A new chapter in my ebay life

I've started selling. Today was 1o cent listing day, so I madly grabbed shoes I never wear, purses I haven't touched in years, a couple of items of clothes, and some weird toys we have lying around. Heck, I even listed my old bed frame. Ten Cent Listings!

I shipped off my first sale (from a 5 free listings day) today. A tweed skirt is now winding it's way to London, Ontario to be enjoyed by some woman who wears a size 12. I'm still waiting for payment from the shoes I sold last week, I told the buyer she could wait to pay cause I was listing more stuff she might like this week. Hopefully she sees something she likes. I gotta tell you, it was exciting seeing people bid on my stuff!

If I'm lucky, my selling will out-total my shopping.

PM Elect Harper

The first time I heard it, I actually, literally gave an involutary shudder.

I didn't think it could happen. I thought Canada felt it held some sort of sad superiority over the US and it's politics, but here we've elected George Bush Light. GBL. The only difference being, Harper cannot unleash his right wing agenda with it's full force, because they don't control the house the way the Republicans in the US control, well, everything.

Damn, Canada can't even do a conservative takeover properly.

I am saddened by the move towards the right. I remember the two terms served by Mike Harris, and we're living with the fall-out from his "Common Sense Revolution". If you think the current gang problems and gun violence in our city aren't a direct result of the budget cuts to social programs, well, you're batty.

Know what scares me? Mulroney is talking up Harper to Bush. That shit scares me. Mulroney is giving Harper mad props. Mulroney.

There's another shudder.

Know what else scares me? I watched footage of PM Elect Harper (shudder) dropping his kids off at school yesterday morning. How did he send them off? With a limp-fish handshake. His kids are no older than 10. A handshake. They seemed confused by the contact. Is this how this man shows affection for his own blood? That seems a little ominous to me.

Get ready for your limp-fish handshake of love, Canada.

ScooterBingBong

Dad's going home today, Mom headed into the hospital yesterday afternoon.

I had a bizarre vision of them both being in the same hospital at the same time and the sight of each other giving them a heart attack and stroke respectively.

Not to worry. Different hospitals.

Spent election night with friends eating pizza, drinking wine and booing at the television. It's becoming an electoral tradition. In my riding, Olivia Chow squeeked past the incumbent. As my friend Christy said last night, it's the first time someone I've voted for has actually won!

We brought Mr. Scooter Bing Bong to the election party, he was to be the designated "cheer-er upper". Dogs and elections go hand in paw. On the way over, Mr. Bing Bong caught a dew claw on something, and busted it but good. He didn't even notice, he was too busy peeing on everything in sight. We got to the Bates-Bruce Manor, and went right to work with their first aid kit bandaging up the paw and debating if it warranted a trip to the emergency clinic. He didn't seem to mind, so we stayed, and booed at the tv. Frankly, I didn't have the heart to have 3 loved ones in the hospital at the same time!

He got to see the vet this morning, they did a bang up job patching him up, and he's as good as new with a bright blue bandage on his foot. Crazy monkey. The clinic is doing something new. They took Scooter's photo when we got there, and when they printed up my bill, his picture was on it. Neat! Great idea, actually.

I'm done with drama for a while, though. Actually, no I'm not. Still waiting to hear mom's test results. THEN I'm done with drama for a while.

Oh wait. I have to call the lady from the Brick back, too. After that, and news from mom, THEN done with drama...

Jesus.

Don't worry? Don't worry. That's what they said before trucking my dad into get his heart checked out.

Turns out, we all should have been worried for quite a while. The main artery bringing blood into his heart? Almost totally clogged and/or diseased. He was one step away from a massive heart attack that would have killed him. But you know, we shouldn't worry.

Close call.

They put a shunt (that seems like such a weird word for a medical device) in, and his blood is flowing 100% now. They expect a full recovery. But just to be safe, he's spending the weekend in cardiac intensive care and getting a couple more shunts in other heart places on Monday.

Incidentally, Monday is also the day my mom goes back to HER doctor to get tested to see if she's had stroke. Her doctor wanted her to go to the hospital yesterday, but she refused on the grounds that she had to go home and feed her dogs.

My head is exploding.

Parents are mortal

Nothing made this more obvious to me than my dad's motorcycle accident a couple of years back. He's still trying to recover, while working full time to make his alimony payments to my mom.

When I saw him at Disneyworld in December, he looked more tired than I remember him being in a long time. He kept up great, but he was quiet. He's always quiet. But he seemed like a very happy pappy, being with his girls.

Right now, he's in the hospital getting some sort of heart cathetarization procedure to investigate the chest pains he's been experiencing the last six months. It's not a big deal, they keep telling me. But it kind of is. It's his ticker. I think anything to do with the heart is serious by default. I know they don't want me to worry.

Well, too bad. I'm gonna worry.

He works too hard.

Nature is Cruel

When I was in Paris a couple of years back, I made the trek out to Versailles. As nice as the palace was, I was more taken with the grounds, the Petite Trianon, the Grande Trianon... the little farm with thatched roofed buildings where Marie could pretend that she was living the simple life so touted by philosophers of the day.

There's a lot to see.

While I was clomping through the muddy paths, taking photos of my Eeyore looking forlornly at his French cousins (plenty of donkeys on the farm), I heard a terrible noise. It was a long necked white goose, and it was being tormented by the huge farm dog.

The dog must not have been trying to kill the goose, because he never drew blood despite having pinned the goose down on its back. He just kept pawing and mouthing that poor goose, and the goose kept fighting back, and honking an ungodly honk.

At one point, the dog took the goose's head in his mouth and started shaking and twisting. More honking and clawing from the goose. This went on for several unending minutes, while I tried to formulate the words "Someone stop that dog!" in French. I stopped just short of leaping over the fence to try and help the goose. Not fun to get mauled by a dog for trespassing on his turf, while on vacation. Instead, I just started walking away, quickly. I didn't want to see the dog's finishing move. I didn't want to see him actually kill the goose. I knew the goose's neck must be broken by now.

As I was walking away, I heard from across the field, "Incroyable!".

I turned.

The goose had freed himself from the dog, gave him a good hiss, and waddled off, apparently none the worse for the wear. I was so proud of that little goose.

I don't know why seeing Olivia Chow's phone number on my call display made me think of that story, but it did.

A new bullseye for my consumer rage

I've wondered what I would do with my time and my crabbiness once my scooter saga was resolved...
The following is an email I just sent to the Brick:

I would like to resolve a complaint I have regarding the delivery of my recent purchase.

At the time of sale, I opted for delivery specifically because the sales associate, Vivian assured me that my old mattress would be taken away and donated to charity. This was the only reason I opted for delivery. I was not told about having to wrap the old mattress, nor was I offered a bag to do so. Other than this omission, Vivian was a great help.

The morning of my scheduled delivery, I woke up at 7:30 to wait for my call (was told I'd be called between 7:30 and 9:30). Didn't happen. I called the Brick after 10am to find out what was happening - no information.

Around 10:30 I was surprised to hear a knock at my door - the delivery truck was there. I asked why they didn't call. The delivery man said he did call at 7:30. I showed him my phone, and said that it recorded all incoming calls, and that it hadn't rang. I asked if he left a message, since he didn't speak to me.
He said, "I don't know, maybe".

He refused to take the old mattress on the grounds that it had to be wrapped in plastic for sanitary reasons - again, first I'd heard of this. He then proceeded to tell me that it was for their own protection and went on to imply that my mattress was a hotbed of parasites and disease. I understand the need for protection, but it can be explained without being insulting.
While he was essentially calling me filthy, he stood there in snowy boots dripping salt and water onto my carpets - same for the other delivery person who actually dragged the mattress and box spring through the slush outside and into my home.

I asked if I could use one of the bags that came with the new mattress to wrap my old one, and they mumbled something unhelpful and continued to drip on my carpet. I asked them to go. I immediately had to walk around my whole living room, dining room and hallway with towels to clean up after them, as well as wiping the melting snow off the mattress and box spring, which were, fortunately, well protected.

This was a frustrating experience, because
a) I was not told when they were coming
b) I was insulted
c) My home was dirtied
d) There was no warning that I'd need to wrap my mattress, and no solutions provided by the delivery men to help resolve the problem.

I could easily picked the mattress up myself. Again, the only reason I opted for delivery was so that my old mattress would be taken away. To not have this task accomplished and to be insulted in the process is not acceptable.

The final straw came last night when I received a sales call at home from VoxCom. I expressly indicated to Vivian, and wrote on the sales order that I did NOT consent to being contacted by this vendor. I am not pleased that my personal contact information was provided to VoxCom. I would hope that the Brick takes their customers’ privacy more seriously that this.

I would like to believe that this is not typical of a purchase from the Brick, and the service I can expect to encounter should I choose to shop there again.
Please contact me with details regarding how you propose to resolve this complaint. I think reversing the delivery charges is a fair start.

The new mattress and box spring, however, are awesome. I would say that I slept like a baby, but it was just so weird to be so... comfortable! And my poor dog can't seem to jump quite high enough to get on the bed every time. He's done some impressive flips and wipeouts. I think he forgets that he can't quite make it onto the bed, cause he'll get down for a while, and then start whining. Dude. Just stay on the bed.

My sister and I have had a very domestic Christmas and New Years. We had some extra dough in the "house account", (we always pay a little more into the account than what we actually owe for our mortgage and condo fees) and so we bought a new stainless steel dishwasher for Christmas. Next goal, new stainless steel fridge.

Then this past weekend, while out looking for a new duvet cover and sheets for my new bed, we strolled into a lighting store and finally saw a chandalier for our dining room that we both really liked. Hey, what's a few hundred more dollars? This is the joy of the "house account". What's that? A new blender? Grab it! New shoe rack for the front closet? In the cart! Oooh, corner shower caddy! Sold!

Savings. Who knew?