We are finally done booking our holiday travel! Yay us!

Thanksgiving flights were booked some time ago, we talked about it here back in September. Not a day after we booked those same tickets were at least $100 more and have been creeping up ever since. So we’re quite happy with our purchase still.

We’re flying United on a direct from Los Angeles (LAX) to Chicago O’Hare (ORD). Even though United just retired the last of their 737s, their fleet still comes across as tired and somewhat outdated considering the route we take. I’m sure you could hop on something new if you were flying outside North America.

The flight from Chicago back to Los Angeles is operated by US Air.

It’s actually the same deal as last year – going out with United and back with US Air. As a matter of fact we have a tight connection in Las Vegas for less than an hour. Last year we had a chance to grab something to eat but the time constraints this year mean we might have a few minutes to do some airport gambling only.

Christmas tickets were an adventure to say the least.

I’ve been trying to use a good chunk of our miles to book tickets since September but nothing was available. There is an Asian airline carrier that allows you to see what available flights you can use your miles on so long as they are a Star Alliance partner. I looked every day and nothing.

Back in September flights into Toronto were in the $800 range before settling in between $523-527. When I say settling in I mean settling in – they were in this range from October until mid-November. I suppose it isn’t a terrible deal considering the value of the US dollar these days but it’s still more than $100 greater than what we paid last year. I’ve read all the articles and I know airlines have taken planes out of service and scrapped some routes in an effort to increase passenger load and actually make some money.

We were starting to get nervous when last Saturday morning I sat down to conduct my daily Star Alliance search and *boom* – tickets! The exact dates we were looking for. I ran over and woke H up to make sure we were good with these days. The direct flights from Los Angeles to Toronto are with . . .

I like flying Air Canada, it’s a pretty good airline. I wish we were on one of the new Embraer planes but what can you do.

Anyhow, I called up United Mileage Plus and booked the exact flights we wanted. The total with taxes and fees came to a little more than $100. That’s more than $1,100 savings when compared to what we were looking at spending with regular priced seats.

I don’t know what happened in the airline world but prices shot up the last week. Although they are still in the $500-550 range some of the Air Canada flights are more than $150 more than a week ago. United? Don’t even bother considering to look.

So we are booked and ready to go, what a relief!

Is it wrong for me to wish we were flying first class? If the flight was an hour or two I wouldn’t care but 4+ hours in first just makes life a little easier/nicer. We were spoiled a long time ago while dating because H had a friend that worked for United and hooked us up with “buddy passes” – we paid taxes of $45 or so and flew standby, but 90% of the time we flew first class.

Christmas shopping has begun, it’s a cool Sunday and we’re off to the beach! …. or the observatory.

“What’s up party people? Thanks for all the comments about wanting to see some pictures of me while my step-parents decide what to do with their blog. They say there is always something to talk about living in Los Angeles/Southern California but they also want to share some more personal stories, pictures and video. I suggested Facebook and a Flickr account but what do I know, I’m just a wheaten terrier.”

“My step-parents like to change the sheets on the bed from time to time. I don’t think they do it as often as they should but whatever. Anyhow, they put the top sheet on the other day and then stepped away for a few seconds. That was my chance to jump up and stake my claim. Sneaky huh?”

“I get in trouble a lot for doing this but let me tell you a story. One day we went for a walk and the next thing I knew I was in a doctor’s office. All of a sudden I was sleepy and later on my parents picked me up. I went home and noticed some things were missing down there. So now I like to check on things as often as possible, just in case.”

“Here I am hiding, tricky huh? Anyhow, I will talk to you all later and thanks for wanting to see more of me!”

I have no problem admitting that I am not all that handy.

Truth be told I wish I were but I was terrible in shop class and everything to do with carpentry. Electricity scares the hell out of me for some reason and I’ve watched enough HGTV to know my limits.

So there we are on Sunday afternoon, gearing up for what turned out to be a terrible performance by the Bears, when I decided to throw out some old flowers we had in a vase. They were roses H brough home from a work function and died relatively quickly so it was time to get them off the counter.

This is where it gets slightly embarrassing.

I never used a garbage disposal until moving to Los Angeles. I am pretty sure H has always had one but that wasn’t the case with me. As a matter of fact, we didn’t have a shower in our house until around 1990 (we had a tub, no shower). A dishwasher made an appearance in our house some time in the mid-1990s but there sure as hell was no garbage disposal.

So there I am waiting to throw out the flowers when I decided the disposal could handle them. Why did I think that? Well it’s designed to handle chicken bones and other hard materials, surely it can take a flower.

Apparently I was wrong.

I ran the cold water, turned on the disposal and put the first flower down there. As it spun wildly around the drain rose petals were flying off and hitting me in the face. I sort of stuffed the stem down the drain and marvelled at the stubborn stem – “Wow, the disposal works on all kinds of things but it’s having trouble with the flower? Huh, who knew!”. A few more stems, this time flower first to avoid being struck, but still they just wouldn’t get swallowed up like I thought.

I like the garbage disposal and have put everything from vegetables to whole eggs down there. It’s right up there with the thrill of shredding documents (I would have done well at Enron).

A few more stems and I finally gave in, realizing this just wasn’t meant to be. I yank out the remaining stem and turn off the disposal before running some water and watching it back up into the sink.

Uh oh.

At this point H gleefully mentions how she isn’t yelling at me whereas I supposedly would have if she had done this.

Around the same time the dishwasher decides to train and this is when I learn that it in fact drains into the disposal and then the disposal drains into the pipe.

I run water in other sink and watch it all go down the train without incident. In the mean time I have bailed water out of the sink connected with the disposal and decided there must be a clog with the garberator. I unplug the disposal, and throw the breaker switch just in case (remember my aversion to electricity) before launching my hands down into the drain but feel nothing. I remember there being a tool under the sink that has something to do with the disposal so I use that as instructed to turn the blades but that did nothing.

More dishwasher draining = more sudsy water mixed with remnants of flower stems = more bailing.

So the disposal isn’t clogged, therefore it must be the drain.

Grab the toolbox but find out there isn’t a wrench big enough to get around the pipes. As I am sitting in the floor I decide to give the connection a go with my hands and guess what, they were loose! So I disconnect one joint, use a screwdriver to loosen the disposal from the sink so I can move it around, and then take out one more pipe joint. In the end I find the spot where all the stems have been ground up and are stuck in the pipe. I fish that out with my hands for a while and pour water down the exposed pipe before concluding the passage is now clear.

Reattach all the pipes with my handy tools, a screw driver and my hands, before confirming that everything is once again working fine.

I’m not Mike Holmes or Bob Villa but I felt handy for once.

I also know just to throw the damn flowers in the garbage.

I haven’t neglected you blog … just deciding what to do with you.

So here’s Carter’s new thing …

Carter sleeps in a number of places throughout the day but namely he chooses to hang out on the bed. How do we know this? Two reasons:

1. You can see all the spots on the comforter where he has made an indentation throughout the day.
2. Sometimes he is lazy enough to not greet us at the door and will just be laying on the bed and looking at us when we walk in.

Usually we take an evening walk somewhere between 8:30 and 10 pm each night, and afterwards Cater comes home for his treat and then goes to bed. Literally. We will be sitting in the living room and he will get up, wander into the bedroom and jump up on the bed and go to sleep.

At night, Carter will jump up and off the bed throughout our sleep. Sometimes he wants to be on the ground, and other times he runs off to get a drink before returning.

For the last 3.5 years he will just hop on up and settle in. He’s a wheaten which means he is a jumper and can just hop up. Sometimes though he likes a running start and will wander into the bathroom and then you can hear him running before all of a sudden leaping through the air and onto the bed.

That’s all changed lately.

For the last five nights Carter has a new habit that take’s place at least once but sometimes twice per night.

Our bed is probably 3-3.5 feet off the ground. Lately he stands with his two front paws up on the bed, in effect standing on his back legs. He then proceeds to scratch the bed or my leg in an effort to get attention. He will do this until I wake up, lean over to pick up the 35 pound puppy onto the bed before flopping down and falling asleep.

This is incredibly annoying.

Of course he tried this with H – going over to her side and scratching and scratching. She ignores it to the point where he comes to my side and gives it another try. For some reason he is relentless with me and no matter how much I put him off he continues to scratch.

We thought maybe he was hurt and that’s why he wasn’t jumping up. However, throughout the day and evening he has no problem running around the house, jumping on the bed and acting like a fool.

No, he’s just lazy.

It’s been nice here the last few days … Daytime temperatures in the mid 70s which means upper 70s with the heat index. Night time temperatures in the 60s with a little bit of a wind … the closest thing you get to fall in Los Angeles.

However …. THIS IS NOT COLD.

Neighbors, coworkers, random strangers on the street have talked to us about the weather and keep mentioning “Can you believe how cold it has got?”

No I can’t, you know why? It’s not cold!

I certainly understand such temperatures are not the norm in a place where it’s 80-something and sunny 350+ days a year. However, I think the word ‘cold’ has some universal meaning and it’s implied what ‘cold’ really means.

No so much here in LA where 60 degree weather means people get out jackets, fur lined coats and warm hats.

For the record – you all look very silly and have no idea what cold means.

Cool … the word people around here are looking for is cool, not cold.

Don’t let the title fool you – this isn’t going to be very exciting.

Anytime a new gadget, web site or application comes out that finds a way to occupy my attention … I’m obsessed.

Lately I am trying to track our miles per gallon using Fuelly, a great web application that does all the calculations for you.

So what kind of stats do we have these days?

We’ve tracked just a little more then 2,000 miles over the past few months. We don’t drive back and forth to work each day so the eight fuel-ups tracked are over the course of months.

Still not impressed that we’re averaging more than $3.10 per gallon but perhaps I should be thankful since prices were so much more last year.

We’re averaging a little better than the EPA Estimated MPG but I think we can improve this if we keep our tired inflated a little better. It’s not something we pay a lot of attention to and we should.

I am in the midst of stringing together 3-4 posts about our experience thus far here in Southern California/Los Angeles.

Everyone has told us “Give it a year, maybe a year and a half …” … well we’ve been here 18 months so it’s time to check in and see where we stand on things.

Give me a day to get things rolling.