Holy Crappola! It's Christmas again! Where the heck did 2008 go? I guess I was too busy to notice it passing by. Now I can't say if it was a good year or not. I'm still here, so I guess it wasn't really bad. And we did manage to get a fair bit done on the house so it wasn't a wasted year. Anything not wasted is good I suppose. H0wever, even though my year has been rather productive and fruitful, Kathryn has had a less than enjoyable year with a hip out of alignment and causing a great deal of pain by pinching her siatic nerve. A Chiropractor helped for a while but his manipulations have worn thin as of late. She has waited since Feb. to get an appointment this past Monday to see a specialist only to find out her appointment had been changed to the previous Monday, so she had missed it. Luckily for her that tears still work, and they found an opening for her this Friday. Our present day politicians, seeing little possibility in garnering public recognition from the health care system don't hesitate to steal from it in order to fund projects that have a better chance to immortalize them. Sorry! Didn't mean to go off on a rant.

Here is some of what I did this past summer. I started off by stripping off the old, improperly installed cedar shingles. What a shame. I would have preferred cedar shakes to any other type of siding. However, these shingles had so many nails in them that they were unsalvageable. This was not a complete waste though, as the shingles make great kindling for anyone with a wood stove. Aaaaaahem! We replaced our wood stove with a pellet stove. However, the neighbours were glad to help us get rid of the shingles as they all still have their wood heating elements.

There were a few surprises along the way. After I had removed the cedar shingles and the black fiber board underlay I discoverd that the house had originally been covered by white masonite clapboards. Oh my! Something else to get rid of. The neighbours didn't want this stuff. Even thogh it burns, it's too bulky to handle for the fireplace. So I loaded it, the black fiberboard and the tarred felt into my utility trailer and off to the waste management plant we go. Now I had taken stuff there before, and it was always free. Not this time though. They let me in with my load of perfectly good refuse, but when I tried to leave after unloading, they wanted me to pay them. The lady said 35, and I was sure she wanted 35 cents as our waste management is supposed to be free. Being embarrassed that I didn't have .35 in my pockets as I very seldom carry any cash, as was the case on this day. I felt rather silly handing over my debit card for a .35 cent charge but it was all that I had. When I got my card and receipt back I saw i had no reason to be embarrassed as the charge was for $35 n ot the .35 cents. I made the decision from there that any furtherwaste would be burned in a outdoor fire pit or the old woodstove I had put out in the yard. The neighbours weren't really happy about all the black smoke emitting from our yard so I began waiting until after dark to burn so they couldn't see the black smoke. Some of the things you have to do to keep your neighbours happy.