Our New House

Behind Tent #1
Originally uploaded by radioflyer007

Yup - here it is . . . our new house. Well, it's not ours yet but should all go well (and that's a big assumption at this point--but I digress), we will have the keys to this house in two days. The house which currently looks like a circus tent.

This termite tenting thing is new to me, a native New Englander. Not that we don't have termites or other wood-eating pests but somehow I don't recall seeing many (if any) tents in Boston.

In the purchase of my first Californian home, I've learned a few things about these pesky critters:

1) you don't want them as your new neighbors (or even occassional visitors)

2) when they do come, they make themselves totally at home, especially when they are most uninvited

3) 40 years of doing nothing about keeping these critters at bay (as in the case with the house we're buying) will result in some extensive (not to mention expensive) wood-work repairs

4) fumigation requires all humans, animals and plants to vacate the premise and not re-enter until a minimum of a 24-hour period

5) the chemicals used are combined with tear gas so that when you do enter before the 24 hours is up, you'll be so sorry, you'll end up crying

6) all this work doesn't guarantee that the unwelcomed guests/neighbors don't return . . .

7) . . . but it does make for a cool photo of your house! (I was personally hoping for red and white vertical stripes with a flag on top - just like how I remember Barnum & Bailey's tents)

First Day of Freeeeedom!

Wow - it felt so great to wake up this morning without having to rush through my morning shower just so I could cram in some problem sets before the kids got out of bed.

I survived the second CSET Math exam even though I felt it was a hard test. I walked out feeling totally relieved it was over but not with the sense that it was a slam-dunk "pass" (or even a simple plain old pass). I felt intimidated by all the test-takers in my testing room. The test administrators had made sure all of us who were taking the geometry & statistics exam were in the same room since specific graphing calculators were permitted. I wondered if my one calculator was enough for the exam when I saw a gentleman walk in with two.

As the proctor walked around thumb-printing us, collecting testing tickets, and clearing the memory of our calculators, there were some folks busy cramming extra formulas and studying whatever notes they had. I started panicking that I didn't have any of my study aids with me . . . and then freaked out because I couldn't remember the formula for the surface area of a right prism with a regular hexagonal base!

Anyway - no need to re-live this horror. I'm done. I came home. I watched TV. I slept in this morning - even with the extra hour with the end of Daylight Savings Time.

Ahhh . . . the freedom from studying math is so sweet! I can now feel like I have my life back . . . at least until the next exam!

Eh, why ruin the moment . . .