Today, we had scattered thunderstorms throughout the day. I was planning on painting some of the new siding, but I guess I'll have to wait. I started it last night with the kids, but we didn't get very far. I was hoping that it was going to be one of those made-for-TV movie moments, with the three of us laughing while we got paint all over ourselves. It didn't quite go like that. Choosygirl got tired after about ten minutes and went inside to watch some TV. Choosyboy helped a little until he got distracted with an old rusty screw that he found beneath the deck.  read more »

We stopped by the library today to borrow a folding table for our little camping and cookout party. Since my wife works there, we get this benefit for free. While we were returning the keys to the store-room, a young man came up to the counter and asked one of my wife's coworkers if she could check to see how much money he owed the library. My jaw almost hit the floor when she told him $180. He then asked if he could pay part of it and start checking out books again. Fortunately, she told him, "no".  read more »

Just as I was starting to think that choosyboy was maturing a little, he received a highlight next to his name on the sign-out sheet yesterday at pre-school. Apparently, he threw a rock at a boy during recess after being told to stop twice. His teacher asked me if there was anything going on at home that might be causing his misbehavior, and I drew a blank. I thought he was actually doing better, as bedtime hasn't been so bad lately.  read more »

This year, we won't be heading home for the holidays. We just can't afford it, and to be honest I hate traveling during the holidays as it is. Most of our family still lives in Colorado, and they've been bugging us about visiting for several months now. Fortunately, my parents have decided that they are going to come out and visit us during the week after Christmas. My father traded his Vegas timeshare for a comparable floorplan in Branson, and they would like us to come out and spend some time with them.  read more »

Choosymom and I have decided to plan a party / camp-out on our acreage next weekend. We're guessing that this will be the last chance we will have to camp this year without freezing our buns off. We've had a couple of nights that dropped below 30 degrees already, which should have killed off most of the ticks and chiggers. We spent a day on our acreage last weekend with the kids and none of us returned home with any bug-bites. So that is always a good sign.  read more »

Ever since I was a child, I've had to be careful with the types of foods that I eat. Although my grandfather boasted of having a "cast-iron stomach", my mother and I took after my grandmother. I was diagnosed with lactose intolerance when I was a teen, which may have explained so many of the embarrassing episodes that I had already experienced by that point in my life. I recall having to run off the baseball field to get to the toilet in time, and I remember having to defecate in a shopping bag in the back of a minivan once because we couldn't locate a public restroom.  read more »

I don't want to jinx us, and maybe I should knock on some wood as I report this, but choosyboy has done great at bedtime for the last two nights. He seems to be following his old routine, although I cannot figure out what has triggered the change. Maybe his school experience was a little "off" for the last few weeks and that's what was causing the trouble before. Or perhaps he's feeling a little better about our house looking normal again.  read more »

Every parent likes to think that they're one step ahead of the child-rearing game. Once you've had more than one kid, you may feel particularly accomplished. You survived the post-meconium mustard poop. (Heck, you survived the meconium!) You've dealt with all the leaky diapers, and finally found the specific brand that works for each gender. You've scraped the Play-Doh from the carpets. Maybe you're even ready for another round. I've seen it a million times across parenting blogs (including my own) - that "been there, seen that" attitude.  read more »

It's that time of the year again...when you find a little photocopied note in your kid's backpack indicating that head lice has been discovered at school. In case you're new to this, don't be alarmed. This happens every year, and it's common in most parts of the country. (It's not just a backwoods Ozark thing.) Even when I was kid attending a private catholic school, someone would get it. I remember my mom breaking out that really fine-tooth comb and going through my hair slowly, starting at the scalp moving outwards, looking for little white "eggs". Is it lice? Is it dandruff?  read more »

After twenty plus years, my parents recently put their house up for sale. It wasn't an easy decision, but my father is a custom home builder, and the market right now is weak. My mother is very upset, for good reason. While I don't think she would consider their current home to be a perfect "dream" home in any way, it is difficult to leave behind any place with so many years of memories.  read more »

I'm stressing out. Choosyboy has been giving us a lot of trouble at bedtime lately. I'm not sure what triggered it, but all of a sudden his bedtime routine has become a battle. From brushing his teeth to changing into his pajamas, to actually going to bed, he fights us every step of the way. I used to actually look forward to bedtime, as we had our little routine and he was so calm and cuddly. He would put on his pajamas, brush his teeth, pee in the potty one last time, and pick a book for me to read him.  read more »

Another alternative to the traditional college that is available for our children is the online degree. Reports have suggested that there are now five times as many online college students as there are at traditional colleges. It sounds incredible, but if you really think about it, it makes perfect sense.  read more »

When I was growing up, college was an assumed stepping stone towards a happy life. Since I was a child, the wheels had been set in motion for me to earn a degree. I'm sure that my parents had lofty (high-paying) career goals for me, and yet I ended up pursuing fine arts because that is what I was interested in. I had a chance to attend a very prestigious fine arts college in New York with a partial scholarship, but I opted to stay in town and attend the local state college instead. Why?  read more »

Choosygirl seems to be gaining a little weight. She's got a little tummy now, and maybe even a couple of barely noticeable lumps growing on her chest. It's not much, but easy to see since she is so skinny. Choosymom noticed a little blood residue in her panties yesterday, and thinks that our daughter may be getting her first period soon. I just about dropped my jaw on the floor when she said this. At seven?  read more »

When choosymom and I were about 19 years old, we walked into a bank with a notebook full of ideas. We wanted to open a new nightclub in Denver. We had drawings, logos, playlists, ideas, ideas, and more ideas. But we had very few facts to back any of it up, and we had very little money to invest in it. So it was no surprise that the loan officer more-or-less laughed at us. Sure, we had pulled all the local demographics that we could find at the time, but aside from the PA, loudspeakers and CD players, we had no idea what most of it was going to cost.  read more »

If you don't run a CMS platform for your website or blog, and have no idea what Drupal is, you may want to skip this post. I just feel like venting a little...  read more »

As a self-employed web entrepreneur, I'm forced to keep my eyes peeled for the next big marketing opportunity. Much of the income that I generate comes from affiliate marketing, which is basically me getting paid to drive traffic and sales to other websites. I run advertisements on several search engines, and I do pretty well, but I'm constantly trying to stay one step ahead of the competition in order to optimize the return on my advertising investment.  read more »

Our meeting with choosyboy's teacher yesterday went well. Honestly, his teacher doesn't really intimidate me very much, especially since we see her every day when we pick up our son from school. She's very friendly and down-to-earth; a bit hippie-ish, even. So the meeting was quite informal, and she wasn't the bearer of any shockingly bad news. She said that our son has been exhibiting behavior typical of a child his age, but nothing to be concerned about.  read more »

It wasn't long ago that I was first reading about hypnopedia in the classic novel titled Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. The story details a pseudo-utopian world of the future, in which many of life's lessons, ethics, and fears are taught to children via audio loops while they are sleeping. The procedure has been demonstrated with some success in real life, but short of some classical music, my children's ears are rarely treated to much more than the sound of crickets and rustling leaves while they sleep.  read more »

Tonight, we have parent teacher conferences at the local elementary school for choosyboy. I'm not really looking forward to going. Although I don't expect much bad news, I don't enjoy being in these types of one-on-one social situations. Actually, choosymom is going to be with me, so it will technically be one-on-two, but you get the idea. I just get nervous, and the awkward moments where nobody is speaking sometimes makes me say stupid things.  read more »

If you've read this blog for a little while, you've most likely come across my fleeting Luddite attitude. In a nutshell, I loathe unnecessary technological "advancements" that do little more than consume our time. So when I hear about products like the Slingbox, which allows people to feed their ridiculous TV obsessions while they're traveling, I can't help but wonder when our supposed advancements pulled a 180 and pushed us down the path of regression.  read more »

I'm having a quandary as to what to do about our current digital camera. It's an Olympus and has already needed to be replaced once. Now it is no longer under warranty and it is starting to cause memory card problems again. I don't feel like buying new memory cards every six months. It also isn't lasting very long on batteries as it used to. At first, I thought that my rechargeables might not be holding a charge like they used to, but the camera seems to be burning through regular batteries just as fast.  read more »

...with the helpful popcorn machine!

With all of the work we've been doing on our house over the last few weeks, the folks who work at the local Ace hardware store have gotten to know me pretty well. On a number of occasions, I had the kids in tow, and I have to say the popcorn machine near the door works like a charm. Each kid can get their own little bag of popcorn (for free), and it keeps them occupied while I'm fumbling my way around, trying to find whatever it is that I think I need.  read more »

My eyes have been bugging me for the last few days while I've been working on the walls and ceilings. I'm not certain if it is the spray texture, sanding, or the paint but my eyes are itchy, red, and sometimes hazy. Given that I work on a computer so often, this is a like a double dose of bad health for my eyes. I try to do that "look away every few minutes" thing when I'm working on the computer, but I'm not as religious about it as I should be.  read more »

There's an area in the ceiling between our breakfast area and our living room where the drywall seam keeps showing through. The previous owners had tried to repair it once or twice, leaving a shiny ridge on the ceiling that was very noticeable. I think they tried using waterproof caulk. Seeing as we've been spending all this time and attention on making our house look good again, I figured that we might as well fix the seam for good.  read more »

Now that the bailout bill has passed, I'm wondering what kind of trickle-down effect (if any) we're going to see at our local banking establishments. Before the bill was passed, I had inquired with my local bank to see how the economic crisis was affecting them. He stated quite plainly that it wasn't affecting them at all. That certainly flies in the face of what the government was saying about "Main Street USA". And so I am curious to see if we'll see any benefit from the bailout here in "the sticks".  read more »

Tonight, choosyboy said three words that made his mother and I cringe - "I'll kill you". It was in the heat of an argument during his bedtime routine. Upon light inquisition, I discovered that one of his classmates uses this phrase regularly when he is upset. I think we may have to have a discussion with his teacher about it.

These words are only equaled in their disappointment and dismay by those other three words - "I hate you" - which luckily we haven't heard from either of our kids yet. (Either that, or we've successfully erased it from our memory.)  read more »

It's easy to get frustrated when you're trying to make your way through Wal-Mart and you get held up by a caravan of criss-crossing electric wheelchairs. But it's important to remember that for some individuals, this is the only way that they can get around. I sometimes find myself judging the wheelchair-bound if they simply appear overweight and aren't missing any limbs. And it's not right, and I know it. In fact, there's a good chance that it was their lack of mobility that led to their weight problem. It's sad, really.  read more »

Choosygirl has been eating like crazy as of late. Maybe she's going through another growth spurt. It doesn't seem to matter how much food we give her; she always wants more. In fact, with some of our meals, she's already eating as much food as I do! She'd probably eat more if we let her. Although she's still very skinny, I worry about her eating too much. Could this be an early sign of an eating disorder? Or is it just a side-effect of her dad being such a great cook? ;)  read more »

My last post (a gripe about my crummy English muffin experience this morning) just reminded me of the perfect meal we had last night. Must be karma. I don't know what it is, but dinners cooked on barbeque grills taste sooooo much better than their stovetop counterparts. Last night, I threw some Italian-spiced chicken breasts on our mini Weber, and finished off the coals with 2 packs of hot dogs. It's amazing.  read more »

So this morning I had myself a couple of English muffins for breakfast. They were tasty. I like to spread butter and cinnamon-sugar on them, unless we have some fancy flavored cream cheese. Unfortunately, I had some trouble with the toaster, as the muffins were not split properly down the middle. Invariably, the edge of the muffin gets burned and the entire kitchen stinks for a few hours afterwards.  read more »

Although we have yet to receive a decent offer on our current home for sale, I have been working on the plans for our new house for several months now. It seems to change weekly, whenever I see a new layout idea in a plan book, or I discover a new green building material that is surprisingly affordable. I was pretty sure that I had the foundation all figured out, at least up until the storm hit us. Now I'm positive that we're going to have to include a basement in our plans instead. It's funny, because this wouldn't have happened if it wasn't for this tree falling on our house.  read more »

I know that, as a father, I'm probably not supposed to say this, but my son sure is ugly when he is angry. Lately, he's been throwing lots of fits when he doesn't get what he wants, and I'm talking about full blown melt-down style hissy fits. He starts by stomping his foot, talking back, and perhaps looking for something to throw. Then, he'll start wailing like a banshee before turning into a total baby. His face seems to shrink and he gets read all over.  read more »

The traffic this weekend is going to be insane, since my town is in the path of the massive annual War Eagle Crafts Fair. Last year, we made the mistake of driving in the vicinity of the fair one afternoon and got stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic for over half an hour. So I'm having a bit of a dilemma with regards to our kids' Halloween costumes. We've still got two weekends to finish picking up their costume supplies, but I'd much prefer to get our shopping done this weekend rather than fighting even more crowds later.  read more »

Okay, I admit it. I may have been overreacting when I was lamenting the commercial-spawned "death" of Halloween. I guess I'm a bit of an elitist when it comes to DIY holiday culture. I have to admit that I hold more respect for people who work through their problems instead of just throwing money at them. But I do understand the concept behind paying for convenience, and I know that some people are just more creative than others. (I'm still sticking to my guns regarding those obnoxious inflatable lawn decorations, though. They just need to go away.)  read more »

As I mentioned in my last post, Halloween isn't exactly floating my boat this year. Honestly, this isn't a sudden thing, as it seems to have been slipping into shopping oblivion for the past few years (like most of the other holidays). I knew things were going downhill when they started selling greeting cards for Halloween. The presence of pre-fab foam gravestones in every retail outlet only confirmed my fears - Halloween is dead. And I don't mean dead as in "super kewl and hearse-creepy dead", but rather a watered down and stepfordian version of dead.  read more »

Halloween is only two weeks away. I still don't have my costume in order, as I'm having serious second thoughts about spending so much cash on a dozen wigs to play the part of "Cousin It". Honestly, I'm just not that excited about Halloween this year. It is, by far, my favorite holiday of all, but this year I feel unprepared. Last year, we had a party and invited all of our friends. We had a blast, although I got sick from trying to finish off the jello shots at the end of the night. (Everclear is vicious!)  read more »

Not too long ago, I mentioned how my latest plan to abstain from playing the role of tech support with friends and family is to convince them to buy Macs. Not necessarily because Macs are indestructible, but because I know absolutely nothing about them, and am therefore unqualified for tech support. My second technique involves outsourcing...for free.  read more »

Today, I received yet another automated recording from someone named "Kate", claiming that I must call her back before 9pm today regarding an urgent business matter. This mystery robot sure is persistent. I even added the phone number to my screen list, but she must have found another number to call from. While I normally might be curious to see what the heck this is all about, this phonecall could not possibly have any merit. The number they are calling is a pay-as-you-go cellphone. I never registered the phone in my name, and I haven't given the number out to anyone.  read more »

I always like to think of myself as something of a consumer advocate. I get it from my father, who can be a real jerk when he feels he isn't getting his money's worth for something. He's the guy who walks into McDonald's and complains if his fries aren't "standing at attention" like they are in the picture overhead. While I don't think that I've gotten that adamant about my rights as a consumer, I do get excited about certain opportunities to "stick it to the marketer".  read more »

Our kitchen walls still have a small unpainted band around the edges. It is all that is left to do on the interior of our kitchen. I know I need to get this done. I'm just not feeling motivated to break out the step ladder and reach my arms over my head for another hour. My arms already feel a little like jelly after texturing the walls in my home office. It's also too chilly outside today to have the doors and windows open, so the house is apt to reek like paint chemicals all over again.  read more »

I am so excited to learn that one of my good friends will be getting married this fall. It sounds as though I may have played the part of his best man, had I been able to make it to the wedding. Of course, with our current budget crunch, I just cannot afford to fly right now. But this is truly an inspiring development from someone who, only two years ago, was asking me to be the executor of his will because he had nobody else to rely on should he (mysteriously) pass away.  read more »

I have a number of friends who aren't happy with their lives. In some cases, it is the lack of a loved one. With others, they may hate their job, or be crushed under the weight of credit card debt. A few are still chasing the dream of enriching their lives with more stuff, although I tend to steer clear of most people like that.  read more »

The internet has truly spawned an entire generation of "me, me, me" people. Everyone wants to have lots of "friends" on their social media profiles, lots of traffic to their websites, and loyal readers absorbing their blog. In a nutshell, everybody wants to be seen and heard (mostly as something other than their true selves). It's a little like Hollywood for the masses...on steroids.  read more »

Poor choosyboy actually fell asleep on the sofa this afternoon, and has been out for the rest of the night. He was busy hand-banging to some music from the stereo when he suddenly leaned over and instantly fell asleep. It was one of those surreal moments when, as a parent, you feel inclined to get real close and make sure your kid is still breathing.  read more »

In case you're just tuning in, we had a large oak tree fall on our house about a month ago. We are STILL getting things back to normal. The primary reason why it took so long is that the first contractor that the insurance company had sent out (their "preferred provider") screwed up a bunch of things, agreed to put everything back together, and then totally blew us off. After having them break three or four scheduling commitments, we finally had to go with another contractor.  read more »

Also on our list of animals that we would like to have at our new piece of land are some sort of fowl that produces eggs and eats ticks. Chickens might seem like an obvious choice, but we have also heard good things about guinea fowl. They supposedly can feed almost entirely on a diet of insects - primarily ticks! They also produce eggs that taste like regular hen eggs, but have slightly harder shells.

The only problem...they are LOUD!  read more »

Choosygirl is anxiously awaiting our relocation to the acreage that we purchased outside of town. I am, too. I can't wait to start building the home of our dreams. Our kids, however, have a different reason for being excited. They can't wait for us to have more animals.  read more »

Last week, we received a notice from the public school that choosyboy is due for some child immunizations. Seeing as his primary care physician doesn't administer booster shots, we had to traipse to the nearest county health department office in a town about ten miles away.  read more »

Choosygirl has been having a little potty problem lately. Theoretically, she has been potty-trained for several years now, but lately she isn't giving herself enough time to get to the bathroom. So, she'll make it to the bathroom and into the stall, but will pee her pants before she is ready to sit down. In most cases, she is in a public restroom fidgeting with the toilet paper to try and clean and cover the seat. I don't know if she is being too involved with the toilet paper she is putting down on the seat, but Choosymom has decided that she will give our daughter a lesson on "hovering".  read more »

Twelve or fifteen years ago, I would have jumped for joy if someone had invented a cure for acne. My skin was in bad shape, and it seemed to be primarily driven by stress, although I'm sure that puberty, my raging teenage hormones, and an affinity for greasy fast food didn't help.  read more »

When I go to pickup choosyboy from preschool, I have to sign him out on a classroom checklist. If there is an orange highlight next to his name, I'm supposed to see one of his teachers. He either got into trouble, got hurt, or was involved in some sort of schoolmate feud.  read more »

Each year, I get a little frustrated by the fund-raising schemes that the local elementary school comes up with. Honestly, it's not the fact that the school is asking for money that bothers me. Rather, it is the fact that they want my children to act as door-to-door salesmen, and they want them to sell overpriced products that none of our friends, neighbors, or family really want to buy. So we end up straining our relationships with these people so that our children feel accomplished in their fund-raising activities.  read more »

Today, choosymom and I spent about half of the day trying to locate a pipe fitting for the water supply of our icemaker. After visiting a hardware store, plumbing store, and the local Wal-Mart, we finally managed to "engineer" a solution.  read more »

Today, I woke up with a bad headache between the eyes. I'm hesitant to call it an actual migraine headache, but it was so bad that I was feeling nauseous. It was particularly inconvenient, since I was planning on getting our kitchen up and running today. I ended up sleeping about half of the day away, waiting for the headache to go away. At about 11am, I rose from my ill slumber and spent a few minutes checking email. The brightness of the laptop display hurt. The headache was still there, no thanks to the Tylenol I had taken.  read more »

Halloween is going to be the next holiday...to sneak up on me. I have a great idea for a costume, but I'm not sure if I can afford it. I want to create a Cousin It costume based on the character from The Addams Family. To do this, I was planning on sewing a few dozen wigs to a trenchcoat. Then I could wear my prescription sunglasses on top to complete the look. It looks like the cheapest wig I can find is about $5, and seeing as I would probably need a bunch of them, that makes for an expensive costume.  read more »

Last night we installed new vinyl flooring in the kitchen, and we finished hanging the upper level of cabinets today. As a result, I feel pretty accomplished. Of course, it was a lot easier than installing new cabinets, since the holes were already in place. I just had to hold them up, set new screws, and level them.  read more »

If you've been reading for a few weeks, you've probably picked up on my hints that we truly need a vacation...and I mean soon. Problem is...short of using some of this homeowners insurance loss money, I can't really afford it right now. And, even if I could afford it, I'd feel guilty. After all, the country is plunging headfirst into a depression, we're all struggling to survive, and I've already made it clear to friends and family that we can't afford to come home for the holidays this year.  read more »

What does a microwave meal taste like after 54 years of research and development?  read more »

Here's a fun site for killing some time...  read more »

Choosymom and I have been painting like crazy for the last couple of days. Our kitchen is still slightly out of commission, but looking better. The kitchen and breakfast areas are now fully painted (except for the ceilings), and we decided to paint some of the wood wainscoting white. Since it was previously a dark stained woodgrain, it is requiring several coats of white paint. Even then, it appears to be a slightly different shade of white than the rest of our trim. Plus, I've had to replace several old black electrical outlets with nice bright white receptacles.  read more »

My daughter loves to read, and we feel fortunate that she is quite good at it for her age. Even with the numerous times that we have relocated, school has had a positive impact. I'd like to think that her mother and I fostered her fascination with books since she was younger, and I'm sure the fact that choosymom works at the library doesn't hurt. It's common practice for my daughter to max out her library account, both from books and children's movies. The local library has a wonderful collection.  read more »

Every couple of weeks, choosymom will bring home a new cable TV series on DVD from the local library. I generally respond with light disgust, but only because I hate to get sucked into watching another six DVD set. Since we haven't had local or cable television station on our TV for the last 3 or 4 years, we miss lots of the drama portrayed on pseudo "reality" shows, and we luckily escape much of the fear imposed by news media corporations. So I guess the occasional lapse is acceptable. The latest cable series that we have been watching is Dexter.  read more »

Speaking of bigger, better, faster, and more...have you picked up your flat panel plasma hi-def television yet? How about your blu-ray player? Or are you more of an HD-DVD sort of family? Regardless of what your technological Hollywood poison may be, a new plasma HDTV is going to set you back at least $900 from your friendly internet plasma wholesaler, and that's for the absolute lowest of the low-end models.  read more »

Choosymom brought home the latest in toilet paper technology yesterday - the rolls are about a foot thick, with a name that combines marketing buzzwords like "super" and "mega". It's only a matter of time before we have the super-mega-quad-roll-2000 in our home, taking up a good cubic yard of space on the bathroom wall. This stuff can't even fit on the roll. Am I supposed to shell out cash for new toilet paper holders?

Here is our economic crisis - materialized in a consumer fanny wipe. It's all about being bigger, better, faster, and more.

Ever since I was a child, my mother always told me that I was very smart and that one day, I would come up with some "great idea" that would make me lots of money. I even believed her for a while. Since that time, I've had lots of ideas. Most are too lofty, or have been hindered by this silly innate sense of ethics that my parents also provided me with. But sometimes I wonder if I'm trying too hard to come up with something phenomenal. After all, the guy who invented the zipper wasn't delving into rocket science. Neither was the inventor of the post-it note.  read more »

I was just thinking about this whole Wall Street bailout plan, and I have to ask...  read more »

I have been noticing more and more services on the internet that gather free public information, reformat it in some way, and then turn around and sell it at a profit. There are genealogy sites that take free census information, digitize it, and sell access. There are pseudo private investigator services online that take government, dmv, and criminal records and combine them into a "report", which they sell at a fixed cost.  read more »

I admit that the title of this post is a little out of character for me. But I've reached that point where my patient frustrations are giving way to sailor-born colloquialism. And I need to vent to somebody. So please bear with me for a little while...  read more »

The Chick-Fil-A restaurant chain came up with an ingenious product marketing campaign for their tasty chicken sandwiches - an image of a cow holding up a hand-painted sign that reads, "Eat Mor Chikin". Instead of having chickens (whose flesh you are consuming) advertise themselves as food, you get a cow promoting the chicken as food, so as not to become burger fodder himself. Finally, we have a restaurant chain that understands the internal conflict behind selecting a cartoon animal mascot to represent the same animal product being eaten.  read more »

AOL used to be one of the largest internet service providers. Where are they now?  read more »

As much as I try to ignore most of the news headlines these days, I must admit that I've been keeping an eye on this bailout plan pretty closely. My experience working for a large telecommunications firm with ridiculous executive compensation and dishonest accounting practices makes me want to root for failure for all of these companies that are going belly up. After all, they made their own bed. Let them sleep in it.  read more »

Yesterday, the drywall guys stopped by to work on the walls again. I had called them early in the morning to find out what the schedule is. Rather than calling me back, they simply showed up later in the afternoon with no notice. Lucky for them, I was home to let them in. These guys act like someone should be home at all times just in case they feel like showing up to work. From what I hear, this is perfectly normal behavior for contractors. That doesn't mean that I have to like it, though.  read more »