flying is always such a kick in the ass. last night karl and i flew back from atlanta (we were in georgia visiting grandma), and were supposed to get back at 8:45 or so, but didn't get back til 11:30 or so, so were up really really late (3:30) tarping the downstairs and moving everything out of the kitchen in preparation for the remodel!!!!!!

that's right! the kitchen is, as we speak (well, type and read) getting renovated! whoo!

karl spoke to frank (the contractor, who is enough like your "slow" cousin ted to make me worry a bit, but all his references said he was the bombshit (not that word exactly), and they'd hire him again should the opportunity arise, so who am i to judge? maybe cousin ted runs a remodeling business on the side) yesterday and he asked "when do you want me to start" and karl said "as soon as you can" and frank said "how about tomorrow?" so here we are. frank and his crew arrived at 7am this morning and got right to work, moving out the old (nasty) stove and ripping down the cabinets. it was glorious.

i left the house at 8:30 to drop the wonderkitty off at the vet to be spayed (we are horrible cat parents. we leave them alone for 3 days, with only a stopover by a friend once a day to feed them, then come home and lock them up while we clean and tarp, then cart wonderkitty off to the vet this morning. poor thing. when i dropped her off, she clung to me and stared at me with big saucer eyes and pleaded "please, don't make me stay here, pleeeeeaaase?" and i heartlessly walked away and went off to my riding lesson.

after a riding lesson where i had to get on at hugo (my new horse. or rather, the new horse that i'm half leasing. show name: full court press. i am not a fan of these show names that are really just phrases. i much prefer *actual names* like the ex-racehorse in the barn who is named edna pedna. now *there's* a name) because he kept ducking out of the second fence in an in-and-out (jump in, one stride, jump out. or, in hugo's case today, jump in, one stride, duck suddenly to the left to avoid having to do the actual work involved in jumping the second damned fence. pansy.) so we fought about that for a while, me vs. a 1200 lb beast of a horse, and i won. ha!

after riding, i headed home, half expecting to see the back half of my house fallen in. but it wasn't. it was still standing. though now it is difficult to tell where the house begins and the layer of dirt ends.

when the workers pulled down the (load-bearing) wall that separates the kitchen from the dining room, they discovered that it had been an old chimney. and all the years of dirt and dust from the chimey came crashing down onto them and into my house. i'm very glad karl and i spent the time last night covering all the surfaces in the living room.

anyway, by noon, when i got back, they had jacked up the house, pulled down the wall, and gutted the kitchen. it was glorious. until after i came down from my shower and was informed that they had found a SNAKE in the kitchen ceiling. a 3-4 FOOT LONG SNAKE. kitchen: right below the bathroom, where i had just been naked! with a snake! shudder.

just one problem: gotta get the floor plan from the cabinet wholesalers. i gave the previous floor plan to the other contractor we were considering (and totally would've hired, had he not been 4 grand more expensive), so i called the friendly lady down at the store to see if she would fax it to me. no, she wouldn't. they are a wholesaler, and don't give plans to the customer unless and until they buy some cabinets. i tried to explain that we were going to be buying cabinets, but we couldn't do that until we knew which of the 2 possible floorplans we were going to use, which we couldn't know until frank gutted the kitchen and took new measurements and (and here's where it gets difficult) compared them to the plans. she told me to have frank call her. i'm not that sure of frank (cousin ted, remember) so we'll see how this all goes. plus, frank has told us that we're responsible for buying the cabinets, but i have the distinct impression that the wholesaler lady will not sell cabinets to us, only to a contractor. so, um, i'm not sure how this whole cabinet-buying party is supposed to work.