Storms

Last night we were sleeping when the tornado sirens woke us up. The next thing I knew, I was wet. No, it's not what you think. The roof did not rip off and let the rain in. Mama spilled her water on me....AGAIN! It's the second time she has done that. She took a drink of water and when she sat it on the table, it fell off and on to my bed. I got up and moved to Scout's bed because Scout had gotten scared due to the storms and moved to Mama and Daddy's bed. I normally do that myself, but I was brave last night and just went back to sleep after the excitement died down. We didn't have any damage here that we know of, but other places did. The storms came though and were moving so fast that they were gone in just a few minutes. It was a lot like the storms that came through on New Year's Eve.

We drove by several homes this weekend, but we didn't find anything we liked. Daddy is still in love with the log cabin and yes, we drove by it again on Sunday. I think he is still going to try and buy it. We are thinking there are personality conflicts between the agents due to some things that we learned on Friday. We will say more at a later time.

Jack
The Greyhound Who May Need To Move His Bed Away From Mama

The House Hunting Continues

Mama and Daddy didn't have much success yesterday with their house hunting. The Dalmatian House really wasn't one. It was cream and brown. It looked white and black in the photos. Mama said it was really cute, but the RV wouldn't be able to make it up the driveway. Normally, the folks do a "drive-by" of the houses they are interested in to be sure they really want to see them. They didn't on this one, so it was a waste of everyone's time. The second house is still a maybe, but it's a little further out than they we want to be. It has some really nice updates, so it's move in ready. It only has an one car garage though. It has a small lake across the street and that would be an awesome view to see each day. Mama likes it, but is not sure it's the right house. They viewed a third one that needed a total makeover. The basement had some issues and they were considering it until they read the subdivision by-laws and that particular lot cannot have any out buildings built, so no sheds or carport for the RV. :::sigh:::

We are going to do some "drive-bys" today in a totally different area. Hopefully, we will find something that we like enough to see the inside. We have two main things that we need in a house. We need a place to park the RV and we need high speed Internet for Mama's work. The combination of those two things are causing us problems. We also want a yard that doesn't require us to use steps to get to, but so far, we have been able to get around that problem in most of the houses that we have toured.

Jack
The Greyhound Who Is STILL House Hunting

We are participating the blog hop again this weekend. Have fun and we hope you make some new friends!

More House Hunting

(Miss Scout in her pink hat.)

Mama and Daddy are going house hunting today. They are looking at three. We are not holding out much hope, but maybe they will like one of them. Mama and Daddy like to nickname the houses they look at. They named one the dirty underwear house because well, the guy left his dirty underwear out all over the house. There was the urine house. We probably don't need to talk any more about that one. Today, they are looking at the "mystery basement house". It's called that because Daddy thinks there may not be an entrance to the basement from the inside of the house. He has not seen any steps for the basement in any of the photos. Mama hopes he is wrong on that. They are also looking at the Dalmatian house. It's a white house that has some black bricks on it and well, it looks like black spots on the house. They even have a black and white polka dotted shower curtain. It's the one that they are the most excited about today.

Guess what? The mean bank people lowered the price on the log home. That's right, they took it down $2,000 and it's lower than the bottom line price that they offered Mama and Daddy. LOL That means no one else put a contract on it and they just didn't want to deal with us. :-P We heard on the news this morning that the mean bank people are wanting more help from the government. Hmmmm.....maybe they should work with the people who have cash in hand and are wanting to buy their houses. It's just a thought.

We had snow this morning. What is up with that? It will be 60 on Sunday, so it won't last long, but I still don't like it.

Jack
The Greyhound Who Wishes House Hunting Was As Easy As It Is On House Hunters

Wordless Wednesday - Me and My Dad

Jack
The Greyhound Who Enjoys Alone Time With His Dad

The Power Of Marketing

Mama is off today for President's Day. She decided to leave us behind and go to the mall and then do some other shopping. Can you believe that? She stopped at Trader Joe's. It was her first time. She said she met the nicest people. There were some elderly gentlemen that recommended the sweet potato fries. They were even giving her tips on how to prepare them. One of the men told her to spray olive oil on them. She had never thought of that and luckily, Trader Joe's had the spray. The checkout lady even told her it was great and to try it on salad. Anyway, the reason we are telling you all of this is because Mama brought us something special from Trader Joe's and the only reason she bought it was because of the box.

Do you see why? There is a greyhound on the box! His name is Bradley. We have to say that the peanut butter treats get 8 paws up from us. Yep, we love them. We are so glad that Bradley put his photo on the box otherwise we would have never have gotten them. Yep, that's the power of marketing and we are glad that Mama fell for it.

Thank you to everyone for their nice comments concerning us not getting the house. We really wanted it and we could still buy it, but they just want more money than we are willing to pay for it. It needed too many repairs and Daddy said we would be loosing money on it. If the bank people come to their senses, then we will re-consider. We know that is not very likely. LOL We hope something good comes on the market this week. Mama is starting to feel like we are just going to have to settle on something. :::sigh:::

Jack
The Greyhound Who Likes Trader Joe's

No Log Cabin For Us

Yesterday, we went with the folks to visit the log cabin and to see it without snow on the ground. A neighbor came over and talked to Mama and Daddy. He gave them some additional news on the place that made them wonder if they wanted to live there. He's the second person who has warned them that the septic may have an issue. He also told them that there will be special assessments of $1,500 for the next 5 years for road repairs. They said they were glad to learn of the additional costs. Daddy said that the driveway for the motor home would have to be completely re-done and also the backyard was in pretty bad shape and it would take a lot of work to make it nice for us. They left wondering if they even wanted the house anymore. They decided that if the mean bank people came in at our price which was more than we ever wanted to pay for it, we would take it. However, if they wanted any more money, we would walk away. As we were leaving the log cabin, another couple pulled up with an agent. Mama almost told them about the septic, roof and assessments, but decided to let fate decide if we would get the log cabin. We found out today that we are not going to get it. The mean bank people not only did not meet our price, but they INCREASED their price by $2,500. They went backwards! We wonder if the young couple put in an offer. We just hope they put a contingency concerning inspections otherwise, they may be in for some unhappy surprises.

We have wasted a month trying to get that log cabin. The mean bank people who shall remain nameless took 3-5 days to respond to each and every offer. They caused Mama to have a migraine on Friday. Mama is worn out after dealing with them. It's back to the drawing board to find us a new house.

A Tour Of Our Room

Since we cleaned our room yesterday, Mama said we could take you on a tour of it.

This is our living room. We re-arranged the furniture and we like it much better. The plants came from our house.


This is the bedroom area, obviously. Sorry for the shiny eyes. Mama used the flash and now she won't help me get rid of them.

We stack the beds during the day and at night my bed goes on the left side of the bed which is Mama's side. She can cover me up easily that way. It works well except she has to step over me to use the bathroom. The other night she knocked a glass of water on me, so that was not good, but usually it works out fine.

The bathroom is to the left of the bedroom. It has really nice granite tops.


Here is the kitchen. The desk is where Mama works and it is also the kitchen table.

The website says our room is 480 square feet. Our old house was 2,600 square feet. Mama says that it has been good for her to get used the smaller space because when we move into the next house, it will seem huge compared to our hotel room. She has found that having a small kitchen isn't bad and actually is more efficient than having a big one because she doesn't have to take as many steps to do things. She does have to put the baking sheets on the fax machine when she uses the oven and we do have the blender and crock pot on the floor when they are not in use, but it works for us.

I hope you enjoyed a tour of our room. It's the place we call home right now.

Jack
The Greyhound Who Is Acting As Your Hotel Tour Guide Today

We are participating in the Saturday Blog Hop. We messed up our name when we joined today. Mama was half a sleep. Oh, well. LOL Have fun exploring and hopefully you will find some new blogs to add to your daily reading.

Fire Alarms

(Scout in her pool in 2007. She wished she could jump in a pool yesterday.)

We are going to the park and out for lunch today because the hotel is going to test the fire alarms. They are going to come in our room and test ours and that's probably not too bad, but Daddy said they will set the alarms off all over the hotel at the same time and it will be loud. They will go off for at least 5 minutes. Mama thinks we will be scared, so that's why we are leaving. We have to clean our room before we make our escape though. Mama doesn't want the hotel people to see our room in it's natural state. LOL

Yesterday, we had to turn our air conditioning on. It was 76 degrees here! It was a beautiful day.

Mama says the mean bank people are making her jump through hoops, but we haven't seen any hoops in our room. Our agent told us not to get too excited because he doesn't know if the latest hoop jumping means that our offer has been accepted or not. Daddy thinks it's good news, but Mama says that they could just be leading us on just to tell us no, again. If they tell us no, Mama says we are going to walk away, at least for a while. Daddy says the same, so we will see what happens. This house buying is stressful!

Jack
The Greyhound Who Is Going Out To Lunch With His Mama and Sis

Wordless Wednesday

Scout
The Greyhound Who Is A Cutie!

Car Washes Are Scary!

This morning Mama asked us if we wanted to go for a ride. Scout and I got all excited. We were dancing around and couldn't wait. It was not a fun ride. Why? She took us to an automatic car wash! It was so scary! Scout and I were both shaking in our paws. It was loud and water was banging on our windows. Then, we went under the dryer and it nearly sucked us through the sunroof! When we got back to the hotel, Mama said we could go on a walk. No way! We wanted to get back to the safety of our room. We are giving Mama the stink eye now.

Yesterday, the hotel people surprised Mama with a Valentine's present.

It's grape juice and chocolate. She thought it was a really nice surprise.

Mama re-arranged the living room furniture yesterday. We have more room now. I can almost do zoomies in the room now. The couch seems more comfy now that it has been moved.

No word from the mean bank people. They appear to be ignoring our offer. It's not looking good. Mama is pretty stressed about it all.

Sorry about my short and matter of fact post today. I'm still shaking over the car wash incident.

Jack
The Greyhound Who Is Probably Going To Have Nightmares About Car Washes

Happy Valentine's Day!

The weather is still wonderful here and it's supposed to be like this all week! Yesterday, we went to the park and as promised, we walked until we couldn't walk any more. Actually, we made it home from the park just fine, but then we went for another walk in the office complex and Scout didn't want to continue. She acted like a mule. After a three hour nap, Scout was as good as new and we walked around places that we haven't been able to reach due to all the snow. It was a fun day.

What are we doing for Valentine's Day? Well, it doesn't sound like a lot of fun. Mama has to do laundry. It takes a few hours, but then she is done for about a week. Our room looks like a dry cleaner on laundry day because she hangs all the sweatshirts in the bathroom because she doesn't want to dry them in the dryer and then she has jeans hanging on a drying rack. Mama says we will take a few longs walks today and maybe, just maybe, we will go out for lunch. She has to work today, so she has to squeeze that in somewhere. Tonight, the folks may go out to dinner, but Mama is not sure. Daddy may need to go shoe shopping because he realized that he put his dress shoes in the Pod and he needs to wear a suit tomorrow.

No word on the cabin from the mean bank people. We are hoping that they were just waiting to see if anyone else looked at it this weekend before getting back to us. We hope it doesn't mean that someone else put in a better offer. It was a long weekend wondering if we are going to get our cabin.

Hope you have a greyt day!

Jack
The Greyhound Who Is Happy That The Snow Is Melting

We Saw The Cabin

Yesterday the folks drove out to see another house. They had a heck of a time finding it. They had two different set of directions and even Tom Tom said the place didn't exist. The directions said to turn on an unmarked road and the approximate miles the directions gave were two miles off. They thought the realtor would have a sign up on the road, but she didn't. Finally, they found the house. Mama said it looked really nice from what she could tell peeking through the windows. It's a foreclosure, so it's empty. Mama liked it, but they decided it was too far out. It's about fifty miles from Daddy's work and we need to be within forty miles.

Later in the day, they told us we could go with them while they drove past houses that they were interested in. We only found one that we thought was nice. Two of the houses were on really bad roads. One road was so bad that we had to put it in four wheel drive and we still didn't know if we would make it. It was muddy and bumpy and still had some ice on it. We decided that even though the Jeep could make it, the RV wouldn't like it at all. Scout thought it was fun driving on the bumpy roads.

Mama asked if we wanted to see the log cabin and we said we did. Oh, we loved the road. It reminded us of home. It felt like a nice place to live. We didn't get out of the car when we pulled into the driveway of the log cabin, but we liked what we saw. There is a golden retriever who lives next door and Scout thought he looked very nice. We really hope we get the house. Oh and you know what we saw as we were leaving? THE PIZZA MAN! Yes, the pizza man comes with the log cabin. We were quite surprised, but Daddy told us we were only about two miles from the pizza place. What could be better than that? We have all our paws crossed that we get the house, but Mama says those bank people seem to be mean so we can't get our hopes up. :::sigh:::

Today, we are going to get our nails done and then we are going to the park and we are going to walk until we can't walk any more. It's a beautiful day here!

Jack
The Greyhound Who Is Dreaming Of Living In A Log Cabin

The Big Thaw!

(Here's an old photo of us when we had room to stretch out. LOL)

It's been a rough week. The 4" of sleet that fell last week melted just enough to make it extremely slick to walk on. It's not fun walking when you are sliding all over. It's all hard to do your business when you start to do it and you loose your footing.

We have been counting the days until the weekend because it is going to be near 50! We are so excited! Yesterday, it was 44 degrees and while there are still a lot of slick spots, we felt happy to be walking. Mama even took us to McDonalds to celebrate!

On the house hunting front, we have put another offer in on that log cabin. They finished the work on it this week and Mama and Daddy visited it on Wednesday. As expected, they didn't do a very good job. They put carpet in the master bathroom, but they didn't put a pad under the carpet in that room so it will be less material to remove. They put carpet in the four season room aka sun room which sounds nice, but it should have been indoor/outdoor carpet because it's really not a room that can be used year round. We would use it more like a screened porch. It's were our dirty feet will hit when we come in from the yard. They didn't replace the ceramic tile in the main bathroom which would be fine if that tile actually was grouted. Then the really bad thing that they did was they caulked around the old tile in the foyer instead of grouting it. They painted the rooms and they look fine. They put in a new stove and dishwasher, but took out the refrigerator, washer and dryer. The home still needs work to be done, but now it is move-in ready. Mama and Daddy put in an offer that was $10,000 higher than the last one and the bank came down a $1,000. We then went up $2,000 more, but haven't heard back from the bank. Mama says she doesn't think we will be able to agree on a price. The bank people have never seen the house in person and it probably looks and sounds better on paper. We know it needs part of the roof repaired, so we have to hold out money to fix that. We really want the house, but Daddy says we have to think with our heads and not our hearts. There is another house that came on the market yesterday, that we are going to drive by today and see if we like the area. It looks nice in pictures, but we have been fooled before.

We are going to check out a park this weekend that we haven't been to before. It's going to be such a nice a weather weekend! Roo! Roo!

Jack
The Greyhound Who Is Ready For The Big Thaw!

Almost Wordless Wednesday - Scout Relaxing

(Frosty Treat Overload - see empty container to the right.)

Finally Friday

(Jack and Scout in 2009)

It's been a long week here. Daddy made it home Wednesday night. He's still sick, so he's not walking us or anything like that. He said he's feeling better and will probably start walking us this weekend. We ended up with like 4" of sleet, some ice and a few inches of snow. It wasn't the blizzard that was predicted, but people not far from us did get the deep snow. It did cause a lot of problems on the roads, but the sleet has been pretty easy for us to walk on. We don't sink in it. We just walk right on top of it.

Yesterday, we had to take Scout to the vet. Mama noticed blood during her morning pee. The vet said to come in ASAP even though Scout was not showing any other signs of not feeling well. Mama was a little nervous about driving to the vet because of the road conditions. She finally got her confidence up and then Daddy came home and drove us anyway. I got to go only because Daddy came with us. I didn't want to stay home alone, but Mama said if Daddy hadn't come home, I would have had to because she couldn't leave me in the car in the cold and I didn't want to visit the vet myself. It turns out that Scout has a bladder infection and has to take medicine for a little while. The vet said that a lot of people notice blood in urine when it snows because it's easy to see. I hope that the medicine makes Scout nicer. Let me just tell you that I know why female dogs are called the "B" word. Sometimes I just walk close to her and she barks at me. Sheesh! Oh, Scout wanted me to mention that she has lost two pounds. She needs to loose more than that, but she is proud that all her walking around the hotel complex is working.

We had Chinese food last night! Mama had General Tso, so we didn't get any of the chicken. We did get a few bites of the leftover won tons.

Mama has to go to the police station today and get fingerprinted! She has to do it for her job. She thinks it's pretty silly considering that she just calls places to verify employment for people who have applied for jobs. Apparently, she has to be a licensed private investigator in Texas in order to call people in Texas. She still doesn't understand because no one ever asks her if she is licensed or even what her name is. It didn't really bother her at first about being fingerprinted, but now she is getting a little nervous about it. Should she be nervous having her fingerprints on file for a job that pays so little?

Jack
The Greyhound Who Thinks His Sister is a Brat

Living Dangerously

I decided I better cover up my nose since I'm so close to Scout's behind. She had very bad gas last night and I'm not sure if it's really safe yet.

Jack
The Greyhound Who Is Living Dangerously

Blizzard!

We are waiting for the blizzard to arrive. Yesterday we had freezing rain. Mama was nervous all day, but it never really got bad as far as the sidewalks were concerned. She took us out one at a time and we walked really slow, but we didn't have any problems. Daddy didn't come home because he thought the roads would be really bad this morning. He called last night and we think he has the flu. That's not good. Mama is worried about him. He could still come home before the blizzard arrives, but he is stubborn and probably won't.

Mama has been worried about loosing power because of the ice. This morning, she was taking a shower and the bathroom light went out. We heard her say "well, it's happened". She then discovered that the electric didn't go out, but the heat lamp in the bathroom turned off. LOL She was relieved.

The pizza man and the Chinese food guy don't deliver in blizzards, but we have fish sticks. Daddy made fun of Mama for buying 115 fish sticks at Sam's Club, but who is laughing now? We think fish sticks may catch on as the new blizzard food.

We will take pictures when something finally happens around here. It's pretty dull right now.

Jack
The Greyhound Who Is Waiting For the Blizzard