Update -- By Popular Demand

Anna asks for an update.  And since I'm finding it hard to come up with 25 Little Known Facts (our AOL-J homework for the weekend) -- I'll take her up on it immediately.

I want to know how Jack is doing?  Is he behaving himself, or still being the wild man?

Jack is doing much better, now that he's got all his anti-virus stuff going.  Of course, I just got a phone call from my more-or-less nice cable company.  Those being the ones who also supply me with cable modem, so it's a Jack-related issue.  Now, the cable company informed me that they're raising the price of my cable modem $10/month, to a whopping $40/month.  (On top of which I pay AOL whatever they want for "bringing your own access.")  I think upwards of $50/month is a little high for one's internet service, don't you?  But there's nothing I can do about it.  Well, I can keep the same price I'm paying now, but they'll drop my connection speed to half what I have now.  Screw that.  With the higher price I'll be getting faster downloads (which I don't necessarily need, but can't complain about), but I certainly don't want to go slower. 

ANYWAY, I absolutely refused to pay the cable company more than I'm already paying them on a monthly basis (upwards of $100, for cable and internet), so I called up and said we're going to have to cancel some of my premium-movie channels to offset the higher price on the cable modem.  (This is both a matter of principle, and the fact that I really only watch HBO anyway.)  At first, the lady says she can't do it without cancelling my entire service.  I give her the disbelieving voice:  "Are you telling me you can't give me the higher speed modem and cancel my Starz/Encore subscription and give me everything else I already have?"  She puts me on hold for five minutes and comes back with a package deal that gives me what I currently have, the higher connection speed, and all the premium movie channels they offer for less than what I'm paying now.  Thank you, and have a nice day.

What happened with you beingable to see your pictures?  Can you do that yet?

That's a reference to this problem I was having where I can't see the pictures I put in my journal using "You've Got Pictures."  And I can only see them in other people's journals sporadically.  The problem still exists.  I think it has something to do with crappy You've Got Pictures software.  (Which, btw, I never used on the old computer, because the one time I tried it, it froze not only AOL by my entire computer.)  So I've concluded that YGP blows, and will just post pictures from my ftp space instead. 

Did Mariette depart yet?   Sweet, good ole girl that she is.

My, I've named a lot of inanimate objects in my life, haven't I?  Mariette is still in her boxes in the middle of my floor.  I called a recycler who will take her -- eventually.  They normally only do pick-ups from businesses, but said they'd swing by and get her next time they're in the neighborhood.  They'll call me one day in advance and I'll just hope I can work at home that day.  But at least we're making some level of progress here.

How's my sweet Jasmine?  

Jasmine -- clearly not an inanimate object -- btw, that link is to a much older picture you might not have seen yet -- is just adorable, as per usual.  The other evening, she pulled my hand toward her -- this generally means she's trying to bring my fingers closer to her mouth so she can bite me, but this time she just wanted to lick my hand and then cling to my arm with both paws.  So precious it was all I could do not to kiss her to pieces.

What have you been deciding about the carpet color and redecorating plans?

The bedroom.  Sigh.  Jury duty was right next to one of them Expo Design Center places, so I took home some carpet samples the other day.  A very dark green for the bedroom and (just for shits & giggles) a burgundy for the rest of the house.  At first, I really liked the dark green for the bedroom, but in the dark it looked kinda black, which I found disturbing.  (The burgundy was nice for the hallway, and went well with most of my furniture, but when I imagined it over the whole floor it seemed overwhelming.)  I took them both back the next day and traded for a sage green and a neutral-leaning-toward-pink.  Both were total disasters.  By the time I put them back in my car for the return trip to Expo, I'd dubbed them "snot" and "vomit."  Not to mention that whatever fibre the sage was made out of was something Jasmine thought was scratching-post material.  I am seriously reconsidering the dark green again. 

I think I may just do the bedroom now.  I'd really like to do a recarpet and repaint of the whole house, but the bedroom is the only thing on an actual CLOCK (gotta get it repainted before the new shutter is installed in May), and, besides, if I just do the bedroom, I can MAYBE get away with not having to kennel Jasmine for a few days.  (...assuming we can dry the paint with the door closed).

Still trying to come up with 25 Little Known Facts...