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Day: April 17, 2012

  • Book Review: Shaman, Friend, Enemy

    Shaman, Friend, Enemy
    An Olivia Lawson Techno-Shaman Novel Book 2
    About the Author: “M. Terry Green is a full-time writer, former archaeologist, and budding minimalist. For more information about her and Livvy’s techno-shaman universe, please visit mterrygreen.com” (from amazon’s website).  You can read more in depth about Terry and in her own words on her website.
    About the Book: Shaman, Friend, Enemy is Book 2 in a Techno Shaman series. Reading Book 1 is not neccesary to understand the events of Book 2. Terry has provided enough back story throughout Book 2 to help the reader understand what is going on. In Book 2, Olivia Lawson, the Lightening Shaman is faced with her personal challenge with her mom, and a broader challenge of keeping the Multiverse in balance with the world. With the help of her friends Olivia takes on these challenges, and learns more about herself, her shamanic powers, and the lives of those around her. 
    My thoughts: I greatly enjoyed this book. It was a nice way to spend my day in the hospital just reading and caring for the new Baby Prince.  Shaman, Friend, Enemy is an easy read, with a plot simple to follow. I felt there were some parts that didn’t quite make sense to me, and were never fully resolved, but perhaps there’s a book 3 coming out.  Overall, this was a great read from a self-published author.  There was a little language, but not too bad.
  • Tuesday Tips – Plumbing

    Tuesday Tips – Plumbing

    Tuesday Tips

    Have you ever worked with plumbing? Has your spouse?
    When it comes down to electricity and plumbing, I get very nervous doing our own remodeling. To me those should be left to a trained professional. Sadly, they also cost a lot of money to update as well.
    We’ve come down to the last few steps of our kitchen remodel. We could’ve been done last week actually, except that the plumbing to the kitchen sink was giving us a pretty hard time. I wish I’d taken a before picture, but I of course didn’t think we’d hit that many problems.
    Every time we turned the water back on, the tubes would pop out and spray water everywhere.  It was quite the mess really. Finally, after 3 days and a lot of white tape, we had it! We had one small leak, but it was just a drip.
    Or so we thought. Sunday night, I found the Princesses dresses pretty wet. I thought as my mom had done laundry that maybe she just hung them up to dry, so I just moved them from the closet to my line dryer.
    I should’ve used my brain a little better.  Monday morning when I went to get clothes for Princess R, I found a sopping wet carpet, and ALL the girls dresses soaked. Plus, Scattergories and Trivial Pursuit (my two favorite games) completely ruined.  Of course at this point Mark was gone to work and couldn’t come home. I found every dry towel we had, and made a facebook plea for fans. I hauled our massive shop vac down the stairs and started sucking the water up the best I could as well.
    Thankfully, a neighbor came over and was kind enough to spend 5hours working on our plumbing.  Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to stop all the leaks either.
    Finally, a certified, licensed plumber was called in. After another 1-2 hours the plumbing under our sink was completely replaced and brought up to code.
    Now our problem is fixing the carpet in the basement….again….I feel like we’re back to last year and the flood we had from a frozen pipe.
    So my dear readers, all this to bring you today’s Tuesday Tip.
    If you’ve never worked with plumbing, or your plumbing is many years old, don’t touch it. If you think you can figure it out, give it a try, but after 24 hours, I suggest you stop and bring in the professionals. Most importantly though, if you think it’s just a drip, think again. Turn off the water, and get it taken care of before you find a flood elsewhere in your house.