News From the Wire

With laundry in the washer, I've started my Saturday morning towards a trend of cleaning. Although today's cleaning centers mostly around flea extermination.

Silly me gave Emma a flea bath the other night, only to accomplish one thing. It seems that once Emma was free of the fleas, they decided to hell with the cat and took over my entire household! And it's disgusting, having to run from room to room, trying to pick off fleas as you go.

So this morning is D-Day.

And it's goodbye fleas as I prepare to take drastic measures in my pest free campaign. Already, I have taken Fitzwilliam and Lizzie aka "The Birds" down to Dad's to await the fumigations.

As for Emma and I, we'll be leaving the house shortly to trek to places unknown.

On another note, it's been an intersting week. A couple of days ago, I was returning to work from my lunch break when I went past a gazillion police, fire trucks and other emergency vehicles all converged at the side of the road, near a small pond.

It turned out that a man had drowned in the pond, either by his own hand, or simply by a silly stunt turned deadly. Either way, it was an incredibly erie sight to behold.

I've also been busy getting myself pre-approved for a mortgage. Having toured a quaint little bungalow and having sufficiently fell in love, I've come to the conclusion that it's time I grew up another notch, and became a bonified homeowner.

I've still got a long way to go, but I'm hoping that within the next 6 months or so, I can put my renting days behind me.

All my sisters are home at the moment, although I shouldn't say that, as Jodi leaves today to go visit a college friend in Massachusetts for the weeek. And I believe Audrey will be momentarily heading back to Baltimore ... Which is a good thing, since between Amy and I, we've had almost all of Audrey we can take.

At 22 years of age, Aud has yet to learn the real facts of life, like how to be self-sufficient, responsible and not so centered on self. But in truth, I can't blame her entirely, she is after all a product of her environment. An environment that has spoiled her for 98.9% of her life. In a conversation with my Father, I tried to explain that their behavior of always giving in to everything she wants has truely done the girl more harm than good. You're not doing the girl any favor, I told him. But mostly, that went in one ear and then out the other.

And it's a pity. Because my sister is never going to learn how to take care of herself without having to lean on someone else to take care of the details. And that kind of crutch - sooner or later - will drop you in the grease without a hand to hold.

Ah well, there are some lessons I suppose you need to learn all on your own.