Mishmash Musings

I swear, I get sooo frustrated dealing with my husband sometimes!! I stay at home all day M-F taking care of our son and dog, doing the cooking, cleaning, etc. So we have a deal that on weekends, my husband has to take over some of the chores. Specificially, he has to take care of the dog and cook at least one dinner (either Saturday or Sunday, his choice).

Anyway, my husband was playing Xbox 360 and I was working on the computer when I noticed that our dog was standing by the patio door, which is her way of indicating that she has to go outside. I told my husband that, but he said he just let her out a couple hours ago and that she didn’t really have to go out again, she was just waiting for her dinner. I said, “Are you sure? It looks like she wants to go out.” I mean, I stay home with the dog all day, so I know her habits and mannerisms. But my husband said he was sure, so I didn’t press the issue.

Well, wouldn’t you know it: 10 minutes later the dog peed all over one of our area rugs!! I had left the room to put laundry away and came back to find the mess. Obviously, I was livid because I had JUST TOLD my husband that the dog needed to go outside. All he had to do was open the patio door to let the dog into the yard, wait one minute while she did her business, and then let her back in. Argh!!!

So anyway, he had to clean up the mess (I wasn’t about to help) and it was all I could do to say “I told you so” only once. I get so frustrated when my husband doesn’t listen to me about things like this!!!

When I bought my computer three years ago, I just wanted something that I could use to surf the ‘net. I wasn’t working from home at that time, so I figured I didn’t need much of a machine. In other words, I went the cheap route and ended up paying less than $400 for everything. As you can imagine, I’m not getting much performance in return.

Now that I depend on my computer for a substantial portion of my income, I think it’s time to make some upgrades. The first thing I’m going to start with is the processor, and then move on to computer memory. By upgrading those two components, I should see enough of a performance increase to suit my needs. If not, I’ll have to keep on trying!

I just read an article that says the only known painting of author Jane Austen will be sold at a Christie’s auction next month. The owner is a six-generation descendant of Austen, and he hopes to get between $400,000 and $800,000 for the painting.

However, the article goes on to say that the authenticity of the subject in the painting is disputed by scholars. Some experts are convinced that the clothing worn by the young woman in the painting is not consistent with what someone of Jane Austen’s time period would have worn. Austen’s descendant, of course, says that’s a weak argument at best and has no doubt that it’s Jane in the picture.

Frankly, even if it is the real thing, I can’t understand why anyone would want to pay that much money for it. Then again, I can’t understand why anyone would pay millions for a Jackson Pollack painting that looks like it was done by a 5-year-old, so I guess I’m just out of touch with the art world.

I’ve got carpeting in the three bedrooms of my home, but I use area rugs everywhere else. I figured this would be a smart move — at least for now — because I have a dog and a young child in the house, which of course means there will inevitably be spills and accidents. I would rather have those spills occur on my hardwood floors or on rugs that can easily be replaced than on carpeting that I would have to live with for many years.

Even though I’m not particularly attached to my area rugs, I’m still interested in keeping them clean and in reasonably good condition. That’s why I was very happy to find the RugsDoneRight.com blog today. This blog is full of helpful tips and insights on how to clean, maintain, and repair area rugs. I can’t believe how much I’ve learned already! For example, there are different strategies to cleaning rugs made from different materials. I didn’t know that, of course, and basically just approached each one the same way. No wonder some of my rugs stain while others don’t! At least now I know where to go to get this kind of information, so I’ll be able to keep my rugs in pretty good shape from here on out.

There are plenty of other topics covered on the RugsDoneRight blog, so it’s definitely a good resource if you own area rugs or are thinking about buying them. Take a look and let me know what you think!

I have been so busy this week that I forgot to post about the Carnival of Cities that I participated in! Sorry about the delay here, and if I participate again, I’ll be sure to get my post done in a more timely fashion .

Anyway, I would like to thank Sheila over at Home Turf Media for organizing the posts. I enjoyed visiting other blogs, and I left some comments on some of them. This was a lot of fun, so thanks to everyone else that participated too!

I’ve noticed that I’m becoming less and less productive as the weeks roll on. I don’t know if it’s because I’m getting burned out from blogging or what, but I’m just not accomplishing even the minimum number of tasks that I set for myself on a daily basis.

So what I think I need to do is start structuring my days. I need to come up with a time table and write down what I have to do during each block of time. Prior to this, I just listed my tasks and crossed them out as I completed them throughout the day. Now, I’m going to list my tasks along with a time limit. I don’t know if it will help or not, but it can’t hurt to try.

My project for today is to create a time table in Excel, print out a week’s worth of sheets, and then fill in some objectives for the next two days.

With today being St. Patrick’s Day and all, I’m sure The Weiner’s Circle on Clark St. in Chicago is going to be extra crowded after hours. In case you’ve never heard of it, The Weiner’s Circle is a little hot dog/hamburger stand that is a favorite among drunks and other night owls in the Lincoln Park neighborhood.

I first went to The Weiner’s Circle back in high school with a couple of friends of mine and I’ve been making the trek all the way to north Clark St. about once or twice a year since then. Like most people, I go for the atmosphere and the experience rather than the food, and I always make sure to take out-of-town friends or relatives to the place during their visit.

The food at The Weiner’s Circle isn’t anything outstanding. The menu consists of very greasy hot dogs, polish sausages, hamburgers, and fries. The items are all “char grilled”, and you can order most of these things with gobs of melted cheese, which results in one of the highest calorie 2am snacks you could possibly indulge in.

I usually end up ordering the char cheddar burger and cheddar fries. The portion is huge, making The Weiner’s Circle a relatively fair value for the money (but it’s still on the expensive side when you consider that you’re really just getting a burger and fries).

Now for the atmosphere: The Weiner’s Circle is notorious as a place where the workers and customers shout insults at each other. I’ve witnessed these types of exchanges a few times, but from what I’ve seen, it doesn’t happen with every single customer. I think the workers size up the person ordering and make a quick judgment as to whether or not that person would be likely to engage in banter. They’ve never harassed me, and I’ve never tried to antagonize them, so I don’t have any firsthand reports on that front.

Overall, I think The Weiner’s Circle is a good place to go to once or twice just because it’s a Chicago thing to do. But after you’ve been there a few times, there’s very little reason to keep going back.

I mentioned in my last post that I’m feeling a bit under the weather. I think I’m coming down with a cold, but on top of that, I’ve just been sluggish in general ever since returning from vacation. I’m having trouble sleeping (which NEVER happens to me) and I’m having trouble completing tasks when I’m awake. Maybe I ought to start taking an energy supplement or something to help me make it through. What do you think? Do these products work?