The Jeff R Project

Chris and I took a giant step recently. One that would make some of our friends weep openly and question their ability to cope. Many couples would break up in record time if they took this step. But we have faith.

What did we do that was so drastic?

We shut our cable off for the summer.

Yep. And Novus took us seriously. About 3 weeks after the first of the month we came home to static. Last year we cut it down to the basics for the summer and it took them 2 months to make the change.

Cable companies do this for 2 reasons as far as I can tell. One is they hope you change your mind before they get here, the other is that 9/10 cancel requests are place where tenants move and they hope the new occupants will subscribe. Either way a month or two of service costs less than dispatching a warm body, so they leave it on until x amount of time passes or they “have a guy in the area.”

With TV season drawing to a close and our ability to watch shows online increasing daily, plus the impending summer weather (you hear me mother nature?) we want to try to lessen our dependence on the tube.

How’s it going? Other than the 2 – 24 hour delay in watching the 3 or 4 critical shows on TV, it’s good. Rumble gets more playtime, more work gets done, more walks get taken and Chris and I get to spend more quality time together.

Which inevitably means sitting at opposite ends of the couch ignoring each other in favor of our laptops.

I joke. That’s the scary time some other couples would dread. What do you do to fill the time otherwise filled by TV?

I’ll let you know how it goes, but being released from the LCD bonds of the TV feels good so far. Now we watch it on our terms. We may never turn the cable back on.

PS: by never I mean until September.

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I haven’t posted in a week, and after the last time, people have been emailing, calling and generally asking “Are you ok?”

Yes, I’m fine.

We have no clue what caused the hospital visit last weekend. All those tests were clear, and so was my cardiac-stress test on Tuesday. Boy what fun that was.

Anyway, it’s been almost a week, I’ve been tested, poked and prodded a few times and nothing happened. Which is good and bad. Good because it means there’s nothing big and obvious wrong. Bad because it means we don’t know what caused it. I would like to know – no matter what it is, knowledge is power.

Today was an amazing! day. Chris and I grabbed a ZipCar to take Rumble for his bi-monthly haircut so he was less of a furry little monster. It also helps with the “post-walk grooming” shall we say.

Right now, we’ve been home about an hour and Rumble is curled up on his bed, happily sound asleep knowing that his dads aren’t going to mess with him any time soon. He’s also exhausted from the playtime he got while waiting for his turn at the groomers.

Fetch in North Vancouver is a HIGHLY recommended place. They keep to their timelines, the dogs are always happy and comfortable. We tried the Kerrisdale location once and they were great too.

We also found a pop-can crusher! We’ve been looking for one everywhere we go. We found them online, but they’re expensive. HomeSense at Park Royal had them for $12.99. They’re supposed to be wall mounted but we don’t trust our walls and it seems to work just fine (if awkwardly) by hand! Yeah recycling.

By the way, Chris expounds on Rumble and the trip to North Van on his blog. Give it a read.

First, for those friends and family reading this – DON’T PANIC! The story I’m about to tell is true, but there is nothing to worry about.

Sunday morning started like any other. Relaxing wake up around 8:00, husband lying beside me, dog sleeping at the foot of the bed, smell of coffee brewing from the other room, man-servant bringing us breakfast. Oh, no, wait. No coffee, no servant.

But then I noticed a “fluttery” feeling in my chest. I’d felt it before (several months ago) and it usually went away fairly quickly. So I dismissed it.

Finally we get up around 8:30 and discover that all the water in the house is brown. It’s happened once before when the turbidity levels were high in the local reservoirs and we’ve had rain recently so we assumed that’s what it was. Turns out there was a burst pipe/leak in the building and we had no clean water.

Fine, we hiked down to the brand new Nester’s Market in the brand new Woodwards development, bought some water and other groceries and hiked back home. My chest was still fluttering from time to time.

I made breakfast (egg McMuffin type things with turkey bacon) while Chris walked the dog and then we watched some TV while deciding what to do for the day.

I finally told Chris around noon that I was having these “flutters” but that it wasn’t anything major. Being Chris (wonderful guy), he insisted we go to the hospital ASAP and figure out what’s going on. And we headed off to St. Paul’s Hospital.

That’s where I got Lucky.

Dr. S. Lucky was the name of the doctor in the RAZ (Rapid Assessment Zone) when we got there. After a very brief wait in the chairs, I was whisked in for an ECG, then got blood drawn, then a little medical history and finally a chest x-ray. From there it started to slow down. We were now in the waiting game.

Nurse Jennifer was awesome in the RAZ and kept a close eye on me. Eventually, the first round of tests came back clear and they suggested Chris and I go for a walk, and we did. But I got some tightness in my chest afterward, prompting them to hold me for a second round of Troponen tests at 6pm.

Chris had to go home and walk Rumble. We hadn’t anticipated this taking ALL day of course.

During this time, Dr. Lucky basically disappeared. At least I didn’t see her again until about 4:45, but her mysterious doctoring kept putting notes into the computer and more things happened. I got Aspirin and was prepped to be moved to a room with better monitoring equipment.

My new temporary home was “Acute Stretcher 5″ as pictured above. Tres chic. I had to leave Jennifer behind and was introduced now to Gemma (or Jemma), a wonderful nurse from the UK. Unfortunately my stay here was brief, like 30 minutes and I was move “somewhere quieter” that I never did find the name of. It was quieter, but I liked the ER feel of Stretcher 5.

Now I was in the able hands of Kristen (or Kirsten) who eventually brought me dinner. Turkey dinner from a hospital on Sunday isn’t the worst thing out there, and considering I hadn’t had anything but a bit of water in 6 hours, I was glad for it. It actually wasn’t too bad and it certainly hit the spot.

In the end, I was sent home a little after 8pm with not much to show. A few sticky spots from the monitoring pads, a little less hair on my hand from the IV tube they never used and orders to go for a stress test on Tuesday morning at 8.

Nothing showed up in anything, and the fluttering never re-occurred. We have our theories as to what it was, and I’ll be talking to my family doctor about them once I can get an appointment.

Chris was with me the entire time, which was VERY much appreciated. He was very nervous and worried about me, but kept calm and helped me relax too. It freaked him out more than he let on. His father passed away from a heart attack so Chris has, if not reason then history, to cause him to worry. I’ve promised to outlive Chris so I have to do everything I can to make sure that happens, or he’d never let me live it down.

See – nothing to panic about. I’m taking today off to relax and make sure everything is up to speed before heading back tomorrow.

Many people have written about the start of 2010 and what it means to them, so I figured I’d throw my hat in the ring too.

Last year got off to a bad start. I don’t remember why exactly. A lot of things went wrong but I didn’t whine about them on my blog hear so I have nothing to go on. I do remember talking to people about how I wanted to start over and that lasted for about 2 weeks. If you remember what I complained about, let me know.

2009 did get a lot better, things were good etc. And then it came to an end much the way it started. I had a headache and was generally “out of it” for a couple of days, including New Years Eve, leading to me being in bed between 10:30 and 11:00. Yep, hardcore party people in the house.

I was actually asleep by 11:10 and woke up not feeling too well again. But it passed.

And then we were in 2010. Corey Monteith of TV’s Glee ran a quick check on Twitter and said it’s officially ‘aught ten’ which I’m not going to pick up. The Olympic branding, which hasn’t taught me much, but has engrained Twenty Ten into my brain, so that’s what I’m going with. It may not stick either but I gotta start somewhere.

Vancouver is roughly 40 days from Olympic Chaos. I could complain about how much it’s going to mess up my commute, but it won’t be too bad (I hope). Considering Rumble and I will mostly be walking. I will have to change my bus route though. It won’t be too bad. I think the 50 False Creek will keep running from the Keefer Street side and end up on or near Granville where I need to get off.

I’m also hoping for nice weather for the Winter Olympics, not to be mean, but just because I don’t like winter.

Oh – and a rant.

Chris and I went to The Bay downtown and I wanted to buy us each a pair of the Red Mittens to wear during the Olympics as we wander around. Apparently the Olympic store in The Bay only accepts Visa and Cash.

Yep, no debit cards, no MasterCard, no American Express. Only Visa (the official card) and Cash (the official cash).

We left without mittens… For now. We’ll be back, oh yeah, we’ll be back.

Screw you 2010, I’m going to win.

A few months ago B.C. Place was host to a semi-annual Home and Garden show sponsored by HGTV. Along with the usual cadre of HGTV.ca hosts (Colin & Justin, Sarah whatsername) they featured Ty Pennington, host of ABC’s Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.

In case you’ve been living under a rock, this is the show where they take “needy” families who are usually in some sort of serious distress and give them a new house. The family may have had a fire, a series of deaths in the family, a disabled child or something that has caused them to livin’ in the margins of life.

Most of the families seriously need help. They’re often living 4 and 5 to a room, if they’re even that lucky. Sometimes they don’t even have rooms.

Somehow, they’ve managed to get the family together and obtain a video camera to submit a request to ABC explaining how and why they deserve a new house. After some kind of screening process, ABC decides on a deserving family each week and Ty and his team swoop in, shoot some emotion-driven video and destroy their house.

Then, while the family is on vacation, the Ty-driven-dream-team recruits some locals who want to be on TV and build an entirely new house in just 7 days. God complex anyone? There’s an abundance of stories about how crap these houses are, leaving the family with a camera-beautiful home, but leaky roofs, toilets and other mechanical problems. It’s hard to believe the it takes a year to normally build a house, but a huge number of people can build one in a week.

So, back to the Vancouver story.

I don’t remember exactly how it went, but I asked Chris if he wanted to go to the home show. He gave me the sad-puppy face and said “Why would I want to do that?” and I replied “Ty Pennington is going to be there.”

He promptly replied “Fuck Ty Pennington!!!” (Possibly with more exclamation points). He seriously objects to Extreme Makeover: Home Edition not just tugging on heartstrings, but actively plucking on them with a chainsaw and exploiting hard done by families.

Ever since then, it’s been Chris’s catch phrase. If anyone (me or on TV) mentions Ty Pennington, Chris exlaims “Fuck Ty Pennington!!”

Tonight, he added Steve Jobs. “Fuck Ty Pennington!!! and Fuck Steve Jobs!!!” was heard. I should go find out what happened to iTunes. It’s usually the cause of Chris cursing Steve Jobs.