picassa.

Moving Ouches...

Oh, I have not been this sore in a long time. The worst part for me today had to be when I was moving the dresser down the stairs, missed a step and smacked my funny bone on the ledge. I think the dresser caught me on the chest as well, since I have a couple of bruises there as well. I was unable to feel anything in my left hand for about 10-15 mins. Then right after that I got a cramp in my left arm and could not move it. Luckily an ice pack was handy and in a few minutes I was back in action. My left arm is a mess with scrapes and bruises, but I'll heal. Might need to go see Dr. Kari soon to make sure everything is where it is supposed to be. I'm sure I'm a wreck.

The most exciting part is that tomorrow we get to do it some more. Yea... :(

Moving Hurts

Today we moved, and moved, and moved. We had two trailers (one we don't have to unload), that we filled up and sent to Ft. Morgan. My brother and parents drove the trailers back down there. Tomorrow Kevin and I will take my car, and his truck (which we also loaded) and head to Ft. Morgan. Where we will unload the big trailer and our cars.

There isn't much left here at the house. We are sitting on the loveseat, and I have the laptop on my lap....that is about all there is here in the house. But we are both beat up. Bruises, scrapes, aches and pains. And just think tomorrow we get to drive down there and unload almost all of it. Ugh. I am so tired. Tonight is a Tylenol night for sure. :)

Wish you were all here......to help LoL.

Conferences

Whew, my conference is over. Actually, today's keynote speaker was really great. We heard from Sir Ken Robinson. If you ever get a chance to listen to him speak (even if you are not involved in education), it would be well worth your time. He has a gift for communicating with his audience, using humor and getting his point across. Those of you who know me well, know I rarely talk this positively about someone I hear from at a conference, so that tells you how good he was.

Overall my conference was OK. I usually hope to come away from a conference with one or two ideas or thoughts that I can think about and hopefully act on within my current position. The challenge of conferences is that when you get back to the daily grind of work, to not forget about the inspirations you had at the conference.

Speaking of daily grind.....time to get to packing and moving!

Life in the City

Ok, so for those of you who haven’t lived in a small community before here is an example of the life...

We needed to put the utilities for our rental in our name. So, Kevin calls the city to do so. Nope you have to do it in person, with a picture ID. Ok, since we are 1.5 hours away (one way), I call my mom and tell her to go down and put them in her name, and then we will just pay the bill. Mom is very happy to do this for us. Monday, she goes down to the city and says “I need to put the utilities at [# Street ] in my name”. Will they do that? No. Why? Because the landlord must first sign a release.

So we contact the landlord, who promptly goes down and signs the release. Tuesday, Kevin and I decide we will take a load of stuff to the rental, and turn on the utilities. We go into the city building and there is a lady at a window, and say “we need to put the utilities at [# Street ] in our name”. She says, “Oh you have to come over here” Over here is really turning to the other side of the counter to that “window”. Then we tell her again “We need to put the utilities at [# Street ] in our name”. The city lady says “I just started that earlier this week for an older lady” Now this tells you a couple of things:

1. My mom is old (She knows this….)
2. There isn’t that much business in Ft. Morgan that she can remember the address and who was in the office.

I politely tell the lady “that was my mom”. So she says, “Ok, I will start over”. What does starting over entail do you think? She goes to her book, and the start of the receipt and she crosses out [# Street ], and then turns the page on a new receipt she writes [# Street ]. Yes that is starting over. Why she had to start over I am not sure, since the only information she had actually written down was the address.

So for the next 5-7 minutes we stand there, while she copies Kevin’s driver’s license, enters information into the computer, and then writes down the information from the computer into her receipt book. Again, I am not sure why you have to enter it into the computer and then also write it in the book, why it isn’t all saved and then a receipt printed out I am not sure. We think she is almost done when she says “Have you had service with us before?” Wouldn’t the computer tell her this? “No, we are just moving to the area”. She says “well then I need a letter from your current company that says you have the credit and that you pay promptly”. Did they tell us that on the phone? NO. So of course we don’t have that. So she says “then you will have pay a deposit” Fine no problem…so finally after all that time and $150 later, we have electricity and water in our name in the grand city of Ft. Morgan.

Happily we go out to the car….and what does Kevin do? He announces to the entire city that we will be moving into the area. Yes he was very loud. What did he do? He somehow pushes the panic button on the keyless entry of the car….HONK HONK HONK! Over and over, “How do I shut it off he says” HONK HONK HONK!, finally after 2 minutes…(I know 2 minutes isn’t long but when you hear HONK HONK HONK, it is a LONG time.), he gets it off. Whew….time to head back to Longmont.....

Pictures...

Since we are moving, I don't think I will be able to have my website up anymore. So I'm moving our pictures to here: http://picasaweb.google.com/kdekorte.

I have a lot to put up there, so I'll keep working on them.

RE: Saddle Ridge

Jody is right, when you read about Saddle Ridge on that web site, you'll think we just live one block down from heaven. Now it really is not that bad of a place... but come on, I think they are really laying it on a little thick

Saddle Ridge

Well, I am in a session at this conference...I don't think I am learning much. I don't mean to brag, but I hate it when I know as much as the presenters. I must start presenting at conferences. I think you just pretend to know a lot about something, but obviously you don't have to...LoL

So, I thought you might want to learn more about Saddle Ridge and where we are moving:
http://www.fortmorganrealestate.net/saddle.html

We are at lot 5...but I love how they say "Inspired by its picturesque views and vistas, Saddle Ridge captures high plains, semi-arid living at its finest. " Makes it sound so luxurious :) Ha....

Welcome to the Ridge

Hi all,

Ok, so I am at this conference and everyone talks about blogging with your classes. Now, I could do that, but I thought it would be more fun to just blabber away about what is new with us and share it with all of you!

So what is new with us? Well we sold our house, so we are moving to a small rental....we will take a picture and post it here for you all. We are hoping that we don't have to stay there too long, as our new house on the "ridge" should be ready by the first part of July.

Basically our life now is about packing and moving, we have 1.5 weeks and we must be out of the house. I will miss this house, very much, and I am sad to leave it.

So we are giving up this.......

But eventually we will be in this :)