Blanket Purrs and updates on the whole darn Shirk Clan (not totally OT)

tanadashoes wrote:
Pam, you, Rob, your kids, and all your fur-children are in my thoughts.
I am amazed by how you are holding up under everything. I'm glad to see
that your sense of humor is still intact :-)

snip
How do you go about
affording a new air conditioner anyway? Advice appreciated.

Have you contacted your electric company? Most have programs that help
fund items such as ACs that improve energy efficiency. They have
low-interest loans that cover the cost of the appliance plus
installation. There also are some great tax credits for energy
improvements (up to 30%), though you won't see the money until next year.

Just as an example, I'm getting new windows that I'm financing through
my natural gas provider for 4% over 4 years, plus getting 30% back
through tax credits.

Just a thought. I hate to think of you sweltering on top of everything
else y'all are going through.

Hugs and Purrs from Kalynnda and the 8 furry freeloaders

Hi Pam,
I've been thinking of you a lot and I'm really glad to see your posts. You
and your family are definitely in our thoughts and purrayers, always.

the air conditioning -- that is a tough one. Sending purrs that the
repair folks can keep yours going through this summer. After several years
of nursing our evaporative cooler along, it finally gave up the ghost and we
bit the bullet and replaced it and I know that electric air conditioners
(which are all that they have in the South) are even more costly to replace.
I guess to help it limp along I'd suggest getting some cheapie large floor
fans to help move the air around. I know last year, Byron bought a window
air conditioner for our living room area to try and help keep the
temperatures down in one of our main living areas. Would that work for you?
The only other thoughts are to see if you could get a) your home refinanced
(if the interest rate would be lower) and you could add the cost of buying a
new air conditioning system onto the new mortgage. We just refinanced at a
lower interest rate and it is helping us with a lower payment -- they didn't
even have to do an appraisal this time. I don't know what the specific
requirements are to qualify for this but you might look into this.? Another
idea would be to see if a local credit union would qualify you for a home
equity loan (this may or may not be worthwhile for you but it might be a
good idea to check out.) Otherwise, another possibility you ask your local
and military friends to do for you is to arrange one or more of those eat at
Chili's and/or Applebee's fundraisers - where a night is picked out for
people to go dine and a percentage of their meals' expenses is donated to a
charity. I know our local Applebee's had one for monies being raised for a
child who has leukemia (a co-worker of Byron's) and we went. If a friend
would get out and set this up for you it would at least help, especially if
it were publicized. Our cat rescue group did this last year, too, and
raised some money. Maybe your military friends/contacts could help you
brainstorm this -- put in the local base newspaper? You could also try
asking (never hurts to ask I think) local air conditioning/plumbing folks if
they would consider matching any fundraising monies for this (or even if
they'd be willing to donate the installation fees or something.) Okay --
those are all my thoughts on this at the mo' )

Otherwise, we're okay. Celeste is out of school and her migraines have
lessened for now. She's volunteering at the local Aquarium to learn how to
teach people about the touchpool critters, like crabs and horseshoe crabs
and sea anemones, etc. Very cool (from a closet wanna be marine
biologist).Alex is still working at Dairy Queen when he's not being a
student at the local community college and he is enjoying spending his
hard-earned money on video games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero. At least
once a week, his old fuddy-duddy parents join him in pretending to be rock
stars and warble into a microphone.

Kitties have been busy running up vet bills for their meowmie (making the
credit card companies solvent, no doubt). Midnight is now recoving from her
latest adventure of pulling a ligament in her front leg (which required
xrays and so forth to see if she'd broken anything) and is actually getting
around and into the usual mischief. (Previously, she'd had a corneal
infection from a scratch and there was something else earlier this year that
I'm blanking on right now, involving bloodwork) Robin had a gastric upset
that got better with antibiotics earlier, also involving bloodwork. Just
got everyone vaccinated and so on. Now they're all asleep, looking innocent
after having woken up their meowmie for breakfast at the usual 5 am time
(sigh).

Regarding Mandy's wedding, I sympathize. I'm definitely with you in the
reception department. Any possibilities of looking for previously owned
bridal wear (i.e., the tiara and veils?) -- seems silly to spend all that $
for something only worn once. As far as bouquets and the cake go -- maybe
you could see if there are any local cake decorating class people who'd be
willing to help with this?

Well, that's our update for now. Purrs for ya'll a'comin' - you're never
far from my thoughts.
Christine


"tanadashoes" wrote in message
m...
Sorry gang. Real life keeps stabbing me in the foot and causes it usual
chaos. First of all, I'm in the process of wading through around 900
messages, after the idiots have been weeded out. So I'm sending kind
thoughts and blanket purrs from our clowder to all out there who want
and/or need us. Believe me, we wouldn't be able to make it without the
physical, emotional, and spiritual support of all of you out there.
(snip)
So, that's our lives and times. How are your lives, owners, and so
forth
going?

Pam S

I meant to write this but forgot, there are tax incentives this year, and
our local el. co. has a load of rebates, you definitely need to check into
these before buying...

and at the risk of sounding crass... i would check with rob's doctors, to
see if the heat might have an adverse reaction to his condition and see if
the VA might help or provide some cooling,

Lee
"Christine Burel" wrote in message
...
Hi Pam,
I've been thinking of you a lot and I'm really glad to see your posts.
You and your family are definitely in our thoughts and purrayers, always.

the air conditioning -- that is a tough one. Sending purrs that the
repair folks can keep yours going through this summer. After several
years of nursing our evaporative cooler along, it finally gave up the
ghost and we bit the bullet and replaced it and I know that electric air
conditioners (which are all that they have in the South) are even more
costly to replace. I guess to help it limp along I'd suggest getting some
cheapie large floor fans to help move the air around. I know last year,
Byron bought a window air conditioner for our living room area to try and
help keep the temperatures down in one of our main living areas. Would
that work for you? The only other thoughts are to see if you could get a)
your home refinanced (if the interest rate would be lower) and you could
add the cost of buying a new air conditioning system onto the new
mortgage. We just refinanced at a lower interest rate and it is helping
us with a lower payment -- they didn't even have to do an appraisal this
time. I don't know what the specific requirements are to qualify for this
but you might look into this.? Another idea would be to see if a local
credit union would qualify you for a home equity loan (this may or may not
be worthwhile for you but it might be a good idea to check out.)
Otherwise, another possibility you ask your local and military friends to
do for you is to arrange one or more of those eat at Chili's and/or
Applebee's fundraisers - where a night is picked out for people to go dine
and a percentage of their meals' expenses is donated to a charity. I know
our local Applebee's had one for monies being raised for a child who has
leukemia (a co-worker of Byron's) and we went. If a friend would get out
and set this up for you it would at least help, especially if it were
publicized. Our cat rescue group did this last year, too, and raised some
money. Maybe your military friends/contacts could help you brainstorm
this -- put in the local base newspaper? You could also try asking (never
hurts to ask I think) local air conditioning/plumbing folks if they would
consider matching any fundraising monies for this (or even if they'd be
willing to donate the installation fees or something.) Okay -- those are
all my thoughts on this at the mo' )

Otherwise, we're okay. Celeste is out of school and her migraines have
lessened for now. She's volunteering at the local Aquarium to learn how
to teach people about the touchpool critters, like crabs and horseshoe
crabs and sea anemones, etc. Very cool (from a closet wanna be marine
biologist).Alex is still working at Dairy Queen when he's not being a
student at the local community college and he is enjoying spending his
hard-earned money on video games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero. At least
once a week, his old fuddy-duddy parents join him in pretending to be rock
stars and warble into a microphone.

Kitties have been busy running up vet bills for their meowmie (making the
credit card companies solvent, no doubt). Midnight is now recoving from
her latest adventure of pulling a ligament in her front leg (which
required xrays and so forth to see if she'd broken anything) and is
actually getting around and into the usual mischief. (Previously, she'd
had a corneal infection from a scratch and there was something else
earlier this year that I'm blanking on right now, involving bloodwork)
Robin had a gastric upset that got better with antibiotics earlier, also
involving bloodwork. Just got everyone vaccinated and so on. Now they're
all asleep, looking innocent after having woken up their meowmie for
breakfast at the usual 5 am time (sigh).

Regarding Mandy's wedding, I sympathize. I'm definitely with you in the
reception department. Any possibilities of looking for previously owned
bridal wear (i.e., the tiara and veils?) -- seems silly to spend all that
$ for something only worn once. As far as bouquets and the cake go --
maybe you could see if there are any local cake decorating class people
who'd be willing to help with this?

Well, that's our update for now. Purrs for ya'll a'comin' - you're never
far from my thoughts.
Christine


"tanadashoes" wrote in message
m...
Sorry gang. Real life keeps stabbing me in the foot and causes it usual
chaos. First of all, I'm in the process of wading through around 900
messages, after the idiots have been weeded out. So I'm sending kind
thoughts and blanket purrs from our clowder to all out there who want
and/or need us. Believe me, we wouldn't be able to make it without the
physical, emotional, and spiritual support of all of you out there.
(snip)
So, that's our lives and times. How are your lives, owners, and so
forth
going?

Pam S

Another thought, Pam, about the A/C -- why don't you write up a story about
your Trane A/C, how it's served your family for 22 years, etc., and, now,
here's the situation in your family, etc., and send it to Trane, and ask
them if there's anything they could do to help you with a discount towards
another Trane? You never know but you might get some kind of response -- in
any case, it's worth a try...
Christine
"Christine Burel" wrote in message
...
Hi Pam,

"tanadashoes" wrote in message
m...
Sorry gang. Real life keeps stabbing me in the foot and causes it usual
chaos. First of all, I'm in the process of wading through around 900
messages, after the idiots have been weeded out. So I'm sending kind
thoughts and blanket purrs from our clowder to all out there who want
and/or need us. Believe me, we wouldn't be able to make it without the
physical, emotional, and spiritual support of all of you out there.

Temperatures last week were in the 100s F. Now what is the worst thing
that can happen when the heat is that bad? Right, our air conditioner
went out last Saturday. I found out that a 10 lb bag of ice, placed in a
tub and in front of an area fan melts in less than 1.5 hours in that kind
of temps. At one point I walked into the master bathroom and found Merlin
and Huey sacked out on the ceramic floor, Pine Cone on the floor of the
bath tub, and Sonya snoozing on Rob's shower chair. So I checked out the
main bathroom and found Tanada sleeping under the sink and QC sprawled in
the bath tub. Miss Calico Girl was stretched out on Mandy's bed under the
ceiling fan. Speedy the d-thing was snoozing on the plywood platform
portion of Rob's wheel chair ramp. The animals had the right idea.

Monday one of our area HVAC companies sent out a technician to check out
what was wrong. First of all, our system is 22 years old. I'm told that
is ancient even for a Trane. Second, the condenser coil had not had
enough ventilation and had frozen up. The Freon level was also down but
not by much (they didn't charge us for topping the Freon up. The first
canister of Freon is $50.) Some times I really miss living up north.
However there was no improvement by Tuesday, so they sent out another
technician and he went deeper into the problem and found a place where the
insulation under the house had gotten into the air duct and blocked it.
They cleaned that out, found some other problems and fixed them. So we
are now over $300 poorer and praying that the air conditioner lasts the
year. How do you go about affording a new air conditioner anyway? Advice
appreciated.

Since then I have discovered that it takes two cats and a d-thing to help
me use the bathroom. They all crowd in as soon as I walk into the room.
They also seem to want something that I haven't figured out yet. I
suspect it is for me to turn off the heat machine. Pine Cone has been
particularly clingy. Huey and Merlin have been hanging out closely, but
not insisting on being scritched like PC has been.

Qui Gun Kit and Hermione are continuing to cement their position in their
new home. I'm told that Hermione thinks that she HAS to beat up Hershey,
the red setter mix d-thing. They have also been busy putting Smokey, the
fat, stupid, and ignorant cat in his place. Carmel is top cat and they
all recognize that.

I don't buy Sour Dough bread very often. I love it, but I'm about the
only human who does.


I'm crazy about it, myself.


I was telling Cheryl Daniels about this and suddenly
remembered that I was the only HUMAN who loves sour dough bread in the
family. I'd forgotten about Tanada. I dismissed this until after we hung
up our phones. I went into the kitchen to make myself a luscious Ham
salad and sour dough bread sandwich and couldn't find the bread. I looked
around and found the empty wrapper beside Speedy. Some hoagie rolls that
I'd also forgotten to shove into the fridge had their wrapper open and
chomps taken out of them. The only bread thief that would do that is. . .
ta da. . . Tanada. This time she enlisted the help of the d-thing to help
her hide some of the evidence. The little sneak. So, I'm back to honey
wheat bread for my sandwiches. But next month. . . .

They ate it ALL??!!


The cats seem to sense something changing in their lives. They've been
following us, especially me, around the house. If we go outside we now
have an interested audience watching our every move. Speedy whines and
cries at the door whenever Mandy leaves the house including when she goes
out to mow the lawn. I suspect that he does the same whenever Rob and I
leave as well.



To Rob. We've started the down hill slide, I'm afraid. He passed out a
couple of times in the past few weeks. Fortunately, both times were
either at the cancer center or as we were driving away from the cancer
center. The last one put him in observation for three days. His oxygen
levels are going nuts with levels as low as 80%. Optimum level is over
95% oxygen in one's blood stream, under 90% is major cause for concern. I
don't know if this makes sense, but just put it down to OMG. No one has
figured out why his blood oxygen is going nuts, though they are exploring
every avenue they can. With the lower oxygen level is a lower cognition
ability. We won't discuss the down side of that. His blood pressure
medicine had to be increased as well. I told him that, if he passes out
on me like that again, I'm going to stick him on the side of the curb and
see what happens. Do you know someone actually seems to have believed me
and asked the staff at the cancer center if I should be checked out.
Fortunately, the center staff are quite aware of our quirky and sick
senses of humor.

Mandy and Jim's wedding is still in train. Her dress has been delivered
and we need to go in, have it fitted, and see if any alterations need to
be done. We now have to buy the two veils, tiara, shoes, and accessories.
I figure about another $500 for all this. We haven't got to the cake or
bouquets yet. I refuse to pay for the reception as we have fewer than 30
people invited (if you're interested, send me an email) and Jim's family
are inviting over 150 people. Jim's family are ok with this. I told them
that cookies and tea were more my style of reception. Nancy, Jim's mom,
had to repress a shudder. I tell you, what I know about weddings and
planning them could be written on the head of a pin.

So, that's our lives and times. How are your lives, owners, and so forth
going?


Very quietly. Nothing big to report, here, except it rained for 29 out of
the last 30 days here. Although all your news is not the best, I'm glad to
hear it, and direct Dante to send you his special, grunty purrs.


--
Theresa and Dante

Stinky Forever: http://pets.webshots.com/album/125591586JWEFwh

"Adrian" wrote in message
om...
tanadashoes wrote:
snip
So, that's our lives and times. How are your lives, owners, and so
forth going?

Pam S

Life doesn't change much here, Shadow has started pulling his fur out so
I'm going to take him to TED next week to try and find what's wrong. Purrs
for your AC to last and that you win a large sum of money before it needs
replacing, purrs for Rob are ongoing.
--
Adrian (Owned by Snoopy, Bagheera & Shadow)
Cats leave pawprints on your heart
http://community.webshots.com/user/clowderuk


I hope that Shadow is ok. Merlin tends to pull his tummy fur out whenever
we have to glop Revolution on his neck. Turns out he is allergic to
something in the Revolution.

Re the AC. I've never had to replace something so expensive before. I have
no idea where to apply for a loan for that, if it can be put on home owner's
insurance, or even how to shop around for the best deal. ACK!!!! I'm a
property virgin.

Pam S.

"Stormmee" wrote in message
...
its hotter than it has been in several years here, that is interspersed
with major thnderstorms, and last year we had our central air serviced...
we used it for a total of 11 hours, because, naturally once we had it
serviced it cooled off enough that it wasn't needed.

as to bread, both DH and i love all manner of bread. Our cats are 7/8ths
uninterested... then there is tiger, who has stolen and eaten with the
assistance of TV, a double bath of pumpkin muffins... now mind you i
wasn't even upset they ate them, it was picking up the muffin wrappers all
over the house, that annoyed me... they were strewn throughout the house
in a manner that suggested a quite enjoyable party atsmophere during the
eating, Tiger has also been known to eat cornbread, the occasional
ungarded slice of white, and he is particualrily fond of the wheat bread
from subway,

Lee

Tanada doesn't seem fond of wheat bread, although, now that I've said it,
she probably will change her thieving habits to include wheat bread in the
future. I have to laugh about Subway's wheat bread. It is what I order
too.

Temperatures have cooled off into the low to mid 90s F. I wonder what July
and August have in store for us. We are also about six inches below normal
in rain for this time of year. Not a good thing. My back yard is turning
yellow and I am refusing to water it.

Pam S.

we will probably get snow or something in july, we are almost eight inches
above normal in the rain dept. Grrr, so i have to pay more often to get my
weeds cut, Lee
"tanadashoes" wrote in message
...

"Stormmee" wrote in message
...
its hotter than it has been in several years here, that is interspersed
with major thnderstorms, and last year we had our central air serviced...
we used it for a total of 11 hours, because, naturally once we had it
serviced it cooled off enough that it wasn't needed.

as to bread, both DH and i love all manner of bread. Our cats are 7/8ths
uninterested... then there is tiger, who has stolen and eaten with the
assistance of TV, a double bath of pumpkin muffins... now mind you i
wasn't even upset they ate them, it was picking up the muffin wrappers
all over the house, that annoyed me... they were strewn throughout the
house in a manner that suggested a quite enjoyable party atsmophere
during the eating, Tiger has also been known to eat cornbread, the
occasional ungarded slice of white, and he is particualrily fond of the
wheat bread from subway,

Lee

Tanada doesn't seem fond of wheat bread, although, now that I've said it,
she probably will change her thieving habits to include wheat bread in the
future. I have to laugh about Subway's wheat bread. It is what I order
too.

Temperatures have cooled off into the low to mid 90s F. I wonder what
July and August have in store for us. We are also about six inches below
normal in rain for this time of year. Not a good thing. My back yard is
turning yellow and I am refusing to water it.

Pam S.

"jmcquown" wrote in message
...


Mega purrs from me and my big "rumble-bug" Persia.

Jill

Back atcha, Girlfriend. How are you two dealing with the heat? Hopefully
the island has cool gentle breezes helping ease life over there. Persia is
such a sweetie (as if all cats aren't?) and I always enjoy reading about her
life and times.

Pam S.

"Kalynnda Berens" wrote in message
news:Sg22m.165855$DP1.40@attbi_s22...

Pam, you, Rob, your kids, and all your fur-children are in my thoughts.
I am amazed by how you are holding up under everything. I'm glad to see
that your sense of humor is still intact :-)

snip
How do you go about
affording a new air conditioner anyway? Advice appreciated.

Have you contacted your electric company? Most have programs that help
fund items such as ACs that improve energy efficiency. They have
low-interest loans that cover the cost of the appliance plus installation.
There also are some great tax credits for energy improvements (up to 30%),
though you won't see the money until next year.


Thanks, I never thought about that. I'll have to check into it.

Pam S. grateful for thoughts and advice.