It's been a while...

Wow, over a month since I posted. Sorry 'bout that! Life goes on and Saturdays escape me it seems!

Over the past month I've had issues with my water bill, accidentally shut off my gas (and thus my furnace, in the winter time, and then couldn't get it re-lit for almost 24 hours), had a toilet decide to run constantly, and read a few books.

It looks like maybe my water meter is bad. It was looked at yesterday and I was going to stop at the office today and find out what's up, but forgot until after the office was closed. Maybe I'll just send an email inquiry...

The gas and furnace problem were caused by me shutting off a valve I thought was water (due to the above-mentioned water bill problem, no way I used 11,000 gallons of water in a month!!). After 3 hours my house began getting decidedly chilly, and that's when I discovered exactly what I'd shut off. The water heater and fireplace pilots lit with no problem, no such luck on the furnace... The pilot is a ways back into the furnace, an aim-n-flame can't reach it, and it's also NOT where I thought it was. Apparently no place local carries the long fireplace matches either. I stopped and got some in town on my way home from work, walked into a house with a temp of 39 degrees (nothing froze, whew!) and lit the furnace right away. Much better than the 2 hours I'd tried to get it lit the night before.

The toilet is in the boys' bathroom, so I only noticed it running when Nate's here. It took me two weeks to go buy the part, and a few more days to install it. Because of the lack of water shut-offs under my sinks, I was a little worried there wouldn't be one for the toilet either. There is. That went easy and quick, and now is another thing I can check off my to-do list. Most of the home maintenance I have had to do/get done has been pretty easy stuff, and I'm lucky to have my dad close (and skilled) to fix what I can't. He's an excellent teacher too, and very willing to talk me through repairs when I need help but want to learn to do it myself.

For the books, I've read "Head Cases," an excellent collection of brain injury case studies written by a case manager. It's very engaging and an easy read, I highly recommend it. I loaned it out at work or I would tell you the author. After that I read "Mistaken Identity" about the two girls in the car wreck, one who was killed and one who survived but was mis-identified. Also excellent, explaining how the mistake was made and why it took 5 weeks to discover the mistake. I chose this one because I work at the facility that she was at when the mistake was discovered. I work(ed) with several of the people named and pictured in the book, but I was not employed there at the time. On to fiction... Two of the Kathy Reich's books that "Bones" is based on. Love these! They get technical sometimes, but the characters are very identifiable. Now I'm reading a book titled "Friendfluence'" about how our friendships shape us into who we are. It's very interesting but sometimes reads like a psychology textbook. I'm only a few chapters in, I'll let you know about this one. A couple people at work want to read it when I'm done.

I have a stack of books in my to-read, I have classics in my e-reader apps, and some on my Amazon wishlist...  I love not being in school, I have a ton of time to read, cook, do home projects, knit, etc. It's nice not feeling like I'm gone all the time! It took a while to get used to, I've had assignments for so long! Now I give myself assignments instead :)