More Ups and Downs

More downs today, I'm afraid. Yesterday our top oven stopped working. Thankfully we have two, but the top one is the only one with the screen that shows the preheat temp, and whether the oven is preheated or not. Bummer. And the other day I discovered lots of ants crawling around the window and floor in the play room upstairs. Today while I was trying to turn a movie on for Benji, as I sat kneeling on the floor in front of the TV stand, I noticed tons of tiny ants crawling around the bottom of the TV stand and on the carpet in front of it. Great, now we have a bug problem! REALLY?? So I put the movie on hold, found a bottle of bug spray in the garage, drenched the TV stand, and sprayed every corner, crack, window, and door in the house. If there were bugs in there before, they ain't happy now.  It felt good to spray those little pests and watch them die. It relieved some of my pent-up anger with this house (albeit in a very small way).

On the bright side, Thad fixed my white Ikea shelves last night. I thought it would take him at least a week, but he did it in a night. He never ceases to amaze me. And tonight we went on a great bike ride with the kids around the neighborhood. Benji is a trooper. First, he's riding Ana's old, pink princess bike. Which, by the way, he doesn't seems to mind in the least. And second, our neighborhood is on a hill so half of the ride is up. But he doesn't complain at all. He just keeps plugging away, stopping occasionally. He's really sweaty by the end. On Monday we rode bikes after FHE, and he was so sweaty that his hair was soaked. When we got home, I felt his hair, surprised, and asked, "Why is your hair so wet, bud?" He goes, "I pink itz jutz wetty. Betudz daddy'tz itz wetty tzo I pink I'm jutz wetty."

Translation: I think it's just sweaty. Because daddy's is sweaty, so I think I'm just sweaty." Love that kid.

I should be working on my talk right now, but instead Thad and I are going to eat brownies and watch a "Chuck." Well, slightly burned brownies, and we're watching "Chuck on Thad's cell phone since Netflix isn't working on the TV. We'll take what we can get these days.