animal poop

29 April 2008

Well, Ellie has been shooting hershey squirts all over the place the last few days. Poor dog. I can't imagine being cooped up in a bathroom all day trying to hold it. She did the best she could- she went in the bathtub. That's been three times in as many days. And Bob had it last week and was crapping all over the place. The best is when they have to go at night and they sneak off to the entry hallway. Then you find all that poop in the morning when you're going out the front door and late for work. Thanks, dogs.

In related news: the cats have figured out that the fern pot is a good secondary litter box, and have consequently killed it with all their digging. Thanks, cats.

Alice called me yesterday and asked me to take them all to the pound. She was that mad. Lesson in all this: we need a house for all these crazy pets, and we need it soon. A one-bedroom apartment was not designed for six mammals.

podcast : : the ruby suns

26 April 2008

Here's a new band I'm getting into: The Ruby Suns. This song is definitely going on the Beach Mix this summer. I've posted it up on the audio page for your listening enjoyment. There must have been a lot of other kids that listened to Graceland obsessively back in the 80s, ‘cause I’m starting to see a lot of African pop influence in the indie scene (e.g. Vampire Weekend). This music is fresh from me to you: I heard this song today on the college radio station and found it for free on Pitchfork a few minutes ago. So enjoy. You're on the (sort of) cutting edge! (unless you're stan reading this)

job fair and block party

Alice is getting ready to go to a Knox County Schools job fair this morning. Hopefully this will lead to a good job in the fall. She finished up all her grad classes on Thursday and presented her thesis. Now all she has to do is walk at graduation and finish out the middle school semester.

Later this afternoon, we're going to help out at Redeemer's block party. I'm helping with the blow-up American Gladiators-style jousting thing. I'm looking forward to watching kids knock each other silly.

In the meantime I'm taking it easy and enjoying the weather with a cup of coffee. Then I'll mosey on over to the house for more (you guessed it) painting.

Posted by ck at 9:58 AM 1 comments  

getting better

22 April 2008

I started getting a cold Sunday afternoon and it went full blown yesterday. A whole carton of orange juice later, I think I've beaten it into submission with a massive amount of Vitamin C. Now all the bad stuff is trying to get out of my body, so lots of coughing today and I'm blowing my nose every few minutes. I did ride my bike to work, though. Gotta represent for Earth Day.

Reading The Crossing currently, which is turning into an amazing book. McCarthy's western novels are simpler, more sparse. The book's sparseness gets my imagination filling in the gaps vividly. It feels similar to Big Two-Hearted River, which means I love it.

my house has siding and my dog has fur

20 April 2008

We got the siding installed on the chimney side of the house on Thursday evening and this weekend on Saturday:
I had a good crew helping me out. Siding is the kind of work that's impossible to do by yourself, so thanks to Ryan, Lucas, and Jason (and Cullin, who showed up for moral support and to feel cool).

Today we went to a "Introducing Redeemer" seminar at Chris Talley's house. Chris is one of Redeemer's pastors, and his family will be our nearby neighbors when we move to Mechanicsville. The seminar is a prerequisite for joining the church, something Alice and I are getting stoked about. Otherwise, we've tried to relax and rest today so we can gear up for another week of work. Alice "defurred" the dogs this afternoon and this is what came off Ellie:
There's enough fur there to make a sweater. Bob is getting his turn now while I'm writing this, but Ellie reigns as Queen of Fluffiness in this house. To any dog owners reading this, here's an unofficial commercial- get a "furminator." This thing gets loose fur off of a dog like nothing else. Seeing how much fur would have been otherwise plastered all over everything you own will make you want to barf.

I'll try to keep this blog updated regularly, but posts may be further apart as work on the house gets more intense.

design : : an "urban eclectic" restaurant

17 April 2008

This is what I've been working on the past few days:
The counter still has some changes to be made. This part of the restaurant is becoming more bakery oriented, so more pastry display cases are being designed in. Should be cool.

Posted by ck at 8:52 AM 2 comments  

work, work, work

15 April 2008

the title says it all. if i'm not working, i'm sleeping. i'll find something to put on here one of these days. but how 'bout some comments, people? i need some encouragement to keep this endeavor going.

Good news! I'm up to the fourth page on a Google search for "Christopher King." This post is getting pathetic.

podcast : : the water jet cilice

13 April 2008

Another one from Andrew Bird. If you can't tell, I've become a big fan of his. This is a very beautiful song that is best listened to on headphones. It sounds like something that should be in an epic, bittersweet movie.

movie time!

house update : the gable is tantalizingly close to being complete

12 April 2008

You can't see it very well in this picture, but I came extremely close to finishing the shingles on the left side, about 12 to go, when I ran out. I couldn't believe it.

We did get some painting done, and the front door is trimmed out. The front gable and the porch are probably two weeks from being wrapped up. We decided to put the dark red as the color of the panels of the "pop out," which I think will give a good burst of color to the front.

Oh yeah, I got the building permit officially transfered to us on Thursday, so now I'm technically a contractor again. Feels good. Now if only we can get this thing finished.

More to come!

[i don't have] something to blog about, or putting a pooping dingo on google

It's not that I have been neglecting the blog, it's just that there's not much in our lives worthy of putting on the internet. It's all been covered already: house, thesis, church, jobs, blah blah blah. But in the interest of regularity, here's a tidbit of my life, something I'm lucky enough to get to see every day:
I don't know why I took a picture of this. We call this position "The Wallaby." But I do hope that if someone image searches "pooping dingo" that Bob is the first to come up. That's about the extent of my contribution to society right now.

filler post

09 April 2008

I'll have a picture of the house progress up in a day or two. I took yesterday off of work because this weekend looks like rain. I'll have to start swapping sunny weekdays for rainy weekends if the current weather patterns keep up. In order to not use up vacation time, I'm coming into work on Saturday. Yay!

Alice is wrapping up her Masters thesis paper this week, so we're both busy as all get out.

house update : front gable extravaganza

04 April 2008

Well, the next big push on the house is underway. Wilson and I finished skinning the window "popout" in the front gable with bead board last night. This weekend I'll be working on the soffit and trimming out the popout with 1X4s.

Come on by this weekend and help out if you have time!

happy bob day

01 April 2008


It was four years ago today that I spent my first full day with Bob.

I had found him late the evening before on a job site, enticing him into my VW bus and taking him home to the Fight Club house and giving him his first flea bath (during which he tried to escape into an attic space).

The reason I remember today is that I left him in my bus at the the company offices and then had to rush out to a job site emergency in another truck. While I was away my "co-workers" (this was a construction company) kidnapped Bob and then called me and told me that the Humane society had seen him and taken him, leaving a fine ticket on my bus. I rushed back to the offices and got a slip of paper out from my windshield wiper. On the back it said, "April Fools!"

And that was only the beginning of the roller coaster ride that has been owning Bob.